09/05/2026
September 6 Bulletin Article | In the Face of Disappointment
How do you handle disappointment? Is it anger, resentment, or just plain, old-fashioned quitting? Whatever it might be, I want to encourage you to look to the Scriptures for guidance and example, because they are full of disappointed and discouraged people. They didn’t always give up, sometimes, they simply forged ahead. Today, I want us to do the same. Nehemiah is one such character who had every reason to quit before he ever laid a single brick in Jerusalem. He left a comfortable position in the court of the King of Persia to rebuild the broken walls of Jerusalem. His own people abandoned the work of the wall, leaving it in rubble, but he felt compelled to go (see Nehemiah 2:1-5), and from the moment he arrived to fix the problem, opposition arrived to stop him.
Two men named Sanballat and Tobiah were the particular thorns in his side. They mocked the effort to rebuild the walls, asking whether these “feeble Jews” really thought they could finish the work in a day or if the stones could even be reused from the heaps of rubble (see 4:1-3). When their mockery didn’t deter the work, they threatened violence (see 4:7-8) and then false accusation (see 6:5-9). They went so far as to lure Nehemiah away from the town under the deception of a meeting (6:2-4). From the earliest days of reconstruction, Nehemiah was tempted with trouble and could have easily given in to the disappointment that accompanies it.
What’s truly remarkable about him is his lack of quit in the face of pressure. He had to be disappointed by it, yet that disappointment didn’t become his destination. When he was mocked, he prayed and kept building (see 4:4-6). When he was threatened, he posted guards and kept building (see 4:9). When he was invited to leave the safety of the town for a meeting of nobility, his simple response was, “I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down” (see 6:3).
That posture is worth noting. He never ignored the opposition, he didn’t pretend the disappointment away. He simply refused to let it set the terms for his next day. It was allowed to visit his construction site, but never allowed to run it or stop it. Most of us know that pull of opposition and disappointment. Something delays, someone criticizes, a plan you cared about gets picked apart, and you’re left with a pit in your stomach. The temptation to let that disappointment and opposition be the whole story, to let the Sanballat and Tobiah of our lives set the tone is real, but shouldn’t be what wins.
Nehemiah’s answer wasn’t to deny the frustration. It was to simply keep busy. His story is remarkable because the wall was rebuilt in 52 days (see 6:15) despite the opposition. So, whatever wall you’re building (or rebuilding), the same advice stands. Don’t pretend disappointment or opposition away, just keep building through it.
- NM
