Saturday, February 19, 2011

TOO NOBLE TO WORK?

God is a builder. He’s building His kingdom, he builds homes, hearts, His church. He builds our lives and makes us what he wants us to be. He is the master builder but graciously calls us His co-labourers.
There is a lot to build but most of the work that has to be done will not be done directly by God himself: he will use you and I.

Amongst many other projects, God decided to rebuild Jerusalem during the 20th year of Artaxerxes (Nehemiah 2:1). The Israelites had just been released from slavery and their country was in ruins. So God put a burden in the heart of Nehemiah to lead the charge for change and granted him the favour of the king who provided all the materials he needed.

The work progressed very well with several groups of people working with him and strengthening his hands. The bible talks about the Goldsmiths, the priests, the merchants and the families who all put their best into doing God’s work.

However in Nehemiah 3:5, the bible says, “Next to them the Tekonites made repairs, but their nobles did not put their shoulders to the work of their Lord.”

Everyone contributed their quota except the Nobles...


That passage got me thinking about the time before we became who we are today and how we used to work for the Lord – street evangelism, village evangelism, night vigils, sharing and giving, accommodating, counseling and the like. And things are just not the same now that we have become Noble.

It's not right that many Christians today are too noble to get their hands dirty doing the things we once used to do. Can you imagine yourself getting to church early and cleaning the chairs? How will it seem if a noble Christian lady in a chaffeur driven car stops to give a ride to her office cleaner who attends the same church.

No one could be nobler than Jesus Himself and yet He stopped to touch the poor, the leper, the sick, and the prostitute woman by the sychar tree. Even though we should give honour to whom honour is due, I think we need to get rid of the class syndrome in the church. Class is not of the Kingdom, it’s of the world.

The reason God makes a man noble is for him to use his nobility to open doors for the work not so that he can use it as an excuse to stay away from the work.

Before God we are all the same and can only be differentiated in His sight by the manifestation of the fruit of the spirit – Love, Joy, Peace, Kindness, Longsuffering, faith, and self control. 

Definitely not by our nobility!

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