Rick Warren - When You Feel Like Giving Up
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Summary
Rick Warren shares how discouragement hits hardest at the halfway point of life’s marathon, using Nehemiah chapter 4 to highlight four common causes: fatigue, frustration from rubble, feelings of failure, and fear from threats. He explains that giving up is worse than messing up and encourages persisting like Nehemiah did. The key takeaway is to combat discouragement by resting your body, reinforcing weak areas, refocusing on God, and resisting the urge to quit, ensuring you finish life’s race well.
A Special Day of Celebrations
Happy Juneteenth today! So, that’s it; we now have a new holiday, finally. I want to say happy first day of summer. And yes, happy Juneteenth, happy Father’s Day, and happy first day of summer! Oh, yeah, and to my babylicious wife, happy 47th anniversary! I never forget our anniversary because it’s on the first day of summer. That means we got married on the longest day of the year and the shortest night. Why didn’t I get married on December 21st, the longest night of the year and the shortest day? I don’t know, I didn’t think about that. Pull out your message notes, everybody! Did you get your lemonade? I got my lemonade!
Life Is a Marathon, Not a Sprint
Your life is not a 50-yard dash; the goal is not to get to the end as quickly as you can. Instead, your life is a marathon. The goal is to go through it pacing yourself. The goal should be to pace yourself and do the right things so that you make it all the way to the finish line standing.
Now, sadly, a lot of people, friends, they shrivel up inside and they die before they actually die. They never experience what it feels like to really be alive, connected to God. As I said, they die before they die. I don’t want that to happen to you. I love you too much, and as your pastor, who loves you, it is my job to make sure that doesn’t happen to you. That in the marathon of life, which is a long journey, you make it to the finish line standing.
Now, if you’ve ever watched a marathon, you know that the starting point is always very crowded. There are a ton of people at the starting line, but as the race progresses, the crowd thins out. The longer the race grows, there is more space between the runners, and many people drop out. They don’t make it to the finish line. One of my goals as your pastor is to help you finish the race that God has called you to run, and that you not just finish it, but you finish well. I want you to finish well. I’m going to finish well by God’s grace in the race that God has called me.
Building Endurance for the Long Haul
Now, if you’re going to make it all the way to the finish line in your life, you’re going to have to build some character qualities, Christ-like qualities such as endurance, resilience, balance, and pacing. You’re going to have to learn these skills. You know, a lot of people start off great in life, but even before they get to the halfway point in their life, they’ve already really messed it up, and they’ve given up, which is worse than messing up. Let me say it again: giving up is always worse than messing up. Everybody messes up. Why do people give up in the marathon of their lives? Because they get discouraged.
Now, discouragement is a deadly disease. It is a deadly disease. Discouragement will sap your energy, it will blur your focus, it will distort reality. You don’t see things clearly when you’re discouraged; you don’t see things as they really are, and it kills your motivation. The problem with discouragement is that it’s also highly contagious. You get around a group of discouraged people, you’ll get discouraged. You get around a bunch of negative people, and if you’re listening to discouraging voices in the media all the time, then you’re going to be discouraged too about life and about the future.
What to Do When You Feel Like Giving Up
That’s why today I want to show you what God says in His Word in the book of Nehemiah that we’re going through: what to do when you feel like giving up. What do you do when you feel like giving up? I hope you don’t need this right now. You might be in the middle of something that’s discouraging you right now, but you’re going to need this message someday. So, I highly encourage you to take notes. When you feel like you’re giving up in our series through the book of Nehemiah, we now come to the second part of chapter four, and this story illustrates that we’re going to look at today: both the four common causes, four reasons people get discouraged, and it also gives us God’s steps for getting out of discouragement.
Now, let me read the passage and then we’ll draw out the lessons for defeating discouragement. Okay? Now, if you’ve been following this series, you know the background of this story. If you’ve been with us in the past weeks, the nation of Israel was conquered by the Babylonian Empire, and most of the people in Israel were taken as prisoners of war to another country. For 70 years, they were held captive, and finally, when the Persians beat the Babylonians and took over, King Cyrus allows the Jews to go back to their homeland. Seventy years later, when they get home to Israel and they get to Jerusalem, they find everything’s been destroyed: their homes, the city, the temple, the walls—everything. They’re living among the ruins and rubble of a destroyed city.
So, this book of Nehemiah has been written to discourage people. They were very discouraged. But then God puts a dream in the heart of a guy named Nehemiah and He says, «Nehemiah, I want you to go back to Jerusalem, and I want you to rebuild the wall around the city for the protection of all the residents from the enemies, because a lot of people didn’t like the Jews.»
The Halfway Point of Discouragement
So, they go back, and as we’ve already seen so far, they started rebuilding this wall. And now today, in this story, we get to the point that they’ve built the wall up halfway to its original height. But at the halfway point, they get discouraged. The initial enthusiasm wears off; the people start feeling tired, and a bunch of stuff, and they want to give up. And we find that story in Nehemiah chapter 4. Look at the top of your outline or up here on the screen; it says this: «So the people quickly rebuilt the first half of the wall around Jerusalem until it reached half its height.» I want you to circle «half its height.» We’ll come back to that. «Because they worked hard, they worked hard with all their heart, but then our enemies heard how Jerusalem’s walls were being repaired and all the gaps were being closed, and they became very angry and plotted to attack Jerusalem together and create some confusion to stop the progress of building the wall. So we prayed to God for protection and posted 24-hour guards to protect the workers.»
But then the people began to complain. They said, «We’re tired, we’re tired, and we’re worn out. Besides that, there’s so much rubble and trash to be removed! We now realize we can’t do this! We can’t finish this wall!» Oh, and by the way, also our enemies are now threatening us. They’re saying, «Before you know it or even see us, we’ll be among you to kill you and end the work!» Then those who lived closest to our enemies kept reporting literally over ten times. They told us that our enemies kept saying, «We’re going to attack you from every direction.»
Now, this brief little story that I just read is packed—just packed—with powerful insights that you’re going to need to finish your race, the marathon of your life. Powerful insights that you need to finish well in life. And what I just read illustrates the four most common causes that would keep you from finishing well in your life—four most common causes—and they also model for us the four things God wants us to do that Nehemiah did that help people get out of their discouragement and get the job done. Anytime you’re hit with a bout of discouragement, you’re going to need to come back to this message that we’re talking about today.
But first, as I said, I hope you circled that phrase «half its height.» Notice that these people got discouraged halfway through the project. That’s typical; discouragement always strikes at the midpoint of anything you’re doing. You have enthusiasm at the start when you see you know you’re getting ready to start, and you have enthusiasm at the end when you can see the finish line. It’s in that middle part where you can’t see the beginning or the end that’s discouraging. That’s true in life; it’s true in your career; it’s true in parenting; it’s true in marriage and any other endeavor.
When you’re halfway up a mountain, you go, «Do I really want to go all the way to the top? I’m tired already, and then I’ve got to come back down!» If you’re halfway through the school year as a teacher or a student, if you’re halfway through your marriage, if you’re in the middle of anything, that’s when you’re most likely to get discouraged—not at the beginning; you’ve got a lot of enthusiasm on the first day of a diet. Okay? There’s no more false hope than the first day of a diet! And you actually feel pretty good when you see the end. «Look! I’m only five pounds away!» It’s in the middle part that you get discouraged.
Now, if you’re in the middle of anything right now, it would not surprise me if you felt like giving up. You know, they don’t call it a midlife crisis for nothing! Not the beginning; not the end; it’s in the middle.
Cause 1: Fatigue
So let’s look at the four things that typically discourage you and then see God’s cures for your discouragement in Nehemiah. All right, here we go!
Number one, the most common reason that you get discouraged is this: write it down—fatigue. Fatigue! The number one cause of discouragement is emotional or physical exhaustion. You simply run out of energy. Notice verse 11: «Then the people of Judah began to complain that the workers were becoming tired.» Circle that word «tired.» Fatigue is the first cause of discouragement. You don’t think straight when you’re tired. When you haven’t slept, when you’re worn out, when you’re weary, when you’re wasted, rebuilding anything, of course, is exhausting! It’s harder than building. Rebuilding is harder than building. These wall builders had worked hard on the first half of the project, but now they’re weary, they’re worn, and they’re worn out. I love this verse actually in the Message paraphrase: it translates the word «they were pooped.» Probably the first time «pooped» is in the Bible—you bet it is! They were pooped!
Now, friends, if you don’t get anything else, get this: sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is get in bed and go to sleep! You just need the rest! You need the rest because fatigue will make you discouraged. All right, studies tell us that Americans are the most sleep-deprived people on the planet, and that wouldn’t surprise me if that’s probably true for much of the developed world. Vince Lombardi said, «Fatigue makes cowards of all of us.» Have you noticed how much better things look after you’ve had a good night’s sleep? Your problems don’t seem as bad when you’ve had some sleep!
Now, look at this next verse; look at this. It says in Deuteronomy chapter 25, verse 18, «Never forget how the Amalekites attacked you when you were”—read it with me—“exhausted and weary, » and they struck down those who began to lag behind. Okay, this is a spiritual principle here: you’re attacked when you’re exhausted and weary. You get struck down when you start lagging behind. Why? Because you’re tired; you’re worn out. Now I want everybody to write this down: expect attacks anytime I’m exhausted! I’m just giving you some fatherly, brotherly advice: expect attacks anytime I’m exhausted! That’s what happened here; the people got worn out.
Now, it may be an attack of doubt when you’re tired; you are more vulnerable to temptation when you’re tired. When you’re tired, it may be an attack of temptation, it may be an attack of anger—you get more irritable when you’re tired; it may be an attack of discouragement; it may be an attack of self-pity. Everybody hates me; nobody loves me. «I’m going to go eat worms!» Pour me a pity party for me, myself, and I, and you’re the only person you invite to it!
What I’m saying is that you need to be aware that fatigue makes you vulnerable to discouragement.
Cause 2: Frustration from Rubble
Okay? Second cause: frustration. Frustration is the second major cause of discouragement, and we see that in the next verse. When you can’t seem to get ahead, when the project that you’re working on is more complex than you thought it was going to be, when the stakes are longer and higher than you expected, and it takes longer, when you have problems that you can’t solve—when you feel like you’re always behind and you can never catch up—have you ever felt like that? Yeah! Anyone identifying with what those five or six things I just said? Yeah!
Well, when you get that kind of frustration in your life, you’re going to be a sucker for discouragement. Fatigue and frustration. Have you ever tried to clean out your closet or your files? You pull them all out, and you’ve got to lay them on the floor, and then there are so many decisions to make; you get so discouraged you just throw them all back in the cabinet, throw it all back in the closet, and go, «Ah! It’s too much!» Okay?
You get so frustrated just trying to decide, «Do I keep it? Do I toss it?» Years ago, the foundation of our home cracked, and we had to tear down literally much of our house. One of our walls was actually coming loose from the roof and from the foundation, and we had to tear down much of the house and rebuild it. It took a year to rebuild that! Now, that was not frustrating to me just because it took that long, but it was also frustrating to me because of all the piles of trash and junk that piled up everywhere during the rebuilding time. There were broken bricks everywhere along with broken pipes everywhere and pieces of lumber everywhere; you know, broken wires and things just lined up. And a permanent porta-potty was proudly stationed by our mailbox for one year! So every time you went out to the mailbox, you got the Miraloma aroma! Okay?
The fact is, anytime you rebuild something, friends, you’re going to have debris. Anytime you rebuild, there’s going to be rubble, rubbish, trash, debris, and debris in your life that causes discouragement. It happens in this story. Look at the next verse, verse 10: it says, «In addition to the fact that everybody was tired, there was so much rubble and trash to be removed.» So, they’re all discouraged by the pile of broken stuff laying around them!
Rubble in your life will discourage you; I’m just telling you right now. So, what’s the rubble in my life? Write this down: rubble is the broken stuff I keep tripping over. Rubble is the broken stuff in my life that I keep tripping over! There’s physical rubble—bricks and trash and broken stuff, but there’s also emotional rubble, relational rubble, financial rubble, bad rubble from bad decisions in my life. Rubble will always be a part of your life! Why? Because in a world where everything is broken and everything on this planet is broken, you can’t avoid rubble!
Now, this kind of stuff is what causes frustration. You get too much rubble in your life, you get frustrated! Unmanaged rubble wastes your time, unmanaged rubble zaps your energy, unmanaged rubble keeps you from moving forward! Unmanaged rubble in your life causes conflict! Unmanaged rubble not only frustrates you, the broken stuff in your life that you keep tripping over not only frustrates you; it frustrates everybody else too! This was the second reason: «Besides that, there was so much rubble and trash to be removed.» Remember, they’re living in ruins, and they’re going, «We’re never going to get this place cleaned up! We’re never going to get it organized!»
What they don’t realize is that God builds the wall from the rubble in our life. They’re literally taking the broken pieces and putting them back together and making the wall. And the stuff that you trip over is often the stuff that God wants to build your life with!
Rules for Rubble Removal
So let me give you right now—I know I didn’t give my space on the outline—let me give you three rules of rubble removal in your life: Here’s the first one: I must continually clean it out of my life. I must continually be on guard to clean out the broken stuff in my life that keeps tripping me up. It’s a never-ending task. You will never clear out all the rubble in your life until you get to heaven. But it’s one of the things God wants you to do. I have to continually be vigilant about cleaning out the broken things in my life or I’m going to trip all over them and I’m not going to make it to the finish line.
Second rule of rubble removal: if I don’t deal with it, it will take over my life! Your weaknesses are not just weaknesses; they are the things that will keep you from God’s purpose in your life if you let them! I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but I’ll give you a little secret—I have discovered that trash multiplies when you’re not watching! Have you noticed that? «Where did that pile come from?» You didn’t even… trash multiplies when you’re not looking! What is rubble? It’s a sign that you’re neglecting something! When the dishes pile up, or the clothes pile up, or anything else piles up—magazines pile up—it means you’re neglecting something! So I have to continue to clean it out of my life, and if I don’t deal with it, it will take over my life.
The third rule is that I can’t—this is important—I can’t always see my rubble, but others do! Hello! You can’t always see the broken stuff in your life that keeps tripping you up, but everybody else can see it! That’s why we need each other. I have rubble in my life I don’t even know that it’s rubble! I might think it’s a trophy, you know, or valuable property—no, no! So if I can’t always see the rubble in my life, but everybody else can, it just means I need to be humble about the broken places in my life, and so do you.
So what do you do with this? Frustration. You know, we said fatigue makes you discouraged and rubble piled up in your life—the things that you trip over—zaps your time and energy. When you’re frustrated by rubble, pray this next verse: Psalm 25:16. It says this: «Come, Lord, and show me your mercy! Come, Lord, and show me your mercy, for I feel helpless, overwhelmed, and in deep distress.» That might be a verse you put on a card and memorize because you may not need it now, but you will at some point.
Help me; show me your mercy, for I feel helpless, overwhelmed, and in deep distress.
Cause 3: Feeling Like a Failure
Now, there’s a third common cause of discouragement, and here it is: fatigue, frustration, and the third cause is feeling that I’m failing! Feeling that I’m failing! When you allow the feeling of failure to well up in your life, you’re going to get discouraged. This is the third thing that caused them to get discouraged in Nehemiah’s story; it’s the third thing that’s going to happen in your life. What does it mean when I feel that I’m failing? Well, it’s that sensation that I’ve bitten off more than I could chew—that this project that I have accepted is going to take me down. When you feel like you’re failing, you throw up your hands and you say, «Maybe secretly, I can’t take this anymore. I can’t do this anymore!» That is a feeling that I’m failing!
Now, at the halfway point when they’re building, they’re tired, there’s rubble, and then the third thing it says in verse 10, the third part of the verse is, «We now realize”—this is the workers—“we cannot—not will not—cannot finish this wall!» What are they doing? They’re feeling like failures! They’re feeling incompetent! They’re feeling like, «We should have never even started this project!» They felt defeated. In fact, the New American Bible says, «We’ll never be able to finish it!» The person who says, «I can!» and the person who says, «I can’t!»—they’re both right! Because if you say, «I can’t do it, » guess what? You can’t!
But they’re feeling defeated, and they’re probably feeling ashamed. There’s probably a little bit of shame mixed in here: «We started this project so well to build the wall around Jerusalem, and now we’re tired and worn out, and there is so much junk around everywhere that it’s just too crowded and too complex, and there’s no way we’re going to get this thing done!» What happened? They got the feeling of failure. Feeling like they’re failing! What happened? Well, because this rebuilding of the city wall was taking longer than they expected. So what happened? They lost their confidence and they doubted their competence! They lost their confidence, and they doubted their competence.
And they said, «Who are we to think we could do this project? Who are we to even attempt this dream?» That’s probably going to happen to you at some point in your life. You got a great dream, and at some point, the devil whispers in your ear, «Who do you think you are attempting to do this?» Wrong question! You should build your life not on what you think you can do, but what you think God can do! You let the size of your God determine the size of your goal! It’s not about do you think I would have tried to do all things I’ve tried to do in life because I was depending on me? Not a chance! In my flesh, there dwelleth no good thing! I know that I can’t do certain things! Jesus said, «Apart from me, you can do nothing!» So that’s pretty clear!
Now, how do you react when your plans take longer than expected? When what you thought was going to be done quickly takes longer than expected? What do you do? Do you give in to self-pity? Do you start complaining? You start blaming other people? Friends, if at first you don’t succeed, you’re normal! You’re normal! Nobody succeeds at first! The only way you actually succeed in life is by failing a bunch and learning what doesn’t work! Failure is the stepping stone to success! Nobody ever succeeds without having failures. I don’t care if you’re Steve Jobs or anybody. Success here? The difference between successful and unsuccessful people is that successful people see failure as a temporary setback; unsuccessful people see it as a mark on their character! «Well, I’m a failure.» No, no! Nobody succeeds at everything! Nobody has an unbroken record of success!
Cause 4: Fear
So, the feeling of failure will cause discouragement. Here’s the fourth common cause of discouragement: fear. Fear! So, we’ve got fatigue, we’ve got frustration, we’ve got failure, and now we’ve got fear. Now, last week we learned in that message on criticism and ridicule that there were people who were enemies who didn’t want to rebuild the wall. They didn’t want it rebuilt! The enemies of the rebuilding of the wall, it says—first they criticized them, remember that? They just criticized the plan, and then they ridiculed the builders. We looked at that last week. How do you deal with ridicule and insults? They ridiculed the builders! Now, this week they’ve moved to threatening. They’re actually threatening bodily violence, and that’s verse 11. Here’s the fourth reason they got discouraged: «Also, our enemies are now threatening us!» They’re saying, «You know, before you know it or even see us, we’ll be among you to kill you and end your work! We’re going to be stealth! We’re going to slip up behind you while you’re working on the wall, and we’re going to stab you in the back!»
Now, that’s a legitimate reason to be discouraged! You might die if you keep up with this project! Okay? But they didn’t actually need to do this because they just scared them, and the fear worked! The fear caused them to stop the work! He scared them! Fear always discourages you.
Now, I want you to notice who got discouraged first. Look at the next verse, verse 12. «Then those who lived closest to the enemies kept reporting over ten times.» They kept telling—they’re gossiping this bad news—reporting over ten times that our enemies kept saying, «We’re going to attack you from every direction!» Now, circle the phrase «those who live closest.» They are the source of the fear! If you hang out with negative people and you consistently listen to them, like negative media all the time, you’re going to become, friend, a fearful person! Some of you, the best thing you can do is just turn off the media! It’s making you a fearful person, a frightened person, a negative person, a scared person! There’s a lot of good in the world, but you don’t see it if all you’re getting is negative, negative, negative, negative, negative all the time!
I wonder what secret fear is discouraging you right now. So you probably have already figured out one or more of these have been a problem in your life. Fatigue, frustration from rubble, failure, feeling like a failure, and fear!
Antidote 1: Rest Your Body
How do I defeat these common enemies that create discouragement in my life? You do what Nehemiah did, and Nehemiah did four things that I want you to start working on this week and for the rest of summer. All right, here they are. Let’s get right into it—the four things that you can do to start defeating discouragement and even being prescriptive and preventative in discouragement that can come. Here’s the first thing you do: the antidote to fatigue is this: rest my body! Rest my body!
As I said, maybe the first thing you need to do is simply get some more sleep than you’re getting! Get some more rest! My body—Psalm 119:73: «You made my body, Lord; now give me sense to heed your laws.» Do you realize that regular rest is so important? God put it in the Big Ten! The Ten Commandments! Rest is in the Ten Commandments! It’s right up there with «Don’t murder anybody, » and «Don’t commit adultery, » and «Don’t lie and defraud people!» It says, «Every six days you take a day off.» It’s called the Sabbath! That’s how important rest is! Our best deserves rest! You can’t be the woman or the man God wants you to be if you’re not getting the proper rest!
Look at these verses: «You made my body, Lord; now give me sense to heed your laws.» And look at the next one: Psalm 127:2: «It is useless for you to work so hard from early morning until late at night, anxiously working for food to eat. God gives rest to His loved ones.» God doesn’t want you being a workaholic! He doesn’t want you working from early morning to late at night anxiously— you’re doing it out of worry! He says God wants you to get your proper rest!
You know, there’s a story in First Kings chapter 19 about a guy named Elijah, a prophet, and he had just had this big God contest with pagan leaders and atheists and idolaters and stuff like that. He just spent all of his emotional energy, and he hears that the queen is upset with him, and he runs away and goes and hides in a cave. He’s so down, and he’s so discouraged, and he’s so depressed. He is the classic case of burnout. He is a classic case of burnout, Elijah! In fact, he’s so discouraged that he asks God to kill him! He’s one of the three guys in the Bible who actually prayed, «God, just kill me! I want to go on to heaven!»
And God’s answer to Elijah’s depression and discouragement was he fed him some food and he let him go to sleep! And then He woke him up and He fed him some more and sent him back to sleep! Eat and sleep, eat and sleep, eat and sleep! That might be a good model for some of you! As I said, sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is just go to bed! Get some rest!
Antidote 2: Reinforce Your Weak Areas
Rest my body! Number two, the second thing Nehemiah did was I need to reinforce my weak areas! I need to reinforce my weak areas! What does that mean? It means you honestly assess where you are most vulnerable! Discover what is the rubble in my life—what is the weakness in my life? What’s the low point in my life? Where am I most vulnerable? Am I more vulnerable to anger? Am I more vulnerable to pride? Am I more vulnerable to lust? Am I more vulnerable to a compulsion? You need to know what works, what the devil uses to work on you. What’s your fundamental sin? What’s your fundamental temptation? You need to reinforce your weak areas!
Now, the Bible says this in Nehemiah 4:13: «So he heard that they were going to be attacked, and they were threatening violence. So I stationed armed guards at the most vulnerable point.» Circle «vulnerable point.» I stationed armed guards at the most vulnerable points of the wall and the most exposed places! Circle «exposed places.» I assigned people by families to protect each other with their swords, and their spears, and their bows! Now notice what he does here. How does he know what are the low spaces? What are the vulnerable spots? He’s been there; he’s done his homework! He knows where the city’s vulnerable! He knows where the exposed parts are!
Do you know what’s most exposed in your life that Satan can just ram you with? And he wins every time because it’s just an exposed area? He wins, and he gets you and he goes, «Got her again! Got him again!» Do you know where you’re most vulnerable? This is the thing you’ve got to reinforce your weak areas! Before you can reinforce them, you’ve got to know where they are! Now, notice here Nehemiah doesn’t give up on the goal. It says he doesn’t—when everybody gets discouraged, he doesn’t say, «Oh, you’re right, guys! We should have never even tried this! Let’s just all go home and have a TV dinner and, you know, watch the late-night talk shows!» No! He goes to work! He says, «We’re just going to do it differently! We’re going to reorganize; we’re going to reorder; we’re going to do a new strategy!»
Listen, when you have a goal, you have a dream, you have a desire and you’re going after it, you are going to have opposition, and you are going to have people who oppose you, and you’re going to have discouragement and doubt and difficulty and even dead ends! You need to understand this: discouragement doesn’t mean that you’re doing the wrong thing, but it may mean you’re doing it in the wrong way! They were doing the right thing—building the wall—they were just doing it the wrong way! A lot of times when we get discouraged, we think, «I’m doing the wrong thing.» No, you’re doing the right thing; you should be doing this! God gave you that dream, but you may be doing it in the wrong way!
So don’t give up on the dream God gave you! Instead, work on your weak areas! Reinforce your weak areas! Keep growing! Reorganize and reorder where you need to reorganize and reorder! Keep going! Are you deep in debt? Reorganize your budget! Are you out of shape? Reorder your lifestyle and your eating patterns! Are you overstressed? Reorganize your time! You may need to eliminate some things in your life! You may need to eliminate some things in your schedule! You may need to clean out the rubble, the clutter, the trivial time wasters and simplify!
Now, notice here: there’s an important point here. «I stationed armed guards at the most vulnerable points.» And at the most exposed places, I assign people by families. Okay, listen. Very important! If you’re going to make it to the finish line in your life, in the marathon of your life, if you’re going to finish well, you’re going to need support! I posted them by families! You need support! The easiest thing in the world for Satan to do is to discourage a lone ranger Christian who isn’t connected to a small group. If you’re not in a small group, or you’ve stopped going to your small group, or you’ve stopped meeting up, you are more vulnerable than you realize!
You need other people in your life! You’re not going to make it! Satan is too smart! It’s easy to pick off a single person. It’s difficult when you’ve got other people in a small group supporting you! Get back in your small group! Now, we don’t have to wear a mask if you’re vaccinated! Get started! Here’s a good next verse—a great post-COVID verse: Hebrews 10:25: «Some people have gotten out of the habit of meeting with other believers”—well, duh, for a year and a half we couldn’t do it! —“but we must not do that! Instead, we should keep on encouraging each other!» Circle that word «encouraging!» Hmmm. What’s the antidote to discouragement? Encouragement! Where do you get encouragement? In your small group! The antidote to discouragement is encouragement! Where do you get encouragement? In meeting with other believers!
So get back in the habit! Start it this week! Get your group, or start a new group—whatever! Now, you may be discouraged because you’re trying to handle everything by yourself! When people come up to me, and they start telling me their problem, and they say, «You know, I just feel overwhelmed, » my first question is always, «Are you in a small group?!» Are you in a small group? God never meant for you to go through life on your own! God never meant for you to run your marathon by yourself!
Antidote 3: Refocus on God
So I rest my body; I reinforce my weak areas. Here’s the third thing that Nehemiah did: refocus on God! Refocus on God! And I love what Nehemiah says in verse 14. Because he knows that one of the problems, one of the causes of their discouragement is fear, and so in Nehemiah 4:14, he says this—I love this: the New Jerusalem Bible says, «Aware of their anxiety, I stood up and said to the nobles and the officials and the rest of the people, ‘Do not be afraid of the enemy! ’» Instead, he’s saying, «Remember the Lord, who is great and awe-inspiring!» Now, what is Nehemiah doing here? He’s saying, «Get your mind off whatever is discouraging you, and remember what God is like! Refocus on God! He says remember the Lord!»
What am I supposed to—when I’m discouraged, what am I supposed to remember about the Lord? Well, you could remember His faithfulness—how He’s always helped you through everything! You can remember His goodness! You can remember His power! He’s omnipotent; He’s all-powerful! You can remember that He’s with you right now—that He’s not distant—that you can remember that He sees everything that goes on in your life, and He cares about you! You can remember that He has all the power you need! You don’t need to worry about anything! You could remember His promises to you.
This is the third key to overcoming discouragement: change the channel of your mind! Stop focusing on what you don’t want, and start focusing on what God has promised to you! When you’re decr—listen! When you’re discouraged, it’s because you are choosing to think discouraged thoughts! That’s your choice! You are as discouraged as you want to be! And you’re as happy as you want to be! Nobody’s holding a gun to your head! Nobody’s saying, «You must be discouraged!» You’re discouraged because you’re choosing discouraged thoughts! How to get rid of discouragement? Choose to change your thoughts! Choose to change the channel of your mind!
Don’t keep replaying all those discouraging images in your mind! Instead, remember the Lord! Choose to think about God and what He’s done—His faithfulness, His love, His mercy, His compassion! Choose to think about God! Because your thoughts always determine your feelings! Do you want to stop being discouraged? Then stop thinking the way you’ve been thinking! It’s stinking thinking! You’ve been thinking about all the problems! Stop! You don’t have to think about the problems! Think about the Lord!
One of my favorite verses when we went through the series on Jonah, Jonah 2:7, look at this verse up here on the screen: it says this: «When I had lost all hope, I turned my thoughts once more to the Lord!» I turned my thoughts once more! When you’ve lost all hope, when you’re discouraged, you need to do a re-evaluation—you need to change the channel of your thoughts! That’s what David did when David got discouraged in Psalm 119. The next verse: he said, «I’m completely discouraged! Revive me by your word!» Stop watching, as I said, all the negative stuff, and get back into this book!
You’re spending more time listening to other people than you’re listening to God! God will always tell you the truth; people won’t! Rest my body! Reinforce my weak areas! Refocus on God! When I’m feeling down, when I’m feeling discouraged, when I’m at the midpoint—have a midlife crisis! This is the middle of 2021; we’re right at the halfway point—June! Halfway through the year! Have you gotten done everything you wanted to do? Have you noticed this year went faster than last year? Hello! Last year creeped; this one zoomed by!
Antidote 4: Resist the Discouragement
Reinforce my weak areas; refocus on God; and finally, here’s the fourth thing Nehemiah did: resist. Resist the discouragement! Don’t you dare, friend, give in without a fight! Fight back! Fight back against your discouragement! Fight back against the devil! Fight back against those who want to discourage you! Discouragement is a choice! Now, in the second part of verse 14, Nehemiah says, «I also told them this: You must fight!» Circle that: «You must fight.» That’s resist the discouragement: «Fight for your brothers and your sons and your daughters and your wives and your homes!»
You will never defeat discouragement by being passive! You have to fight it! Now, I don’t need to say a whole lot about this, but as believers, we are engaged in a spiritual battle, and where is that battle fought? Not out here in the air; it’s fought in your mind! And Satan’s two favorite weapons in the battle for your mind are, number one, discouragement, and number two, distraction. Those are the two biggest things that he will use to get you off course, to make you not finish your marathon, to not finish well in the race of life! He’ll use discouragement and he’ll use distraction!
D.L. Moody, a great pastor of the last century—and actually, the 18th century—said, «I’ve never known God to use a discouraged person.» When you get discouraged, you get set on the shelf! And so, you—discouragement, distractions—he’s going to use both these tried in your mind! But you can choose to refuse! Jeremy, you can choose to refuse the discouragement! I give you permission to not believe every thought you have because some of the thoughts you have, as I said, they’re stinking thinking; they’re wrong! Not everything you tell yourself is true! Not everything that Satan puts in your mind is true! So I’m giving you permission to not believe those discouraging thoughts!
This is the difference between ordinary people and great people! Great people never give up! They never give up! They keep on in the marathon of life, even when they’re fatigued, even when they’re frustrated, even when they feel like failures, and even when they’re fearful. You know, in the second year of this church, 1981, I went through an entire year of depression—the entire year! I was discouraged and depressed, and I was having these brain problems that I’ve had all my life, but they were really bad! And I was filled with frustration and fear and fatigue and a feeling of failure. My goal was not, «God, build a great church!» My goal was, «God, can I put one foot in front of the other?»
And I would come and teach on Sunday and go home and get in bed and basically sleep through Monday! I was a basket case! I really wasn’t a good leader! And you know what kept me going during that year of depression and discouragement? As I would finish the sermon I was going to preach on Sunday sometime about Saturday morning, every Saturday afternoon for most of that year, I would get in the car and drive myself down to Laguna Beach, where those bocce ball areas are, the cliffs where the old folks play bocce ball, and I would sit there, and I would watch the waves for a couple hours. And it would just calm me down! It allowed me to pray and to fight the fatigue and the frustration and the failure—the sense of failure and the fears!
And in that year, sitting there watching the beach at Laguna Beach every Saturday afternoon, I learned something—that the tide goes out, but it always comes back in! The tide goes out, but it always comes back in! When the tide is out, the beach is ugly! It reveals all kinds of junk and driftwood and stuff; it doesn’t look very good when the tide’s out! But it always comes back in! Right now, the tide may be out in your life! We’ve just been through a horrendous year and a half with COVID, and I’m sure right now that many of you listening to me are just barely holding on. It’s been a rough year, and I want to tell you: don’t give up! Don’t, don’t, don’t you dare give up! Hold on!
In my office, there is a plaque on the wall that is written in Hebrew so nobody knows what it says except the people who read Hebrew. And what it says is this: This too shall pass! The tough stuff that you’re going through didn’t come to stay—it came to pass! It’s not going to last! COVID is not going to last! The problem is not going to last!
So don’t give up on God! Don’t give up on your marriage! Don’t give up on your church! Don’t give up on your dream! Don’t give up! You might need to change the way you’re doing something; you might be doing the right thing in the wrong way! But don’t give up! Psalm 142—there on your outline, verse 3, says this: «When I’m ready to give up, He knows what I should do!» Don’t give up; look up! Look up to Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who created you, who thought you up, who loves you, who has a purpose for your life, who died on the cross for you, who rose again and is coming back one day—who’s going to take you to heaven one day! Jesus Christ is the secret of strength to make it to the end of your marathon and end well!
Isaiah—last verse on your outline, 40:29–31: «God gives power to those who are tired and worn out. He offers strength to the weak. Those who wait on the Lord will find new strength.»
Your Homework This Week
So this week, here’s your homework: rest your body. Recognize the vulnerable spots in your life, the exposed areas. Start working on reinforcing them. Refocus on God! Stop listening to the negativity! Resist the discouragement! Don’t you give in to it! Resist it! Fight it! It’s a choice! You’re discouraged because you’re allowing yourself to be discouraged! You cannot fight discouragement with passivity; you have to fight it! And who will give you the energy to fight it? Your Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! So focus on Him, not on the problem.
Closing Prayer
Let’s bow our heads for prayer. Father, this word is so clear and so convicting to each of us. We all know that there are areas in our lives where we’re tired and frustrated-where we feel like failures and we’re honestly afraid. But we come to you right now, so pray this in your heart. Say, «Godкарпат, I give you my fatigue! 」 Say it: „God, I give you my fatigue! God, I give you my frustrations! I give you the rubble in my life-the broken things that I keep tripping over in my own life that frustrate me! I don’t want to be that way! I give you the areas that I feel like a failure in, where I feel like I can’t do it anymore, and I give you all my fears, Lord! I don’t want to be one of those people who live closest to the enemy and then just spread bad news to everybody else! I want to gossip the gospel, not the negativity all around us!
So, Father, this week, I’m going to ask you to help me. Help me! You made my body, Lord- now give me the sense to heed your laws! Help me to rest my body! Help me, Lord, to reinforce my weak areas! And, Lord, I have gotten out of the habit of meeting together with other believers, and I’m not getting the encouragement that I’ve had in the past! I want to recommit to being in a small group! I don’t want to go through life as a lone ranger! Lord, help me! When I begin to think of all the things that get me down, help me to change the channel of my mind!
Help me to refocus on you! Help me to not be afraid of the enemies, but to remember the Lord who is great and awe-inspiring! Just like David, I ask you to rewire me and revive me through your Word! And then, Lord, help me to resist the discouragement! Help me to fight for what I know you want me to do with my life! And, Lord, when I’m ready to give up, you know what I should do! I’m asking you to give me the power when I’m weak and tired and worn out!
Give strength to the weak, Lord! In that sense, I want to thank you for discouragement because it forces me to come to you! Help me to see that even discouragement can be good if I let it draw me to you and trust in you instead of myself! I commit myself completely to you!“
If you’ve never said, „Jesus Christ, I’m yours, “ say it to Him right now! „Jesus Christ, I’m yours! I’m all in!“ In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.