A Shovel and a Sword
Calvary Church with Skip Heitzig Audio Podcast
Skip Heitzig
4.8 • 631 Ratings
🗓️ 1 June 2025
⏱️ 51 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
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Summary
In life, you don’t get to choose between building and battling—you’re called to do both. In Nehemiah 4, we discover how to keep building the future while fighting off the fear, distraction, and opposition that threaten to stop us. Whether it’s clearing the rubble of your past, guarding the vulnerable places in your life, or learning to trust God as your ultimate defender, we are called to stay strong in the fight and faithful in the work. Don’t drop your shovel. Don’t sheathe your sword. The wall goes up when you show up.
I. Buried in the Rubble (v. 10)
II. Threats in the Shadows (vv. 11-12)
III. Guard the Gaps (vv. 13-18)
IV. Backup on the Battlefield (vv. 19-23)
Talk with God: Meditate on Hebrews 4:12 and ask the Lord for the discipline and courage to take up your sword—the Word—as you step onto the battlefield each day.
Talk with others: Go to battle in prayer for your Connect Group or circle of believers and ask them how you can guard the gaps and provide backup for them this week.
Talk with kids: How do the Commandments teach us to love God and people?
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Calvary Church with Skip Heitzig. We're so glad you joined us today. As believers, |
| 0:07.5 | we mourn the darkness and decay around us, knowing that a city in shambles reveals more than broken walls. |
| 0:16.4 | It mirrors the moral and spiritual condition of its people. In the book of Nehemiah, we find a template for taking ground and responding in faith and |
| 0:25.9 | obedience rather than fear or despair. |
| 0:28.7 | This message with Pastor Skip will help you transform your grief for a broken world into |
| 0:34.7 | a stepping stone to repentance, prayer, and action. |
| 0:50.5 | Good morning and welcome to church. |
| 0:52.9 | Who's happy to be in the house today, studying the Word of God. |
| 0:58.1 | Go ahead and pre-mark your Bibles to Nehemiah chapter 4. |
| 1:01.2 | We're going to be in verses 10 through 23 this morning for a message I've titled |
| 1:05.1 | A Shovel and a Sword. |
| 1:08.0 | But as we open up, can we just come to the Lord and ask him in prayer to take what we have given |
| 1:14.2 | sacrificially and use it to do something we could never do on our own? I think anytime we give, |
| 1:19.9 | we need to do it in prayer. We need to come before the Lord and ask him to use what he's given us |
| 1:25.4 | because he gives us what he gives us in order to use it for his |
| 1:30.5 | glory. And so I think it's important that we ask the giver of all good gifts to use what we have |
| 1:36.3 | sacrificially given to make an impact. Lord, we thank you for the opportunity we have to partner |
| 1:41.7 | with what you're doing in our city. Lord, so many of us come in prayer and we ask you |
| 1:47.3 | to bless these things that we're doing, these things that we're involved with. But Lord, |
| 1:52.0 | when we get involved with what matters to you, we know that it's already blessed. And so, Lord, |
| 1:58.1 | I pray that you would take the finances that we have sacrificial given, Lord, |
| 2:01.8 | and you would use them to make an impact in our community and our city, that as people come to |
... |
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