I find that there are seasons in my life when I’m just going along with the tasks of life, thinking all is well, and then God points out something that is lacking in my life or something that I’ve simply missed. And I count such times as acts of grace from God because it’s a clear reminder to me that he is working in me and with me to conform me to the image of Christ and is not simply giving me over to my ways. The Lord has used our text this week in this way in my life. Meditating on this text has caused me to stop and to reevaluate my own life, and I trust that for many of you looking at this text this morning will do the same.

Our text this morning is actually comprised of two messages from Haggai that were delivered on the same day. We read in verse 10 that on the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month Haggai spoke to the people, and then in verse 20 we read that “the word of the Lord came a second time to Haggai on the twenty-fourth day of the month.” And these are the last messages of Haggai to a people who had begun to rebuild the temple. So what were his last messages? They were messages that reminded the people of the character and ways of God, something that I believe we need to be reminded of this morning as well. Therefore, let’s turn to the text and see what Haggai says to Israel and how this should affect us as well.

The first word that Haggai has for the people is that …

Our acts of worship do not please God if our hearts are not turned toward him (10-14)

Haggai comes to the priests to ask them about the law. First, he asks them if holiness can spread just by coming in contact with something. According to Leviticus 6:18-22, certain portions of the sacrifice were made holy. Therefore, Haggai asks them to imagine that holy meat being carried around in the priest’s garment, and then the garment touching another food. He wants to know if that other food becomes holy. That is, does holiness just spread like that? The priests answer, “No” (v. 11-12).

However, he then switches the focus to something being made unclean. According to Numbers 19:11, if you touch a dead body you become unclean, and according to verse 22 of that same chapter, if you then touch something else it becomes unclean. So, Haggai asks them to verify this truth, and they do, answering that if you touch a dead body and then something else that something else you touch becomes unclean (v. 13).

But why was Haggai asking all these questions? He knew the law. It was because he was about to make a point that he wanted them to understand. We read in verse 14, “Then Haggai answered and said, ‘So is it with this people, and with this nation before me, declares the Lord, and so with every work of their hands. And what they offer there is unclean.’”

Yes, they had started building the temple, but Haggai didn’t want them to miss the main point that God was teaching them. They had been content for fifteen years to neglect the presence of God while they continued (having built an altar) to offer sacrifices to him. And Haggai wanted them to know that their offerings were not an act of worship at all. In fact, as he declares, what they were offering was unclean, not because of the sacrifice itself but because of them. Their unholiness was causing the offering to be unholy. Their uncleanness was spreading to everything they did. Haggai wanted them to know that unless their hearts were turned toward God (see the end of verse 17) their acts of worship were not pleasing to him but defiled before him. And the Lord wanted to ensure that the people understood this even as they were building the temple.

And we need to understand the same thing as well. The greatest commandment given by God to us is that we love him with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. That was declared in the law and Jesus declares it again in the New Covenant. And so it is a true and weighty truth today. The greatest thing that God demands of you is that you love him with your all. That includes your thoughts and labors and affections. And unless you truly love him, then do not think that all of your acts of worship are pleasing to him. Your formal acts of worship don’t purify your lack of love for God. Rather, your lack of love for God defiles your formal acts of worship.

Therefore, I would ask you this morning, do you love God. Are you loving him with your minds so that you’re learning his Word? Are you loving him with your strength, so that you’re laboring to obey him? And, are you loving him with your heart and soul so that you can say you are affected by him? Thinking of my own affections for God this week has really been a source of conviction for me. I remember when Nathan Young came to Cornerstone one of the first questions he asked me was, “What is your greatest strength or asset to this church?” Nate rarely asked me questions with little weight in those days. And I remember saying to him, “You know, I don’t think it’s any ability to preach or teach or anything. I think it’s that I really and truly love God. My affections are easily kindled when I think of him.” I felt at times that I could hardly contain my affections in thinking of him and what he has done for me. And I was convicted this week that I don’t know if I could say that same thing now. Thus, I have repented even as I confess to you and have asked God to kindle my affections more for him so that I might indeed know that I love him with my heart and soul as well as my mind and strength.

I believe it would be good for all of us to evaluate our lives in light of this reminder from Haggai. Our formal acts of worship are not pleasing to God if we are not turned toward him with our all, if we are not loving him. So maybe today part of your response to this word needs to be to ask God to search your heart and repent of feeling okay about your lack of love for him having replaced it with simply your formal acts of worship.

Haggai allows them to see more of God’s character and ways, however, as he proceeds. He doesn’t simply want them to see what God is teaching them, but he wants them to see how God how gone about teaching them. He wants them (as he says in verse 15) to “consider from this day onward” what God has done to turn them to himself.

In verses 15-19 he reminds them that …

God will do whatever necessary to make sure he is first in our lives (15-19)

He declares, “Now then, consider from this day onward. Before stone was placed upon stone in the temple of the Lord, how did you fare? When one came to a heap of twenty measures, there were but ten. When one came to the wine vat to draw fifty measures, there were but twenty. I struck you and all the products of your toil with blight and with mildew and with hail, yet you did not turn to me, declares the Lord. Consider from this day onward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month. Since the day that the foundation of the Lord's temple was laid, consider: Is the seed yet in the barn? Indeed, the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, and the olive tree have yielded nothing. But from this day on I will bless you” (vv. 15-19).

Haggai points out to them that the Lord had done much to turn their attention to him, even though they had not turned to him (v. 17). They were sowing much and harvesting little. Their wine supply was low. Their goods were overtaken with blight and mildew and hail. The trees had yielded little fruit. What they should have clearly seen is that what God had brought on them the curses he had foretold in the book of Deuteronomy. He had told them, for example, in Deuteronomy 28:22 that if they did not obey him that he would “strike [them] with wasting disease and with fever, inflammation and fiery heat, and with drought and with blight and with mildew.” And that’s exactly what had happened, and (again) they had not turned to him.

Haggai, it appears, wanted them to understand what the Lord was doing so that they might not miss it the next time. He wanted them to consider these things from this day onward. And we need to understand it as well. God will do whatever necessary to make sure that his children will make him first in our lives.

So, even as we said when we looked at chapter 1, if you’ve identified this morning that you have not been pursuing loving God with your heart, soul, mind, and strength, then consider that he may have been showing you this for a long time. Maybe it was by frustrating your plans or giving you little satisfaction in life. But however it may have been, consider it from this day onward, for God will no doubt continue to do those things in your life in order to get your attention and turn you back to him.

And also be thankful this morning that even as in the book of Haggai, though you have not repented before now, he brought his word to you to make sure you understood what he was saying to you. God wants to be first in your life and mine and will do whatever necessary to make sure that’s the case.

We also need to see, however, that this is a very loving thing for God to do. Consider the scene in Haggai. He frustrated their plans to harvest much, brought the word to them through Haggai, and then showed them again what he had been doing to get their attention. He had gone to great lengths to turn his people toward him. And then he ends the message delivered by Haggai with these words: “But from this day on I will bless you” (v. 19). He wanted their devotion and obedience because he wanted to bless them, and now he was going to do it.

We need to remember this as well. When we do not labor to cultivate greater love for God we do not gain anything. Rather, as C. S. Lewis has said, we are like a child who fights against moving out of the sandbox when his parents want to take him to the beach because he “cannot imagine what is offered by a holiday at the sea.” We fight against doing what is necessary to be all about God when God wants to bless us with himself.

So this morning, if you have found it necessary to repent and have done so, also consider from this day onward what God has done to point out your need so that you might continually be guided by him and quickly turn to him from this day onward so that he might bless you with himself.

We will not know in this life how richly God has blessed us (20-23)

Even as God’s last words in v. 19 had been that he will bless them, he now comes to speak again to Zerubbabel to tell him specifically how he will bless him. After all, Zerubabbel had been the one initially addressed to ensure the temple reconstruction began, and he had obeyed. Thus, we read in verses 20-23, “The word of the Lord came a second time to Haggai on the twenty-fourth day of the month, ‘Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah, saying, I am about to shake the heavens and the earth, and to overthrow the throne of kingdoms. I am about to destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the nations, and overthrow the chariots and their riders. And the horses and their riders shall go down, every one by the sword of his brother. On that day, declares the Lord of hosts, I will take you, O Zerubbabel my servant, the son of Shealtiel, declares the Lord, and make you like a signet ring, for I have chosen you, declares the Lord of hosts.’”

The Lord tells Zerubabbel he is about to destroy the enemies of his people. He is about to overthrow chariots and their riders and destrow them by the sword of their brothers. He is about to overthrow every other kingdom of this world. And in the midst of God being against every enemy of his people, he is about to honor one among his people, Zerubabbel. He tells Zerubabbel that he will make him like a signet ring, for he has chosen him.

Now, you can imagine how encouraging this must have been to hear. After the exile, Israel was nothing like that people who had lived under the reigns of David and Solomon. They were still dominated by world powers. Though Zerubabbel would have been the rightful king of Israel, their was no throne upon which he could reign. They were nothing in this world, and Zerubabbel was nothing. Even his title as governor was possibly some kind of honorary title and not anything official. And then he receives this word from the Lord.

Just so that we understand this word more thoroughly, the signet ring was something that the king would place on the hand or around the neck of one who was to be his representative among the people. When Joseph was elevated just below the pharaoh over Egypt, the pharaoh gave him the signet ring. In addition, years prior, the Lord had said to Jechoniah that even if he were a signet ring on his right hand he would tear him off, pronouncing his judgment against him. And Zerubbabel was Jechoniah’s grandson. God was lifting him up again and declaring that he would make him his signet ring.

But before you begin wondering where in the Scripture we hear about Zerubabbel becoming this great king and reigning over his people with his enemies all defeated around him, then I can save you the time, we don’t find it anywhere in the Scripture. In fact, Zerubabbel fades into nowhere after this point in the Scripture. We know nothing more of him in the Old Testament. And we never read of all the other kings being destroyed all over the rest of the world. So why did God then promise to bless him in this way?

God promised to bless him in this way because he indeed would bless him in this way, but not in a way Zerubabbel might have understood at the time. Again, here we see an other important lesson in understanding promises to God’s people in the Old Testament. The promises to God’s people come to God’s King, Jesus, and then through him to them. And Zerubbabel’s rich blessing is that Israel’s great King would come from his line. Ultimately Zerubabbel’s line leads to the birth of a man named Joseph, the husband of Mary, the mother of Christ. And right now he reigns at the Father’s right hand. Then one day he will return and all the kingdoms of this world will be destroyed and his kingdom be over all. And he will reign forever, and his people will reign with him over a new heavens and a new earth, and Zerubabbel will no doubt be among them, for God’s promises are sure.

And so it reminds us, we might not ever see how richly God has blessed us and used us in this lifetime, so may we simply be faithful to love and obey him in this life, trusting that indeed there will be one day when it will all be made clear. There will be one day when all things are finally summed up in Christ and all the mysteries of God are made clear in him. Until that day, may we be found faithful loving our God and obeying him. May we obey him now even in coming to the table. Amen.

CURSES, BLESSINGS, AND THE DAVIDIC KING

Listen to Audio