Nehemiah 6:10-19 Discernment

6:10-15

Next we come across Shemaiah who proved to be a rather foolish individual. He suggested a meeting inside the temple, saying Nehemiah's life was in danger. Either way this would have been bad for Nehemiah, and his cause. Again Nehemiah demonstrates his insight, recognising Shemaiah as a false prophet. If he had gone along with it, Nehemiah would, at best, have looked weak, at worst he would have been accused of desecrating the temple, he would have sinned, for he was not a priest. As usual Nehemiah prays to God, and puts his enemies in God’s hands. So the work continued and the wall was completed.

6:16-19

The nations and Israel’s enemies were afraid, on hearing of the completion of the wall.. They realised that God was helping Israel.The nobles were rather naive and stupid, sending letters to Tobiah. The same sort of thing can happen today within churches. We can have the equivalent of Lenin’s useful idiots. They tried to make out that Tobiah was really a rather good man, when the truth was that he was an enemy of Israel. Some supposedly godly people can lack discernment.