We Are The Church

Scripture

Nehemiah 2:17-18 (NIV)
“...They replied, 'Let us start rebuilding.' So they began this good work. (v. 18)”

On the surface, Jerusalem had a construction problem. Broken walls. Burned gates. But Nehemiah understood the real issue was deeper. ^{This wasn't simply about rebuilding a city. It was about restoring a people.}

Additional Scripture References

• Nehemiah 1:4 Nehemiah weeps, fasts and prays before he ever builds.
• 1 Peter 2:5 You are living stones being built into a spiritual house.
• Ephesians 4:16 The whole body grows as each part does its work.
• Nehemiah 6:15 The wall is finished in fifty two days.
• Mark 16:15 / Acts 1:8 Go. You will be my witnesses.

Main Idea

Think about moving into a new house. You pack the furniture, the dishes and the clothes, and you haul it all to a new address. But your family isn't the house. ^{The house is simply the place where your family lives.}

Encounter Church is stepping into a new location. We'll move equipment, instruments and signs. But we are not moving Encounter Church, because Encounter Church isn't a stage, an auditorium or an address. It's us. The building is a tool, not the destination. ^{The goal isn't simply to have more room. The goal is to reach more people.}

Points Used in Sermon

God Builds People Before He Builds Places

SCRIPTURE

Nehemiah 1:4
“When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven.”

OVERVIEW

Notice what Nehemiah didn't do. He didn't grab a hammer. He didn't start making plans or gathering resources. He prayed. Before there was construction, there was consecration. Before he asked what he could build, he let God break his heart for what was broken.

It's easy to get so excited about what God is giving us that we forget to ask why. More room. More visibility. It can't just be so we're more comfortable. ^{We could walk into a better building and remain the same people.}

BEFORE GOD BUILDS SOMETHING THROUGH YOU, HE WILL BUILD SOMETHING IN YOU.

DEEPER DIVE

Nehemiah wasn't a contractor. He was cupbearer to King Artaxerxes in Susa, roughly 900 miles from the rubble he's crying over. He tasted the king's wine for poison, which means the king trusted him with his life. Nehemiah had made it. And the news that wrecked him was about a city he wasn't living in, and a problem that had been sitting there for over a century.

Here's the part we rush past. Compare the dates in chapter 1 and chapter 2 and you'll find about four months between the moment he heard the news and the moment he said a word to the king. Four months of mourning, fasting and praying before one brick moved. We tend to treat that kind of waiting as wasted time. God was using it as construction time. By the time the door finally opened, the man walking through it had already been rebuilt on the inside.

QUESTION

What has God been building in you during the waiting? Name one thing about your character, your faith or your willingness to serve that looks different than it did a year ago.

What God Builds, He Builds Together

SCRIPTURE

Nehemiah 2:17
“Then I said to them, 'You see the trouble we are in: Jerusalem lies in ruins, and its gates have been burned with fire. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem...'”

OVERVIEW

Look at his language. Not "watch me rebuild." ^{"Come, let us rebuild."} The burden started with one man. The assignment belonged to everyone.

There's a version of church where we become consumers of something Jesus called us to contribute to. We come, we sit, we receive, we leave, and we do it again next Sunday. But Jesus didn't save you just to give you a seat. He saved you and gave you an assignment. ^{You cannot carry the vision if you only consume the benefits.}

YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO EVERYTHING, BUT YOU ARE CALLED TO DO SOMETHING.

DEEPER DIVE

Nehemiah 3 is the chapter most of us skim. It reads like a roster, and that's exactly the point. Goldsmiths and perfume makers show up with trowels. Priests work on the Sheep Gate. Shallum and his daughters take a section. Over and over the text says people repaired the stretch of wall in front of their own house. Nobody was handed the whole project. Everybody was handed something. ^{They built it brick by brick, and the wall went up because forty something teams each owned one piece of it.}

The chapter is honest about the exception too. Verse 5 quietly notes that the nobles of Tekoa wouldn't put their shoulders to the work. Their names made the list anyway, just on the wrong side of it. Paul uses a body metaphor for the same idea in Ephesians 4:16, where every ligament matters. Ligaments aren't glamorous. Nobody compliments your ligaments. But try walking without one.

QUESTION

What's the section of wall in front of your house? Be specific about the something you're being called to in this season: serving, giving, discipling, inviting or praying.

We Won't Just Move In, We Will Move Out

SCRIPTURE

Nehemiah 6:15
“So the wall was completed on the twenty-fifth of Elul, in fifty-two days.”

OVERVIEW

Fifty two days. What looked impossible got finished. But here's what I love about Nehemiah: the book doesn't end in chapter 6. There are seven more chapters, because ^{completing the wall was not completing the mission.}

There will be a moment when the equipment is moved, the signs are up and the lights come on. That cannot be the moment we say "we made it." We haven't made it. We've been positioned. ^{The blessing isn't the destination. It's a responsibility.}

THE BUILDING IS WHERE WE GATHER. THE CITY IS WHERE WE ARE SENT.

DEEPER DIVE

Watch what happens the second the wall is done. Chapter 8 opens with the whole city packed into the square asking Ezra to read the Book of the Law out loud, and they stand there listening from daybreak until noon. People weep. Then chapter 9 turns into confession and covenant renewal. ^{The wall wasn't the revival. The wall made the gathering possible.}

Jesus put it plainly: go. He never told His Church to sit inside a building and wait for the world to show up. Read Acts and the pattern holds. They gathered, then they scattered, and the gospel spread through ordinary people carrying it into ordinary places. ^{The building gives us a place to gather. The Gospel gives us a reason to go.} There are people in your life who may never walk through our doors unless somebody invites them. That somebody might be you.

QUESTION

Who are the three people God has already placed around you? Neighborhood, workplace, school, gym. Say their names to the group so somebody can ask you about them next week.

Summary

God did a work in Nehemiah before He did a work through him. Then one man's burden became everybody's assignment. Then the finished wall turned out to be the starting line, not the finish line.

Same three moves for us. If all we change is our address, we missed the point. ^{A new place means nothing without a renewed people.}

Call to Action

Three things this season, and none of them require a new building:

• Pray for three. Ask God to put three people on your heart who need Jesus, and start praying for them by name.
• Serve somewhere. If we're asking God to send people, we need to be ready to receive them. Find your place and help carry the mission.

DON'T JUST CELEBRATE THE ROOM GOD GAVE US. FILL IT WITH PEOPLE WHO NEED JESUS.

Prayer Prompts

• Thank God for the closed doors and the waiting. Ask what He was building in you during it.
• Ask God to break your heart for something in our city the way He broke Nehemiah's.
• Pray by name for the three people on your list. Do it out loud in your group if you can.
• Ask God to show you your section of the wall, and for the courage to pick it up.
• Pray for the pastors, leaders and volunteers carrying the weight of this move.
• Pray that we would leave the new building as often as we fill it.