(3) They made real sacrifices for their work. It must have been a sore inconvenience to these men to leave their own occupations and to labour on the wall; but they laboured night and day till the wall rose from its ruins. Oh, that we had more of this spirit in the Church of God! Would that we knew better how to give to Him so as to pinch ourselves; to give our time, our money, our painstaking, our real self-denying work, in order to glorify God, and show that we live not unto ourselves, but unto Him that died for us and rose again. II. THEIR FAITH. This showed itself in three ways. (1) In prayer. Nehemiah was a man of prayer. When any trouble arose, his heart turned as if by an holy instinct to God, and so, when Tobiah mocked their efforts, Nehemiah gave no rough answer, but he turned his heart upwards and said, “Hear, O our God, for we are despised.” {52a} How much bitter strife would be avoided in the world if men acted like Nehemiah, and, instead of retorting, spread out their provocations before God. But the conduct of the opponents soon turned from mockery to war, and there was a plan to attack the rising walls. But the attack was met just in the same way as the insult. In both cases he gave himself to prayer. I cannot imagine a better illustration of the praying believer than the words in verse 9, “Nevertheless we made our prayer unto our God, and set a watch against them day and night.” They heard of the conspiracy, and at once spread the intelligence before God; but, having done so, they did not consider that prayer superseded effort, but day and night they set their watch on the walls. Had they watched without praying, they would have been trusting to their own forethought; and had they prayed without watching, they would have tempted God to leave them. But they watched and they prayed, and they prayed and they watched, and so they acted in the spirit of the words in aftertimes spoken to us, “Watch and Pray.” {52b} (2) Their faith showed itself also in the recognition of what God had done for them. Faith not only asks God’s help, but acknowledges it. It gives Him thanks for His action as well as asks Him to act; so when the danger was past we find Nehemiah ascribing it all to the good hand of God on his efforts. He did not say, “When we had defeated their plans,” but “When God had brought their counsel to nought.” {53}