Part 5 | Leadership That Lifts: Following Christ to Empower Others
From Nehemiah 5
God desires His to be .
📖 Deuteronomy 15:6 ESV For the LORD your God will bless you, as he promised you, and you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow, and you shall rule over many nations, but they shall not rule over you.
📖 Deuteronomy 28:13 ESV And the LORD will make you the head and not the tail
A. I am called to through my .
📖 1 Peter 2:12 NIV Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.
B. A dwells of me.
📖 Romans 8:14 ESV For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
C. Jesus has me to the for others.
📖 Matthew 5:14–16 ESV “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
Leaders:
1. into the people face.
📖 Nehemiah 5:1 ESV Now there arose a great outcry of the people and of their wives against their Jewish brothers.
📖 Nehemiah 5:2-3 ESV For there were those who said, “With our sons and our daughters, we are many. So let us get grain, that we may eat and keep alive.” 3 There were also those who said, “We are mortgaging our fields, our vineyards, and our houses to get grain because of the famine.”
📖 Nehemiah 5:4-5 ESV And there were those who said, “We have borrowed money for the king’s tax on our fields and our vineyards. 5 Now our flesh is as the flesh of our brothers, our children are as their children. Yet we are forcing our sons and our daughters to be slaves, and some of our daughters have already been enslaved, but it is not in our power to help it, for other men have our fields and our vineyards.”
Leaders:
2. people, enough to .
📖 Nehemiah 5:6 ESV I was very angry when I heard their outcry and these words.
📖 Nehemiah 5:7–8 ESV I took counsel with myself, and I brought charges against the nobles and the officials. I said to them, “You are exacting interest, each from his brother.” And I held a great assembly against them 8 and said to them, “We, as far as we are able, have bought back our Jewish brothers who have been sold to the nations, but you even sell your brothers that they may be sold to us!” They were silent and could not find a word to say.
📖 Nehemiah 5:9–11 ESV So I said, “The thing that you are doing is not good. Ought you not to walk in the fear of our God to prevent the taunts of the nations our enemies? 10 Moreover, I and my brothers and my servants are lending them money and grain. Let us abandon this exacting of interest. 11 Return to them this very day their fields, their vineyards, their olive orchards, and their houses, and the percentage of money, grain, wine, and oil that you have been exacting from them.”
📖 Nehemiah 5:12–13 ESV Then they said, “We will restore these and require nothing from them. We will do as you say.” And I called the priests and made them swear to do as they had promised. 13 I also shook out the fold of my garment and said, “So may God shake out every man from his house and from his labor who does not keep this promise. So may he be shaken out and emptied.” And all the assembly said “Amen” and praised the Lord. And the people did as they had promised.
Leaders:
3. as an .
📖 Nehemiah 5:14 ESV Moreover, from the time that I was appointed to be their governor in the land of Judah, from the twentieth year to the thirty-second year of Artaxerxes the king, twelve years, neither I nor my brothers ate the food allowance of the governor.
📖 Nehemiah 5:15 ESV The former governors who were before me laid heavy burdens on the people and took from them for their daily ration forty shekels of silver. Even their servants lorded it over the people. But I did not do so, because of the fear of God.
📖 Nehemiah 5:16 ESV I also persevered in the work on this wall, and we acquired no land, and all my servants were gathered there for the work.
Leaders:
4. down to others.
📖 Nehemiah 5:17–18 ESV Moreover, there were at my table 150 men, Jews and officials, besides those who came to us from the nations that were around us. 18 Now what was prepared at my expense for each day was one ox and six choice sheep and birds, and every ten days all kinds of wine in abundance. Yet for all this I did not demand the food allowance of the governor, because the service was too heavy on this people.
Leaders:
5. people’s .
📖 Nehemiah 5:18b–19 ESV Yet for all this I did not demand the food allowance of the governor, because the service was too heavy on this people. 19 Remember for my good, O my God, all that I have done for this people.
📖 Galatians 6:2 ESV Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
Sermon in a sentence:
God has called me to ; to use my , , and to others, not to myself.
Notes Section:
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