Watch and Pray (Nehemiah 4:9)

2025-07-03

Nevertheless we made our prayer unto our God, and set a watch against them day and night, because of them. (Nehemiah 4:9)

When the men returned to Jerusalem to rebuild the walls, they were confronted with many adversaries that were trying to stop their work. They had to both watch for marauders and pray to the Lord that they would be delivered of them. The Lord commands us to do the same in the New Testament, not being so presumptuous as to our own deliverance being so automatic.

The Lord Jesus tells us, “Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is” (Mark 13:33). We do not know the hour of His return. We are told to walk very circumspectly, “Lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping.”

He continues, “And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares. For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man” (Luke 21:34-36). Should we presumptuously assume that we will always be accounted worthy to stand before Him on His Day? It does not sound like it.

But soon after telling His disciples this, Jesus had to tell them the same thing on the eve of His arrest. “And he cometh, and findeth them sleeping, and saith unto Peter, Simon, sleepest thou? couldest not thou watch one hour? Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak” (Mark 14:37-38). Since the flesh is weak, we must walk always in the Spirit. We see that the three disciples fell asleep and were not ready when Jesus was arrested.

Again, the Spirit says that with the Word of God, we should be “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints” (Ephesians 6:18). And again, “Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving” (Colossians 4:2). And again, “But the end of all things is at hand: be ye therefore sober, and watch unto prayer” (1 Peter 4:7).

We watch and pray because we must be ready for His coming. It sounds like it makes a big difference for a believer to watch and pray than not to do so.

Again, we read, “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching” (Hebrews 10:25). As His Day gets closer, we are told to gather with the other disciples and encourage each other to persevere.

Again, the Spirit says, “Gather yourselves together” and “Seek ye the LORD, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment; seek righteousness, seek meekness: it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the LORD’S anger” (Zephaniah 2:1, 3). Can we be so presumptuous that we are “accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man”?

The Lord Jesus says, “Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth” (Revelation 3:10). Those who will keep the word of His patience are delivered. Do the Laodiceans have the same confidence?

It looks like we must continue to watch for His coming and pray, not taking our eyes off the Lord until the very end.