This One Thing

You and I need to do something.  What’s interesting is the fact that the “something” we need to do is different for all of us.  Your one thing is different than my one thing and my one thing is different than yours because whatever the one thing is, it’s based on what’s going on in your life, your relationships, your marriage, your finances, whatever it might be.  If you figure out this one thing and if you would do this one thing it would leave you in a much better place a year from now than where you are right now.

This one thing in your life is something you’ve thought about, it’s something that someone has suggested to you, this one thing may be something you even tried before but for whatever reason you lost focus, you lost track, you got distracted and you didn’t focus on the one thing.

Maybe your one thing is a habit that you need to break.  Nobody needs to tell you what it is because you know what it is and know you need to break the habit.

Your one thing could be a relationship you need to restore or perhaps a relationship you need to end.  Or it might be a debt you need to retire.  It’s been hanging around forever and every time you hear someone talk about debt you feel guilty.  Your one thing might be something completely different, but for every one of us there’s something that is a part of your life and if you don’t get anything else accomplished, there’s this one thing you need to do.

Let me tell you a story from the Old Testament.  The story of Nehemiah takes place in about 444 B.C., around the time of the reign of Artaxerxes, the emperor of Persia.  And Nehemiah worked for Artaxerxes as his cup bearer.  We would consider him a wine taster, somebody to make sure that the wine hadn’t been poisoned, but Nehemiah was much more than that.  Nehemiah had gotten close to the king and was a friend.

Nehemiah was Jewish, and to our knowledge, had never been to Israel, but he  gets this burden for his city and he hears how terrible things are in Jerusalem and so he does a very risky thing.  He prays this big prayer in Nehemiah chapter 1 before he goes to King Artaxerxes.  And then he says to him, “Oh King, things are bad with my people and I’d like to go back and bring some organization, bring some leadership to my people. How would you feel about giving me some time off?”

Nehemiah worked for the king, but he wasn’t an employee, he was a slave and slaves don’t get time off.  But he asked for it anyway.  Lo and behold, the King says, “I’ll do better than that. I will make you the governor of Judea, basically the mayor of Jerusalem and I will give you whatever you need to help you get your people in shape but you have to come back.  You can’t stay away forever.”

So Nehemiah spends a lot of time preparing for this trip, gets a whole bunch of money, gets a bunch of lumber and other building materials and he heads to the city of Jerusalem.  The walls had been torn down for so long that the people living in the city of Jerusalem had never lived in the city when the walls weren’t torn down and the gates weren’t burned.  There was no national pride, there was no sense that, “God is with us”.  They had forgotten their history and the surrounding region was led by some very strong warlords who would come and go into and out of the city and steal all the time.

So Nehemiah shows up, he sees the city and it breaks his heart even further and he takes an entire day and night to travel around the city and to meet the people and to talk to the people and he comes to this conclusion.  “If I don’t get anything else done while I’m here, I’ve got to get this wall rebuilt.  There’s an economy that needs to be propped up, there are leaders that need to be put in place, there is all kinds of problems but the one thing I’ve got to do while I’m here, we’ve got to get the wall rebuilt around this city. It will give people protection, it will give people a sense of national pride and it will protect us from our enemies.”

So Nehemiah calls all the people together and he casts this unbelievably compelling vision.  Nehemiah pulled the people together and, essentially, laid out 4 things. He said, 1) here’s the problem we need to solve, 2) here’s the solution, 3) here’s why we need to do something about it and 4) here’s why we need to do something about it now.  The people rallied behind the vision and together and they began to rebuild the wall around the city.

Long story short, there were some people who didn’t like him rebuilding the wall, and they did everything they could to try to stop him, but it didn’t work.  And the reason it didn’t work was because Nehemiah was committed to getting the work done.  When he was asked to come down from the wall, here’s what he said:

“I am doing a great work and I cannot come down.”  (Nehemiah 6:3b, NAS)

So........what’s the one thing that you need to get done?  What’s that one thing that you need to step up to and work on and refuse to come down from?

The great news about the story of Nehemiah, there are no miracles but clearly the hand of God was at work and when you lean into the plans that God has for you, when you lean into the vision that God has birthed inside of you, you never know what God will do.

It’s time to get on the ladder and refuse to come down.  Even though you don’t know how this is going to work out, and even though you don’t know where the money is going to come from and even though you know your parents-in-law are going to think you’ve lost your mind, you know this is something you’ve got to do.  Make the decision:

I’m doing a great work and I cannot come down.