Mining the Minors: Haggai (3)

When things are going wrong around us and the obvious blessings of God a distant memory, it’s natural to wonder why. Scripture offers us a variety of possible explanations.

Job suffered because Satan was trying to break him, and God allowed it for a time in order to prove a point. David spent years on the run from Saul in fear of his life because it was not yet God’s time to give him the kingdom. Israel slaved away in Egypt in order to give the Amorites sufficient time to repent and to become a great nation, among other things. The tower of Siloam fell on eighteen people and killed them, and the Lord told his disciples the victims had done nothing out of the ordinary to deserve their fate. Perhaps it was “just one of those things”. A man was born blind in order that God might display his works in his life.

Things go wrong for all sorts of reasons, don’t they. It’s not all one thing, and we may never know the real reasons in this life.

Sometimes, however, things go wrong because God’s people have their priorities out of order. That is the primary message of Haggai. The good news is that, unlike these other possibilities, selfish priorities are something we actually have the power to change.

1/ Get Your Priorities in Order (continued)

Haggai 1:3-4 — Reaching the Audience

“Then the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet, ‘Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?’ ”

We may note that the Lord’s first word through Haggai came in two stages: first, to the leadership of Judah, alerting them to the need for change; second, to the people more generally, who needed to adjust their thinking and priorities.

The people of Jerusalem were dwelling in paneled houses. We might well ask where all these panels came from. Ezra tells us that years earlier the Jewish leadership had entered into a trade arrangement with the Sidonians and Tyrians for lumber with which to build the temple. We have no reason to think these trading partners failed to deliver the goods as promised. So where did that lumber go over the preceding seventeen years or so, that the Lord now had to say to the people, “Go up to the hills and bring wood”? The question answers itself, and the answer does not reflect well on Judah. It explains the Lord’s severe dealings with the people, which might otherwise seem a little unfair given that the reason they stopped building was, at least allegedly, the king’s edict.

Haggai 1:5-11 — Consider Your Ways

“Now, therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts: Consider your ways. You have sown much, and harvested little. You eat, but you never have enough; you drink, but you never have your fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns wages does so to put them into a bag with holes.

“Thus says the Lord of hosts: Consider your ways. Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified, says the Lord. You looked for much, and behold, it came to little. And when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why? declares the Lord of hosts. Because of my house that lies in ruins, while each of you busies himself with his own house. Therefore the heavens above you have withheld the dew, and the earth has withheld its produce. 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.”

The Lord lists four different ways in which his displeasure manifested itself in Judah. A shortage in harvest, a lack of satisfaction with their food, an inability to feel comfortable and rest properly, and financial stress caused by what was probably an early version of inflation. Everything cost more than it used to and money didn’t go as far as it should. None of this was coincidence. When God’s priorities were neglected, nothing worked properly. The earth itself reflected the Lord’s displeasure with his people. The dew and rain did not fall, the crops did not grow abundantly, and everything that makes life pleasurable was in short supply. The problem was certainly not human effort; they had sown much. Yet nothing they did led to a successful outcome. The Lord thwarted their desires at every turn.

The remedy — getting the nation’s priorities in order — was not a new one. It goes back to the Law of Moses, which establishes God’s right to the firstfruits of every harvest. God was always to receive his portion from the best and the earliest of every material benefit he lavished on his people: the first of the oxen, the first of the sheep and even the firstborn of Israel’s sons. All these were God’s by right. He had given the increase, and he was entitled to his portion. When God was satisfied, his satisfaction overflowed to his people. We can observe this principle at work in the nation over its history, and in the lives of individuals as well. Hannah was barren until she dedicated her firstborn to the Lord, after which she conceived five more children.

How much more would this be the case with the Lord’s own temple, the center of Israelite worship, when it lay in ruins? No blessing could come to God’s people until they took care of Job One.

The principle still operates today as the Lord affirmed. “Give, and it will be given to you”, he told his disciples. That’s the right order of priority. The kingdom comes first, and blessing always follows. I’ve had the experience myself. To those who are not putting his priorities first, the Lord gives this advice: Consider your ways. Look at the outcome of your actions. What you are doing isn’t working, so learn from it and do things differently. God’s pleasure first. God’s glory first. Everything good follows naturally from that. As odd as it seems, it is how the world is designed to work.

This time, God’s people heeded his word and responded appropriately.

2/ The People Respond

Haggai 1:12-15 — An Obedient Spirit

“Then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the Lord their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the Lord their God had sent him. And the people feared the Lord. Then Haggai, the messenger of the Lord, spoke to the people with the Lord’s message, ‘I am with you, declares the Lord.’ And the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people. And they came and worked on the house of the Lord of hosts, their God, on the twenty-fourth day of the month, in the sixth month, in the second year of Darius the king.”

Something about Haggai’s message reached the minds and hearts of Israel. Perhaps the people figured they had nothing left to lose. What they were doing was not working, and there seemed to be no end in sight. So the people feared the Lord, and they obeyed his word through Haggai. Twelve times in these two chapters we read the words “declares the Lord” or “declares the Lord of hosts”. Eight times we read “says the Lord”, and five times that “the word of the Lord came” to or by Haggai. The prophet leaves us in no doubt about where his message originated. Other prophets encountered almost nothing but hardness of heart and a refusal to hear the Lord’s word, but there is no record of Haggai meeting any resistance at all to the Lord’s word or will. May we all be so wise!

If we had nothing but the messages God gave his prophet, we might not know how his message was received, but Haggai provides the reader with a little history in these four verses so that we too can see the consequences of a humble, teachable spirit working itself out in the world. It took twenty-three more days to get ready to start. Presumably, the people had to go up to the hills and bring wood, gather their supplies and organize themselves to begin the work on the house of God.

But begin they did.

3/ I Am With You

Haggai 1:13 — Four Little Words

“Then Haggai, the messenger of the Lord, spoke to the people with the Lord’s message, ‘I am with you, declares the Lord.’ ”

Nested within these four verses of history are four little words of further prophecy from Haggai: “I am with you.” This is the only undated message in Haggai and the first positive affirmation the Lord makes through his prophet. And it is a message from God, not just an impression formed by Haggai that produces a timely word of encouragement: Haggai “spoke to the people with the Lord’s message, ‘I am with you.’ ” Up to this point, everything Haggai has said has been corrective. We should probably not miss the fact that everything positive begins with the people’s obedience to the word they had received. Most commentators count four messages in Haggai, but this makes five. When we count them, we ought not to leave out this one, brief though it is. Its importance cannot be overstated. The name Immanuel, Matthew tells us, means “God with us”. That has always been the plan.

Nothing useful has ever been done for God by the strength of human effort alone. It is the presence of the Lord with his people and in his work that makes it effective and profitable. That’s true in evangelism, in prayer, in worship and in every form of service.