Opposition to God’s Work may Slow His Work

Pray – (1/2 minute)

Read – (2 1/2 minutes) – “Then the peoples around them set out to discourage the people of Judah and make them afraid to go on building. They hired counselors to work against them and frustrate their plans during the entire reign of Cyrus king of Persia and sown to the reign of Darius king of Persia.” (Ezra 4:4-5)
          Passage: 1 Thessalonians 2:13-20

        The people who did not want to see the Temple rebuilt or Jerusalem restored tried to infiltrate the exiles by claiming to worship God and by offering to help. The Jewish leaders recognized that they were not true followers of Jehovah who were under His Covenant and so they did not let fall for the scheme. That caused the opposition to take more deliberate steps to stop the work. They used intimidation, threats, hired antagonists and finally sent a letter to the Persian king who came after Cyrus. The result of all that is recorded by Ezra in 4:23 which says that the Jews were “compelled by force to stop.”

A delay in God’s work is not a denial or defeat of God’s work. In the process of carrying out a vision that God gives a church, there may circumstances or conflicts that were unexpected, but which caused the vision to be delayed. In his letter to the believers in Thessalonica, Paul shared how he wanted to get back to them after having to leave because of persecution after only three weeks. (See Acts 17:1-10) He attributed the delays to the work of Satan, but He didn’t express discouragement or a desire to quit. He looked up in trust and He looked forward to seeing God’s people in that city again. Whenever there is a delay in a vision, let it be a reminder that the vision is big enough for Satan to want to try and stop it and keep serving Christ every day.

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