Good planning and hard work lead to prosperity, but hasty shortcuts lead to poverty. (Proverbs 21:5)
How difficult it is to find a person who thinks first and then acts! Most of us usually do the opposite. Equally difficult is helping people maintain proper priorities and to use time wisely.
I admire Nehemiah because he was a man who thought before he acted and kept his priorities clearly in view. He didn’t bring a group of people into Jerusalem and immediately have them start to stack up bricks and stones, mix mortar, and erect a wall. He spent four months in uninterrupted thought before doing anything. He thought through the vision before he ever shared it with anyone else.
Thinking is hard work. Don’t kid yourself; coming up with a good plan is usually far more difficult than carrying it out. Leaders who don’t plan carefully and who shoot from the hip miss the target, wounding others in the process.
Thinking calls for projecting. By backing off and thinking through a plan, the leader is able to travel down his or her projected path intelligently and also consider future inevitabilities while it is still safe.
Leaders who expect to be respected and followed must, first and foremost, be thinkers.
The people of Jerusalem determined to do things in the order of their importance. First things were to come first. They formally declared their dependence. In effect, they developed a new set of priorities, which they declared in writing.
Now because of all this we are making an agreement in writing; and on the sealed document are the names of our leaders, our Levites, and our priests. (Nehemiah 9:38 NASB)
This is the action of a people who are serious about putting first things first.
They drove a literary stake into the ground that day, which became their rallying point. They drafted and ratified their declaration of dependence and distinction—their constitution. It established their purpose and values, saying, as it were: “We don’t care if anyone else in the world lives by this. We will live by it. It will be our guide.”
I want to point out that promises are fine but, as fallen creatures who are given to weakness and second-guessing, it helps if we document our priorities.
