Several years ago, Christian author, researcher and pastor Ed Stetzer wrote an article titled “Too Many So-Called Christians Merely Giving Lip Service to Jesus”. In that article Stetzer observed that roughly 3 out of 4 Americans identify as Christians and that those self-identified Christians fall into three groups that each represent about a quarter of the population. While I’m not really sure that each of the three groups are equal in numbers based on other research and other anecdotal information, this is a helpful way of understanding why many who call themselves Christians give only lip service to Jesus. Here are the three groups that Stetzer identified:
1) Cultural Christians. These are the people who believe they are Christians because the culture tells them they are. They may have religious roots in their family or come from a specific Christian tradition, but they are Christians in name only and don’t practice a vibrant faith.
2) Congregational Christians. Although these Christians are similar to the first group, they have at least some connection to congregational life. They may even have a church they consider to be a church home that they attend occasionally. But they don’t really have a real, vibrant faith either.
3) Convictional Christians. This final group is made up of those who actually live according to what they profess. They have a personal relationship with Jesus that has led to life change. My personal feeling is that this group consists of well less than 25% of the population in the U.S. – probably something more like 10% or even less.
It’s no surprise at all that those in the first two groups would merely give lip service to Jesus. We would expect that to be the case for them. But as the passage that we’re going to study this morning shows, it is really easy for even the most committed Christian to fall into that trap as well. So regardless of which of the three groups that you fall into, today’s message is relevant to your life.
This morning we’re continuing our series title “Little Books with a Big Message” and the next two weeks, we’ll be studying the book of Haggai. It is the third book from the end of the Old Testament, right before Zechariah and Malachi.
The book of Haggai is the second shortest in the Old Testament. We’ll be looking at the one book that is shorter – Obadiah – in two weeks. Haggai’s message was given to people that I think are much like most of us – those who acknowledge that God must be the first priority in our lives, but who often struggle to make that more than just lip service.
Before we read the first chapter of that book, let me give you a brief background that will help us to out the text in its proper context. We can find much of that historical context in the early chapters of Ezra.
After roughly 70 years in Exile in Babylon, a group of around 42,000 Jews, accompanied by another 7,000 servants, returned to Judah in 536 BC under the leadership of Zerubbabel. They quickly rebuilt the altar and began to offer sacrifices once again. Two years after returning, they laid the foundation to rebuild the temple. Their Samaritan neighbors offered to help with the rebuilding, but the Jews refused their offer. The Samaritans retaliated by threatening the workers and lobbying against the Jews before the Persian government and that work came to a halt.
For the next 14 years, the people got caught up in the routine of life and got used to life without a temple. So God sends two prophets to proclaim His message to the remnant that had returned to Judah – first Haggai and then two months later, Zechariah.
The book of Haggai consists of four messages that are precisely dated over nearly four months in the latter half of the year 520 BC. Today, in chapter 1, we’ll see the first of those messages.
[Read Haggai 1:1-15]
This is one of those passages where I think the main idea is actually pretty easy to discern, and here is how I’m going to summarize that message for us this morning:
Putting first things first requires
life service, not just lip service
As I pointed out earlier, it is easy to assume that the Christians who fail to put first things first are those who are only the cultural or the congregational Christians. But if we consider the group that God is speaking to through Haggai here, we find that they are among the most committed of God’s people at that time. Unlike their fellow Jews who chose to remain in Babylon, where things were familiar and comfortable, this group of roughly 50,000 people made the dangerous journey back to Jerusalem and began to rebuild. Almost all of them had been born in Babylon and lived their entire lives there, but their commitment to God’s purpose for His people motivated them to return to the land God had given them as a people and reestablish themselves in a land that had been devastated by war.
But just we often do, after a pretty good start, they had lost their zeal for the things that were important to God and become so busy with the everyday tasks of just living life, that they might have said that God was a priority, but their lives didn’t really reflect that. They believed intellectually that God was to be first in their lives, but that idea wasn’t reflected in the way they were living. And if we’re not careful, we’re all prone to doing the very same thing.
So let’s use this chapter to see what we can learn about…
HOW TO TURN LIP SERVICE INTO LIFE SERVICE
1. Stop making excuses
Benjamin Franklin once wrote:
He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.
I doubt that he got that idea from the words that God spoke through Haggai, but that is pretty much God’s message here.
Look again at verse 2. God’s first charge against the people is that they were saying that it was not yet time to rebuild the house of the Lord. Obviously, God’s presence has never been or will never be limited to a physical place like the temple. God had been present with His people while they were in exile in Babylon. But the temple was important to the worship of the Jews because it was the place that God had appointed for them to worship Him and the only place where they could make the required sacrifices and offerings.
If you had asked the people about why the temple had not yet been rebuilt after 16 years back in the land, my guess is that they would have said something like this: “We’re all for rebuilding the temple. It’s a great cause, but the timing isn’t quite right. After all we’re in a recession and we can barely take care of our own families. But once the economy turns around, then we’ll rebuild the temple.”
Today, the house that God wants us to build is not a physical building, but rather His people – both individually and corporately. Peter describes that idea like this:
As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
(1 Peter 2:4–5 ESV)
Today, putting first things first when it comes to building God’s house means making my life a fitting place for God to dwell and devoting my life to building up others so that the same is true in their lives. Unfortunately, the excuses that we come up with don’t sound a whole lot different than the ones we see in this passage.
• “We just started this remodeling project on our house, so I don’t really have time to read the Bible and pray consistently right now, but just as soon as we finish that project, I’ll have more time for that.”
• “I know that we don’t attend church very consistently right now, but the kids are right in the middle of their sports season and that’s the only morning we have to sleep in. So as soon as the season is over, we’ll get back to church more.”
• “I know that I’m working a lot of hours at work right now, but somebody has to make the mortgage payments and the car payments and the credit card payments. Just as soon as we pay some of that debt down, I’ll spend more time at home with my family.”
• “I really do want to invest in furthering the gospel, but right now we’re living paycheck to paycheck already. Just as soon as I get that promotion and raise, then I’ll start giving to my church.”
There are nearly an infinite number of excuses that we can come up with to push God and His purposes, plans and ways to the side. But if we want to give life service and not just lip service to God then we need to stop making those excuses.
2. Stop being selfish
We see in verse 4 that the people were selfish. They had plenty of money and time to devote to their own houses, but the temple lay in ruins.
Before we go any further with this point, let me just say that God is not admonishing the people for having riches or a nice house. The Bible never condemns anyone for having riches or material goods. The problem here is a heart problem. The people are spending the very best of their time, talent and treasure on their own selfish interests, while at the same time ignoring the things of God.
In verse 5, God tells the people to consider the results of their selfishness. The command to “consider their ways” literally means to “weigh their hearts”. So God is reinforcing the idea that they have a heart problem. And because that idea is so important God repeats the command to consider their ways again in verse 7.
In spite of the fact that the people have been focusing on their own selfish desires, the results are not what they hoped for. They sowed plenty of seed, but there had been droughts so the harvest did not yield as much as they had hoped for. That meant they had even less seed to sow the following year. Inflation seemed to gobble up what they earned so that it was like putting money into a bag with holes. So at the end of the month they had nothing left to give toward the building fund for the temple.
God not only understood that, He was the one who was causing that to happen. We see in verses 10 and 11 that God was the one who had caused the droughts and caused all the shortfalls in order to help the people see that they weren’t putting first things first. The people just kept working harder and harder and getting behind faster and faster, but they had failed to consider that God was trying to tell them something.
Of course we would never do anything like that right? We would never work more and more hours only to see our bank accounts dwindle even more. We would never spend all our waking moments thinking about and planning our next vacation, or buying a new car or some major remodeling project at our home to the point that we forget about God.
Here are a few simple questions that we need to ask ourselves on a periodic basis that will help us to consider our ways and evaluate whether we are becoming too selfish:
1) How do I spend my time? That would include what I do with my leisure time. Is it all spent on me and the things I want or am I investing time in the things of God and in other people?
2) How do I spend my money, which is really God’s money? Am I generous with others and with God or do I spend everything on myself?
3) What are my goals in life? Are they all about getting stuff for myself or do they include investing my life in others and in bringing the kingdom of God near to others?
4) What do I think about most? If you’re on Facebook or other social media, the best way to answer that question is probably to look at what you post about the most.
3. Fear God
In a moment, we’ll go back to the first part of verse 12 and see that the people immediately responded to Haggai’s message by being obedient to God. But first I want us to focus for a moment on the last part of verse 12 and see why the people did that – they feared the Lord.
This would be a good time to note that Haggai uses the title “Lord of hosts” 14 times in this short book. In Hebrew that phrase literally means “the Lord of armies” It is a title for God that reveals His sovereign power over all of heaven and earth. In the context of this chapter, it reinforces the idea that God was the one who controlled the weather and had caused the drought that frustrated the labor of the people.
Fearing God is one of those ideas that is hard to describe. To a large degree that is because it is so multi-faceted. One aspect of fearing God is certainly the idea of awe and respect of the majesty of God that keeps us from approaching God flippantly. That had certainly been lacking among that remnant of Jews there in Jerusalem, which is one reason they had neglected God’s house. I like to think of that aspect of the fear of the Lord as God “taking my breath away.”
I’m going to get on my soap box here for a moment regarding that aspect of the fear of the Lord. It may very well be that I’m blowing this all out of proportion, but I’m really bothered by the tendency I see for people to give credit to God by using phrases like “Yay, God”. To me that seems a bit too causal and something that sounds a lot more like rooting for my favorite sports team than giving credit to the Lord of hosts for His awesomeness.
The other aspect of fearing the Lord, one which I think we tend to dismiss a bit too easily some time, is the fear of God’s judgment for our rebellion against Him. In my opinion, that is a healthy fear that leads us as sinful people to be reconciled to God through Jesus. And I think the remnant that Haggai is addressing here had lost sight of that as well.
Obviously for those of us who have put our faith in Jesus, our sins have been paid for in full and we no longer need to fear the judgment of God for our sins. But we still ought to have what Martin Luther called “filial fear” in which we fear offending the God, not primarily out of fear of punishment, but rather because we don’t want to displease Him.
4. Obey
I really love how people responded to the message that Haggai had spoken to them. Beginning with Zerubbabel, the governor, and Joshua, the high priest, the people obeyed God. And they did that immediately. They didn’t argue with God. They didn’t continue to make excuses, they didn’t procrastinate.
This is really the essence of what it means to turn lip service into life service. I can say that I’m not making excuses, I can say that I’m not selfish. I can say that I fear God. But unless my actions are consistent with my words, then all I’ve really done is give lip service to putting first things first.
Every time that we open our Bibles or every time that we hear a sermon or every time that we take part in a Bible study, there is a very good possibility that God is going to confront some aspect of the way that we are living our lives. My guess is that if you’re listening carefully this morning and your heart is open to hearing from God, that God has already done that in your life today. And when that happens, we have to make a choice – we can either make excuses, or ignore what God is saying or put off our obedience and miss out on the blessings that naturally come with obedience, or we can obey immediately and experience those blessings.
We see that in verse 13 when God responds to the obedience of the people with these words:
“I am with you.”
We need to be careful here not to conclude that we are to obey in order to receive God’s blessings. God is not saying here that now that the people have obeyed that He will bless them because of their obedience. As we’ve often said before it would be more accurate to say:
There are blessings in our obedience, not for our obedience.
Do you see the difference?
5. Work
This obviously ties in very closely with the idea of obedience, but I thought it was important enough to discuss separately.
This chapter closes with the people beginning to work on the temple just a little over three weeks Haggai spoke God’s message to them. We’re going to see this idea of work coming up again in chapter 2 when God actually commands the people to work.
The apostle Paul reminds us that just like any other relationship, putting first things first in our relationship with God does require work on our part.
Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.
(Philippians 2:12–13 ESV)
While Paul is careful to point out that we are dependent on God to do His work in us – to give us both the desire and ability to develop our relationship with Him, we also have a responsibility. I like to think of it in these terms:
I must work out, what God is working in.
There were some things that the remnant in Jerusalem had to do themselves. Although God could certainly have done it if he wanted to, He did not just command the temple to rebuild itself. Instead He chose to do that through the work of the people.
The same thing is true for us. If we are going to grow in our relationship with God, there is work for us to do that God will not do:
• God will not read your Bible for you. You can get an app where some guy with a deep voice with an English accent will read it to you, but God won’t do that Himself.
• God won’t pray for you.
• God won’t give an offering for you.
• God won’t lead Children’s Church or teach a Bible study for you.
• God won’t show up to take your shift as a Greeter on Sunday morning.
• God won’t go serve your neighbor in the name of Jesus for you.
Those are all things that you will have to choose to do. God will give you both the motivation and the ability that you need to do those things but He won’t do them for you.
Putting first things first requires
life service, not just lip service
I’m going to close this morning with an illustration that might be familiar to many of you, but it won’t hurt to be reminded of it again.
I have before me a glass jar that is filled up with some rocks. So let me ask you, is this jar full?
[Fill the jar with gravel]
Let me ask you the same question again. Is this jar full?
[Fill the jar with sand]
Same question. Is this jar full?
[Fill the jar with water]
So what’s the point of this illustration? One time I had someone tell me that the point was that there is always room to fit one more thing into your schedule, but that’s not what I’m trying to illustrate this morning. In fact, my point is pretty much the opposite. If you don’t put the big rocks in first, you’ll never get them in later.
So as we close this morning, I want to encourage everyone to do two things. First, I’ve left you a space to write down one of your “big rocks” – something in your life that you absolutely need to put first.
My “big” rock”
And once you’ve done that, I’ve also given you space to write down one specific thing that you will do this week to make sure that you give life service and not just lip service to that priority. That step should be something that is achievable and measurable so that you can determine whether or not you have completed it.
One step I will take this week to give “life service” to that “big rock”
Let me give you an example. Let’s say that my “big rock” is to pray more consistently. Instead of just saying I’ll pray more, I could take a step like making a commitment to pray for 10 minutes each day before I get on Facebook. That is something reasonable for me to do and something that I can measure. Although maybe I’ll get there some day, I don’t want to start with a goal of praying for an hour because I’m not very likely to follow through on that.
Putting first things first requires
life service, not just lip service
Are you willing to do that?
Discussion questions for Bible Roundtable
1. What do you think about Stetzer’s three classifications of Christians – cultural, congregational, and convictional? How could that be either helpful or harmful in developing my own relationship with Jesus?
2. If God sent Haggai to Christians in the United States today, what do you think he would say that we are putting ahead of God?
3. Is it Ok for Christians to have “nice things”? Where do we draw the line?
4. What is the difference between blessings for our obedience and blessings in our obedience? Why is it important for us to understand that difference?
5. What do you think it means to “work out your own salvation with trembling and fear?”
