Summary of Nehemiah 4:1-6
Sanballat and Tobiah insulted the Israelites as they rebuilt Jerusalem’s wall. Nehemiah prayed to God to take them captive as punishment for ridiculing God. The people rebuilt the wall anyway.
BSF Study Questions Exile & Return: A Time to Build Lesson 24, Day 2: Nehemiah 4:1-6
3a) Sanballat said they were feeble. He ridiculed God’s powers by asking if they would finish in a day and if they would bring the stones to life. Tobiah said that the wall would be so weak that a fox could break it.
b) Very similar taunts. People will target the people themselves and God and question their abilities and powers.
4) Nehemiah prayed (as we all should) when we face persecution.
5a) They worked with all their hearts for God and ignored their taunts.
b) God. The words of others. Prayer.
Conclusions BSF Study Questions Exile & Return: A Time to Build Lesson 24, Day 2: Nehemiah 4:1-6
I love examples in the Bible where God’s people overcome everything for His purposes!
End Notes BSF Study Questions Exile & Return: A Time to Build Lesson 24, Day 2: Nehemiah 4:1-6
Many will try to discourage you when you are doing God’s work. But God is with you always.
Nehemiah responds with prayer. He took it to God. We are to rely on God in the face of opposition.
God will fight for us. We turn our enemies over to God to deal with justly.
We use our minds to overcome.
END NOTES SUMMARIZED
The Psychological Attack (Verses 1–3)
The Anger: Sanballat is furious that the work is actually proceeding. He resorts to public humiliation to demoralize the builders. The Mockery: He asks five rhetorical questions to highlight Jewish weakness:
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“What are these feeble Jews doing?” (Attacking their strength)
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“Will they restore it for themselves?” (Attacking their autonomy)
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“Will they sacrifice?” (Attacking their faith/implying religious fanaticism)
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“Will they finish in a day?” (Attacking their grasp of reality)
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“Will they revive the stones out of the heaps of rubbish?” (Attacking the quality of materials) The Insult: Tobiah the Ammonite joins in with a biting sarcasm: “If a fox goes up on it, he will break down their stone wall.” This suggests their work is so amateur that even a small animal could destroy it.
The Spiritual Defense (Verses 4–6)
The Prayer: Nehemiah does not debate the critics. Instead, he prays an imprecatory prayer (a prayer for judgment). He asks God to:
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Hear their contempt.
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Turn their reproach back on their own heads.
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Not cover their guilt, because they have “provoked You to anger.” Nehemiah views an attack on the work as an attack on God Himself.
The Persistence: The result of this prayer is focus. The people had a “mind to work,” and the wall was joined together to half its intended height.
Conclusion
Nehemiah 4:1–6 teaches that ridicule is often the first weapon of the enemy.
When progress is made, pushback is inevitable. Nehemiah demonstrates that the correct response to mockery is not to engage in a shouting match, but to take the insult to God in prayer and keep working. The best answer to a critic is a finished wall.
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