One of the greatest enemies of prayer is excessive busyness. It’s true that we can lift our hearts to God wherever we are, that we can and should be turning to Him in the midst of our daily work. But if that’s all we do, if we never spend unhurried time in His presence, the tendency is for even those brief, momentary prayers to be crowded out. They become less and less frequent, because we’re too hurried inwardly to stop and turn our hearts to God. And even if we persist in our attempts to cry out to God during the day, these prayers will tend to be shallow and self-centered, because we’re not taking the time to cultivate God’s presence.
A.W. Tozer was a man who spent his life seeking God, so his words in this area carry a lot of weight. Here’s something he said on the importance of communion with God: “The Christian is strong or weak depending upon how closely he has cultivated the knowledge of God.... Progress in the Christian life is exactly equal to the growing knowledge we gain of the Triune god in personal experience. And such experience requires a whole life devoted to it and plenty of time spent at the holy task of cultivating God. God can be known satisfactorily only as we devote time to Him.... A thousand distractions would woo us away from thoughts of God, but if we are wise we will sternly put them from us and make room for the King and take time to entertain Him. Some things may be neglected with but little loss to the spiritual life, but to neglect communion with God is to hurt ourselves where we cannot afford it. God will respond to our efforts to know Him. The Bible tells us how; it is altogether a matter of how much determination we bring to the holy task” (“We Must Give Time to God,” in The Root of the Righteous, pp. 11-13).
It’s tempting, I know, to make excuses for ourselves, to say “I don’t have that kind of personality. I’m a practical person. I can’t sit still long enough to spend time in prayer; I serve God and honor Him through my work.” And it’s true that God has made us all differently and that genuine spiritual maturity looks different in different personalities. But it’s also true that God calls us to stretch ourselves, to deny ourselves, and to grow in ways that don’t come naturally to us. He calls us to expend some effort for the sake of knowing Him.
Nehemiah can be a real encouragement in this area. He was a practical man, a man of action. He was a great leader, someone who was able to enlist others and work together with them to accomplish a seemingly impossible task. He was just the sort of person who might have said, “There’s so much work to do, we don’t have time to hold a prayer meeting; let’s get on with the job!” But he didn’t do that. Nehemiah was a man of action, but he knew the importance of prayer. He knew that apart from God he could accomplish nothing of lasting value. He encourages us that a strong prayer life is not only for people with a certain kind of personality.
Nehemiah is a man of action, but prayer is where he begins. He’s received a bad report about the situation in Jerusalem, and the first thing he does is spend an extended period of time in prayer about it. Nehemiah is a strong, decisive person, and he’s also in a position of great influence. He’s in a position to do something. As the king’s cupbearer, he has regular access to the king himself. Because of this, cupbearers often had immense political power and influence. But Nehemiah, despite his personality and position, doesn’t rush off immediately and start doing things: pulling political strings, manipulating people behind the scenes, campaigning for support from influential people, making plans to solve the problem. He begins in this way: “When I heard this, I sat down and wept. In fact, for days I mourned, fasted, and prayed to the God of heaven” (v. 4, NLT). And then he tells us how he prays. Let’s look at Nehemiah’s prayer, how he approaches God about this problem.
Here’s the first thing that’s apparent, looking at Nehemiah’s prayer: despite the urgency of the situation, and despite his overwhelming sense of grief at the condition of Jerusalem, Nehemiah approaches God with great reverence. He doesn’t just rush into God’s presence crying “Lord, help us!” There are times when it’s appropriate to do that; there are times when that’s all we’re capable of doing. But in addition to those times when we fly into God’s presence with our urgent requests, we need times when we approach God more slowly, taking the time to remind ourselves of who we are speaking to. That’s what Nehemiah is doing here; he begins by stirring himself with a realization of God’s greatness: “Then I said, ‘O Lord, God of heaven, the great and awesome God who keeps his covenant of unfailing love with those who love him and obey his commands, listen to my prayer!” (NLT). He remembers who God is and then approaches Him with praise and worship.
But when we try to do that, we often find ourselves at a loss for words. What do we say? How do we learn to approach God in this way? We can be sure that Nehemiah didn’t learn this on his own. In public worship as a Jew, he would have grown up praying the Scriptures, participating in the Liturgy. And as he did this year after year, he cultivated a language for prayer; the corporate worship he experienced was, among other things, a school for prayer. He had been trained in the language of prayer and worship. So, if we want to approach God with reverence, we need to be intentional about entering this school for prayer, praying the Scriptures and the forms of prayer that have come to us in the Church. Try using Nehemiah’s prayer; adapt it to make it fit your situation, then make it the cry of your heart. Or, listen to this, from John Baillie: “All Hail, O Lord my King! Reverently would I greet Thee at the beginning of another day! All praise and love and loyalty be unto Thee, O Lord most high!” (A Diary of Private Prayer, p. 129). Make use of prayer guides like this one from John Baillie. Or pray slowly and attentively through the Lord’s Prayer: “Our Father, who art in heaven; hallowed be thy name.” We need to learn to approach God with reverence, and part of the learning process is cultivating a language that’s adequate to the task.
When we take the time to approach God with reverence, remembering who He is, we’re then reminded of who we are. The more clearly we see who God is, the more we realize that we’re unworthy to claim anything from Him. This leads to confession, which we see in Nehemiah’s prayer: “I confess that we have sinned against you. Yes, even my own family and I have sinned! We have sinned terribly by not obeying the commands, laws, and regulations that you gave us through your servant Moses” (NLT). When we see God more truly as He is, we realize our spiritual poverty, so we come to Him with empty hands, crying out for mercy and grace. The situation is urgent, but Nehemiah takes the time to approach God with reverence.
The second thing we see in Nehemiah’s prayer is this: despite his sense of awe in the presence of God, he’s able to pray confidently because he’s aware of the promises of God’s Word: “Please remember what you told your servant Moses: ‘If you sin, I will scatter you among the nations. But if you return to me and obey my commands, even if you are exiled to the ends of the earth, I will bring you back to the place I have chosen for my name to be honored’” (NLT). We see the same thing in Daniel: “It was the first year of the reign of Darius the Mede, the son of Ahasuerus, who became king of the Babylonians. During the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, was studying the writings of the prophets. I learned from the word of the Lord, as recorded by Jeremiah the prophet, that Jerusalem must lie desolate for seventy years. So I turned to the Lord God and pleaded with him in prayer and fasting” (Daniel 9:1-3a, NLT).
If we know that God is faithful to His Word, we know we can confidently pray using His promises. This gives a strong foundation to our prayers and stirs our faith. We’re not just listing our own desires; we’re asking for things God has promised. Prayer and Bible reading go together. We need to know the things God promises in His Word, then we bring those things into His presence in prayer. But if we don’t know His Word, if we don’t have a strong grasp of His promises, we won’t be able to do this. Nehemiah knows his own spiritual poverty; he knows that he can claim nothing in himself; but he also knows that God has promised great things for His people, and this gives him the faith to pray with confidence.
And the third thing is this: despite Nehemiah’s personal sense of urgency and despite his own desire to do something about the situation, Nehemiah recognizes that this is God’s work, not his: “They are your servants and your people, whom you redeemed by your great strength and your mighty hand.” God may very well give Nehemiah a part in the work — that’s what Nehemiah has in mind — but it doesn’t depend on him. It’s God’s work. The people, the nation, belong to Him. He began the work, and He’s the one who will carry it to completion. So Nehemiah has a part, but he’s not at the center. It all revolves around God and His purposes.
Having gone through all this, Nehemiah now makes his personal request: “Please grant me success now as I go to ask the king for a great favor. Put it into his heart to be kind to me” (NLT). He has a plan; he has something in mind that he wants to do in Jerusalem. Having prayed about the situation, he’s not finished with it. Prayer and action go together. But now Nehemiah’s actions are rooted in prayer and submitted to God’s purposes.
This order that Nehemiah follows in his prayer is important. He begins with God, not with his own plans. And, because he approached God in this unhurried way, two things have happened: 1) Nehemiah’s faith has been stirred and strengthened. He’s able to trust God now in a way that he couldn’t have before, because he’s committed and entrusted the whole situation to Him; 2) Nehemiah’s heart has been set right, so that he’s now prepared to receive the answer. When the answer comes, Nehemiah will know where the glory belongs; he’ll know who gets the credit. He’ll be clear that this is God’s work, not his. Then, when he sets out to do the work, he’ll be able to act on a foundation of confidence in God. He’s prepared spiritually for the work that God is calling him to.
Nehemiah would have agreed with Tozer: “A thousand distractions would woo us away from thoughts of God, but if we are wise we will sternly put them from us and make room for the King and take time to entertain Him. Some things may be neglected with but little loss to the spiritual life, but to neglect communion with God is to hurt ourselves where we cannot afford it. God will respond to our efforts to know Him. The Bible tells us how; it is altogether a matter of how much determination we bring to the holy task.” It’s not a question of personality. It’s a question of whether or not we’re going to submit to God and His ways. No matter what personality we have, there are going to be things that will be difficult, things that will stretch us. God calls us to cultivate a relationship with Him, to spend unhurried time in His presence, and Nehemiah shows us that this can be done by someone who doesn’t fit the mold of a quiet, contemplative person. Nehemiah was a great leader; we’ll see something of that as we continue studying this book. But we remember Nehemiah after all these centuries because he was a man who spent unhurried time in God’s presence in prayer, then stepped out in obedience to Him. It wasn’t easy for him. It didn’t come naturally. But he did it, and God responded to his efforts. May God stir our hearts and make us into people who seek Him above all else, who commit our lives to cultivating a relationship with Him.
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