Does the brokenness of your city do anything to your heart? Grant Partrick encourages us to ask God to soften our hearts for the community around us and to pray boldly for them.
Key Takeaway
Let's activate our hands and heart, call on heaven, and be willing to be part of the answer to that prayer as God moves in our city.
"Desperate prayer is not just a defensive plea from a position of distress, it is also an offensive call on an almighty God."
We, the people of God, are to seek the peace and prosperity of the city. (Jeremiah 29:7)
1.) The brokenness of the city broke Nehemiah.
Nehemiah's response to the brokenness of the city: he weeps, he fasts and he prays. If we're going to be people who are for the city, does the brokenness of the city do anything for our hearts?
We must have room in our hearts to feel the weight of the brokenness of our city and to know that we have the opportunity to lift it up to a holy God that can do something about it. What if we mourned, fasted, and prayed for our people the way that Nehemiah mourned, fasted, and prayed for his people?
2.) Nehemiah was willing to be a part of the answers to his own prayers.
He wasn't just willing to pray but to move. Nehemiah knew there would be cost and he was scared, but he knew the cost was worth the risk and the reward. What's worth more—the awkwardness of it going bad? Or the reward of it if it goes good and we win people over to the eternal Kingdom of God?
We ought to be people who are willing to endure the risk of stepping into the brokenness of a city with the hope and promise of a God who can restore.
The outcome is God's job, obedience is ours. Nehemiah prayed and then he followed the God who answered His own prayers
"We maximize our kingdom influence by Godly engagement, not by spiritual withdrawal." - H.B. Charles Jr.
3.) Nehemiah expected opposition and pressed forward for the sake of the people and for the Glory of God.
Through all of the opposition he faced, he did two things: prayed, and followed the God who answered his prayers.
If we're honest, we're less willing to endure opposition today. But, as we look to Nehemiah's life, we are reminded we are in a spiritual battle of light vs. dark. We aren't living out God's plan by staying safe. We're exiles and ambassadors, and it is our opportunity to plant our roots here.
"The great Master-gardener, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in a wonderful providence, with his own hand . . . planted me here, where, by his grace, in this part of his Vineyard, I grow. . . . And here I will abide, till the great Master of the Vineyard think fit to transplant me." - Samuel Rutherford
We will not be here forever, but for this moment, we have been called to be planted here and to put roots down, not to disengage and stay comfortable.
Plant and seek the welfare of your city, activating your heart and your hands on behalf of it.
4.) Meeting the physical needs of the people paved the way for them to have their spiritual needs met.
The people around us are in need of hope, of what we have, and in the person of Jesus.
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There is hope for those whose lives are in rubble and ruin, because we have experienced the grace and mercy of God. We taste his grace and mercy, yet we get so secluded into our own world and we forget that we were exactly like the people without Jesus around us at one point.
God may lead us far and wide, but He could be leading us right here, to plant and put down roots, declaring to a broken city all that He has done for us.
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Practical takeaways:
1.) For one week, do not listen to anything in the car. Look at the city around you, and call on heaven. Pray for the people in the buildings and the cars and the places that you pass by.
2.) For one week, refuse to use any convenience that keeps you from connecting with people. Get in line to talk to a cashier, talk to the person sitting at the front desk at the gym, etc.
3.) Make it a point to pray with your community once this week.
4.) Serve the city. Ex. Invite a neighbor over, help a family in need, etc.
Discussion Questions
Have you been broken by the brokenness of the city around you? What specifically has broken you?
If your heart isn't broken by the brokenness of the city around you, how will you commit to praying this week for a softened heart?
Do you really want to be a part of the answers to your own prayers? How can you shift your prayers this week to reflect a heart that's open to be used by God?
"The outcome is God's job, obedience is ours." How can you be obedient to God this week?
How have you disengaged in your community out of fear of discomfort?
How have you planted yourself in the community you're in?
In what ways can you work on planting yourself in community?
Do you pray for the city around you? If yes, how can you work to pray more often? If not, how can you start praying?
How are you in a grocery store? Do you put in headphones and always head for self-checkout? Or do you actively engage with the people in line or with at the cash register?
How can you serve someone in your city this week?
Scripture References
