“I (Nehemiah) went to Jerusalem, and after staying there three days I set out during the night with a few others.” ~ Nehemiah 2:11-12a (NIV)

When Nehemiah finally arrives in Jerusalem, his first act of business is to do nothing for three days. 

When he finally gets to Jerusalem 

When he finally gets to the place his heart has been burdened by

When he finally gets to the people his heart has been breaking for

Nehemiah does nothing.

For three days, Nehemiah does nothing and when he finally does something, it’s at night, in secret, completely unnoticed by the people of the city.  Now the Bible doesn’t tell us exactly why Nehemiah waited these three days, but let’s have a little fun and consider some possibilities here:

Could it simply have been a matter of sheer exhaustion?  The trip from Susa to Jerusalem would have covered about 950 miles.  That’s 950 miles riding on a horse or a donkey or a mule or maybe on foot.  Regardless, it must have been terribly long and uncomfortable.  After traveling that far and that long, maybe he was just exhausted and needed to rest.  This is completely plausible.

Or could this be a foreshadowing of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ?  After all, Jesus is the better Nehemiah, renewing the hearts and soul of humanity, not simply the bricks and stones of a city.  Is this what the three-day wait is all about?  Maybe.  Surely Nehemiah himself wouldn’t have seen his waiting in this way, but we need to remember that the Holy Spirit is the Author behind the authors of scripture (2 Timothy 3:16).  Certainly, the Holy Spirit intends more for and from the Scriptures than even the human authors themselves intended or understood.  Could Nehemiah’s three-day wait be an anticipatory foreshadowing of the death and resurrection of Jesus?  It’s possible.

Or perhaps there’s a third option we need to consider?

So, it took 3-4 months to speak with the king.  He had to wait for that opportunity to open up. It also took 3-4 moths to get to Jerusalem.  Again, he had to wait before he could actually get started. At every turn, no matter how much Nehemiah may have wanted to rush into what’s next, he’s had to go much slower than his passion and desire to help would have liked. 

What Nehemiah is learning is that sometimes we’re not ready to step into it until we’ve first sat with it. 

We’re not ready to step into it (whatever ‘it’ is) until we’ve first sat in it – until we’ve sat with it. 

That thing you want to do

That dream you want to chase

That desire you feel is from God

That burden you have to help others

That passion you have to get involved

Whatever it is that you feel God calling you to do

sometimes we need to sit in it before we step into it 

because until we’ve sat with it, we'll never stick with it.

Sitting with it creates in us the sticking power we need for the work we're doing to be more than just a momentary good idea or an altruistic fleeting feeling.

My kids love waffles – it’s something we have almost every single morning for breakfast (To be clear, we’re talking toaster-friendly frozen waffles.  We don’t have homemade-waffle-kind-of-time in the mornings!)

Anyway, to borrow a pop-culture kids’ way of phrasing this, if you give a kid a waffle… they’ll have to have it covered in syrup.  And if you give a kid a syrup-covered waffle, syrup is bound to find its way onto a variety of surfaces. 

The counter.  The kitchen table.  The couch.  Their clothes.  Their faces.  Why this strange sudden talk about waffles and syrup you ask?  The longer the syrup sits, the stickier it gets. 

The longer it sits on the couch, the table, or my kid’s face, the stickier it gets and the stickier it gets, the harder it is to remove. 

Dreams, passions, calling – they’re like syrup – the longer you sit with it and in it, the stickier it gets.

Our capacity to stick with the work God has called us to is directly related to our willingness to sit with our hunger, even before the work has been officially started. 

God didn’t rush Nehemiah into what was next. 

When Nehemiah was broken over the condition of Israel, God didn’t rush Nehemiah into a conversation with the King – He let him sit in his burden and brokenness so that his pain would not simply be a reaction to sad news, but an unrestrained fire burning within him, compelling him to get involved. 

When Nehemiah got the opportunity to go to Israel, God didn’t supernaturally transport Nehemiah from Susa to Jerusalem to expedite the process.  Instead, he let Nehemiah travel the long way, the slow way, the normal way, so that all the pain and chafing and soreness associated with that kind of travel might prepare him for the intensity and the work that was yet before him.

As much as we may not like it, today’s waiting is preparing us for tomorrow’s work.  Today’s patience is preparing us for tomorrow’s problems.  Today’s perseverance is preparing us for tomorrow’s pain.  Today's test is preparing us for tomorrow's trouble.

Sometimes you’ve got to sit in it before you step into it, so that when you do finally step into it, you've got the grit and drive necessary to stick with it.

If God didn't rush Nehemiah into his work, chances are, He's not going to rush you through whatever it is you're going through either.  So, here's to becoming more and more 'sticky' for the glory of God and the sake of the world.