Over the last few weeks we have been studying a few of the Old Testament books; Daniel and Nehemiah to be exact. There is so much information and so much that these books have to offer. We could spend weeks and weeks on each of these books and only scratch the surface of the knowledge that they have to offer… Yet we spent 4 days on Daniel and a mere 1 and a half days on Nehemiah.
The book Daniel speaks to few topics: God’s miracles and strength, God’s sovereignty, and even God’s prophetic plans for his people’s future. The last of which we studied more in depth. It is inspiring to see how God’s plans have unfolded, yet chilling and empowering to see his plans for the future.
Nehemiah continually points to God’s sovereign plan as it goes through Israel’s progress of rebuilding itself after being exiled for 70 years. It is encouraging to see the dedication and all the work that went into the rebuilding; it was much more than just building a wall. They encountered many trials along the way.
With both of these books the thing that stands out to me the most is the leaders themselves. There is so much we can learn from the leadership of both Daniel and Nehemiah. Daniel was faithful to God despite facing death, Nehemiah not only lead the entire build of the wall, but also governed the people during the process and dealt with problems as they arose.
Both Daniel and Nehemiah were men of prayer. That’s where everything should always start; on your knees before your father. Good leaders know this and live by this. Daniel was thrown into a lion’s den because of this, yet at the same time was spared because he was faithful to follow God in prayer.
As you read these books we can see that a huge quality of a leader is that they take responsibility of the people that they are leading. Nehemiah weeps for days as asks God for forgiveness for the sins that “we” have made, not just they. Daniel prays to God asking for God to remove the punishment that he knows is rightly there and that again “we” have committed. Humility is a necessary character of a leader.
There is much more to these books and to talk about them would take lots and lots of time. I encourage everyone to read these two books of the bible (I would recommend starting with Nehemiah because Daniel gets a bit confusing with all the prophecies.) If you want to know how to be a leader study from these two men who were some of the best leaders who we can learn from today