THE HOUSE OF GOD
“CONSIDER YOUR WAYS”
According to the positive statement of the Spirit of God in chapter 15 of the Epistle to the Romans, these prophecies by Haggai were written for our instruction. We are told there that “as many things as have been written before” (that really covers all the Old Testament scriptures) “have been written for our instruction”; and I am satisfied, beloved brethren, that there is very important and much-needed instruction for us in this Book of Haggai the prophet. I think the circumstances in which the earthly people of God were at the time of Haggai’s prophecies are similar to those which surround us at the present time; or we might put it the other way and say, that the circumstances surrounding us at this present time, as God’s people, are very similar to those existing at the time of Haggai the prophet.
God had wonderfully interposed in connection with His people: God had almost, as it were, departed from His usual ways; He had stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, who issued a proclamation to the effect that God had instructed him that he should build the house of God at Jerusalem, and he sent out the proclamation inviting a response, And there was a response; we are told in the beginning of the Book of Ezra the wonderful response there was. I do not go into the detail; I only want to say that we are told, with regard to those who returned from Babylon at that time, that they went back with the express purpose of building the house of Jehovah at Jerusalem, and it would seem that at the first they set to work with a good deal of energy and earnestness; they addressed themselves to the work of rebuilding the house, and then after this first, and what we may speak of as a good start, there was a flagging of energy, they lost heart in the interests of Jehovah, they ceased to go on with the building of the house, and, alas! the same thing is characteristic of the people of God at all times, and it is characteristic of us at this time. If we begin to be taken up with our own interests there is a corresponding decline with regard to the interests of God. There was a great opportunity, so to speak, presented to them in connection with their return to Jerusalem to make themselves comfortable, and they seized the opportunity and began to make themselves very comfortable, they built houses for themselves, wainscoted or ceiled, and thus their hearts became set on their own interests and ends, and of course there was a corresponding decline with regard to the interests of Jehovah. We find just the same thing in the New Testament and at the present time. We see it in principle in the Epistle to the Philippians, where the apostle, speaking of sending Timotheus, says, “For I have no one like-minded who will care with genuine feeling how ye get on”; then he adds—“for all seek their own things, not the things of Jesus Christ”. It becomes a great test at all times to the people of God; I have no doubt it is a testing point just now, we may have the opportunity within our reach of making ourselves very comfortable here, but if our hearts are set on that, there will be decline with regard to the interests of the house of God.
Well, it is under these circumstances that God raised up the prophet Haggai and began to speak to His people. In the first instance He makes a very touching and yet a very solemn appeal to them. They were saying, the prophet tells us in the opening of this chapter: “These people say, The time is not come, the time that the Lord’s house should be built”. It is wonderful how cleverly people can talk about this and that matter as to the suitable and unsuitable time for things of the Lord when they get interested in themselves, and have their own interests before them. They then imagine it is not the time to be interested for the Lord, and they do not like to be wakened up. Then came the word of the Lord to Haggai the prophet, saying, “Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your ceiled houses, and this house lie waste?” What a solemn and yet touching appeal! There was the house of God lying waste, and they were busying themselves with building their own ceiled houses, looking after their own comfort and interest.
Now I should like to say, with regard to the house of God, whether then or now, that you have two aspects of it. The one original builder of the house of Jehovah, the temple at Jerusalem, was King Solomon, the son of David. It is true that a certain preparation was made beforehand by David the king, and the Spirit of God gives him credit for all that he did in the way of gathering together the material; but the Spirit of God always attributes the building of the house to Solomon. Stephen says, “but Solomon built him an house”, Acts 7: 47. Now in that sense there was no other builder, but as we know from 1 Kings 8, the house built and completed by king Solomon was dedicated to Jehovah, and Jehovah signified in a wonderful way His appreciation of that house.
Now I would like to make a remark as to the continuity of that house in God’s mind. We find it in the gospels—the same house. I imagine that the act of that poor woman in Luke 21, who cast in her two mites into the treasury, was more pleasing to God than perhaps all that Herod had done in connection with the rebuilding of the temple. So, the house is maintained in continuity, and that is why I called your attention to the proper reading of chapter 2: 9. In the King James’ Version it reads: “The glory of this latter house”, &c., but it should read: “The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former”. There is only one house in God’s mind.
But I want to bring before you the fact that the house had lapsed into a ruined condition, and the time had come in the ways of God, and He stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, to have the house built again. I do not mean in the sense that Solomon built it; as I have said, there was only one builder in that sense; but it was to be set up again, it was to be brought out of that waste condition in which it was lying so that all that God connected with it might be established: all the thoughts of God, whether in connection with His own glory or with the blessing of His own people, or still further with the outgoing of blessing—because while in a sense it was Jewish, God never limited it to the Jews; for instance, when the Lord went into the temple, as recorded in Mark 11: 17. He quoted the scripture “Is it not written, My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations?” In God’s purpose there was always a group of nations around Israel, and God had blessing in view for all the nations in connection with that house. Now I think without any argument we might simply look at it as a fact. Not only Zerubbabel (Zerubbabel was governor of Judah at the time) and Joshua, who was the high priest, but the whole of the remnant had the wonderful privilege of building up that house; they had gone back for that ostensible purpose, but there had come in a decline, and they had been betrayed into this decline by a spirit of selfishness; they were occupied with their own ends, and the house of God was allowed to lie in this waste condition. What answers to this at the present time? There is the house of God, and just as of that material structure in the city of Jerusalem Solomon alone was the builder, so the Lord Jesus Christ is alone the builder of the house of God. He is the builder because in the Lord Jesus Christ you have the answer to both David and Solomon. In the days of His flesh, while He was here as a Man among men, He gathered together the material; but that material was put together after the resurrection and exaltation of the Lord Jesus Christ to the right hand of God. The house has been built by God, and let me emphasise too the continuity of that house, for we have now passed from the types to the antitype; we have passed from that material structure in Jerusalem to that spiritual structure—that wonderful building where Jews and Gentiles are built together for an habitation of God in spirit, or, to use the language of Peter in chapter 2 of his first epistle, “that spiritual house”.
But what has taken place? Well, in a sense, there has been an answer to what took place with the children of Israel. Speaking generally, there was something which answered, a number of years ago, to the return of the remnant from Babylon. God wrought, not now through a Cyrus king of Persia, or any king or earthly potentate for that matter, but God was pleased to take up His own vessel or vessels; indeed, one might speak of one particular vessel that He was pleased to take up, and there was inaugurated what really answers spiritually to a return from Babylon. Many beloved people of God were brought out here and there from the systems around them to the principles of His house; they were brought out—to a clearer gospel? Yes, and that is all right so far as it goes, but they were brought out with reference to the house of God. I know the truth of the Head in heaven was first seen, and then it was seen that His body must be here, and afterwards the truth as to the house of God came out; and I think in our day, if one might speak soberly, God has been pleased to give a great deal of light with regard to His house, not only with regard to it as a spiritual truth, but in a practical way so that there might be return to the principles of the house of God.
Well, now a word further, I venture to say this, and I beg you to receive it in grace. I think there has been that which answers a good deal to what was the case at the time of Haggai’s prophecies. I think there has come in a spirit of selfishness, and the days in which our lot has fallen are days of material prosperity, and many advantages have been brought before the people of God with regard to advancing their interests here, and more or less there has been decline, so that at the present time I believe God is speaking in a very solemn way to us as His people, very much as He did through Haggai to the returning remnant from Babylon in his day—speaking to us with reference to the house of God. I do not attempt to make very much application, only to bring it before you as the Spirit of God knows just where we are spiritually, each one of us, so that the Spirit of God might use the appeal. I do not care to use it on you, and I do not know that you would care to use it on me, but I would like to leave it with you and just to say that I believe the Spirit of God would bring it home to each one of us, so that there might be on our part what answers to verse 12. We find—“Then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Joshua the son of Josedech, 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 did fear before the Lord”. That is to say, there was an answer to the appeal, not only on the part of the leaders, the governor and the high priest, but on the part of the whole remnant. It says: “with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the Lord their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet”.
I think we are too much in the habit (and so far it is right) of dwelling exclusively upon the one side of the truth of the house as built by the Lord Jesus Christ, and that many of us have used the truth of the house of God in that sense like a pillow to lie down and repose on, with the comforting thought that we are in and of the house of God, and that we are there as the Lord indicates, as sons (the son abides in the house for ever, he cannot have his wages paid at any time and be turned off as a servant). I fear that many of us have dwelt upon that side exclusively, and with the effect of its producing indifference. So I have a little difficulty in attempting to bring before you what this prophecy seems to emphasise—that is, our part in connection with the house of God.
Now, before going further, I should like to say this—from the very first time that God had a house here in this world you will find that the truth of the house of God became a touchstone and a test of the condition of His people. For instance, we find decline and we find revival—revival after revival—in the history of God’s earthly people, and you will always find this, that when there was a decline that decline was marked by neglect of the house of God, and when there was a revival that revival was marked by a profound interest in and exercise with regard to the house of God, I might instance, perhaps, that last and most wonderful revival in the days of Josiah. The house of God was in a dreadful condition; all manner of rubbish had accumulated there, and you remember how Hilkiah (the father of Jeremiah), the high priest, in connection with removing the rubbish from the house of God discovered the Book of Moses (2 Kings 71