Haggai Series

September 11, 2021

Gone were the glory days of Israel and Solomon’s Temple…. For 70 years God’s people lived in their self-created exile, but just as Isaiah had prophesied, Cyrus the Great granted the Jews freedom to return to Palestine. Those who did return arrived to find a pile of rubble and nasty neighbors.

After the initial blush of freedom and the excitement of rebuilding the Temple, discouragement and outside interference begun to cause the people to question their priorities. They decided that their difficulties were God’s way of tempering their zeal, “Maybe it’s not the right time to rebuild the Temple”, they thought. They rationalized their choices until work came to a dead stop.

The returning exiles still claimed to be “God’s Chosen People”, but their actions indicated that they cared more about ease and comfort and “getting back to normal”. So, as they waited “for the right time” to rebuild the Temple, they built mansions for themselves.

The Temple was the place God had always come to meet with His people. It enabled Him to get as close to them as possible. It was the place that represented relationship. It was the place that pointed to their means of salvation.

• Exodus 25:8 - Then have them make a sanctuary for me, and I will dwell among them.

• Exodus 29:42-46 - For the generations to come this burnt offering is to be made regularly at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting before the LORD. There I will meet you and speak to you; 43 there also I will meet with the Israelites, and the place will be consecrated by my glory. 44 "So I will consecrate the Tent of Meeting and the altar and will consecrate Aaron and his sons to serve me as priests. 45 Then I will dwell among the Israelites and be their God. 46 They will know that I am the LORD their God, who brought them out of Egypt so that I might dwell among them. I am the LORD their God.

• Exodus 40:33-34 - Then Moses set up the courtyard around the tabernacle and altar and put up the curtain at the entrance to the courtyard. And so Moses finished the work. 34 Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle.

Therefore, rebuilding the Temple should have been given precedence, AND YET the people had turned away from that symbol of God’s presence and toward their own interests. They might not have been worshipping idols, but God was STILL NOT first in their lives.

And so, the Temple remained in ruins for 14 years until Haggai showed up.

This book is perhaps the most precisely dated book in all the Bible. Each of Haggai’s sermons can be dated to an exact day, during a 15-week period, in the 2nd year of the reign of Darius the Great (522-486 BC).

• Message 1 – 1:1-11 (August 29, 520 BC) – Rebuke for leaving the Temple in ruins and challenge to resume construction.

• Message 2 – 2:1-9 (October 17, 520 BC) – Future glory of the Temple.

• Message 3 – 2:10-19 (December 18, 520 BC) – Future blessing for the people.

• Message 4 – 2:20-23 (December 18, 520 BC) – personal message for Zerubbabel.

Which brings us to My Favorite Thing About HAGGAI – Message 1 and 4 words: PRIORITIES – FAITHFULNESS – OBEDIENCE – COOPERATION

In the second year of King Darius, on the first day of the sixth month, the word of the LORD came through the prophet Haggai ….. "How is it that you are living in mansions while my house lies in ruins? Think about this very carefully…. You have put a lot of effort into improving your physical lives. You plant your crops, but your harvests aren’t very good. You never have enough to eat or drink, your clothes are not sufficient to keep out the cold and there is a hole in your wallet.”

The “Chosen’s” PRIORITIES were confused and they still viewed FAITHFULNESS as a one-way street ---- They expected God to be faithful to them ---- They expected a homeland. They expected comfortable living. They expected good crops and full stomachs. They expected all the blessings that come with being “God’s Chosen People” while choosing not to return the favor.

Faith is belief in the assurance of God's word and all that he has done. Faithfulness is living in accordance with that truth.

Faith = belief leads to Faithfulness = action:

• Hebrews 11:4 - By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did.

• Hebrews 11:7 - By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark

• Hebrews 11:8 - By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.