HAGGAI
HAGGAI
The prophet Haggai prophesied in the second year of Darius the king, when the work of rebuilding the temple had been at a standstill for a number of years. The adversaries had been persistent (see Ezra 4) and a king had arisen who was ready to listen to them, and to give orders that the work should cease, but the work really ceased because it was no longer the chief interest of those who had been engaged in it. Opposition never really hinders the work of God; it is waning interest on the part of His people that is the true secret of all weakness.
Now after an interval of about fifteen years, Haggai, with Zechariah, “prophesied unto the Jews that were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel, even unto them”, Ezra 5: 1. But in spite of all that had transpired, his prophecy made no reference to the external difficulty; it addressed itself to the state of the people and made manifest the real hindrance to the work. “Thus speaketh Jehovah of hosts, saying, This people say, The time is not come, the time that Jehovah’s house should be built. And the word of Jehovah came by Haggai the prophet, saying, Is it time for you that ye should dwell in your wainscoted houses, while this house lieth waste?” Haggai 1:2 - 4.
There are always difficulties in the way of anything being done for God, and it is easy quietly to accept them, and to regard them as an indication that we should let things stand as they are. When God’s chief interest ceases to be our chief interest some form of self-consideration inevitably comes in. Jehovah speaks of His house lying waste while they dwelt in wainscoted houses. It was very sad that Paul had to say of those about him at Rome, “all seek their own things, not the things of Jesus Christ”. Timothy stood out as a bright exception to this, caring with genuine feeling how the saints got on.
Living in our own things leads to poverty and dissatisfaction. The divine call is to set our hearts on our ways; we are to weigh well how things are working with us. Are we really prospering in soul? Or is it such a time with us as is described in Haggai 1:6; Haggai 1:9-11? God would have His people to consider whether they are not giving a good deal of time to things which yield very little. There is a kind of eating which gives no satisfaction, and drinking which adds nothing to the inward man, and we may surround ourselves with things which bring no warmth to the [p. 75] soul, and what we earn may go into a bag with holes. These are striking figures of the result of seeking our own things. Christians on this line may get through life by the mercy of God, but it is a lean and empty and impoverished life compared with what it might have been.
The divine call is, “Go up to the mountain and bring wood, and build the house, and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith Jehovah”, chapter 1: 8. God’s house cannot be built without material, and the material cannot be found without labour. All true spiritual labour at the present time has the house in view. The preaching of the gospel and all ministry of the word is only carried on intelligently as we see that it is to get material for the house and to build it. Let us make this our great business. It is not easy work to go to the mountain and hew timber, but what could be a greater honour than to do something of which God says, “I will, take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified?” God’s great thought is that there may be a company here built together for His pleasure, and amongst whom He is glorified. We are all to be at this great work. If each one who knows something of God’s chief interest were to be the means of bringing one other into the truth of God’s house, and into practical accord with it, what pleasure God would take in it! It is the same work that began nineteen centuries ago by the labours of the apostles and others, but it has now to be done at a time when Christendom is full of bodies which are not for God’s pleasure, and in which He is not glorified, for they have not the constitution or the character of His house. Indeed, the religious bodies of today answer to the wainscoted houses of Haggai 1, and it is not difficult to see that as religious buildings get larger and finer the inward spiritual power declines. The Lord had spoken of the temple as His Father’s house, but the time came when He had to call it “your house”. God had ceased to have pleasure in it, and so it is today. Christians are running to what are really their own houses while God’s house lieth waste. And this accounts for the spiritual dearth of which many believers complain. “Ye looked for much, and behold it was little; and when ye brought it home I blew upon it”. There is much going on in an outward way, but where are spiritual results? Where do we find the dew of the heavens? Where are the precious things which answer for us to the corn, the new wine and the oil? Is it not time for Christians to consider their ways, and to ask why blessing is withholden? We need not go far for the answer; it is “Because of my house which lieth waste, whilst ye run every man to his own house”.
What is needed is that we should do as the remnant did in that day. They “hearkened to the voice of Jehovah their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, according as Jehovah their God had sent him, and the people feared before Jehovah”, chapter 1:12. As soon as they took this ground the message was sent to them, “I am with you, saith Jehovah”. All that is needed on our part is that we should hearken to what God says; that is, be in the spirit of obedience before Him and fear Him. The moment we take this ground He will be with us, and His presence with His people is their only power. If God is not with us, even our efforts to build His house will come to nothing. But if He is with us our spirits will be divinely stirred up, and we shall come and work at the house of Jehovah. It is a notable day when that takes place; the exact day of the month is given. We may be sure that when our hearts are stirred up to come and work at the house it is placed on record in heaven.
Then on the one and twentieth day of the seventh month there was a further prophetic word given to fortify the hearts of the remnant against discouragement; chapter 2: 1. It would appear that, within a month of resuming to build, a discouraging influence was found amongst the people. It took the form of contrasting what was then present with the former glory of the house. This is a subtle form of the enemy’s work because it seems rightly to make much of a glorious past. But it is evident that the object was to minimise, and even make nothing of, the wonderful revival that was then in movement. In the estimation of faith the fact that it was God’s house put upon it a wondrous glory, however feeble might be the outward expression of it at the moment. The widow who cast her two mites into the treasury showed that the house was exceedingly precious to her as God’s house notwithstanding its actual state at the time. If we have really seen the former glory of the house we cannot accept that if God is reviving His work He has something very inferior in view. We cannot accept that it is a different house now, or that anything less than the full divine thought is to be before us in our building, however feeble we may be in relation to such great thoughts. If we have a right thought of the house we see it as invested with all the glory that originally attached to it, and if God is with us we shall not be prepared to give up any part of what is in His mind.
[p. 77] So there is a thrice-repeated call to “be strong”, chapter 2: 4. If we think that what we are occupied with is “as nothing” we shall be weak indeed, but if we think of God’s house, and that He is with us in the building of it, we shall be preserved from fear. “The word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, and my Spirit, remain among you: fear ye not”, verse 5. It is as though God said, ‘My thoughts have not changed one bit. I brought you to Myself that you might be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation, and that you might make Me a sanctuary that I might dwell among you, and this is still what I have in My mind’. If God’s Spirit remains among us, it is certain that He will never depart from God’s original thoughts. Christendom may depart from them, and we may depart from them, but the Spirit never will. So now if there is only one stone laid upon another there is something which speaks of, and represents, the whole divine thought. There may be today, perhaps, only two saints in a town or village who recognise in a practical way that they are a constituent part of the house of God, and are set to further the building, but there is something which recognises the whole divine thought, and that cannot be “as nothing” in our eyes. Satan would desire that it might be, and that we might despise it as a small thing, and give up the practical confession of it, and the building in of what is suitable to it.
God would have us to know what He thinks of His house. He is going to shake everything with a view to His house being here filled with glory. Every divine shaking at the present time has in view the freeing of what will contribute to His house. We know that there will be a terrible shaking presently to prepare the way for God to bring in the First-begotten into the habitable world, and when He comes in there will be found material that will fill the house with glory. But at the present time there is much precious material in the world, and God claims it all for Himself and for His house. “The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts”, verse 8. The silver and the gold today are the saints secured for God as the fruit of redemption and as in new creation. “The desire of all nations” (verse 7) refers to everything that is precious and truly desirable in all the nations. It refers to apprehensions and appreciations of Christ brought by the work of God into the hearts of His saints everywhere, so that Christ has become “the preciousness” to them. This is what has value before God, and He intends that it should all come to His house to enrich it with glory. So what God has [p. 78] in mind is not diminishing glory, but increasing glory. “The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former, saith Jehovah of hosts”, verse 9. Each brother and sister can bring more of the glory in; it is the divine thought that we should be continually moving “from glory to glory”. If God shakes the nations it is with a view to what is precious coming to light as the glory of His house; it is that men and saints may be shaken out of settings that are not suitable to God’s house, and brought as contributors of glory to that house.
Then two months later Haggai had another prophetic word, and this time it was a solemn warning against what is unclean. This is just the opposite to acquiring glory, and it seems to suggest that if we are not acquiring features of glory we shall be very likely to become unclean by contact with the uncleanness that is all around us here. The questions raised by Jehovah (verses 11 - 13) brought to light that holy things have no power to make holy what is not holy in itself, but what is unclean can quickly impart its own characteristic to anything which it touches. It is a warning against touching what is unclean. If we want to be suitable to the house of God, and to have features of glory, we must keep from the touch of what is unclean. The people in running to their own houses were really unclean; the state of their hearts in allowing the house of God to lie waste while they pursued their own interests was one of uncleanness, and it brought upon them the severe governmental dealing of God. This is very much the state of the Christian profession at the present time.
The four and twentieth day of the ninth month (verse 18) was a notable day, for there was evidently a fresh start made in building, and Jehovah took immediate notice of it. “From this day will I bless you”. It is interesting to notice that this was not the first movement they had made. They had begun years before, but there had been a long period of slackness. It is often like this; there is a beginning made, but it is not followed up, and spiritual energy wanes. Then God sends a prophetic word and uses it to bring about revival. A fresh start is made, and God immediately answers it by the assurance and bestowal of blessing.
Then on the same day there was a second word given to the prophet, but this time it was addressed to Zerubbabel as typical of Christ. It declared plainly how God would shake everything, the heavens and the earth, the throne of kingdoms and the strength of the kingdoms of the nations, but His object in all this was that Zerubbabel might be made as a signet. That is, God’s [p. 79] object is to use Christ as His seal, and to put the impress of Christ on the whole created scene. We are made painfully aware that the nations do not carry the impress of Christ at the present time. They might have done so, for God has sent the gospel into all the creation and, if it had been believed, it would have brought all who received it under the impress of Christ. But it has not been believed, and hence there must be a terrible shaking to make way for the impress of Christ as God’s chosen One. At the present time it is those who have come under the impress of Christ who are suitable to form part of God’s house and to build it. But this has to be brought about by the shaking and overthrow of all that belongs to the flesh and to the natural man. As the flesh is judged and refused, God can seal us with His chosen Signet, and those who are thus sealed can build God’s house and can bring glory into it.
There is very definite help for us in these things if we pay attention to them. The prophets Haggai and Zechariah helped the builders in their day. We are told that “the elders of the Jews built; and they prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo”, Ezra 6: 14. In putting these prophecies on record the Spirit of God had in mind that they would be a help to us in building the house of God in our remnant times. May we have grace from God to profit by them!