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We're going to read another statement
of faith in Haggai 2, and we're going to read verses 4 through
9. This is the third to last book of the Old Testament. We've
made major progress. Hear the Word of God. Yet now be strong, Zerubbabel,
says the Lord, and be strong, Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the
high priest, and be strong, O you people of the land, says the
Lord, and work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts.
According to the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of
Egypt, so my spirit remains among you. Do not fear. For thus says
the Lord of hosts, once more, it is a little while, I will
shake heaven and earth, the sea and dry land, and I will shake
all nations, and they shall come to the desire of all nations,
and I will fill this temple with glory, says the Lord of hosts.
The silver is mine, the gold is mine, says the Lord of hosts.
The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former,
says the Lord of hosts. And in this place I will give
peace, says the Lord of hosts." And all God's people said, Amen. Father, we thank You for Your
Word. And as we study it, may You give us insights, even things
that I did not mention as we're reading through it, that we might
glory in You and the treasures that You have stored up for us.
Bless this preaching in Jesus' name. Amen. I was once a member
of a church that took on huge debt in order to be able to have
a very attractive and welcoming building. And I will admit, it
was a gorgeous building. But I was very, very nervous
about the debt, and I disapproved of the debt that they took on.
And there were actually quite a number of members that were
fearful enough about this debt that they left the church, which
of course added financial pressure for what they were under. And
because this pastor had previously been regularly preaching that
tithing is unbiblical, We really need to give out of love. He
could not depend on regular tithes So he had to preach on love and
he preached on love a lot You only love the Lord 10%? I mean,
Jesus said we need to be giving 50% of what we own to others. And of course, it was a misapplication
of the passage where Jesus said, if you have a brother who is
naked and destitute and you have two shirts, yes, give him your
one shirt, extra shirt. But that's a wild leap to go
from a naked, destitute brother that you're giving 50% of what
you owe to, which makes perfect sense, right, to going to say
you need to give 50% of what your savings are to a very wealthy
church that just had super bad stewardship. Well, they also
preached from Hagia, I remember very distinctly, saying that
you really ought not to be preoccupied with your own homes until our
church is built. You know, what that church did
is being done all across the states and pastors justify it
by saying Haggai 1-4 does after all say, is it time for you yourselves
to dwell in your paneled houses and this temple to lie in ruins?
Build a temple, then you can build your houses. And my response
is, the church is not the temple, right? But anyway, one website
that I looked at on Wednesday said the prophet Haggai should
be the patron saint of parish fundraising. And I say, no, Haggai
should be the patron saint of a kingdom vision. That's what
he is about. Haggai chapter one is not about
making the kingdom of God the top priority and everything else
is outside the kingdom. You can do whatever you want
with that. That's not the point. The temple was the symbol of
God's lordship over absolutely every area of life. So yes, Haggai
1.8 says, go up to the mountains and bring wood and build the
temple, that I may take pleasure in it and be glorified. But the
application Haggai makes is that God's glory should be our passion,
not our own self-seeking glory. God's pleasure must be what we
seek, not our own independent pleasure. We must be seeking
God's kingdom and God will take care of us with all of these
other things when we put God's kingdom vision as our driving
concern. That's exactly what Jesus said,
seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all
these things shall be added to you. And so, as we go through
this book, I think you're going to see it. It's not a sacred-secular
dichotomy. He is saying, this is a test
of your vision, whether you have the kingdom. By the way, chapter
1, that's the main emphasis, is kingdom stewardship. And then
that gets applied to the future in chapter 2. So, that's the
way we're going to look at this. Now, sometimes I think it is
helpful to get a little bit of historical background, and if
you turn to Ezra chapter 4, I'm going to show what that background
is. Ezra chapter 4, and beginning
to read at verse 1. Now, when the adversaries of
Judah and Benjamin heard that the descendants of the captivity
were building the temple of the Lord God of Israel, they came
to Zerubbabel and the heads of the father's houses and said
to them, let us build with you, for we seek your God as you do.
And we have sacrificed to him since the days of Esarhaddon,
king of Assyria, who brought us here. Now, Zerubbabel and
Joshua the high priests response seems almost rude when you don't
understand the context. They're rejecting these people
who want to be a part of what they're doing. They want to help
them build this temple. But they understood two things,
and the first was that the Samaritans were theological liberals who
were trying to infiltrate and undermine. It was really a demonic
desire that was driving them, and we'll see that in a bit.
And then second, God was simply a mascot for them, not their
Lord. Maybe if we do a little bit for
God, He will then give us all of our desires, right? So they're
not seeing God's kingdom as their passion. They've got their own
kingdom that they hope God will get on board in supporting. So
it's a totally different attitude. Anyway, the leaders say no in
verse 3. But Zerubbabel and Jeshua, and that's just another spelling
for Joshua, the high priest that Haggai talks about, but Zerubbabel
and Jeshua and the rest of the heads of the father's houses
of Israel said to them, you may do nothing with us to build a
house for our God, but we alone will build the Lord God of Israel
as King Cyrus, the king of Persia has commanded us. Now when infiltration
did not work, Then they begin to explicitly, very overtly and
outwardly oppose the work. And that shows where their hearts
truly were at. Their hearts were not interested
in serving God and being stewards of the kingdom. Verses four through
five. Then the people of the land tried to discourage the
people of Judah. They troubled them in building
and hired counselors against them to frustrate their purpose.
All the days of Cyrus, king of Persia, even until the reign
of Darius, king of Persia. So this opposition went from
536 B.C. all the way up to 520 B.C. when Haggai and Zechariah, the
prophets, came onto the scene. So this is 16 years of opposition,
16 years in which the temple has not been built despite the
fact God had told the people this is really something you
ought to pursue. Ezra 5, 1-2 says, Then the prophet
Haggai and Zechariah, the son of Ido, prophets, prophesied
to the Jews who were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of
the God of Israel, who was over them. So Zerubbabel, the son
of Shealtiel, and Jeshua, the son of Josedach, rose up and
began to build the house of God, which is in Jerusalem. And the
prophets of God were with them, helping them. Those two verses
that I just read pretty much summarize the whole of Haggai
chapter 1. And Haggai expands upon that. So let's take a look at Haggai
1 verse 2. By the way, English pronunciation
can be Haggai. The Hebrew pronunciation is Haggai.
Haggai. So you might find me alternating
between those two pronunciations. Either one really is appropriate.
So Haggai 1 verse 2, thus speaks the Lord of hosts saying, this
people says the time has not come, the time that the Lord's
house should be built. Now in this verse, he identifies
himself as Yehoah of hosts. All capital letters, Lord is
Yehoah and what a great name to stir up the post-exilic community. Yehovah is the covenant name
reminding them that they were not saved to pursue their own
interests. That's the way a lot of Christians think, oh good,
we've got a free ticket to heaven, now I can go about my own interests. No, we have been saved to serve
Him. We are in covenant with Him.
We are bond slaves to Him, and we must be kingdom-oriented,
whether we're brushing our teeth, building a house like the younger
Jesus no doubt did as a carpenter, or engaging in admin work like
Joshua I mean Joseph the patriarch did. Everything that we do must
be kingdom oriented. And so the temple really is the
throne of God. It's his palace. The throne was
actually in the Holy of Holies, but it's his palace and it represents
his lordship over absolutely every area of life. Marriages,
food, whatever. So really, by refusing to build
the temple, they were in effect denying His Lordship, but they
were also making this division between the sacred and the secular.
They were saying, look, we've got to survive, we've got to
work on our own things, and eventually we'll get around to working on
the spiritual. For them, they thought it was
a matter of timing and priorities. And God said, no, it's a matter
of focus. You have lost your kingdom focus. The rest of his name, Yehoah
of hosts means Yehoah of armies. Even though they had faced formidable
opposition from the enemies all around them trying to get them
to stop, they should remember that God has armies, angelic
armies that can back up his people if they are willing to obey him
and willing to follow him. Now they had come up with spiritual
sounding excuses. The verse says, the time has
not come, the time that the Lord's house should be built. So again,
they're claiming it's an issue of timing, not disobedience.
And with all of the enemies opposing them, hey, even the emperor is
opposing us. This is obviously not the time
to be working on the temple. When God providentially opens
things up, yeah, we're going to get around to building on
the temple. They planned to obey when it
was feasible to obey God, which means that they were pragmatists,
right? We have similar spiritual sounding
excuses for why we do not obey God in many areas of life, politics
being one of them. It won't work in our context,
is what people think. It's not the right time to apply
the Bible to politics. Why? Because people just won't
accept it. We don't outright disobey God. We delay. We put
it off to a theoretical future. We have spiritual-sounding excuses. But Haggai is about to show that
when our focus is upon God's kingdom, nothing should take
precedence over Him. Let's read verses 3 through 6.
Then the word of the Lord came by Haggai the prophet, saying,
is it time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses,
and this temple to lie in ruins? Now therefore, thus says the
Lord of hosts, consider your ways. You have sown much and
bring in little. You eat, but do not have enough.
You drink, but are not filled with drink. You clothe yourselves,
but no one is warm. And he who earns wages, earns
wages to put into a bag with holes. Part of their prioritization
had to do with time and money, and God was blowing away both.
All of the time invested was lost. All of the money that invested
was lost. And Haggai said when they were
responding, hey, we'll get around to the temple when we can afford
it. And he said, you got it backwards. The reason you can't afford it
is you're not getting around to the temple. You're not obeying
God. You're not seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.
So he's pitting his house against their house, same word, beit
in the Hebrew. But he's pitting those two against
each other because he's in effect saying that if you're not willing
to obey me in the building of my house, it's extremely unlikely
that you're serving me in the building of your own houses,
right? It's a test of stewardship. And since they were not faithful
stewards, he was not gonna entrust them with more stuff. Now, since
we are not commanded to build the temple today, we don't have
a literal temple, right? Let me give you a modern equivalent.
We are commanded to tithe as a test of our stewardship, and
interestingly, Malachi, who was also a post-exilic prophet. He uses the issue of tithing
in exactly the same way that Haggai does on the temple. I've talked to people who have
said that they would start tithing once they earn more money, once
they can afford it. And I've told them, you've got
it completely backwards. The tithe is a test of whether
we see everything that we own as belonging to God. It's not
an issue that God owns 10%. We own the rest and can do whatever
we want with it. If we don't tithe, it is unlikely
that we are stewards of the rest of our money, of any of the money
that we work. And Malachi will bring the same
message, saying that because the people refused to tithe,
they were cursed. He concluded bring all of the
tithes into the storehouse and prove me now in this says the
Lord of hosts if I will not open for you the windows of heaven
and pour out for you such a Blessing that there will not be room enough
to receive it. He's basically saying when you
pass my integrity check, the tithe on finances, I will bless
you with finances. I'll just pour out blessing into
your life. The Sabbath is another test of
whether we have a kingdom orientation. Now, last Sunday, Gary quoted
from Joseph, Joey Piper's book on the Sabbath, And Joey Piper
said this, Sabbath keeping promotes stewardship of time in the same
way that tithing promotes stewardship of money. Both are simply tests
of whether everything we own is being used as a stewardship
trust for God. And so chapter one, really the
essence of that chapter, is an accusation that these Jews were
not acting as stewards. They were not seeking God's kingdom.
They were building their own independent kingdom. They were
centered on their own independent pleasure and seeking their own
independent glory. And let's read verses 7 through
11 that gives his powerful message to them. Thus says the Lord of
hosts, consider your ways. Go up to the mountains and bring
wood and build the temple that I may take pleasure in it and
be glorified, says the Lord. You looked for much, but indeed
it came to little. And when you brought it home,
I blew it away. Why, says the Lord of hosts. because of my
house that is in ruins, while every one of you runs to his
own house. Therefore, the heavens above you withhold the dew, and
the earth withholds its fruit. For I called for a drought on
the land and on the mountains, on the grain and the new wine
and the oil, on whatever the ground brings forth, on men and
livestock, and in all the labor of your hands. So he brings this
powerful message into their lives And almost immediately they repent
they all repent and they adjust their attitudes and god's word
Has a way of doing this. We read this in the catechism
earlier today God ordinarily works through the preaching of
the word and it has a powerful effect upon our lives giving
us Enthusiasm to search building our faith. That's why we should
be under the preaching of the word on a regular basis and so
in verses 12 through 15, we see their reaction. Then Zerubbabel,
the son of Shealtiel, and Joshua, the son of Jehozadak, the high
priest, with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice
of the Lord their God, and the words of Haggai, the prophet,
as the Lord their God had sent them. And the people feared the
presence of the Lord. Then Haggai, the Lord's messenger,
spoke the Lord's message to the people, saying, I am with you,
says the Lord. So the Lord stirred up the spirit
of Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel. of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua
the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the spirit of all
the remnant of the people. And they came and worked on the
house of the Lord of hosts, their God, on the twenty-fourth day
of the sixth month in the second year of King Darius." I'm just
going to point out briefly, if you look on the back side of
your outlines, you will see that this whole first chapter is arranged
as a chiasm beginning and ending with a date. And when you get
into the Hebrew, I put the Hebrew to the right of that. It is quite
detailed and quite beautiful, the parallelisms that are in
there. And I forgot to put Christology
and the keys in your book, but yesterday I did put it onto the
online version, so eventually it'll be there. But anyway, if
you go back to your chiasm chart, you'll see that the center point
of it is verse eight. Verse 8, seeking God's kingdom,
God's glory, and God's pleasure. That is what should consume our
life. That is what we should be passionate
about. That's what should bring us the greatest delight. And
this message of chapter 1 is not just to individuals. If you
look at verse 1 of chapter 1, you will see this was addressed
to the church and to the state. Let's read that. In the second
year of King Darius, in the sixth month, on the first day of the
month, the word of the Lord came by Haggai the prophet to Zerubbabel,
the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the
son of Jehozadak, the high priest, saying, so Zerubbabel was the
governor of the state and Joshua was the high priest representing
the old covenant church. And the point is that God's Word
must govern all of life and all people. When civil magistrates
are consumed with God's glory, seek His kingdom, take pleasure
in bringing God pleasure, God will prosper the work of their
hands like nothing else. But when, as they currently are
doing, they're seeking their own glory, building their own
kingdom, seeking their own pleasure, God can blow away the work of
their hands. I mean, it gives you a totally
different perspective on politics. It makes you no longer satisfied
with conservative victories if God is left out. It should grieve
us to the core of our being when God is left out of anything,
even out of politics. So, we must long for more and
more of God's kingdom and law and politics, and work for more
of God's kingdom and law. And the same goes, by the way,
for churches and families. Each government is accountable
to live their lives to God, and so chapter one really is a call
to stewardship for all of life. Now, you've figured out by now
from Gary's sermons that this whole year we're going to keep
bringing up from time to time the subject of stewardship, right?
And I would really encourage you to take seriously some of
the resources that Gary and I provide for you. But the temple was simply
a test of whether they had steward's hearts. So that's the end of
chapter one. Chapter two begins about a month later, and it would
be another four years before the temple would be completed.
But already a month later, there are people who were discouraged
and who are giving up. And what's even worse, these
guys are talking other people into being discouraged. They're
just slowing down the whole work. They were old people who remembered
what the Temple of Solomon used to look like before it was torn
down. And they're thinking to themselves, and they're saying
it out loud, oh, this is never going to be as good as Solomon's
temple. And there's no way we could complete this anyway. Think
of how long it took Solomon. And he was a multi-trillionaire. He had all of the money. There's
no way we can do this. We are so weak. They came up
with all kinds of reasons why they should not undertake this
project. As Zachariah worded it, They had, quote, despised
the day of small things, Zechariah 4 verse 10. And so Haggai has
to prophesy in order to encourage these people, hey, your labors
in the Lord are not in vain. Not only is this temple going
to be an incredibly glorious temple in the future, but it's
actually going to merge into Messiah's temple, which will
be far more glorious than any earthly temple. This is going
to be very similar to Ezekiel's merging from the literal temple
of Zerubbabel into something that's obviously not literal.
It's pointing to the temple in the New Covenant. But anyway,
he's telling them their labors in the Lord are not vain. Now
you'll notice that verses one through nine of chapter two are
almost a complete chiasm. It's missing the second A, the
date, but really the second A is simply the beginning of the next
grouping. And you will see this frequently
in Hebrew literature, that there's an interconnection between different
parts by doing that. So there's a sense in which it
is a complete chiasm. The two A parts, are the dates,
but otherwise a typical chiasm with the glory of Solomon's temple
in verse 3 being compared with the glory of the future messianic
temple in verses 8 through 9. So you can see on that chart,
the two Bs, verse 3 parallel to verses 8 through 9, the work
of demolition, wow did they have a lot of demolition, and reconstruction
for the current temple in verse 4 is compared to the universal
deconstruction and reconstruction that the Messiah will engage
in with regard to His future temple. So, verse 4 is parallel
to verses 6 through 7, and that brings us then to the heart of
the chiasm in verses 4C through 5. where God says this, "'Yet
now be strong, Zerubbabel,' says the Lord, "'and be strong, Joshua,
son of Jehozadak the high priest, "'and be strong, all you people
of the land,' says the Lord, "'and work, for I am with you,'
says the Lord of hosts, "'according to the word that I covenanted
with you "'when you came out of Egypt, "'so my spirit remains
among you, do not fear.'" If God is for them, they have everything
that they need to accomplish their task. Now, Haggai's Fellow
worker Zachariah gave very similar words, but here's how Zachariah
worded the same comfort. It's not by might nor by power,
but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts. So both prophets are
in effect saying, guys, don't worry about the fact that you're
weak. Don't worry about the fact that this is an overwhelmingly
huge, seemingly impossible task. If I'm with you, there is nothing
that can stand against you. Are you willing to obey me even
in the impossible things that I've called you to do? That's
basically what they're saying. And he did do a miraculous work
on their behalf. It's absolutely amazing. Let
me just give you a hint of how amazing it was. They had no permission
of the emperor yet. In fact, the emperor had forbidden
any work on the temple. They had opposition from without.
But they started to work on the temple in faith because of what
the prophets had said. And immediately there is opposition. And they keep working despite
the opposition. Tet and I, the pagan governor,
He wrote to the emperor and told him, hey, these guys are rebuilding
this temple. You need to stop it. It backfired
on Tetoni. Not only did Darius tell him
to lay off, not oppose it, but he threatened them. He said,
if you oppose this, I'm going to hang you on one of the girders
out of your house. We're going to confiscate your
house, and we're going to do it to anybody else who opposes
this work. And hey, I'm actually going to
fund this project, and I'm commanding you guys to fund the project.
It was astounding. From absolute opposition, it
went to such a well-funded and well-supported project that what
took Solomon seven years to build was completely built in four
years by Zerubbabel. God can do miracles when we are
willing to quit looking at our weakness and start to follow
him in his commands and say, Lord, if you command me to do
it, even if I die, I'm going to do it. But I trust you that
you are strong enough to do this through me. It really is a wonderful,
wonderful story. And we can apply it in our own
situations. God commands us in the word to
apply his word to politics. And people say, ha, that's impossible
nowadays. It's irrelevant whether it's
impossible. Our God is the God of impossibilities, right? What
is our duty? That's the key thing. And so
we need to really apply this in our own lives and not fear,
but look to the Lord's grace and watch Him do the impossible.
So let's look again at this whole structure of verses one through
nine. The second half of this refers to Messiah's kingdom,
and it's quoted in Hebrews 12. He's comparing their work on
the temple to the even greater work that the future Messiah
is going to do. And the promises in this section,
I think, are such encouraging promises, especially when you're
faced with the kind of demoralizing setbacks that we're faced with
in America. Okay, chapter 2, verses 1 through
3. In the seventh month, on the 21st of the month, the word of
the Lord came by Haggai the prophet, saying, speak now to Zerubbabel,
the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the
son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people,
saying, who is left among you who saw this temple in its former
glory? And how do you see it now? In
comparison with it, is this not in your eyes as nothing? So that
was the discouragement I've already talked about to the old guys
What was currently being built and accomplished seemed like
nothing compared to Solomon's temple. They were looking at
the glass half empty and taking the wind out of the sails of
those who were excited to be involved in the work. It's very
easy for armchair critics to discourage the efforts of others. And God does not appreciate the
comments of these people. They were not comments that flowed
from faith at all. They were comments that questioned
the value of doing anything. And if you tend to be a glass
half-empty kind of a person who's a naysayer, I would encourage
you to take heart to what God says to these people here. When
you kill the faith of other people, God is holding you accountable. Not then, he's holding you accountable
for holding back the kingdom. Build faith in others, don't
rob it. Now in verse four, God restores faith to the remnant
with words that I think are wonderful. Yet now be strong, Zerubbabel,
says the Lord, and be strong, Joshua, the son of Jehozadak,
the high priest, and be strong, all you people of the land, says
the Lord, and work, for I am with you. That's really all that
matters. in the ministry, the work of
the Lord, if God is with us. And when you think about it,
if the opposite is true, there's no point in engaging in anything
if God is not with us, because we need His presence, His power,
His blessing. But if He's with us, obstacles
are irrelevant. I think that's one of the messages
of this book. And as I said earlier, He promised His Holy Spirit's
presence with them, and based on that assurance, they need
not fear. Fear kills faith. And when fears
arise within your heart, Go to the recipe here. What's the recipe?
You start chasing that fear away by meditating upon the promises
of God and the greatness of God and the irresistible forward
advancement that He has promised of His kingdom. Now, the two
seas of that chiasm compare the huge task of clearing away the
rubbish of the previous temple and building the second temple
with a far greater task that the Messiah will have of getting
rid of all of the rubbish of the fall. okay, and replacing
it with the new things of His temple building program. So,
both of those seas deal with deconstruction and reconstruction.
I'm just going to look at the second sea in verses 6 through
7. For thus says the Lord of hosts,
once more, it is a little while, I will shake heaven and earth,
the sea and dry land, and I will shake all nations, and they In
other words, the shaken nations, they shall come to the desire
of all nations. And I will fill this temple with
glory, says the Lord of hosts. Now, there is debate on whether
the Hebrew phrase for desire of all nations is a title of
the Messiah or whether it should be translated as the wealth of
the nations coming into the temple. I won't be dogmatic on it, but
I think Hebrews 12, the fact that it quotes this passage,
and there is no way you can get around this, some people have
tried to get around it saying he's quoting the second time of shaking,
but he quotes the once more, which only occurs here, and then
applies it to New Covenant times, and to me this demonstrates that
this is a prophecy about Christ shaking the entire universe and
gradually making all things new. Let me read Hebrews 12. beginning
at verse 25 See that you do not refuse him who speaks for if
they did not escape who refused him who spoke on earth So that's
a reference to God's shaking the earth at Mount Sinai when
he brought his revolutionary document the Pentateuch to Israel
Much more shall we not escape if we turn away from him who
speaks from heaven whose voice then shook the earth So we're
not talking about a shaking that's going to destroy planet Earth,
as some people talk about, because cyanide definitely did not destroy
planet Earth, but it changed it, hugely changed it, right?
But now He has promised saying, yet once more I shake not only
the earth, but also heaven. Now this yet once more indicates
the removal of the those things that are being shaken, now that
is in the present tense, so this shaking was already going on
in the first century when he wrote Hebrews. So he says, indicates
the removal of those things that are being shaken as of things
that are made that the things which cannot be shaken may remain.
Since we are receiving, that's in the present tense as well,
since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us
have grace by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence
and godly fear, for our God is a consuming fire. So here is
the point, just as Haggai Haggai, boy, Haggai, that's the way I
used to pronounce it. It's gonna get really hard to
change that. But just as Haggai really tried to get these people
to work and build the kingdom, Hebrews is trying to get the
first century saints to work and build the kingdom and don't
give in to discouragements or opposition. And Hebrews assures
us God is with us, just like Haggai did, and that our God
is a consuming fire. Now, there is a bit of warning
there. Hebrews 12 is saying that there is a certain judgment that
will fall upon you if you identify, as the Samaritans and Tet and
I did, if you identify with the non-New Covenant things that
are being removed. In other words, if you're a part
of what is being shaken, the shaken things, the rubbish that
he's trying to get rid of, you're in trouble. There's only two
alternatives. You're a part of what's getting
shaken and thrown out, or you're a part of the new covenant where
Jesus is making all things new. There's no neutral between. So,
with the inspired commentary of Hebrews 12, we may not interpret
this as James Jordan and some others do. as referring to anything
prior to Christ. Yes, there is a literal temple
that transitions into the new, but it's clearly referring here
to the New Covenant. And in the New Covenant, Christ
claims ownership of everything, including your gold and silver,
everything. And since the temple is the symbol
of Christ's kingdom, Yehoah of Armies promises that this future
kingdom or future temple will be far more glorious than anything. in the earthly temples. Verse
8, the silver is mine and the gold is mine, says the Lord of
hosts. The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than
the former, says the Lord of hosts. And in this place I will
give peace, says the Lord of hosts. And that ends the first
snapshot in chapter 2 that was designed to give encouragement
to the post-exilic community. He was giving them reasons why
their labors in the Lord were not in vain. when they what they
were building was a symbol of the messianic kingdom. In fact,
probably shouldn't get into it, but the Spirit of God would be
poured out on that literal temple, which is the symbol of Christ,
and that's where the symbolic, non-literal temple began to be
built of living stones that would eventually fill the entire world. Now, let me just read you a couple
of samples. Why don't you turn, actually,
with me to Ephesians chapter 2, and I'm going to give you
some samples that describe this temple that Haggai is pointing
to. Ephesians 2 and beginning to read at verse
19. Now therefore, you are no longer
strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints
and members of the household of God, having been built on
the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself
being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being
fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you
also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in
the Spirit. Chapter 3 goes on to show that
this temple composed of believing Jews and Gentiles wasn't 100%
understood by Old Testament prophets. Chapter 4 speaks of him pouring
resources, gifts, into this temple, which is his body. And 1 Peter
2.4 says, you also as living stones are being built up a spiritual
house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices
acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Now, I won't give more,
but as you start tracing this temple imagery in the New Testament,
you realize Christ is the temple. His body, the church is the temple,
and individuals who are filled with the Spirit of God are also
the temple. In other words, this is the symbol
of the new covenant kingdom as it's invading earth, shaking
out of it everything that smacks of Adam's rebellion, or smacks
of Satan, or smacks of sin, and eventually producing a world
in which only righteousness dwells, and God abides with His people
forever in His temple, in His house. Now, the last three snapshots
also begin with a date, but commentators point out that it's a reversed
date, and I don't have the time to get into it. But the way the
dates are used symbolically in both chapters, along with a couple
of other reversals, shows the reversal in time of the humanistic
dominance that previously existed to Christ's universal kingdom. Let me just give two examples
of how that works. First of all, in verses 11 through
14, he gives a very common knowledge fact to make them realize that
holiness of a priest's garment Can make any it cannot make anything
that it touches holy So these priests had holy garments, you
know, so if he brushed up against this, uh, unholy pulpit here
He said no, it's not going to do anything. He asked them that
question. They knew the answer but then he asked If you're an
unholy person and you've got an unholy garment, it's an unclean
garment Does everything that it touches become unholy? And
they say, yes, it does. Now, the point of this illustration
is in old covenant times, the defilement of sin was far more
pervasive than the cleansing of God's grace. That's in the
old covenant. the leaven of sin was far more
dominant and pervasive than the leaven of the kingdom. And so
that's why things kept tending to go downhill all the way up
to the cross. The cross reverses this. After
the cross, it's the exact opposite. The leaven of the kingdom will
dominant and eventually replace the leaven of sin. So when everything
under the Messiah becomes holy, as it will, We can only attribute
it to God's grace. Why? Because we've seen in the
Old Covenant it's impossible for this to happen apart from
God reversing it. Okay, that's the point. Then
he gives a second illustration. He points out that they had repeatedly
sown grain and barely got anything in return. They had gotten something
in the Old Covenant, there was something. But God had cursed
their previous efforts, but now that they had started building
the temple and had thereby gained a renewed kingdom focus, God
was gonna show. He says, mark it on the calendar.
From this day forward, you're gonna see remarkable changes
in your crops. And you're gonna see remarkable
blessings in other ways. Now this too is symbolic of Christ's
kingdom reversing things on earth and producing more and more blessings. But even on the literal level,
I think there's a lot that we can learn from this. They still
had to plant. God's not gonna bless us if we
don't work, right? So they had to plant, but he said, from here
on in, I'm gonna just pour out blessings upon your crops. And again, his point was they
could not attribute these blessings to chance. Blessings come from
heaven. Now I don't know, some of you
probably remember seeing the transformations of videos. where
they looked at Guatemala and some other countries where there
were regions that are 100% Christian, they're following God's law,
and it's remarkable that stark changes that happen, even soil
that was poor and unproductive, is massively producing all kinds
of things. So, the point was, God astonishingly,
providentially, ensures a connection between kingdom orientation and
being prospered. He loves to do that, and he illustrates
that. Even in the Old Covenant, he
illustrated that. Anyway, his concluding application is that
the messianic promise that he had earlier given in verses six
through nine could not be attributed to human goodness or human effort.
Though God blesses our efforts, the messianic kingdom is the
supernatural work of God Himself removing the Old Covenant curses
and all of the messes of sin and replacing them with new covenant
kingdom realities that cannot be shaken. This is the trajectory
for planet Earth. This is the trajectory that the
Bible lays out for planet Earth. Now it takes faith to believe
that, but hey, the just must live by faith. And without faith,
it's impossible to please God. God sets a paradigm that requires
us to live by faith. Are we willing to do it? In any
case, he starts with a reverse date in verse 20 to show he's
still talking about the reversal of sin, but he only mentions
the shaking that he had previously mentioned, not the rebuilding.
Now, I think the rebuilding is also implied. I think this is
just a shorthand way of saying, now I'm returning to the subject
that we talked about earlier, shaking and rebuilding. And so
you link those two together. Let's read verses 21 through
22. Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah, saying, I will shake
heaven and earth. I will overthrow the throne of
kingdoms. I will destroy the strength of
the Gentile kingdoms. I will overthrow the chariots
and those who ride in them. The horses and the riders shall
come down, every one by the sword of his brother. And again, the
fact that Hebrews 12 merges phrases from verses 6 through 9 together
with phrases from verses 21 through 22 shows to me he's still talking
about the messianic kingdom's shaking work. Haggai is guaranteeing
that eventually all enemies will be purged from this earth before
Christ's work is finished. That's what he's guaranteeing.
And 1 Corinthians guarantees the same thing. He must remain
at the right hand of the Father until all enemies are put under
his feet. This is a pervasive theme in
the scripture. All evil kingdoms will be brought
to nothing and all that will eventually be left will be the
Messiah who is symbolized by Zerubbabel the governor referenced
in the last verse. Verse 23 says, in that day. In
what day? Well, context in Hebrews 12 indicates
we're talking about New Covenant times. In that day, says the
Lord of hosts, I will take you, Zerubbabel, my servant, the son
of Shealtiel, says the Lord, and will make you like a signet
ring, for I have chosen you, says the Lord of hosts. Now,
many evangelical commentaries take this as purely being a symbol
of Jesus because it obviously goes way, way, way beyond Zerubbabel's
lifetime. But I think it's a mistake to
do that. We have seen over and over again
that with symbols in the Bible, there's always a literal referent.
You know, there's a literal rock that's struck, pointing symbolically
to Jesus being struck and the Holy Spirit. So, you can't dismiss
the literal when you're looking at what it symbolizes. Now that
puts a conundrum then, because he's saying that the literal
Zerubbabel is going to be connected in some way in New Covenant times
to God's finger. And how do you reconcile that?
Well, the way I reconcile it is just telling people to look
at my Revelation series. And in Revelation chapter 20,
we saw that all of the old covenant saints were raised in what Revelation
20 calls the first resurrection. Not the second one, that's reserved
for us, right? But the first resurrection. So
I think in a very literal way, along with all the other saints,
Zerubbabel was raised up, put on God's finger like a signet
ring, was very close to God. But even in that, he still is
a symbol of Christ. as a type, and several evangelical
commentaries point out that the language of verses 6-9 and verses
20-23 is very messianic in nature, so much so that even some unbelieving
Jews in the past have said, this has to be referring to somebody
beyond Zerubbabel's lifetime. So anyway, these commentators
say it has to be referring in some way to Jesus. Just as David
was a symbol of the greater David, Jesus. Zerubbabel is the symbol
of the greater Zerubbabel, Jesus. Okay? And O. Palmer Robertson
points out that the references to Zerubbabel as God's servant,
God's signet ring, God's chosen one, all have messianic overtones. And since Zechariah, who was
Haggai's contemporary, since he clearly uses him as a type
of Christ, it's the same thing going on here. Now let me just
read from Ochtemeyer's commentary. says God always keeps His promises. And so when the kingdom of God
began to come among us in the person of Jesus Christ, Mark
1, 1, 14, and 15, that one born of the house and lineage of David
came as the descendant of Zerubbabel, Matthew 1, 12, Luke 3, 27, and
as the beginning of the fulfillment of this word to Haggai the prophet. He introduced God's kingdom,
which has no end, Luke 1, 32 to 33, which will overthrow every
rule and authority and power, 1 Corinthians 15, 24 through
26, and which cannot be shaken or ever pass away, Hebrews 12,
28. The word of God spoken by Haggai the prophet began to find
its fulfillment in Jesus Christ our Lord. When the Lord returns
to complete His kingdom, may He find us working to build up
His church. And I say amen and amen. So that's the theology of the
book. But let me end with 10 more applications
that David Knorr brought to my attention. Praise God, I've got
another two or three weeks with this research assistant that's
here. Big help. Verse one. shows the importance of addressing
God's Word to both church and state. We've already touched
on this, but there is no area of life that should ever be exempt
from the law word of God. We completely miss the purpose
of stewardship when we exempt the state or any other aspect
of life from God's Word. The humanism of American politics
and law is a part of what is being shaken and blowing away,
and we need to make sure that we're not clinging to what Jesus
wants to shake and blow away. We cannot cling to it. Psalm
2 tells us that God's law mandates for the new covenant that states
bow to King Jesus, that kings bow to King Jesus, go into covenant
with him, submit to his laws. It's very clear. Second, Verse
2 of chapter 1 shows how easy it is for us to rationalize and
compromise His Word, even when it's clear disobedience. I regularly
ask God to reveal any self-deception in me. I want to be pleasing
to the Lord, and I know how easy it is for me to just compromise
that and deceive myself. So we just need to be aware of
the implications of self-deception. By the way, it just came to my
mind now, but Bonson has one of the most fabulous, it's a
tape lecture, we maybe need to digitize it, but on the apologetic
implications of self-deception. It is powerful. When you start
realizing how easily we deceive ourselves, it has ramifications
for many areas of life. So pray that God would unravel
anything within you, anything within me that needs to be shaken
and blown away, and that He would replace it more and more with
His kingdom focus. May His kingdom come more and
more in our lives here on earth. May His will be done more and
more on earth in our lives. Third, verse 4 shows, this chapter
1 verse 4 shows that God puts tests of our stewardship into
our lives. And when we pass the test, we're
blessed. When our disobedience proves
that we've lost a kingdom vision, He doesn't bless. And especially
since this year, again, is the focus on stewardship. Do study,
try to grow in this whole area of stewardship, but also get
used to seeing for providential tests that God brings your way
and determined to pass those. Fourth, the twice repeated phrase,
consider your ways, is a good reminder that we do need to occasionally
engage in self-examination. See if our lives have drifted.
It's very easy to be blind. To you know our drifting so do
a spiritual checkup fifth verses 9 through 11 shows God Disciplining
his people by evaporating their budgets making their crops not
turn out etc and like Deuteronomy 28 Haggai assumes that God's
providence relates to every molecule, every germ, every virus, our
cattle, money, adversaries, skin, bone, children, politics. And
God is very creative in using all of those things to discipline
his people. And I think we Christians need
to get better at reading those providences and saying, Lord,
are you disciplining me? Bring conviction to my heart
if this is something you're reminding me of. More and more, I've begun
recognizing some of the ailments that I have from the Lord are
reminders. Phil, you need to press into
God. Kathy was telling me of something that's just always
consistent in her life when she needs to press into the Lord.
So be sensitive to God's providence. In verses 12 through 13, God
gives the central promise of the previous covenants, I am
with you. That is such a glorious promise.
And Hebrews repeats it. I will never leave you nor forsake
you. When we fear, press into that. Say, Lord, thank you that
you have promised that never, I will never leave you. You are
with me. Help me not to be fearful. Seventh, in verse 14, and again
in chapter two, verse four, we see the command to work and God's
blessings on manual labor. If Jesus devoted most of his
life, really, most of his life to the manual labor of carpentry,
then that shows how much God values physical labor. Physical
labor should not be beneath any of us. It should be something
we honor just as God honors it. And even your carpentry, you
need to do as a kingdom vision, as unto the Lord. Even if you're
doing carpentry for relaxation, by the way, you can relax to
God's glory. You can, if you're strategic,
you're really thoughtful in the way in which you relax, it's
a part of seeking God's kingdom, it really is. Eighth, in chapter
two, verses four through five, we have God encouraging us that
we should not get discouraged with small things, small beginnings. If God is in it, our small beginnings
can leverage huge things. People might be tempted to think
that this conference that got thrown together because we all
of a sudden found out that Matt Truwilla and Rusty Thomas are
coming, That's an impossible goal. Why would you even think
of making Nebraska a sanctuary state? You know, it's unicameral. We've got so many things going
against us. And really? Abolish abortion
in Nebraska? I say, brothers and sisters,
according to your faith, be it unto you. But I would encourage
you to have faith that with God, nothing is impossible. And if
we don't try, it won't happen. Right. And so let's have faith
and and try to do what God is calling us to do and trust that
he can do miracles through us. OK. Oh, where was I? Don't despise days from the beginnings.
Okay, ninth, chapter two, verses seven through nine, gives the
goal for all of our lives, to glorify God and bring Him pleasure. This is my heart's desire, that
the Lord would say, well done, thou good and faithful servant.
I want the smile of His approval. I want to experience His pleasure.
And though there are other applications, I'm just going to end with one
more. And this one actually is an iffy one. I'm not dogmatic
on it because the Hebrew can be translated two different ways.
But if the new King James is correct in translating this as
Messiah, the desire of all nations, then it speaks of the post-millennial
hope that all the earth will become jealous of the gospel
glories and will stream to Christ from every part of the globe
desiring him. He certainly is our desire and
vision. The Apostle Paul said in Philippians
3 that he was willing to quote, count all things loss for the
excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. He said,
I count them as rubbish that I may gain Christ. His life passion
is stated in the next verse, that I may know Him and the power
of His resurrection. So certainly Christ was the desire
of Paul's heart. And it's my prayer that we would
desire this magnetic pull of Christ to capture our desires
and pull us closer and closer to Him, just as Haggai says,
that the nations are gonna be magnetically drawn to the Lord
Jesus Christ. May our faith and vision Be consistent
with Christ's goal to shake off from planet earth anything that
is in competition with Jesus, that only His kingdom and His
glory remains. Amen? Let's pray. Father, thank
you for the reminders in Haggai of how we need to press into
your kingdom. Have a kingdom vision, have a steward's heart,
and I pray each one of us would grow in this. We realize that
our whole lives we're gonna keep pressing into that and we won't
be perfect. So help us not to be discouraged when Satan tries
to beat up on us for our failures, but help us to just keep focused
on Christ. Keep pressing into your kingdom,
and may you do astounding, astonishing things as we, by faith, do the
impossible that you have commanded us to do. In Jesus' name, amen.
Haggai
Series Bible Survey
| Sermon ID | 3220201163518 |
| Duration | 54:32 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | Haggai 1:1 |
| Language | English |
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