THE BOOK OF HAGGAI

Haggai had a short career as a prophet. He preached four sermons over a period of four months. The sermons were short, straight and successful.

Although this Book only covers a period of about four months it is a tremendous little book. It records one of the crucial turning-points of God’s dealings with Jerusalem and the covenant people. The background to Haggai can be read in the Book of Ezra.                                                                                                                      

Haggai preached his message to the leaders and the returned Jews in the autumn of 520 B.C.. Sixteen years earlier the Persian emperor, Cyrus, had issued a decree that allowed the Jews to return to Jerusalem and to rebuild  Jehovah's temple. A group of some fifty thousand, had returned to Judea under the leadership of Zerubbabel, to implement the royal proclamation (Ezra1- 2). Two years later they had been laid the foundation of the temple and celebrated their accomplishment with praises and tears (Ezra 3:8-13). The prospects for the rebuilding had seemed very bright.

Now fifteen years later, in 520 B.C., things were quite different. Adversaries of the Jews, from the mixed race of the Samaritans, had set out to disrupt the work from the moment of their return, by threatening the Jews. They hired advocates to misrepresent the cause of the Jews throughout the reign of Cyrus. At the accession of his successor, Artaxerxes, they convinced him to put a halt to the project (Ezra 4). Now, after such a long time, the Temple had not yet been rebuilt. By now the foundations were silted up with debris and overgrown with weeds and the returned Jews had lost their vision and seem to have accepted this situation with an almost fatalistic resignation.

FIRST MESSAGE IS TO AROUSE THE PEOPLE

The date is the first day of the Sixth month.                   

The message is, “Build the House”(verse 8).

The people were now saying, “The time has not yet come to rebuild the Lord’s house — the Temple .” This was the result of their wrong interpretation of prophecy. Jeremiah had predicted a seventy years' period of “desolations” on Jerusalem (Jer 25).The Jews who had returned were aware of this and seem to have mistakenly understood, that even the temple could not be rebuilt until this period of the “desolations” on the city had run its course. This was despite God's sign to them by the edict of Cyrus that the time had come to rebuild the Temple to the glory of God. This was what Haggai has in mind in his opening words, "This people say, “The time is not come, the time that Jehovah's house should be built” (1:2). They were being paralysed by a wrong attitude to prophecy and a false interpretation of it.

Haggai’s purpose is to reprove the people for their neglect, and to arouse them to immediate action. Based on a wrong understanding of the prophecy, they were presuming that, “The time is not come, the time that the Lord's house should be built.” Whatever semblance of reason there may have been for this at first, there is no doubt that it had degenerated into a mere excuse for negligence of religious duty and for the pursuance of selfish interests. “Consider your, ways!” cries the prophet. “Is it time for you for you to dwell in your expensive and embellished houses while this House of Jehovah lies waste?” 

This reproof, through the lips of Haggai has a relevance to our own day. There are those today who presume on prophecy, and say, “The time is not come” as an excuse for inactivity when they ought to be spending themselves in the effort to win our present generation for Christ. There is a right attitude and there is a wrong attitude to prophecy. We need to remember that although inspired prediction is infallible our own interpretation of it is not infallible. We should learn from this, because prophecy Instead of proving a tonic to them had become a narcotic. They had given way to a feeling that their present effort was of no use. They must just wait until the clock of prophecy struck the predestined hour. The result is indifference to the needs of the world’s lost millions and the cause of God suffers. The people in Haggai’s day were getting used to being without a temple and this would have proved fatal. Many today bemoan the fact that many churches are closing while doing nothing to win the souls who would help to keep them open 

We need to be on our guard against this attitude. This was the attitude of Dr. Ryland of Northampton when he overrode the then young William Carey with the rejoinder, “Young man, sit down. When God pleases to convert the heathen, He'll do it without your aid or mine.” This is the attitude of those today who say, “There's no use hoping for any revival of Christianity today. The Word of God does not foretell any revival toward the end of the present age. Things are just going to go from bad to worse until Christ returns.” That may be so but it does not excuse us from doing as the Lord commands. “Consider your ways,” says Haggai. “Go up ...and build the House.” We must not let our presumption about prophecy paralyze our endeavours for Christ. It is not a choice between agonising in prayer or organizing an effort. Agonising and organizing should go together. We must never allow the truth of Divine sovereignty or what we see as the fact of Scripture prophecy to dull our perception of human responsibility. This great fact, perhaps more than any other, is brought home to us today by this prophecy of Haggai

SECOND MESSAGE IS TO SUPPORT THE PEOPLE (2:1-9).

Twenty-first day of the Seventh month,.

The message is “Work, for I am with you”, (verse 4).

Haggai's second message is to encourage the leaders and the people.  Some of the older Jews who remembered the former temple were downcast at the contrast between it and that which was now being built. Haggai heartens them by declaring three great facts.

First, Jehovah's covenant with Israel still stands, and Jehovah's faithfulness continues (verse 5).                

Second, the Spirit of God still remains among them verse 5.

Third, God's promise is that there shall yet be a great shaking, that One shall come who is the Desire of all nations, and that "The glory of this latter House shall be greater than of the former" (verses 6-9).

These are three great truths which should also be an inspiration to us, God’s Covenant, the Holy Spirit's presence and the promised return of the King. There will be a shaking, an advent and a glory-filled temple. This is the landscape of promise.

THIRD MESSAGE IS TO CONFIRM THAT THEY WOULD BE BLESSED ( 2:10 -19).

    The twenty-fourth day of the Ninth month

The message is “From this day will I bless you.”

The people had expected a return to material prosperity three months earlier. On the day that they responded to Haggai and again started working on the temple they expected that all their troubles would be over. They had thought that their financial problems and the famine would immediately be over. Haggai now has to point out to them that they no matter how hard they worked God would never be obligated to them. They must not view their renewed work on the temple as making God their debtor.      In fact, it was quite the opposite. In language that they perhaps understood better than we do he made it clear to them. If a person was ceremonially clean he could not pass on his goodness but if a person who was ceremonially unclean and touched someone that person became defiled 2:11 -14. So it was with them. They had no special merit. They were defiled and it was only by God's grace that they were accepted. In spite of that, God would give them a special sign of His favour, for from this day onwards He would bless them (verses 15-19).

  FOURTH MESSAGE IS TO ASSURE ZERUBBABEL OF GOD’S FAVOUR  ( 2:20 -23).

The twenty-fourth day of the Ninth month,.

The message this time is a personal one.

And again the word of the Lord came to Haggai on the twenty-fourth day of the month, saying, “Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah , saying:

‘I will shake heaven and earth.

I will overthrow the throne of kingdoms;

I will destroy the strength of the Gentile kingdoms.

I will overthrow the chariots

And those who ride in them;

The horses and their riders shall come down,

Every one by the sword of his brother.

                                                                                                                                                                                             ‘In that day,' says the Lord of hosts, ‘I will take you, Zerubbabel My servant, the son of Shealtiel,’ says the Lord, and will make you like a signet ring; for I have chosen you’, says the Lord of hosts.”

The fourth message is to Zerubbabel himself, the leader of the Jews returned from exile in Babylon , but it looks far beyond him to the ultimate restoration of the Davidic line in the coming reign of the Lord Jesus Christ. It should be clearly grasped that Zerubbabel is here addressed as the representative of the Davidic line. Once more God speaks of the great shaking which is to come, but adds that, in that day Zerubbabel shall be as a signet (the sign of authority).

It is worthy of mention that this figure of the signet should be used here of Zerubbabel, for it was used of his grandfather, king Jeconiah, in a tragic way, to express God's rejection of him. “As I live, saith the Lord, though Coniah (Jeconiah) the son of Jehoiakim King of Judah were the signet upon my right hand, yet would I pluck thee thence” Jer 22:24.

In the last great victory of the Divine purpose, the Lord Jesus Christ, the greater Son, and wonderful Antitype of David, and Zerubbabel, will be Jehovah's signet whereby He shall impress and imprint upon all nations His own majesty, His own will and His own ways, His own perfect ideal, and His own very image.

Haggai’s prophecy is a stirring call to God’s people through all the ages. “Get your priorities right”. We must put God in first place and make obedience to Him our number one priority. Then we will start building and God will start blessing.