In my study of the book of Nehemiah, I came across the following thought, which I thought was worth passing on:-

Nehemiah…is a man to admire and to imitate—but be careful! The theme of imitating Bible characters is often mishandled. Bryan Chapell has written of the “deadly Be’s” (“killer Be’s” would have been more vivid), of which the first is sermons that require us to “be like” some figure in the Scripture story. Such sermons summon us to a treadmill life of perpetual role-play that is bound in the end to prove self-defeating, for, as Chapell rightly comments: “Simply telling people to imitate godliness in another without reminding them that anything more than outward conformity must come from God forces them either to despair of spiritual transformation or to deny its need.”

J.I. Packer, A Passion for Faithfulness (quoting Chapell’s Christ-Centred Preaching)