Haggai 1:15-2:9 First, a Remembered Prominence….
In our Old Testament reading from Haggai we see that the Jewish believers in that day began to think all was lost, especially when they compared the beautiful temple of Solomon with the ruins around them now. But the prophet tells them that Jerusalem will again be the center of worship when world events conclude and there is peace on earth.
Haggai knows that those who remember seeing Solomon’s temple will feel discouraged that the temple they are building now doesn’t compare to it in splendor. They are poor and have had a bad harvest and they really don’t have silver and gold to put into it.
All they have is their desire to build it and their faith.
That turns out to be enough.
“How do you see it?” Haggai asks.
Don’t worry about it not being good enough for God.
“Work, for I am with you….My Spirit remains in your midst. Fear not. I will fill this house with glory,” the Lord assures them.
How you see things may depend upon your faith in God and in his ability to stick with you and sustain you.
God wanted them to look ahead with eyes of faith and know that whatever structure they built in which to worship would be Holy and acceptable because His Spirit would inhabit that place.
I remember hearing about a missionary who went to China and found out that the local Christians were meeting in a duck shed. She was sure she couldn’t worship properly there until she visited and heard them singing, “We have come into this place and gathered in His name to worship Him.”
God wants to inhabit not only our buildings but our bodies, which are the true places where He dwells and can be glorified.
Even in this Old Testament book, God was hinting of heaven and our new bodies which will perfectly worship him.
LUKE 20:27-38 Second: A Ridiculous Preconception
Here we have an example of a mocking question, intended to ridicule the teaching of Jesus. The Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection. (That’s how I remember them, that is sad, you see! The Pharisees did believe because they are fair, you see!)
According to Jewish law, when a man died his brother was required to marry his widow to keep her from being homeless, helpless and without an heir. They think they will trip Jesus up by using an example from Levitical law.
The Sadducees attempted to ridicule belief in the resurrection by using a far-fetched example to make nonsense of it. They ask, “In the resurrection what is the situation of a woman who had seven earthly husbands? Which, if any, would be her real husband?”
They really were just trying to embarrass the Pharisees and show how ridiculous and complicated resurrection life could be if a man had married many times.
Jesus says there is a sharp difference between life as we know it here on earth and life in eternity. In the “age to come” people will not die, nor will children be born. Hence, there is no need for marriage and procreation. Life will be different, not a mere continuation of this life in, imaginary, ideal terms.
Jesus is not saying earthly husbands and wives will not know each other or continue to love each other or be close, but only that “marriage,” as such will not be in heaven.
Their mistake was in assuming that the next life would be exactly like this one.
I always thought about it like this: I would want to be with Bill and my parents and he would want to be with me and his parents and our parents would want to be with their parents etc. until we all discover we are after all just one big family…children of God living in the Father’s house together.
When we become “like the angels in heaven” it does not mean we have wings etc. but rather that we have complete fellowship with God and one another without “belonging” to anyone but God.
Fellowship with God is eternal. He is the God of the living.
Jesus argues with the Sadducees on their own terms. He uses the Passage from Exodus 3:6 and the scene of the burning bush to point out to them that there is, indeed, scriptural basis for belief in the resurrection from the dead. It is significant that he quotes from the first five books of the Old Testament because these were the only ones the Sadducees recognized as divine scripture.
Jesus points to the proof of the resurrection in the words God spoke to Moses saying, ‘I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. This could only be possible if Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were still alive, because these words were spoken several hundred years after they had died.
If we walk with him now, we continue to walk with him in heaven.
But to try to figure out heaven with only our knowledge of things on this earth is like a baby in the womb trying to figure out our process of eating and walking and talking and enjoying a sunset. There is no way an embryo could figure this out. It’s an entirely different way of life.
We are dust and return to dust but we are given a new eternal body, too, that is like our old body the way one kernel of corn is like a whole ear of corn.
Jesus’s explanation of the resurrection assures us that our loved one has only left us to be with Christ in heaven.
Without the resurrection, death would be the end and our accountability to God would be limited only to this life and judgment and eternal life would be meaningless.
The resurrection offers us a new existence where men and women will no longer be subject to suffering and death.
Heaven is not a continuation of life as we now know it, since time, death and sin limit our relationships in this life.
Our relationship with Christ is the most important thing in life.
It is this relationship that prepares us for the age to come. This relationship ensures that we experience the peace of God both in this life and in the life to come.
Those who place their faith in God and his Son are declared righteous in the sight of God. They will spend eternity in fellowship with God the Father, his Son, and all the saints from every generation.
This brings us to our final passage from Second Thessalonians.
2 Thess 2:1-5,13-17 Reliable Promises
In the passage in Thessalonians, Paul is dealing with another question that still perplexes people today. When will the Lord return? They had waited many years and had begun to think perhaps they had missed it. Paul assured them they hadn’t.
The main thing Paul says is the fact that they know they are saved and they should always be encouraged by the hope of the gospel he has taught them.
As we wait for the return of Christ, it is easy to get discouraged with so much crime and cancer and accidents and horrible things going on in the world today. But that is why we call it faith…it is trusting in God to be God and have everything under his control. An old black preacher friend of ours used to say, “You know, God is not in any trouble at all!”
We often hear various modern day “prophets” tell people that all of the events predicted before the Lord returns have already happened. And they often set dates and become a laughing stock when their predictions don’t come true.
Jesus says no man knows the day or the hour. Paul is writing to calm the people and assure them just to wait in faith and the day will certainly come one day.
The acceptance of the truth of the gospel through trust in Jesus Christ is the believer’s protection against destruction. And those chosen and called by God are saved and do not have to fear the end times whenever and however it comes about.
Paul had instructed the Thessalonians concerning “the Day of the Lord” when he preached to them in person.
The Day of the Lord is the period of history mentioned repeatedly in the Old Testament during which God will bring judgment on the people of the earth in a more direct, dramatic, and drastic way than ever before.
In his first letter to the Thessalonians Paul had taught them that the day of the Lord would come as a thief in the night (1 Thess. 5:2).
Misinformation began to circulate regarding this event
To some it seemed that the day of the Lord had already come. After all, the persecutions they were experiencing seemed to be what the prophets had predicted.
The people at Thessalonica were afraid - maybe Jesus had come and they’d missed him.
Sometimes I used to wake up in the middle of the night when I would hear a loud noise and Bill would ask me what was wrong.
I would say “Oh, nothing, I just heard a noise so loud I thought Jesus was coming back.”
Then he would tease me and say, “Well if that happens again just look over here and if I am still here, He hasn’t!”
II Thess. 2:1-2 tells us: “Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers, not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by some prophecy, report or letter supposed to have come from us, saying that the day of the Lord has already come.”
They were suffering from a degree of uncertainty about their salvation.
It is clear that the subject of the Second Coming had become a source of tension and disruption, instead of a source of comfort and hope as it is intended to be.
Some Christians actually avoid learning about the Second Coming of Christ because the whole scenario scares them. They don’t want to think about the End of the World, so they ignore those parts of the Bible. But that’s a real problem, because the Bible is full of Prophesies about the Last Days.
We should not be afraid to learn about the Last Days … as long as we are learning it from God’s Word. The problem comes when we get our information from other sources. This is why Paul warned the Thessalonians: Don’t let anyone deceive you …
The problem comes when we don’t know the difference between man’s theories and Scripture. It’s dangerous when someone teaches that God has given them all the details.
While we wait for the Lord’s Promised Coming, we can stand firm and hold on to the TRUTH.
I think at least one thing is clear in these first two verses.
You’re not going to “miss” the Lord’s return if you’re trusting in Jesus—you don’t have to wonder about that. Your salvation is based upon what Christ did and the fact that you are trusting in Him.
Paul had told them about the future rebellion against the truth, the great apostasy headed by the Antichrist. But he also warned that there was a present danger, and that the church must guard God’s truth and not turn from it.
God works in this world through the truth of His Word, and Satan opposes this truth by substituting his lies.
Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev used to tell of a time when there was a wave of petty theft in the Soviet Union. To curtail this, the authorities put up guards around the factories. At one, Timberworks in Leningrad, the guard knew the workers in the factory very well. The first evening, out came Pyotr Petrovich with a wheelbarrow and, on the wheelbarrow, a great bulky sack with a suspicious-looking object inside.
"All right, Petrovich," said the guard, "what have you got there?" "Oh, just sawdust and shavings," Petrovich replied. "Come on," the guard said, "I wasn’t born yesterday. Tip it out." And out came nothing but sawdust and shavings. So he was allowed to put it all back again and go home.
When the same thing happened every night of the week the guard became frustrated. Finally, his curiosity overcame his frustration. "Petrovich," he said, "I know you. Tell me what you’re smuggling out of here, and I’ll let you go."
"Wheelbarrows, my friend," said Petrovich, "wheelbarrows."
Satan would like very much for you to get your eyes on the sawdust and lose track of the wheelbarrow.
In the midst of the teaching about end-time events and confusion about them comes this reminder of the basic truths of salvation and an encouragement to hold fast to these truths.
This is the bottom line of the Gospel. Christ died for sins so that all who trust in what he has done receive eternal life.
That is a reliable promise. Wait for it expectantly, but work for Him while you wait!
