I Cannot Come Down by R. C. PORTER

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Dec 24, 1914

“I Cannot Come Down”

By R. C. PORTER

NEHEMIAH had learned the true secret of loyalty to a great cause. He knew the worthlessness of worldly considerations in comparison with the value of an eternal life of loyalty to God. All worldly methods employed to dissuade him from the great purpose which controlled all his conduct, seemed to him cheap and unworthy of consideration when compared with the great issues of eternity which he cast in the balance against them.

A Well-Organized Work

Nehemiah so organized the work of rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem that the entire wall was covered by workmen, and all parts were completed about the same time. Nehemiah, chapters 2 to 4. “The people had a mind to work,” and every man built over against his own house, so a quick work was possible. Although the work was done in “troublous times,” it was accomplished in fifty-two days. The people were not working for wages and counting the hours to see when their work would close. “So we labored in the work: and half of them held the spears from the rising of the morning till the stars appeared.” Neh. 4:21. Nehemiah’s experience illustrates the advantages of a thoroughly organized work, and is a standing rebuke to those independent spirits who refuse to cooperate in the organized plans for the advancement of the Lord’s work. May we not learn from his experience that our work can be finished only when all parts of the world have shared equally the opportunity of hearing the glad tidings of a soon-coming Saviour? Should we not distribute the repairers of the breach in the law of God proportionately throughout the entire world as speedily as possible for the finishing of the work?

Meeting Opposition

We have here a very familiar experience of opposition to the Lord’s work, and a good example set for meeting it. Their enemies laughed them to scorn, despised them, and called them rebels against the government. Neh. 2:19. Then they scoffed, saying, “Even that which they build, if a fox go up, he shall even break down their stone wall.” Neh. 4:3.

When laughing and scoffing proved unavailing, they conspired together to come and stop the work by force. Verses 7, 8. But it was the Lord’s work, and they did not stop it. The last resort was to stop it by intrigue. What they had failed to accomplish by laughter, scoffs, and threats, they attempted to accomplish by strategy. Four times messengers were sent inviting Nehemiah to join them in a friendly council, as they wished to shield Israel from rumors that the latter were contemplating a rebellion against the king. If the Jews would meet them in council in one of “their villages in the plain of Ono,” they would advise them as friends how to escape the displeasure of the king. Neh. 6:1-7.

But Nehemiah was a man of discernment, and he was not entrapped by their fair speeches. He reveals the secret of their proposal as follows: “But they thought to do me mischief. And I sent messengers unto them, saying, I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down: why should the work cease, whilst I leave it, and come down to you? Yet they sent unto me four times after this sort; and I answered them after the same manner. . . . Then I sent unto him, saying, There are no such things done as thou sayest, but thou feignest them out of thine own heart. For they all made us afraid, saying, Their hands shall be weakened from the work, that it be not done. Now therefore, O God, strengthen my hands. Afterward I came unto the house of Shemaiah the son of Delaiah the son of Mehetabeel, who was shut up; and he said, Let us meet together in the house of God, within the temple, and let us shut the doors of the temple: for they will come to slay thee; yea, in the night will they come to slay thee. And I said, Should such a man as I flee? and who is there, that, being as I am, would go into the temple to save his life? I will not go in. And, lo, I perceived that God had not sent him; but that he pronounced this prophecy against me: for Tobiah and Sanballat had hired him. Therefore was he hired, that I should be afraid, and do so, and sin, and that they might have matter for an evil report, that they might reproach me.” Verses 2-13. Who among those who have accepted

the special message for our time, has not been confronted by similar proposals and for the same purpose? But the end is not yet. The climax of the endeavor to stop the work is yet to come. The one object of all Satan’s opposition and strategic scheming is to weaken the hands of those proclaiming the third angel’s message. Our safety lies in answering, as did that godly man of old, when by laughter, threats, or intrigue, efforts are made to deter us: “I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down: why should the work cease, whilst I leave it, and come down to you?”

To leave the Lord’s work, which is as much higher than any other as heaven is higher than the earth, for any such unworthy considerations as are here mentioned, is to come down to the common level of worldly wisdom in our plans and methods of work in the cause of God. May our eyes ever be so enlightened that we may discern spiritual things with spiritual vision, and respond to all worldly or satanic endeavors to turn us aside from the great work of finishing the proclamation of the third angel’s message in all the world in the closing hours of this generation, in these words: “I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down.” R. C. PORTER.