Our Priorities or God's Glory

Historical Background

The book of Haggai belongs to a part of the Old Testament generally called the twelve books of the minor prophets.

They are called the minor prophets not because they are less important than the Major prophets like Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel, but mainly because they are shorter in length. Haggai is in fact the shortest gook in the Old Testament next to Obadiah, and comprises just two chapters. But although short in length it contains a powerful message which speaks to us today.

The events recorded are set within the context of the return of God’s people from exile in Babylon, where they remained for seventy years as foretold in Jeremiah. The Babylonian Empire was defeated under the hands of the Persian Cyrus in 539 BC. Haggai and Zechariah speak into the situation where the early pioneers who had begun toe rebuild the temple as shown in Ezra 1-3, had ceased to do so because of a combination of external opposition and inward will of the heart.

Upon their return to Jerusalem they were greeted by a disheartening sight as they see their glorious city was in ruins, its walls heaps of rubble, and its beautiful temple a pile of blackened stones. For the next sixteen years, this situation remained unchanged and the foundation was overgrown with weeds. Zacharia, began his ministry of exhorting the leaders and the people to recommence the work of building God’s house.

Even though the main theme deals with the rebuilding of the temple, it contains other important lessons on

1) obedience to God’s word

2) the effect of powerful preaching

3) spiritual priorities

4) apathy and indifference

5) zeal for and worship in God’s house

6) the doctrine of the remnant.

CHARACTERS IN THE BOOK

We do not know a whole lot about the prophet Haggai other than references in Ezra chapters 5 and 6, and Nehemiah 8. The assumption given is that people would have known who he was, so, no introduction was necessary.

THREE MAIN CHARACTERS MENTIONED

Darius, King of the mighty Persian Empire, who ruled Judah from his capital in Babylon during the ministry of Haggai. He is also mentioned in Ezra 5 and Zechariah 1.

Zerubbabel, the leader of the returning exiles from Babylon and the civil governor of Judah. His name means ‘offspring of Babylon’ and suggests that he was born in Babylon during the exile.

Joshua, the High Priest, who was responsible for the spiritual life of the nation and shared the leadership with Zerubbabel. He is also mentioned in Ezra 2:2 and Zechariah 3:1.

KEY QUESTIONS AND RESPONSES IN THE TEXT

Is it a time for you to dwell in your panelled houses while the house of the Lord lies in ruins? (physical house of the Lord, as well as spiritual dwelling place)

Consider your ways.

My house lies in ruins but you are busy with building your own houses.

INTRODUCTION

The more we study the Bible, the clearer it becomes that throughout the history of the kingdom of God He chooses special people for special tasks.

Or to put it another way, he always has the right man or woman in the right place at the right time.

This is one of the major lessons we learn from Hebrews 11, that at certain strategic points in the history of the Old Testament God raise up Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Esther, Jacob, Joseph, Moses; and in the New Testament you have John the Baptist, Peter, Stephen, Paul and others; and in secular history men like Augustine, Athanasius Polycarp, Wycliffe, Tyndale, Luther, Calvin, John Whitefield, Wesley and others.

Haggai is now a strategic figure in history that God uses to get his peoples attention to begin to care about the things that God cares about.

Haggai: An Expositional Commentary Introduction (1:1)

The word of the LORD came ‘through Haggai’ or literally ‘by the hand of Haggai’. Haggai was God’s instrument through which his word came. God’s message passed through the prophet’s hands. The only other occurrence of this phrase in the prophetic books is found in Malachi 1:1. The usual expression is ‘the word of the LORD came to …’ The title ‘LORD’ or ‘Jehovah’ is God’s covenant title. It emphasizes his unchangeableness and faithfulness.

You have the opportunity every week to hear the word of the Lord preached and taught. There are still people in the world today who have yet to hear the word of the Lord proclaimed. There is nothing in all of the world more significant than having the eternal God of the universe communicate to us through his eternal never changing word.

Haggai: An Expositional Commentary The People’s Excuse (1:2)

recognized as such and that Haggai was acknowledged to be a true prophet of God.

The title ‘LORD Almighty’ or ‘LORD of hosts (armies)’ occurs fourteen times in Haggai and emphasizes God’s universal dominion. He has all powers in heaven and on earth at his disposal, doing with them as he pleases; for he alone is the omnipotent and invincible ruler of the universe.

CONSIDER YOUR WAYS

If you took the excuses people use for not going to church and applied them to other important areas of life, you'd realize how inconsistent we can be in our logic. For example:

10 Reasons Not to Wash

1. I was forced to as a child.

2. People who make soap are only after your money.

3. I wash on special occasions like Christmas and Easter.

4. People who wash are hypocrites they think they are cleaner than everyone else.

5. There are so many different kinds of soap, I can't decide which one is best.

6. I used to wash. It got boring, though, so I stopped.

7. None of my friends wash.

8. The bathroom is never warm enough in the winter or cool enough in the summer.

9. I'll start washing when I get older and dirtier.

10. I can't spare the time.

BIG IDEA: Your behavior is a reflection of what you truly believe.

ACTIONS SHOW BELIEFS.

1. The uselessness of excuses overshadows the urgency of the Emergency

“This is what the Lord Almighty says: “These people say, ‘The time has not yet come for the Lords house to be built.”

NOTE: 16 years earlier the people and their Leaders set out with great enthusiasm to rebuild the house of the Lord which earlier had been destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar. But then came some opposition and trouble from the surrounding pagan nations and a decree from the emperor putting a stop to the work. Gradually the peoples zeal for work on the temple turned inward to their own private affairs, and they became comfortable worshiping among the ruins of the original temple.

NOTE: It is an all too familiar story, isn’t it? it’s a matter of the uselessness of excuses, especially where God’s work is concerned.

We feel like we should commit or consecrate ourselves to God, but “the time is not come,” or that we should make an offering to some missionary enterprise but “the time is not come.” The time to help God’s work is an ever present opportunity. “Consider your Ways.”

CULTURAL NOTE: Sometimes we believe or assume that we are doing what God wants us to do, but it really couldn’t be farther from the truth. The Temple was the heart of worship for Israel, but following the Babylonian captivity, it had fallen into desperate disrepair.

However, the Hebrew people treated it as if it were fine. They had become oblivious to the truth because they were more concerned with serving themselves and their own interests. God challenges them by asking them to compare their own houses and lifestyles with the house of God. The glaring problem with the people that Haggai was preaching to is not unlike our problem today.

THE PEOPLES USELESS EXCUSES

1)The timing is NOT RIGHT

The apathetic response of the people shows the heart of the people. They were accepting this state of spiritual deadness as normal in their lives. The question is this a call to the spiritual house or physical place that we come to worship. I think there is a strong case to be made that it is both.

2) There are not enough Resources

The excuses that the Hebrews used were long and extensive. There is not enough food, there is not enough to drink, there is not sufficient clothing to keep them warm, the money bag that collects their wages has holes it it. This is suggesting that they have the means to get the job done, however they choose to use it on themselves instead on the eternal house of God. They were too occupied with their own standard of living that the house of God was not very high on their priority list.

Excuses go all the way back to the garden of Eden, Adam’s excuse, “the woman you put here with me - she gave me the fruit from the tree to eat.” Eve’s excuse, “the serpent deceived me and I ate.” (the devil made me do it)

Both the man and woman enjoyed all of the freedoms of whether to eat the fruit or not, but neither was prepared to accept the responsibility that went with it.

CULTURAL NOTE: Typically, people who are struggling in life do one of two thing: 1) they work harder, or 2) they blame someone else. Occasionally people will resort to doing nothing at all. God instructed the people to look carefully or observe the way they were going about what God had instructed them to do. Here is where the rubber meets the road:

NOTE: This is characterizes our culture today. We live in a BLAME culture in which the fault is always with someone else - with ones background, or a broken marriage, or lack of opportunity, or the management, or the people we work with. But never, it would seem, is anyone prepared to say, ‘It is my fault, my sin, and I am responsible.’ The sad thing is that this attitude is not confined to the people of the world, as is evident from this passage. There is not getting away from the fact that they were God’s covenant people, and the temple was the symbol of that covenant relationship.

We expect all of the blessings of God without the effort

Haggai 1:10–11 ESV

10 Therefore the heavens above you have withheld the dew, and the earth has withheld its produce. 11 And I have called for a drought on the land and the hills, on the grain, the new wine, the oil, on what the ground brings forth, on man and beast, and on all their labors.”

2. The Catastrophe of apathy kills the thrill of the will

The Fog of Unbelief Blocks God's Beauty

Steve Fuller, Desiring God blog, "When You Don't Feel Like Worshiping" (8/24/14); submitted by Van Morris, Mt. Washington, Kentucky

Yosemite Valley in California is one of the most beautiful places on earth. To get there you go through a tunnel which opens to an awesome view of the entire valley—El Capitan, Half Dome, Cathedral Rock. Right at that tunnel opening there is a parking area where everyone is out of their cars, looking at the view, saying "Ooooh!!!" and "Aaaah!!!"

Now imagine you drive through that tunnel, but when you emerge all you see is fog. No awesome view, just thick, gray, soupy fog. That's what happens when we are not feeling worship. The beauty of God is right in front of us. But blocking that view is the fog of unbelief—worries, or pride, or greed.

If we just go through the motions in worship then it's like getting out of the car at the parking area, staring at the fog, and saying "Ooooh … Aaaah…"—words, but with no feeling. Why do that? Because if we will wait on the Lord, (Look to Jesus expectantly; say and ask him to help you worship; and set your heart on the truth of who God is as revealed in Christ), it's just a matter of time before the wind of the Spirit starts to blow, the fog starts to break up, we see the beauty of God revealed in Christ—and we worship.

Thrill: causing someone a sudden feeling of excitement and pleasure

Note: Perhaps our choices are what keep us from receiving the full measure of what God has in store for our lives. Perhaps we are being unreliable or maybe we just aren’t putting forth the effort. it could be that we are outwardly doing all that is required, but inwardly cultivating the wrong heart attitude.

The lethargic, apathetic spirit that responds with, “I cannot be bothered with that right now feeling” is a hard thing to break. One growing sign of this apathetic catastrophe is a continuing lack of desire for worship.

Clear signs of Apathy taking hold

1) Time in worship becomes expendable

Expendable: of little significance when compared to an overall purpose, and therefore able to be abandoned.

Do you have a desire to be with, and gather with God’s people in worship? or do you wake up on Sunday morning and it doesn’t seem to faze you or cross your mind.

2) Minimize the time given to Bible reading and private devotion

Do you feel incomplete or like something is missing on the day’s that you are not in God’s word or spending time in prayer? or does it not seem to faze you as you go about your daily life?

3) Losing a sense of God’s direction and purpose.

Like a fog it stealthily and quietly envelops us until we lose our sense of direction in any of these things. And if something occurs to disturb our conscience and make us say to ourselves, ‘It really is time I started to get back to worship and reading m bible,’ somehow - like the people of Haggai’s day the time never does seem right, and the desire to move in that direction never really grabs us at all.

It all boils down to a personal discipline and a determined act of the will

Cultural Note: Many Christians today are content with flabby laid-back kind of Christianity, and do not give sufficient importance to the place of the will in the spiritual life. They seem to think that our growth in Grace seems to happen automatically. It doesn’t. You have to work at it! If we want to get our Christian life together, then we have to bring the will into action and put some effort and determination into it.

We need a Kinetic kind of faith

Kinetic Energy: If we want to accelerate an object, then we must apply a force. Applying a force requires us to do work. After work has been done, energy has been transferred to the object, and the object will be moving with a new constant speed. The energy transferred is known as kinetic energy, and it depends on the mass and speed achieved. Therefore, the greater the mass that is moving the greater the speed.

Scientifically, energy found in the universe can be categorized two ways: as potential energy and as kinetic energy. Kinetic energy is movement energy an object possesses, such as the energy that is used when coasting downhill on a bicycle.

Much of the energy I find in the U.S. church today is kinetic energy, where the church is either living off the gifts shared by faithful members of the past - also known as “endowment.” How much longer the church will continue to be propelled forward before running out of energy is a question we must ask.

Paul expresses energy in Colossians 1:29 “for this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.” Paul became a formidable force for the expansion of the kingdom of God.

With the potential energy that [Christ] powerfully inspires available to all followers of Jesus, we have the power to do incredible things for the kingdom of God. We call these ripples of hope, when gathered together, they become fountains and eventually ever-flowing streams of mercy that together can sweep through mighty walls of resistance as proclaimed by the prophet Amos.

Amos 5:24 ESV

24 But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

3. The wrong priorities displace God in our lives.

Priorities, we all have them even if we cannot readily recite them or declare what they are. So much of what I have seen and encountered on a reoccurring basis is the issue of misplaced priorities. As a pastor I have encountered a number of painful scenarios within the body, however the symptom are normally the same. Regrettably it is often times the most simplistic things for the believer that become the most dangerous when neglected.

Einstein on Priorities

R. C. Sproul, Jr., In the Presence of God (Word, 1999)

A student once asked Albert Einstein, "Dr. Einstein, how many feet are there in a mile?" To the utter astonishment of the student, Einstein replied, "I don't know."

The student was sure the great professor was joking. Surely Einstein would know a simple fact that every schoolchild is required to memorize. But Einstein wasn't joking. When the student pressed for an explanation for this hiatus in Einstein's knowledge, he declared, "I make it a rule not to clutter my mind with simple information that I can find in a book in five minutes."

Albert Einstein was not interested in trivial data. His passion was to explore the deep things of the universe. His passion for mathematical and physical truth made him a pivotal fixture in modern world history.

We are called to put the interest of God as preeminent in our lives. To pursue what He pursues, to love what he loves, to enjoy what he enjoys. God is consumed with his glory and supremacy.

Therefore, we are all called to pursue conformity into the image of Jesus through dependency upon the Holy Spirit and obedience to the word of God wile loving the glory of God. We must always keep this in view in our daily lives.

Romans 12:2 ESV

2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

So why do we slip?

Haggai calls the people to consider their ways. They had neglected the divine agenda. They had lost the focus of their purpose. So what does God do? He frustrates their labor. The agenda of God many times gets sacrificed on the alter of personal pursuits.

The key excuse used in Haggai’s day and in ours today is we are too busy… too busy for people, too busy for ministry, too busy for personal Bible reading/ and devotion, to busy to pray, to busy to meditate, too busy to whatever you fill in the blank. God says, “Consider your ways!”

Questions we should ask ourselves

1. What is my chief and ultimate priority?

2. Would my time (day by day scheduling) support this?

3. Why have I allowed something or someone to have preeminence over God?

4. What must I do to replace or reform my life’s habits to conform with what God desires?

5. Do I really believe that God is supreme?

NOTE: We must make it clear that there was nothing wrong with the people taking pride in making their homes comfortable, and in decorating them tastefully. That was perfectly in order. The trouble was that it had taken over their lives and had, to a certain extent, displaced the concerns of god’s work in their order of priorities. They had plenty of energy to spend on their own life, and the things that they felt were important spending it on their own life-style, but were tired and apathetic when it came to working on God’s house.

When our homes, family, work, pleasures etc., begin to displace and jeopardize the centrality of Christ in our lives, it spells spiritual danger. It means we are beginning to live our Christian life at a shallower level, and that the Holy Spirit, instead of holding the controlling place in our lives has to struggle and compete with all these other things to have a foothold in our lives.

How much margin do you allow in your life for what really matters to God?

If we are not careful, our lives can easily become so cluttered with secular interests and non-essentials that there is less and less time for the things that really matter, such as prayer, the reading of God’s word, and meditation and worship.

NOTE: Hag. 1:5-9 Haggai makes an appeal to the people - ‘to give careful thought’ to their ways, and take a good hard look at their life-style- was meant by God to be taken very seriously, for he repeats twice more in chapter 2 verses 15 and 18.

What is God actually saying to them in this way? He is giving them a stern warning about getting their act together if they are not to experience his judgement and the withdrawal of his blessing. He reminds them that, as long as his house and his work remain neglected, they are losing out.

Haggai 1:10–11 ESV

10 Therefore the heavens above you have withheld the dew, and the earth has withheld its produce. 11 And I have called for a drought on the land and the hills, on the grain, the new wine, the oil, on what the ground brings forth, on man and beast, and on all their labors.”

WHAT GOD IS SAYING HERE MAY BE APPLIED IN TWO REALITIES

1) People are living at a hectic pace without a thought for God.

2) Churches have lost their way in what they believe or what their role is in society.

Opening Up Haggai A Word of Warning

we must apply what God is saying to the church today, because in some ways we are facing a crisis of faith. Many local churches seem to have lost their way, and are no longer secure in what they believe or what their role in society is. John Stott has expressed it thus:

What is at stake is nothing less than the essential character of Christianity; is the Christian religion natural or supernatural? Various attempts are made to rid Christianity of its supernaturalism, to reconstruct it without its embarrassing miracles. But these efforts will be as fruitless as they are misguided. You cannot reconstruct something by first destroying it.

Authentic Christianity - the Christianity of Christ and his apostles - is supernatural Christianity. It is not a tame and harmless ethic, consisting of a few moral platitudes, spiced with a dash of religion. It is rather a resurrection religion, a life lived by the power of God.

The biblical message has been diluted, the Church is missing out on God’s blessing. And that blessing will not be recovered until the Church recognizes that Christ governs the Church through the word of Scripture.

We need to give careful thought to our ways.

4. Gods presence stirs our spirit to action

3 Movements of Change

1) Obedience

The leaders and the people respond to Haggai’s preaching. We now see that something happened in the hearts and lives of the people as Haggai preached the world of the Lord. The flimsy excuses the people had once given for not getting busy about the work of the Lord melted away as the word of the Lord got through to their hearts.

NOTE: Notice the phrases that were used in response to the preaching -

“they obeyed the voice of the Lord.”

“The people feared the Lord.”

These are meaningful descriptions of the response to Haggai’s preaching. The question is what is it in preaching that makes it effective to the hearers?

For there is not doubt that one of the most discouraging aspects of the Christian ministry is when the man of God in the pulpit prepares well and preaches his heart out, only to find that it has little or no effect on the hearts of the members of the congregation. And yet there are other times when things really do happen, the message strikes home to peoples hearts and their is a positive response, peoples faith renewed, conversions, the reclaiming of backsliders.

What is effective preaching?

A sermon has been described as 30 minutes to wake the dead.

Preaching is not only words, but is an activity, a deed, in which God himself is actively present by his Spirit confronting men and women either to judge, or to save. Effective preaching will only happen when the preacher is conscious of his own ineffectiveness.

NOTE: Think of Moses shrinking from the task of preaching to the Israelites in Egypt. Or Jeremiah when called to be a prophet, complained that he did not know how to speak. Or Paul who constantly highlighted his weakness and ineffectiveness as a preacher.

A Preacher is not giving a speech, or a lecture, or a moral address, but is preaching ‘for a verdict’ in relation to the destiny of people’s soul. This is a matter of life and death.

2) Reassurance

“ I am with you declares the Lord”

Haggai’s words echo those of Isaiah in 43:5, “fear not for I am with you.” God being with them was bound up in rebuilding his house, not simply in terms of wood and stone but in terms of changed hearts which responded to his word.

This is a reassurance of protection, that what God has started he will not fail in His mission. It will not be completed in our own power and energy.

3) Divine and Human Action

THE REMNANT TODAY

First, it speaks to the individual believer. In every age, however dark and spiritually barren, God will never leave himself without witness. There will always be those who have been saved through his grace and who will remain faithful to his word. All who have not bowed down to modern Gods and the false gods of man’s making. Being a part of God’s remnant can be a lonely undertaking.

Second, the teaching on the remnant speaks to the church today. The spiritual outlook in places like Britain is bleak looking, far removed from evangelical truth is the preaching and teaching ministry in so many Churches. But that is by no means the whole story. There are still many Churches big and small where the gospel is faithfully proclaimed. Where the authority of God’s word and the Bible is upheld, and where there is a zealous spirit in evangelizing and missionary work, and in reaching out to the community.

‘Am I one of God’s remnant today?’

First, do you have a Holy Fear that leads to accepting God’s authority in your life?

Sad to say that there is a since in which the awe in God’s presence is often lacking in church worship today.

Instead, in some forms of contemporary worship there is an easygoing familiarity with God that robs him of his wonder, majesty and greatness. What is our response in the presence of a Holy God? Are we totally undone in His presence?

“The fear God is to recognize the limitations of our humanity in the face of life’s challenges, and our dependence upon him to overcome them.”

Isaiah 6:1–3 ESV

1 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”

NOTE: The modern life is full of many other fears, the fear of war, of disease, of losing one’s pension, of old age and illness, of violence on the streets, of suicide bombers and of death.

IF WE FEARED GOD MORE, WE WOULD BE WISE ENOUGH TO FEAR EVERYTHING ELSE LESS.

Second, do you experience the zeal of the Lord moving you to action.

I am going to share something with you this morning with all of the love and urgency of the spirit I can give to you.

Zeal does not save you. I want that to sink in this morning. Listen to what Paul says in Romans 10:1-2

Romans 10:1–2 ESV

1 Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. 2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.

So, you can have a zeal for God and not be saved. Pastors can have an apparent zeal for God and not be saved. Churchgoers can have a zeal for God and not be saved. Laypeople can have a zeal for God and not be saved. There is a kind of zeal that is not saving, and it’s not connected with those who are saved. You can have a zeal for justice, you can have a zeal for social action.

The question is are you devoting your life to the right thing? Am I spending my life pursuing what I ought to be pursuing.

The zeal and passion that we need is the Zeal to Be Saved.

Romans 12:11 ESV

11 Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord.

A Christian may be excused many things - a lack of intellectual ability, the lack of a great gift, the lack of fluency in speaking, or the lack of talent.

But no Christian can be excused the lack of zeal for the cause of God, for that depends upon you. And without zeal, something is vitally missing in a Christians life.

You can have a zeal for many things in life - our careers, our hobbies, our homes, our families, etc. But what we really need is for the Holy Spirit to stir up our spirit with an all-consuming zeal for the work of the Lord and the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Amy Carmichael a great missionary to India described it this way.

Amy Carmichael

Give me the love that leads the way,

The faith that nothing can dismay,

The hope no disappointments tire,

The passion that will burn like fire;

Let me not sink to be a clod:

Make me Thy fuel, O Flame of God.

CONCLUSION

What would it feel like to catch a 40 foot wave and ride it into shore? During a competition at surfing hot spot Maverick’s, about 22 miles from San Francisco, a Sports Illustrated story described the incredible rides of a surfer named Darryl [the] “Flea” virostko:

“For his first 40 footer he made a beautiful drop, essentially skiing down the face of the wave. The breaking exploded in a huge whitewash and Virostko raced ahead of it to safety … On his second ride, Virostko did something few surfers in the world can do. Rather than ski down the face of the 30 foot wave, he used his feet to point the nose of the board straight up and went free-falling … He positioned himself to catch the oncoming barrel and rode inside it. When he emerged from the tube, he surfed the wave to its terminus … On his third wave, Virostko … took off right at the peak of a 40 footer, made a graceful drop and rode it serenely. His whole body looked utterly relaxed though he was being chased by a wave big enough to kill.

Imagine sitting on a little board and having a forty-foot wall of water roaring at you and then deciding to stand up on that little board. I don’t think anyone who surfs at Maverick’s comes away thinking, “That was boring. Maybe tonight I can do something exciting like watch TV!”

The movement that Haggai is talking about is a lot like catching a wave. At different times in the history of the Church, God has built a wave for the Church to ride. We can’t manufacture a wave on our own efforts, but we can experience the thrill of the ride if we have the guts to stand up on our boards and start riding the wave that the Lord has prepared for us to ride.

YOUR BEHAVIOR IS A REFLECTION OF WHAT YOU TRULY BELIEVE

Are you fueled with the flame of God for the mission of the Church? or Are you full of excuses and lack of true zeal for the Lost.

Actions show beliefs, what is your life showing today? Maybe