Anxiety can come into our lives though all sorts of avenues. One of the key ways it can creep in though facing opposition. We can hear the negative voices around us and begin to believe them. We can second guess our own thoughts, efforts and plans simply because of what someone else said. Often it is too easy to listen to the voices of the doubters, the haters, and the plain old enemies. So what do you do when you face anxiety because you have listened too much to the voices of your detractors?

Go back and you remember the vision. You remember the plans that were put in your heart, not by your own ambition or effort, but by almighty God himself. You remind yourself that if God is for it… does it matter whose voice is against it?

And the officials did not know where I had gone or what I was doing, and I had not yet told the Jews, the priests, the nobles, the officials, and the rest who were to do the work. Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer derision.” And I told them of the hand of my God that had been upon me for good, and also of the words that the king had spoken to me. And they said, “Let us rise up and build.” So they strengthened their hands for the good work. But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite servant and Geshem the Arab heard of it, they jeered at us and despised us and said, “What is this thing that you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king?” Then I replied to them, “The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build, but you have no portion or right or claim in Jerusalem.” (Nehemiah 2:16-20 ESV)

This is what Nehemiah does. When the contemporary leaders of the territories surrounding Jerusalem were pressing in on him, saying that they would get his permissions revoked and that he had no right to rebuild a wall (before a brick was even put on top of another). He didn’t appeal to his own courage, he didn’t appeal to his relationship to the king; he appealed to the will of almighty God. He knew God was in it and therefore it was going to happen. There was no room for anxiety.

So when you face opposition (and you will) be sure to press into God. For years I have been praying the Lord’s prayer (Matthew 6:9-11) as a way of helping me take the focus off the struggles in front of me and placing it on God’s plan and purpose for my life. If he has given you a vision or a dream to reach others, then be sure that He will deliver you, your job is to stay humble and stay close. Make sure that all along the way you are pointing others to the work that God will do and is doing. To take credit for it yourself to stumble and fall before you have reached the finish line.