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We're coming towards the end
of our study in the Minor Prophets. Just two more after Haggai, Zechariah,
and then Malachi. And the last three of the Minor
Prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, form a new section
within the books, the Twelve Prophets. Most of the prophets
we have considered spoke about the coming captivity in Assyria
and Babylon. And Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi
take us beyond that. And the people of God have returned
from captivity in Babylon to Israel, Canaan, and Jerusalem.
And then Haggai takes up the ministry whenever the people
of God, according to God's promise and as a fulfillment of God's
promise, are back in their own land and nation and work has
to be done. And so Haggai ministers as a
post-captivity prophet to the people of God. back in Jerusalem
once again. We'll just read from chapter
1 and the first six verses. Haggai chapter 1 and verse number
1. In the second year of Darius
the king, in the sixth month, in the first day of the month,
came the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet unto Zerubbabel
the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the
son of Josedek, the high priest, saying, Thus speaketh the Lord
of hosts, saying, This people say, The time is not come, the
time that the Lord's house should be built. Then came the word
of the Lord by Haggai the prophet, saying, Is it time for you, O
ye, to dwell in your sealed houses, and this house lie waste? Now,
therefore, thus saith the Lord of hosts, consider your ways.
Ye have so much, and bring in little. Ye eat, but ye have not
enough. Ye drink, but ye are not filled
with drink. ye clothe ye, but there is none
warm. And he that earneth wages, earneth
wages to put it into a bag with holes. And we'll just end at
the end of verse six, and we know that God will bless the
reading of his word to all of our hearts. I'm not sure if anybody
tonight in the meeting, maybe more the men folk than the women
folk, have ever started a job about the home. maybe some enterprise
or DIY that you've been meaning to do for years, and eventually
you start it, and for a week or two it goes well, and then
other things come in, and the building project, or the renovation
project, or the painting program, whatever it was you started,
seems to just fall by the wayside. and just lies derelict maybe
for a number of months or years and eventually you get back to
it once again. I see some of the ladies in the
meeting looking around maybe at their husbands and different
things. I'm not sure if they've opened a can of worms, if there's
going to be an argument on the way home in the car. I hope there
isn't, but we all know what that's like. Some of us men and us husbands
are very guilty of it. Even in the Republic of Ireland,
whenever there was such an influx of money from Europe, many housing
sites were built. And then with the recession and
the Celtic tiger that died and so on and so forth, the economy
slowed down. And there's many ghost estates
in the Republic of Ireland, hundreds of homes, but many of them not
furnished and not finished and just lying derelict. almost worthless,
deteriorating over the last number of years. And as we think of
scenes like that, vivid scenes that we can all identify with,
that illustrates exactly where the nation of Israel are whenever
Haggai the prophet ministered to them. God's people have returned
from their captivity in Babylon. They have returned to Canaan.
And having returned to Jerusalem, they began almost immediately
to rebuild the temple that had been destroyed. The building
program went well for a period of time. They cleared the site.
They brought in the builders. They brought in the materials.
They laid the foundations. And they began just to build.
And then they stopped because of opposition. that came from
some of their enemies round about. And so, the temple was started,
they began to build it, and then they stopped. Once the foundations
were laid, they stopped building. And for a period of 14 years,
not one brick, not one trial was lifted to continue the building
work of the temple. And during that 14-year period,
the people of God began to get complacent, They got their eyes
off the work that the Lord had called them to, and they got
their eyes off building the temple, and they began to look at themselves
and began to very much be caught up with their own enterprises
and their own homes and their own businesses and so on and
so forth. And ultimately, God's house lay
derelict and unfinished. And so often as believers, all
of these years and generations later, we can often go so far
with God and then stop. Maybe even begin to do something
for the Lord and then stop. It might be something that in
the eyes of the world would be relatively small. How often at
the start of the year, the first of January, do we purpose, I'm
going to follow a Bible reading plan, I'm going to read through
the Word of God, either in one year or in two years, and I'm
going to study it, and I'm going to get a grip on it, and we maybe
get to February or March, and it begins to get slack, and we
miss a couple of days, and then we think, well, I've lost so
much ground, what's the point going on now? Or maybe something
a little bit bigger? Maybe we purpose that we're going
to spend more time in prayer and endeavor to get out to all
of the meetings or seek to win that person to Christ, that friend,
that workmate, that colleague, that person across the street.
I'll endeavor to pray for them and pray for an opportunity and
witness to them and try to get them out to God's house. And
then we go so far. Well, we get discouraged perhaps,
and the task then ultimately remains unfinished. You see,
tonight, it is possible to go so far with God, and then stop. And in the interim period, if
we're not progressing, ultimately a coldness creeps in, and then
with that, discouragement and dissatisfaction, as we'll see
a little bit later on. You see, getting into the kingdom
of God is only the beginning. Once you're born again and you've
become an inheritor of God's kingdom and you're united to
Christ and you're part of the body and you're on that road
that leads to heaven and home, that is only the beginning. The Apostle Paul makes that truth
abundantly clear whenever he wrote to the church at Corinth
in 1 Corinthians. And chapter 3 and verse number
10, he says, according to the grace of God which is given unto
me as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation and
another buildeth thereon, but let every man take heed how he
buildeth thereupon. So the foundation that he is
speaking upon there are the doctrines of the gospel. He has presented
Christ unto these people. He's left them with the gospel.
Many of them have been converted. He says to them, he are God's
building. But he says, from henceforth, let every man take heed how he
build thereupon. Yes, you're converted. You're
saved. You're standing in this foundation
that cannot be shaken. But that is only the beginning.
He says, you have to build and you have to work. Other foundation
can no man lay than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus.
And then he talks about the various building materials, gold, silver,
precious stones, wood, hay, and stubble. He talks about the day
of judgment that's coming. Every man's work shall be tried
by fire, and so on and so forth. And so he's making it very clear
that, yes, a foundation has been laid, and we're standing in that
foundation, and, yes, we're back into the kingdom, and the Lord
has delivered us from our captivity, from the bondage of sin that
we were in, brought us into the family and fold of God, brought
us into this new country, as it were, this new kingdom, and
the foundations have been laid, but we need to work and we need
to constantly be building upon that foundation. So tonight we're
looking, as you would be aware, at the prophet Haggai. Just two
chapters in the prophecy, and following the same little outline
that we've been looking at in weeks gone by, the man, the ministry,
and then focusing on the message. So first of all, Haggai, the
man. Little is known As with many
other minor prophets, little is known about the prophet Haggai. Outside of the book of Haggai
itself, which is just two chapters, Haggai's name is only mentioned
twice in the entire Bible. Both times in the little book
of Ezra. Just before you have the book
of Job and Sam, you have Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. And those
three books Like the last books of the Old Testament, Haggai,
Zechariah, and Malachi all complement each other. And whenever we read
in Esther chapter five, verse number one, we read about the
prophets Haggai and Zechariah. So they ministered at the same
time. They ministered together. They
were partners in the work of God and they were there together
as companions in the work of God. And then again, in Ezra
chapter six and verse number 14, we read about the prophesying
of Haggai and Zechariah and they built it and finished the temple
according to the commandment of the Lord. So it's very evident
that Haggai ministered whenever Ezra and Nehemiah were building
the temple and building the walls. And he ministered alongside Zechariah. He was a contemporary of Zechariah. The date of the prophecy is very
clear as well. It's given in the first chapter,
in the first verse of the prophecy itself, in the second year of
Darius the king, in the sixth month, in the first day of the
month. So right down to the very day
that he began to preach, we have the date given. And that equates
to 520 BC. it is most likely that Haggai
was born in Babylon during the captivity. The people of God
aren't all that long back in the land, whenever Haggai began
to minister, and they had been in captivity for 70 years in
Babylon. So, in all likelihood, Haggai
was born in Babylon during the captivity, although we know nothing
at all about his family. He must have returned under the
leadership of Zerubbabel. That's the first person he begins
to minister to. Zerubbabel, the son of Shaltiel,
and Zerubbabel was the governor of Judah. And we read in the
book of Ezra that the first contingent of captives came back into Jerusalem
under the leadership of this man, Zerubbabel. The name Haggai
itself means festive. And that has to do with joy and
with celebration, festivity, joy, and celebration. The same word translated haigai
in this man's name is translated dancing in 1 Samuel chapter 30
and verse number 16. And I think again that his name
is very significant, called to minister to a people who have
returned from captivity in Babylon. They should be rejoicing. They
should be celebrating. They should be festive in their
attitude and in their spirits, given what the Lord has done
for them. He's fulfilled His promises.
He's turned again their captivity. And you might be thinking already
of that great Psalm, Psalm 126, when the Lord turned again the
captivity of Zion. We were like them that dream.
Then was her mouth filled with laughter, and her tongue with
singing. Then said they among the heathen, The Lord hath done
great things for them, whereof they are glad. And so they were
rejoicing in Psalm 126. But sadly, by the time Haggai
begins his ministry, many of God's people have lost their
song. Have you lost your song tonight?
Where is the blessedness I knew? When first I saw the Lord, where
is the soul-refreshing view of Jesus and His Word? After being on the road for a
little while, it's possible to lose that zeal and to lose that
joy and to lose that sense of elation as to what the Lord has
done for us. Just as the Israelites were delivered
from their captivity in Egypt, full of joy and rejoicing, we
have the song of Moses as he led the whole congregation in
praise after they passed through the Red Sea. But after a period
of journeying through the wilderness, they began to say, our soul loatheth
this light bread. And they began to want to go
back, many of them, even to Egypt. It is possible to lose your joy,
to lose your song. And yet, even in this day and
generation, despite all of the hardship and all of the opposition
that there is to the work of God, we ought still to be a festive
people, a people marked by joy and celebration, because the
Lord has done great things for us. He's forgiven our sin. He saved us from an eternity
in hell. He's put our names in the Lamb's
Book of Life, engraved them, as the scripture says, upon the
very palms of His hands. He bears our names upon His heart.
He'll take us one day to heaven itself. And from this moment
until we get to the celestial city, He has promised that He
will ever be with us. and answer prayer, lead us and
provide for us, and do great and mighty things for us. So let us tonight, even in spite
of hardships and opposition that there may be, and antagonism
to the work of God that maybe you're involved in, let us seek
never to lose our joy or lose our song, because the Lord is
good. Then we have the man's ministry.
Haggai, along with Zachariah, and Malachi was a post-captivity
prophet. That is to say, as we've mentioned
already, they ministered, these three men, after the Israelites
were back in the land of Israel. Haggai and Zechariah were contemporaries,
they ministered together. And then about 120 years later,
Malachi ministered at the end of that restoration period. The
fact that God had restored his covenant people to the land of
Israel is vital, because it shows us, first of all, that God had
not forgotten Israel. One of the great promises that
God gave to the father of the nation of Israel, Abraham himself,
is found in Genesis chapter 13. Whenever Abraham and Lot decided
we'll have to part company, there's this strife between our herdsmen,
and he says to Lot, you choose out a plot of land. And, of course,
Lot looked towards Sodom where the grass was green and the land
was fertile. And then the Lord said to Abraham
in Genesis 13 and verse 14, lift up now thine eyes and look toward
or look from the place where thou art northward, southward,
eastward, westward, for all the land which thou seest, to thee
will I give it, and to thy seed." And notice the words, forever,
forever. And he says in verse number 16,
And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth. So if a man
can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered. And so he's speaking to Abraham,
you're going to be a great nation. And as far as you can see, north,
south, east and west, this land, I'm giving it to you and I'm
giving it to your seed forever. And God is a promise and a covenant-keeping
God. And there were many people that
whenever the Israelites were in captivity, had the idea, we
will never be back in Israel again. But God brought them back
into the land because God keeps His promises. Even whenever it
seems impossible for those promises to be fulfilled, God keeps His
promises. So returning from captivity,
restoration was vital because it showed that God had not forgotten
His people. It was also vital because the
Messiah would minister in the land of Israel itself. He would minister in the land
of Israel. He would be born in Bethlehem.
He would be raised at Nazareth. He would preach in Jerusalem.
He would preach in Capernaum. He would preach at Galilee. He
would travel around that land preaching. He came unto his own,
and his own received him not. And so God had a wonderful plan
for that land, for that nation, not just for the people of Israel
themselves, but also for the Messiah. And the purpose of God
was that Messiah, our Lord Jesus Christ, would minister in the
land of Israel. And it's also important because
it prefigures The great restoration that I believe will happen amongst
the Jewish people at the last day, at the last time. How it
all comes together, there's different schools of thought, but we know
that God has not finished with the Israelite people. If you
just look for a moment or two at Romans chapter 11, study this
chapter yourself, take your Bible, Spend a little bit of time with
it. Go through it and look at it. But you've got wonderful
promises here for the nation of Israel. The whole thought
governs this olive tree. And that represents God's people. It's rooted in grace. There's
only one olive tree. God is only one people in this
world. It's not just Israel, but it's Jew and Gentile together. God made a covenant with Israel.
The natural branches were broken off because of unbelief. God
grafted in the Gentile people into this olive tree, brought
them into the covenant, saved them. But it says that God is
able to graft the natural branches in again. But verse 1 of Romans
11, I say then, hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite. Off the seed of Abraham, off
the tribe of Benjamin, God hath not cast away his people, which
he foreknew." Now, the first two verses make it abundantly
clear that this chapter is speaking about national Israel, the Jewish
people, the seed of Abraham, tribe of Benjamin, Israelites,
the people of God, foreknew. And then whenever you read on,
It says in verse number 25, For I would not, brethren, that ye
should be ignorant of this mystery. Now he's speaking here to Gentiles. Lest ye should be wise in your
own conceits. In other words, lest you should
be puffed up with pride and somehow think that you're better than
the Jews who rejected their Messiah. He says, don't be conceited,
don't be proud, don't be puffed up. He says, blindness in part,
has happened to Israel, a judicial blindness, so that they cannot
see Christ, the Lord Jesus, for who He is. Blindness in part
has happened unto Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles
be come in. So God's going to save a people
outside of the commonwealth of Israel, the Gentiles of which
we are part. And then it says in verse 26,
and so all Israel shall be saved. As it is written, there shall
come out of Zion the deliverer and shall turn away ungodliness
from Jacob. Again, speaking of nationalism,
this is my covenant unto them, and I shall take away their sins. As concerning the gospel, they
are enemies for your sakes, but as touching election, they are
beloved for the Father's sakes, for their gifts and the calling
of God are without repentance. And God called a great nation
unto himself and made that promise with Abraham way back there in
Genesis chapter 13, unto your seed will I give this land forever.
And the gifts and the calling of God are without repentance. And so this restoration was important
on those various levels. The ministry of Haggai was relatively
short. just four months, and the book
is one of the shortest books in the Old Testament, but being
a short, a small book, it nevertheless really does pack a punch. He was one of the only minor
prophets, with the exception of Jonah, who saw immediate response
to his preaching. We've looked at many of the minor
prophets already. Jonah went to the Ninevites and
preached to them, not wanting them to respond positively to
his message, but they did. But the rest of the minor prophets,
if you've been listening, they ministered to their generation
about their sin, about the possibility and the threat of judgment. The
people didn't listen, and they didn't see success in their day
and generation, but Haggai was different. Whenever Haggai preached,
within a few weeks, there was a tremendous response to his
preaching. And the people's hearts were
stirred. And after the first sermon that
Haggai preached, there was a response. And the work of God, which had
been stopped for 14 years, began to commence again. And so the
appeal of his ministry was very simple. Resume the work of God,
which you've stopped. Haggai was here tonight and he
knew our circumstances. Would he say that to any of us?
Get back into the work. Lift the sword and lift the trial
once again. And get back into the work of
God. Then the third little point,
the man, the ministry, the message. Haggai's message is given over
a four month period. And in that four-month period,
he delivers four sermons to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. The first sermon is seen in chapter
1, from verse 1 to 15. In fact, virtually the whole
chapter is taken up with Haggai's first sermon. And the subject
matter of his first sermon is this. He's highlighting the fact
that the people of God are in a position that prompts consideration. They find themselves in circumstances,
a situation, a position that prompts consideration. Because in verse 5 he says, consider
your ways. Again in verse 7 he says, consider
your ways. So there's something that Haggai
is using that they find themselves in to prompt them to consider
and examine where they are in relation to the Word of God,
the will of God, and the work of God. Now, it's important,
again, to notice verse 1 and verse 3 of the first chapter,
that it was the Word of the Lord which came by Haggai. It wasn't
his own thinking, his own concoction, his own message. It was the Word
of the Lord. In fact, A very familiar verse
in Haggai 1.13, Then spake Haggai the LORD's messenger in the LORD's
message. He was the LORD's messenger.
But he didn't just come with a sermon that he'd concocted
that he thought might be interesting for the people. He came with
the LORD's message. I remember listening to the testimony,
and I think I've told the story before, Pastor Willie Mullen,
whenever he was a young Christian, a young convert, he was in the
company of Dr. Harry Aronside. Mr. Aronside was conducting his class
and addressed the students, and Mr. Mullen was there, and he
said, is there a difference between God's truth and God's message? Willie Mullen says, well, I don't
think there is. a difference between God's truth and God's
message. And then Mr. Ironside said, well,
say, for example, I went to a church on the Lord's Day and preached
on the Lord's return to that particular people. He says, would
that be God's truth? He says, yes, that would be God's
truth because the Lord's coming back again. And then he asks
another question. He says, but would it necessarily
be God's message for that particular people at that particular time? And that made him think. And
then Mr. Ironside said, so you see that
God's message will always be God's truth. But God's truth
might not particularly be God's message. Just because it's orthodox,
it might not necessarily be God's message for that people. But
Haggai was so sensitive to the Spirit of God and to the leading
of God that he wanted to be sure he was not just preaching truth,
cold truth, cold facts, but he was coming with the message that
God wanted him to bring. And that's what he did on four
occasions. The Jewish people have returned
to the land. The foundations of the temple
have been laid. You can read about that in Ezra
chapter number 3. The laying down of the foundation
of the temple. Ezra chapter 3. And then whenever
you get to Ezra chapter 4, as they were building and the foundations
were laid, there began to become opposition from outside. Ezra
4 and verse 1, when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that
the children of the captivity builded the temple on the Lord
God of Israel, listen to what it says. These are the adversaries
of Judah and Benjamin, their enemies. They came to Zerubbabel
and to the chief of the fathers and said to them, listen to these
words, let us build with you for we seek God as ye do. And there you have, in embryonic
form, the whole basis for the ecumenical movement. Those who
once appeared to be so opposed to the doctrines of grace, to
the preaching of the gospel, to the great doctrines of regeneration
and blood atonement and all of the rest of it, now there's this
desire to meet together. Sure, we're all worshiping the
same God and that's just put our differences behind us because
we seek God as you do verse number three is a rubble and gesture
and the rest of the fathers of the Israel said on them you have
nothing to do with us to build an house on to our God for we
ourselves together will build on to the Lord God of Israel
and And then it says in verse 4, And the people of the land
weakened the hands of the people of Judah, and troubled them in
building. And by the time you get to the
end of Ezra chapter 4, it says, Then ceased the work of the house
of God, which is at Jerusalem. And so the work began well, but
it stopped. And so it's not how you begin
the Christian life that counts. It's how you proceed through
the Christian life, and ultimately, how you finish the Christian
life. That's the most important thing.
Many a believer has got off to a very shaky start perhaps, and
maybe has been written off or frowned upon by other believers
as maybe something wrong and he's never going to make it.
But very often those who get off to a shaky start can finish
well. It's not how we start, but it's
how we finish. What was the problem here then?
Whenever Haggai took up his ministry, the work had stopped. But he
wants them to consider the position they're in, because they find
themselves with a spirit of complacency. Haggai 1, verse 2, the people
say the time has not come. The time that the Lord's house
should be built. Problem of procrastination. It's
not just the right time to be doing this. There's another time
for it. We can put it off. Maybe the
generation coming behind can take up the mantle or take up
the baton and take up where we left off. But it's just not the
right time. There's too much opposition.
There's too much hardship. And so they had this spirit of
complacency. We can take it or leave it. It's
not really all that important. And that same spirit of complacency
can pervade our hearts today. The Church of Jesus Christ is
likened unto a great temple, a great building in 1 Peter 2,
verse 5. And even regarding the local
church, it's very easy for complacency to step in. Gospel service? Take it or leave it. Prayer meeting? Take it or leave it. It's not
really all that important. If it's time, I'll go. But there's
other things that are more important. This is not really my time to
get serious about the work of God yet. Well, if not now, when? So there was a spirit of complacency.
And then if you look at verse 4, there was also a selfish priority. They had really got their priorities
all wrong. Haggai was quite hard-hitting.
He says, is it time for you, O ye to dwell in your sealed
houses, and this house lie waste? You see, they were quite content
to build beautiful homes for themselves, and there's nothing
wrong with that. But it is wrong whenever God's
house was neglected. If God's house had been finished
and they put their heart and soul into that, there'd be no
problem building their fine homes and their fine mansions and their
sealed houses. But the problem was they had
got their priorities all wrong. They were quite happy to work
and build their own little empires and their own homes and their
own standards, whatever it was, but the house of God was lying
waste. And so their priorities were
all wrong. It was really the polar opposite
to Matthew 6, 33. Seek ye first the kingdom of
God, and all these other things shall be added unto you. But
they were seeking first all of the other things, and the kingdom
of God wasn't just as important to them now as it once was. Oh, it was important whenever
they were in captivity, and they wandered out of that bondage,
and they wanted to get back in their land. But now that they're
in the land, and they feel secure, and they've started the temple,
somebody else can finish it. Let's just build houses for ourselves
and get our tent pegs down. Isn't it often the case that
the work of God often takes a back seat to our plans and to our
desires? And yes, we wouldn't forsake
it altogether. We want it to be there, but we
don't really want it sometimes to be the priority. Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones, who was a
medical doctor in Hurley Street in London, felt the call of God
and began his preaching ministry in Aberavon in South Wales, in
a little place called the Sandfields, early part of the 20th century,
and he began to minister there. There was a church-going community.
It was popular to go to church on a Sunday morning, and then
Sunday evening was your own, and you just really did whatever
you liked, and this really disturbed him. And he wasn't sure how to
deal with this, so he began to preach about attending in the
house of the Lord. And he said to the congregation
one Sunday, he says, you know, you come here on a Sunday morning.
Sunday nights, you go to the beach. Promiting nights, you're
somewhere else. And he says, I'll tell you what,
whenever there's hardship, and whenever you need to get hold
of God, And whenever there's bereavement or there's some big
trial in your life and you feel your need for God, he says, I'll
tell you what to do. Just go back to the beach. And
that really shook that little congregation up, out of their
complacency, and they realized we've been devoting so much time
to ourselves and our pleasures and our pursuits, and we've neglected
the house of God, and ultimately, in time, God sent a great awakening
to that church, and God sent a revival. So there's that issue,
a spirit of complacency, a selfish priority, and then a substandard
testimony. This temple that was lying desolate
and derelict, just a foundation laid, maybe a few bricks scattered
here and there, and just a virtual building site, was a poor testimony
to the surrounding nations. For 14 years, they could look
and bypass Israel, maybe go through Jerusalem, and think they haven't
laid a brick on the temple for one year, two years, five years,
10 years, 14 years. Is that all that their God really
means to them? They sang and they rejoiced whenever
they were coming back from Babylon. They boasted that they would
build their city again and build the walls again and the gates
again and build their temple again. And then because of a
little bit of persecution, they threw the trial in and it just
lies waste. Is that really all that their
God means to them? And, you know, there's something
about having a love for the house of God, like the psalmist who
said, I joyed when to the house of God go up, they said to me,
that has a quiet testimony and witness amongst our neighbors. And we maybe don't even realize
it, that they see you morning and evening, prayer meeting night,
and at other times going to God's house. What happens if that stops? Or somebody comes to your home
on a Lord's Day afternoon. Cup of tea, bit of chat, bit
of crack. And then you lose track of time, and you just sit on
and you think, well, we'll not bother going to church tonight
because, well, we have to get ready and time's rushed on. And
they mightn't be converted, but if they see that, they're gonna
come to the conclusion, well, God's work is not really all
that important. Or if you can gallivant all week
or stay out late on a Saturday night and be too tired to come
to church on a Sunday or too tired for the prayer meeting,
but time for other things. The people that socialize and
rub shoulders with you, surely they notice that and think, how
come all of these other things are more important and you have
time, you're never too tired for those things, but there can
be tiredness for the house of God. and the priorities are all
wrong, and it's not a great testimony, is it really, if we're honest
to the world around about us. And if they don't see in our
hearts a hunger and a thirst and a love for God and for God's
house and for the things of God, and the church being the hub
of our spiritual life as the temple was the hub of spiritual
life in Jerusalem, it's not really going to bear witness to them
that our God is a God that's worth serving. if we lose that
festive, joyous spirit of celebration. So you'll notice in the first
sermon that he preaches, twice he calls them, consider your
ways. Are your priorities right? Does God and His work and His
cause come first? They were also doing a disservice
to themselves, because it says in verse 6, and this is Haggai
applying this personally to the individuals. It's not regarding
the temple, because the temple hasn't been built. It's regarding
the people of Jerusalem as individuals. He says, you've sown much, you
bring in little, you eat, and you have not enough. You drink,
but are not filled with drink. You clothe you, and there is
none warm. and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it
into a bag with holes." Just like putting your money into
your pocket, there's a hole in your pocket and it just falls
out. And he says you're working and you're laboring and you're
eating and you're drinking and you're sewing and you're so busy
doing all of the things that you want to do while my house
lies waste and at the end of it all you're still dissatisfied
and still empty and still discouraged and there's just barrenness in
your hearts. And it's because you're trying to satisfy yourselves
with temporal things. Trying to satisfy your eternal
souls with things that are temporal. And if the eternal God was in
the midst, you would really know what it was to be satisfied.
Verse 10, therefore the heaven over you is stayed from you. What was the priority that this
man of God was calling them to? It was very simply the key text
of the whole book. Verse number eight, go up to
the mountain, bring wood and build a house. Simple, go up
to the mountain. Now that's going to take hard
work. if you've ever climbed a mountain, but I'm sure it's
not easy. Especially whenever you're going up there to cut
down big trees and get the big trees cut down and bring the
lumber down and get it into Jerusalem, go up into the mountain, cut
down the wood, bring the wood, build my house. And then he says,
but I will take pleasure in it and be glorified, saith the Lord. It takes effort. I know that
it's Christ that builds this church. He's the master builder.
But we're the tradesmen, if you like. working with the Lord. Remember how it speaks in the
end of Mark's gospel, they went everywhere preaching the word,
the Lord working with them. They were working, but the Lord
was working with them and confirming the words with signs following.
The temptation is to say, well, we can sit back and all we can
do is pray about this terrible situation. But all the prayer
in the world is not going to get the house built unless people
are willing to work. Don't think your house that you
live in or this church building built itself after a prayer meeting
somewhere else, drive down the road. No, the Lord has built
this beautiful church. The Lord's built this house.
And folks, souls are not going to get under the sound of God's
word unless we're busy working. People are not going to come
to a gospel mission unless we go and invite them. And if we
work and go up into the mountain and bring the wood and try our
best to get that dead wood into the house of God, onto the building
site, it's the Lord that will do the rest. if we can work at
getting them in. Then the second sermon, a little
bit shorter, Sermon number 2, chapter 2, verses 1 to 9. You'll
notice, incidentally, that the first message he preached, verse
12 to 14 of chapter 1, had this immediate response. They were
quick to respond. Zerubbabel's heart, it was stirred
up by the Spirit of God. And the remnant of the people,
they obeyed the voice of the Lord, and they began to work,
and they began to build. And yet, as they were building,
the discouragements were still there. They hadn't gone away. They maybe weren't coming from
without, but there were certainly discouragements within. If you
look at a second sermon, verse 3 of chapter 2, here you have
what we could call the wet blanket brigade. While they were working,
there's a group of individuals standing, looking on, and they're
saying, this house is nothing in comparison to the temple that
Solomon built. Solomon built this beautiful
temple overlaid with gold. It was bigger. It was more ornate. It had got more grandeur. It
had got more beauty. And we're building this temple
and it's smaller. And Haggai challenges him and
says, who is left among you that saw the house in her first glory?
And how do you see it now? Is it not in your eyes in comparison
of it as nothing? Zachariah rebuked the same people
by saying, who have despised the day of small things? Temple wasn't what it used to
be. It wasn't as big as it used to be. And you know, we can be
the same today. We can harp on about the good
old days all we like and say, well, things aren't the same
today as they were 70 years ago or 50 years ago. I'm sure nothing's
happening now and that people aren't coming to the gospel meetings
or the prayer meetings aren't full and the spirit of prayer
is not the same as it used to be. And these are realities,
we know that. But standing and complaining
about it is not going to do anything. It was the ones that weren't
working were the ones that were complaining about how this temple
wasn't as it used to be. Not like the good old days. Nothing's
happening. And then, well of course the
reason why there's nothing happening is because some of them weren't
working. That's why maybe things just weren't the way they were.
But then in verse number nine, Haggai reminds them, verse number
nine, he says, listen, the glory of this latter house shall be
greater than that of the former. Now, again, for them, that seemed
impossible because it's nowhere near as big. It doesn't have
all of the gold and all of the beautiful ornate elements around
it, but it definitely does grant. How could the glory of the latter
house possibly be greater than that of the former? For the simple
reason that this temple that Ezra is building is the very
temple that the Lord Jesus Christ is going to be ministering in
himself. And it's the glory of the Lord
and the presence of Christ that makes a temple or a building
beautiful. You can sit, the Covenanters did it, and they stood in fields,
and they broke bread, and they partook of the cup together,
and the presence of God filled the highlands and the heathers.
Put out of their churches, but the presence of God was with
them. And that's the glory that we
seek. We can have the most beautiful
building in all of the town or all of the world. but without
the glory of God in the midst, it's nothing. Verse number 7
says, I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations
shall come. Isn't it the Christmas carol,
Come, desire of nations, come, fix in us thy humble home? The
desire of nations is none other than Christ. And Haggai is saying
he's going to come to this temple that presently is being despised
by some within the group. Then others in verse number 8
were worried about the finance. You see, they had fitted their
money away in themselves. They put their wages into bags
that were filled with holes. They had nothing left to show
for their wages. And now that they'd squandered their money,
they think, well, if we're going to build this, where is the cash going
to come from? And God says to them, the silver is mine and
the gold is mine. And then others, in light of
chapter 1, verse 10, where it says, the heaven over you has
stayed from Jew, they were concerned that even if they built the house,
there would be no blessing in the house to begin with, and
nothing would happen, and they were pessimistic. And yet the
Lord says in verse 6 and 7 of chapter 2, yet once in a little
while, and I will shake the heavens and the earth and the land and
the sea and dry land, and I will fill this house with my glory. And then still there were others
who were fearful of failure and persecution. And Haggai said
to them in verse number four, Be strong, be strong, be strong
three times. All ye people of the land, saith
the Lord, and work, for I am with you. So Haggai's first sermon
shows a position that prompted consideration. This second sermon
gives a plea to practice courage. In spite of all the discouragements,
he says, be strong, be courageous. The work can be done. God's with
you. God will help you. God will give
you grace and strength to do what needs to be done. Then the
third sermon, chapter 2, verse 10 to 19, brings a proposal to
practice Cleanliness, a proposal to practice cleanliness. You'll
notice verse 10, the fourth and 20th day of the ninth month in
the second year of Darius. So, each message, you've got
the very date that the message was preached. And whenever God
speaks to your heart, it's often a good practice to write down
even the date. The third sermon was addressed
to the priests. Verse 11, now thus saith the
Lord of hosts, ask now the priest concerning the law. And Haggai
asks them two questions. So this is an interactive type
of a sermon. He's preaching, and then he's
asking the congregation of priests to answer the question that he's
presenting. The first question, verse 12, if one bear holy flesh
in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt do touch bread,
or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any meat, shall it be holy?
The priest answered, no. And so the lesson from that is
you cannot impart holiness. Then the second question he asks,
verse 13, if one is unclean by a dead body, touch any of these,
shall it be unclean? And they answered, yes, it shall
be unclean. You cannot impart holiness, but
you can spread corruption. And so this is a challenge to
the priests who are ministering in this temple that's going to
be built, a challenge to them to ensure that they bear a good
testimony before the people. Haggai is calling them to a renewal
of their consecration and purity. And again in verse 18 he says,
consider now from this day, think about this, you're starting out
from this day. Forget about all that's gone
on before, all of the failure, all of the lethargy, all of the
just forgetting about the work of God. Now from this day consider
this, your testimony. before those around you. And he encourages them in verse
19, at the very last phrase in the verse, he encourages them
that the blessing of God is waiting for them. If you can maintain
purity, and you can put your shoulder to the wheel again,
and you can bear a good testimony, he says, be sure that from this
day, God says, I will bless you. So now that the people of God
have returned to the land, and their hearts have been stirred
up about the work of God, they're challenged now and encouraged,
saying, listen, if you can do God's work, God's way, with clean
hands and pure hearts, God promises, from this day, I will bless you. I believe God is ever willing
to bless hard work. Done with clean hands. Then very
quickly, the last sermon, verse 20, down to verse number 23,
is a promise to produce confidence. A promise to produce confidence.
God has already given many wonderful promises to the people here.
Chapter 1, verse 8, verse 13, chapter 2, verse 4, verse 5 through
7, verse 9, verse 19. And yet the last sermon that
Haggai preaches is one entirely of promise. And again, verse
20, the date is given and it is addressed to Zerubbabel. It
was Zerubbabel who led the Hebrew people out of captivity It was
Zerubbabel who looked over the work. He was like the foreman,
so to speak. It was Zerubbabel that Haggai preached his first
message to. It was Zerubbabel whose heart
was stirred up to begin the work again. And now he encourages
Zerubbabel by giving them this promise to produce confidence.
And He gives them this wonderful promise. Again, I will shake
the heavens and the earth. I will overthrow the throne of
kingdoms. I will destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the
nations. And it's a promise that God is going to signally bless
His people once again in their land, in Jerusalem, in the temple. Now, if you were to read Matthew
chapter 1, the great genealogy, that shows us right to the birth
of Christ. Matthew chapter 1 verse 12, Zerubbabel,
governor of Judah, is in the line of Christ. And in fact,
he's a type of Christ. Because was it not said of the
Lord Jesus Christ himself, of his government there shall be
no end, and the government shall be upon his shoulders. And so there's an immediate application
here for Zerubbabel, but there's also a secondary application
that points to the kingdom of Christ again coming with great
power and glory on this earth, a golden age of blessing. The burden, therefore, of Haggai's
message is very simple. If you want the blessing of God,
going to have to work for it and get priorities right. But God gives us every encouragement
in that area. Go up to the mountain, bring
wood, build a house. I will take pleasure in it and
I will be glorified, saith the Lord. Time has really beaten
us tonight. I do apologize for going on a
little bit longer than usual, but we'll get down please to
The Prophet Haggai
Series Messages from Minor Prophets
| Sermon ID | 823161421583 |
| Duration | 50:57 |
| Date | |
| Category | Prayer Meeting |
| Bible Text | Haggai |
| Language | English |
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