Blessings from Haggai Part 5: THE LIFE THAT GOD BLESSES

"On the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came by Haggai the prophet, saying, "Thus says the LORD of hosts: 'Now, ask the priests concerning the law, saying, "If one carries holy meat in the fold of his garment, and with the edge he touches bread or stew, wine or oil, or any food, will it become holy?" ' " Then the priests answered and said, "No." And Haggai said, "If one who is unclean because of a dead body touches any of these, will it be unclean?" So the priests answered and said, "It shall be unclean." Then Haggai answered and said, " 'So is this people, and so is this nation before Me,' says the LORD, 'and so is every work of their hands; and what they offer there is unclean. ' And now, carefully consider from this day forward: from before stone was laid upon stone in the temple of the LORD -- 'since those days, when one came to a heap of twenty ephahs, there were but ten; when one came to the wine vat to draw out fifty baths from the press, there were but twenty. 'I struck you with blight and mildew and hail in all the labors of your hands; yet you did not turn to Me,' says the LORD. 18 'Consider now from this day forward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, from the day that the foundation of the LORD's temple was laid -- consider it: 'Is the seed still in the barn? As yet the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, and the olive tree have not yielded fruit. But from this day I will bless you.' " Haggai 2;10-19 ESV

God wants to bless you life! Do you believe this? I’m going to say it to you again. God wants to bless your life! He is willing-in fact- He desires to pour out upon you His people His gracious and extraordinary blessings to make your life His masterpiece of grace.

One of my biggest challenges has been convincing myself and convincing others that God delights to bless His people. So many people cannot accept the truth that God delights to bless them. Did you know that over seven verses in the Bible say that God delights, enjoys, or takes pleasure in His people, three verses say that He delights in loving and blessing His people, and one verse tells that He delights in our welfare. In short, those eleven verses say that we bring delight to God.

So I say it again: God wants to bless your life! I pray that God's word and His spirit would convince each and every one of you that you are capable of being loved and blessed by God. The question is: Do you want His blessing on your life? Are you willing to receive His blessing on His terms? When you have God’s blessing, you have it all. You may be rich or poor, healthy or ill, living in a mansion or hiding out in a cave. But if you know that God is blessing your life, you have something that the world cannot give or take away. You are truly satisfied and exceedingly joyful!

The prophet Haggai’s third message (2:10-19) is a message about God’s desire to bless a people who had been formerly cursed. He tells us how we can experience the life that God blesses. Remember from the past few blogs that when the people left Babylon and Persia, they returned to Jerusalem and began rebuilding the temple. They laid the foundation, but then, due to opposition and then apathy they quit the work for some sixteen years.

After all that time, the prophet Haggai was sent by God to get them back to work. Haggai’s proclaimed the Word of God and called the people to “consider your ways, go, and build”. In short, to put first things first and seek above all God and His Kingdom. As a result, his message produced a powerful revival, and the people were awakened and repented of their sins. After neglecting the work on the house of God for sixteen years, the Holy Spirit stirred their hearts to begin to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and they resumed building the temple. So they worked about a month, but discouragement seeped into the community.

So in chapter 2 God spoke again with a word of encouragement for His people to persevere in the work He had called them to do. He said: be strong, do not fear, and work. Then He gave them assurances of His name, the Lord of Hosts, His ongoing and comforting presence with them in their work, His power to enable them to do his will, His ongoing covenant, and a promise that there was more than meets the eye to what He has called them to do. Someday there would be a glorious future temple greater than anything they have seen or could ever imagine. He was saying, be encouraged about the seeming little and insignificant thing that you do. For you build more than you see!

Now this third message comes on December 18, 520 B.C., about three months after the first message in chapter 1 and two months after the second message in chapter 2:1-9. The last half of Haggai 2 gets back to practical matters, probably in response to a question that might have gone like this: "You are speaking of a future glory of the temple, which is all well and good. And I grant that there is some encouragement in knowing that. It makes our labor just a little more meaningful. But still, we are liv­ing in a most discouraging time. You speak of the future. That is your unique perspective. But we don't have your perspective, God. We have to live in the present, and day by day as we handle our bricks and apply our mortar and see the walls of the temple slowly rising, we are reminded of how bad things are. What good is a distant future, however glorious, when we live here and now?"

God's Word is for any who may be in this condition. The people had been complaining about the grimness of their present days, so God tells them to pay good attention to those days, especially by comparing the days before they began to work on the temple with the days afterward. God is going to give us both a bold challenge to us and a wonderful promise. God assures the anxious people that because they had put His house first by rebuilding again, He would bless them.

I. Two Curious Questions- (verses 10-13) The challenge was conveyed in a dramatic way. Haggai as to go to the priests and ask them for a ruling on how an object could become consecrated or defiled. He asked the question: "If a person carries consecrated meat in the fold of his garment, and that fold touches some bread or stew, some wine, oil or other food, does it become consecrated?" The priests answered, "No." That was right. Holiness is an isolated virtue. It is not communicable. Then Haggai asked: "If a person defiled by contact with a dead body touches one of these things, does it become defiled?" The priests answered, "Yes." Again they were right. Contamination is communicable. It is far easier to spread evil than virtue. This is really a lesson about the pervasive power of sin. Let me illustrate. Suppose you wash your hand and then touch a dirty plate. What happens? Will your clean hand make the dirty plate clean? No, but the dirt on the plate rubs off on your hand. Now change the image. Suppose your wear a white glove and do yard work in the dirty mud? (Bear with me on the analogy) What happens? You get a muddy glove. But the white glove does not make the dirty mud white, in short, you don’t get glovey mud!

Sin is like dirt. It’s spreads so quickly. Just as it’s hard to keep a white glove clean, it’s hard to keep a life clean because sin stains everything. Or consider this illustration. Sin is like a contagious disease. Suppose a person with a cold kisses a person in perfect health. Will the sick person catch health from the healthy person? No, but the healthy person can easily catch a cold from the sick person. Sin is it like dirt and like disease. It transfers much easier than holiness.

II. An Important Application- (verse 14) So Haggai makes an application to those strange questions. I like the NIV translation here: “So it is with this people and this nation in my sight,' declares the LORD.’Whatever they do and whatever they offer there is defiled”. Haggai applied this priestly wisdom to the lives of the people of Israel, to explain to them why God had not blessed them, and we must apply it to our own lives as well. God explains that it has been like that with Israel. They had been living in a contaminated state due to their inverted priorities, and, as a result, everything they touched had been contaminated.

The key is the word “whatever.” When your heart is not right with God, whatever you do will be wrong. You see, God wanted more than a temple built. He wanted the hearts of the people to be fully devoted to him. God did not want a big house filled with empty hearts. He did not want animal sacrifice unless it was accompanied by a living sacrifice of the people. In Psalm 51:17 David speaks of the sacrifices desired by God: "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart, O God, you will not despise." In other words, God will accept the broken and contrite heart. In Isaiah 57:15 God makes a similar statement: "I live in a high and holy place, but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite." God is more interested in our hearts than in any external sacrifices. In 1 Samuel 15:22-23 Samuel told King Saul, "Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of the Lord? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams.”

God wants your heart because if he has your heart, he’ll soon have every other part of your life. That’s why Proverbs 4:23 says “Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.” The heart of the matter is the matter of our heart. So how about your heart? How is it today? Does God have yours?

"The soul is measured by it's heights, some high and others low; but the heart is measured by it's delights and its pleasures never lie."

To be continued...
Pastor Bill