Pastor Bell's Words To Live By

I went to Jerusalem, and after staying there three days I set out during the night with a few men. I had not told anyone what my God had put in my heart to do for Jerusalem. There were no mounts with me except the one I was riding on. By night I went out through the Valley Gate toward the Jackal Well and the Dung Gate, examining the walls of Jerusalem, which had been broken down, and its gates, which had been destroyed by fire (Nehemiah 2:11-13 NIV). 

Although Nehemiah had it in his heart to rebuild the walls that were broken down, he first needed to assess the extent of the damage before he could crystallise the plan. He went by night and inspected every area of the ruins. And significantly he only had a few trusted people with him. As we read through the text we notice that all the gates were accessible and anyone could go through them. This highlights to us the extent of the problem, the whole city was open to everyone and anything.

The significance for us is this: when the walls of protection around us are broken down, anyone or anything can come and go as they like. The gates are there to check what comes in and what goes out. But if the gate lies in ruins and there is no gatekeeper then there is free access.

Today the lord wants us to rebuild the walls and to re-establish the gates. We need to rebuild the walls around our relationships, our families, our finances and our spirituality.  We also need to establish gates so that we know who and what is coming and going. As an example of this let us look at one of the gates to our bodies. Our nose is a gate, and if anything out of the ordinary tries to get into our bodies, there is a natural reaction of sneezing to eject that foreign body.  Similarly our spiritual body should be on alert so that when a foreign body tries to breach a gate there is a natural reaction to subdue and eject it.

So today, survey all the areas in your life that needs rebuilding and make a plan as to how you will start the rebuilding process.

Read Nehemiah 2:11-16