SOUNDING THE TRUMPET
Nehemiah 4:15-23

Everyone recalls the story I shared earlier in the children’s message, the Aesop’s fable about the boy who cried wolf. When we constantly cry out in alarm, we destroy our credibility when the time comes for real help.

In the life of the church, there are many voices crying out to rally the troops to their cause. Mailings bombard most of us from some very noble and worthy ministries pleading for our financial and prayer support. Yet, when all we hear is the sounding of the alarm, the constant desperate appeals, after a while we begin to turn a deaf ear to what may indeed be a genuine need.

That is one of the reasons we have avoided unnecessarily sounding the trumpet over the years here at Providence. As a result, sometimes folks have gotten the impression that the needs elsewhere are more urgent and have redirected their resources to those with the loudest trumpet. God has still supplied all our needs and for that we are most grateful, but other needs have gone unmet because we are not willing to blow a steady note of crisis and be guilty of crying wolf resulting in the loss of trust and credibility.

In Nehemiah’s leadership of Israel in his calling from God to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, he proved to be a brilliant strategist in leading his people to fulfill their mission. In the routine functions assigned to the for the duties of rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, he managed the work well by organizing it and dividing the labors among the people. But when a crisis arose, he put in place a plan to sound the alarm if necessary to rally ALL the people to meet the need should the enemy attack and try to destroy them and their labors.

We want to function with just such a plan as the body of Christ.

THESIS: The rallying cry must be heard sparingly if it is to be taken seriously enough for all to come at the sound of the trumpet.

Nehemiah 4:15 And it happened when our enemies heard that it was known to us, and that God had frustrated their plan, then all of us returned to the wall, each one to his work.

--So they each went back to the work God had given them and labored together on one project—rebuilding the walls—but a variety of assignments needed to complete the work.

1. Sheep Gate 2. Fish Gate 3. Old Gate

4. Valley Gate 5. Dung Gate 6. Fountain Gate

7. Water Gate 8. Horse Gate 9. Inspection Gate

--In order to complete the work of rebuilding the walls, the people demonstrated that they had a “mind to work” (4:6) and worked on the gates and the walls with diligence both in their labors and in looking out for each other.

Our responsibility is to…

i. Faithfully Fulfill Our Routine Patterns of Ministry

--Their task was to rebuild the walls—our task is to build up the body of Christ.

Ephesians 4:16 From whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by that which every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body, for the building up of itself in love.

--The routine work for which every believer is responsible is to grow to maturity in Christ and to join their efforts to assist, enable, equip and encourage their brothers and sisters in the process.

Colossians 1:28 And we proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, that we may present every man complete in Christ.

--We have broken that major process down into three categories in which this growth must take place, each with proportional emphasis: edification, evangelism and exaltation.

A. EDIFICATION: INTEGRATED LIVES

--To be complete, there must be an integration of various aspects of our lives so that we do not live fragmented, inconsistent lives.

Edification consists of…

Prayer Relationships Instruction

Service Management

--The impact of these five areas of biblical emphasis will make a profound difference on our…

1. Worldview

--How we think of our world, our assumptions about what is true and right, our perspectives on what is possible and impossible, our confidence in what could be and should be—all arise from hearts and minds that have been built up to maturity so that we see all things as Christ sees them.

2. Attitudes

--Beyond just being optimistic, beyond being nice and kind, beyond a cloying sentimentality which craves an emotional experience of life, there is an attitude each believer must develop that most accurately reflects the attitude of Jesus Christ.

3. Practices

--The net effect of a life that is built up to maturity in Christ is a life that behaves according to its beliefs, practices what it preaches—in short, lives with authenticity and despises all that is hypocritical.

--We labor together to keep these aspirations alive and growing in one another, to hold each other accountable for genuine Christ-likeness in all that we are and all that we do.

B. EVANGELISM: INVITING LIFESTYLES

--In order to give hope to others and to pass on the life-changing good news that Jesus Christ forgives us and gives us new life in His name, as we grow up (are edified) we will become more and more intentional about telling others what makes us complete.

Evangelism suffers a bad name because so many have done it so badly for so long that the overwhelming majority of Christians have avoided it and have never explained to anyone how they can become a follower of Christ. The sections of the wall relating to evangelism are largely left in ruin with few willing to work through the rubble and find a way to rebuild that part of the wall of the body of Christ!

--If we are to do the routine work assigned to us by the Master, we must become more intentional about sharing the good news about Him with others.

--There are three very important factors to keep in mind in how we develop our strategy and go about this critical work.

1. Authentic

--People can see through us when we say one thing and live another…they have no respect for hypocrisy and no reason to listen to words from people who make no effort to be real.

--Therefore, we must be consistent in the edification process if we hope to make a difference in the evangelism process!

2. Attractive

--We have to ask ourselves if there is anything appealing or attractive about our lives that can only be explained by the fact that we belong to Jesus.

Love—The way we love each other as Christians—the way we love and treat people in general—makes a big difference in how our message communicates.

Joy—If there is no evidence of joy in our lives, how do we explain its absence in light of the message we believe and proclaim? Joyful people are attractive people!

Peace—Contentment and inner peace generate an oasis of calm and confidence in a world that is chaotic and harsh—and when our lives demonstrate the peace of God because of our peace with God, there is something supremely attractive about that!

3. Aggressive

--Listen carefully to what I mean by the word aggressive—I mean a commitment to take action, to be proactive in an intentional way to reach out to others in love and with sensitivity to offer them hope through Christ.

--I do not mean to see unbelievers as projects and objects, to treat them as goals to be achieved, notches to be carved in our Bibles—not aggressively dealing with them as if they did not matter to us except as a target for our gospel arrows to be ignored after we hit the mark.

--By aggressive, I mean that we take the initiative and take the first steps toward finding ways to bridge the gap that separates them from the message of the love of Christ.

--As routine as it may sound, that means that we must become an “inviting people” whose lives are attractive and authentic (inviting lifestyles) and whose intentions take action and invite people to “come and see.”

Thom S. Rainer wrote: “More than eight out of ten of the unchurched said they would come to church if invited…Perhaps the evangelistic apathy so evident in many of our churches can be explained by a simple laziness on the part of church members in inviting others to church.”

Out of 160 million unchurched people in the USA, if only half instead of 82% came, 80 million more people would come to church! Imagine the evangelistic impact of opening that door to introduce them to the gospel!

--Until we have committed resources and energies to rebuilding the evangelism section of the wall, we have not yet addressed the routine labors required to get the wall back in good shape!

C. EXALTATION: INEXPRESSIBLE JOY

--The last area of emphasis is our worship, our regular commitment of our hearts to praise and exalt the Lord for who He is and what He has done.

--Our worship flows out of our new life in Christ built by faith in His perfect sufficiency to restore us to our Creator and fill us with His joy.

1 Peter 1:8 and though you have not seen Him, you love Him, and though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.

--Joyless worship is a complete contradiction in terms and as those who have been called to the routine work of ministry together, we have left sections of the wall unguarded and in ruin when we are not worshiping with great rejoicing our great and glorious God and King, our Savior, Jesus Christ!

These three areas make up our daily routines of life together in the body of Christ—the areas we pay attention to year in and year out as we seek to present everyone complete in Christ.

--The people of Jerusalem went about their work, routinely devoting themselves to this task of rebuilding the walls, but with the understanding that the threat of an urgent cry for help was always looming in the background.

--Therefore, they agreed to come together, to rally as one, when they heard the sound of the trumpet signaling the presence of a threat that was extraordinary, far beyond the routine.

Our responsibility is to…

ii. Readily Respond When the Trumpet Calls Us to Rally

Nehemiah 4:19-20 “…The work is great and extensive, and we are separated on the wall far from one another. At whatever place you hear the sound of the trumpet, rally to us there. Our God will fight for us.”

--Sometimes in the life of God’s people, a crisis arises, or a challenge arises, that is so great that it requires them to rally together for a season, to sacrifice the every-day routines for the immediate issue at hand.

Not everyone was allowed to determine what constituted a need significant enough to rally everyone together. As the leader, Nehemiah was responsible for making that call—and for not “crying wolf” every time a difficulty arose. He said that “the trumpeter stood near me” so that the battle cry would be clear and certain from a trustworthy source.

That responsibility must be guarded and in 25 years we have seldom sounded the trumpet for everyone to rally to a cause…the Upper Room prayer ministry was one of those times…another time was the fund-raising effort in 1990 to gather money to expand our facilities. You sound it too often and you lose credibility!

Every year you are flooded with requests from ministries and missionaries who plead their case for your support—unfortunately, some of them never seem to let up with their cries and eventually you treat their appeals like the little boy crying wolf.
On the other hand, we seldom ask you to rally to the cause, seldom sound the alarm, seldom call you from the routine labors on the walls—and others have seemed to be in greater need and have received support that was needed here in your home church.
Today, we want you to know that this will be a year in which you can expect to hear the sound of the trumpet from your leadership here at Providence—and when you hear it, you will know that the need is real and your response is critical.

--What kinds of crisis or challenges warrant the sounding of the trumpet? After all, in Nehemiah’s case, the routine labors were sufficiently supported so that the trumpet never was blown.

We must rally when the trumpet calls us together…

A. Common Enemies

--In the case of Nehemiah, there was a common enemy threatening the life and security of the city and everyone understood that it was no idle threat.

--Therefore, they were prepared to abandon everything and rally together to defeat their common enemy.

--Societal threats to the church should call us to action as well as threats to righteousness wherever they occur…racism, abortion, sexual sin, abuse…and other such things that should be handled in the routine pursuit of godliness, but occasionally need a rallying of the troops!

While many in the church find more passion in fighting for their own interests, people without Christ have no one willing to rally together to tell them, no one willing to recognize the common enemy is a deceiver who is perpetuating a world of darkness in which spiritual blindness prevails while Christians duke it out over issues that are often petty in the eternal scheme of things!

B. Community Encouragement

--Once in a while, a crisis arises that alerts us to the need to rally together for support and encouragement.

--Such was the need during the 9/11 crisis when believers rallied to church to pray and find comfort…when the war in Iraq began…when hurricanes and tornadoes wrecked havoc on our area.

--Then when the trumpet sounds, we gather for mutual encouragement and prayer, to seek the face of the Lord together and to find His comfort and peace.

C. Consecrated Entreaty

--Periodically, we need to be called together for a season of special prayers of repentance and consecration before the Lord.

--The Old Testament practice of calling Solemn Assemblies for the purpose of prayer and fasting, confession and repentance, renewal and restoration—still has a place in the body of Christ and when the cry goes forth, we need to put everything down, lay aside the routine duties and come together to be united in our consecration of ourselves collectively and individually to the Lord.

Joel 2:15-16a, 17b Blow a trumpet in Zion, consecrate a fast, proclaim a solemn assembly, gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children and nursing infants…let them say, Spare Thy people, O Lord!”

D. Critical Events

--Then there are those times when a critical event faces the people of God and requires that we all put aside our routine labors, our normal habits and practices, and devote ourselves to the cry before us.

--For us at Providence, the routine labors on the walls have proved to be insufficient in two distinct areas: our practices of inviting and in-gathering.

1. Inviting

--This year, listen for the appeal to become a more inviting people, to become more intentional about saying to those around us, “come and see!”

--If we respond in the course of our routine commitments to follow Christ, all the better, but if we persist in keeping our message to ourselves and inviting few if any to come and see, we may have to figure out how to sound the trumpet for a special emphasis to meet the critical need of getting the gospel message out!

2. In-Gathering

--This year also, you will be very likely to hear the sound of the trumpet calling each of us to rally to the financial needs we will face in building a new facility to meet the ever-growing need for more room for those who are invited to come and see and hear of the wonders of the grace of Jesus Christ.

--The routine gathering of funds through tithes and offerings has not even matched our budget for the past few years leaving no significant excess to be saved for our building needs.

--When you hear the trumpet sound, it will be time to lay aside other priorities and come together in an unprecedented way and all take our places side by side to contribute sacrificially by faith to the critical need for new facilities.

--We mention it to you now at the beginning of the year so that you may consider how you manage the resources God entrusts to you this year in a way that allows you to be generous and sacrificial when you heart the trumpet sound!

CONCLUSION: The joy of laboring together for the glory of the Lord always has been a bonding experience for us as members of the body of Christ. The day to day struggles we face in the routine matters of walking and depending upon the Lord seem less overwhelming when we know we are not alone.

But once in a while, we must understand that we have to kick it up a notch to face the unusual requirements of the challenge at hand. Frankly, many will find such times as just the excuse they need to move out of Jerusalem and resettle in Damascus until the storm blows over. That happens in every church whenever the trumpet sound signals the time for some to run for the hills instead of rallying to the point of need.

For the majority of us, such times prove to be extraordinary seasons for growing up and growing closer to one another in the process. Enduring together establishes a special bond with each other and with the Lord that frankly I no not want to miss!

Keep up the work on the walls, but be ready to rally together…when you hear the trumpet call!

We will promise you that we will not cry wolf…that we will not invent a crisis…that we will not sound the trumpet prematurely. But when you hear the sound of the trumpet come together and rejoice. “Rally to us there. Our God will fight for us!” I for one do not want to miss what He is going to do!

January 11, 2004

Providence Baptist Church

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AESOP’s Fable: The Boy Who Cried Wolf

There once was a shepherd boy who was bored as he sat on the hillside watching the village sheep. To amuse himself he took a great breath and sang out, "Wolf! Wolf! The Wolf is chasing the sheep!"

The villagers came running up the hill to help the boy drive the wolf away. But when they arrived at the top of the hill, they found no wolf. The boy laughed at the sight of their angry faces.

"Don't cry 'wolf', shepherd boy," said the villagers, "when there's no wolf!" They went grumbling back down the hill.

Later, the boy sang out again, "Wolf! Wolf! The wolf is chasing the sheep!" To his naughty delight, he watched the villagers run up the hill to help him drive the wolf away.

When the villagers saw no wolf they sternly said, "Save your frightened song for when there is really something wrong! Don't cry 'wolf' when there is NO wolf!"

But the boy just grinned and watched them go grumbling down the hill once more.

Later, he saw a REAL wolf prowling about his flock. Alarmed, he leaped to his feet and sang out as loudly as he could, "Wolf! Wolf!"

But the villagers thought he was trying to fool them again, and so they didn't come.

At sunset, everyone wondered why the shepherd boy hadn't returned to the village with their sheep. They went up the hill to find the boy. They found him weeping.

"There really was a wolf here! The flock has scattered! I cried out, "Wolf!" Why didn't you come?"

An old man tried to comfort the boy as they walked back to the village.

"We'll help you look for the lost sheep in the morning," he said, putting his arm around the youth, "Nobody believes a liar...even when he is telling the truth!"

SOUNDING THE TRUMPET Nehemiah 4:15-23