But number two, look what the Bible says in verse two,
"Wherefore the king said unto me,
"'Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick?'"
This is nothing else but sorrow of heart.
Look at this last phrase, "Then I was very sore afraid."
The second thing I wanna show you about Nehemiah
is that Nehemiah overcame his fear with boldness, okay?
It's not that he had no fear,
and he wasn't even just a little bit afraid,
he was very sore afraid,
and yet he still is gonna boldly speak to the king
and get exactly what he needs from the king.
He overcame his fear with boldness.
You see, great leaders, great Christians,
it's not that they don't have any fear,
it's that they overcome their fear with boldness.
Every single one of us,
the first time we went out soul-winning,
was scared to death.
I remember probably the first year of soul-winning,
literally, going soul-winning every week or twice a week
for like a year.
I would say I was scared walking up to the first door,
even after I've been doing it for six months,
nine months, 10 months.
Probably took me like a year to get over that fear.
And I can just remember knocking on the first door
and just wishing that people would not be home
because I don't want anybody to be home.
I don't want to face anybody because I was so nervous.
And obviously getting up to preach.
I was super nervous.
Even when I started Faithful Word,
I was still nervous when I would get up to preach
for the first few months.
The first time I did a wedding, I was super nervous.
The first time I did a funeral, I was super nervous.
That's life.
But, you gotta overcome your fear
to do what God wants you to do.
Pray for boldness, right?
The Bible says, when they had prayed,
the place where they were assembled together was shaken,
and it says they were all filled with the Holy Ghost,
and they spake the Word of God with boldness.
So pray for boldness, overcome your fear with boldness.
It's not that we, as leaders, or successful soul winners,
men and women, boys and girls,
that get the job done, it's not that we have no fear,
it's just that we've overcome that fear.
Through the power of the Holy Spirit.
And because we've pushed ourselves to do the hard thing,
and not just, oh, it's too hard, I'm too scared, forget it.
No, you gotta overcome your fear with boldness.
And do it anyway, I mean, think about Gideon.
You know, God tells Gideon what he needs to do,
and he says, if you're scared,
bring Fura, your servant, with you,
and then the next verse is like,
he's bringing the servant with him.
If you're scared, do X, Y, Z, and then he does X, Y, Z,
'cause he's scared, right?
People in the Bible are human,
and they were subject to like passions as we are,
yet they got the job done through the power of God.