Haggai 1

Study Guide 76: Haggai PUTTING GOD FIRST Overview Haggai was a prophet who spoke to the tiny Jewish community which had settled again in the Promised Land after the Babylonian Captivity. Little is known of the prophet. Jewish tradition suggests he was a priest. Three things set this prophet’ s work apart. First, each message is carefully dated. We can place his preaching of each sermon recorded in this book to the day! Second, the people acted on his exhortation! While many Old Testament prophets saw no real response to their ministries, this prophet saw the Jews heed his words. Third, rebuilding the temple is linked with the “ shaking of the nations” — the coming of Messiah to establish the kingdom promised by the Lord. This book, whose theme is putting God first, has a special message for those we teach as well as its message to the men and women of Haggai’ s day.

Outline August 29, 520 b.c.Haggai 1:1-15 October 17, 520 b.c.Haggai 2:1-9 December 18, 520 b.c.Haggai 2:10-19 December 18, 520 b.c.Haggai 2:20-23Ezra and Nehemiah contain narrative descriptions of the return. The Prophet Zechariah was a contemporary of Haggai. They mention many of the same people, such as Zerubbabel (who was governor of the Jewish community) and Joshua (who was high priest).

Commentary Some 50,000 people returned to Judah from Babylon. They settled in a tiny portion of the Jews’ ancient heritage, centered on Jerusalem. There they found their once-fertile lands ruined. What had once been forested was stripped of its trees and grasses. What had been fertile crop land was now wilderness. In addition, the little remnant, struggling to clear its land, was met with a series of natural disasters. There were droughts and storms. Crops planted in hope were harvested in despair, as not even the seed was recovered. It was this situation that the Prophet Haggai described when he preached his first sermon on August 29, 520 b.c., to a people who had gathered in Jerusalem for a religious festival. Now this is what the Lord Almighty says: “ Give careful thought to your ways. You have planted much, but have harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it. . . . “ You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little. What you brought home, I blew away. Why?” declares the Lord Almighty. “ Because of My house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with his own house.” Haggai 1:5-6, Haggai 1:9 The First Message: Haggai 1:1-15The people had returned to Judah in 538 b.c., some 16 years before Haggai first spoke out. They had come with the specific intention of rebuilding the ruined temple of their God. The people had quickly laid the foundation of the temple, but then enthusiasm had flagged. Their efforts shifted to preparing houses to live in, and to clearing fields so crops might grow. For over a decade work on the temple had been abandoned, and even the funds they had brought with them for the building program were spent on a futile effort to make the little community self-sufficient. In essence, the people of Judah had forgotten that it is the call of the believer to put God first. Blessing follows full commitment — blessing cannot be found apart from it. Haggai’ s first message, then, was a call to recommitment. It was an explanation of dashed hopes, for through Haggai the Lord now explained what had been happening. “ You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little. What you brought home, I blew away. Why?” declares the Lord Almighty. “ Because of My house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with his own house. Therefore, because of you the heavens have withheld their dew and the earth its crops.” Haggai 1:9-10LINK TO LIFE: YOUTH / ADULT Tape record this “ appeal” from a radio or TV preacher. Play it, and ask your group members to evaluate: “ You have to put God first! You have to show God you love Him! You have to be willing to sacrifice if you’ re going to be blessed! That’ s why I’ m begging you to put that $100 in the mail today. Or even that $1,000. You say you’ re too poor? You don’ t have that kind of money? Well, maybe the reason you’ re poor is because you haven’ t put God first! Maybe He’ s holding back financial blessing just to teach you that God and His ministries have got to come first! Oh, yes, that’ s the pattern, brother and sister. Give to God first, even when it’ s a sacrifice. And then, yes then, God will bless you.” Discuss: “ What’ s your reaction to this kind of appeal? What is right about it? What may seem wrong? Would you send that $100 or $1,000? Why, or why not?” Then give the background and read together Haggai’ s first sermon (Haggai 1:2-11). Discuss: “ How is this sermon different from the one we’ ve just heard on tape?” (Note it had to do with an earlier commitment that had been abandoned, and was uttered by a prophet who spoke expressly at God’ s command in a specific situation.) How did the people of Judah respond to Haggai’ s August sermon? His book tells us that “ the whole remnant of the people obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the message of the Prophet Haggai, because the Lord their God had sent him. And the people feared the Lord” (Haggai 1:12). God worked in the hearts of His people (Haggai 1:13-14), and within the month work on the temple was resumed! LINK TO LIFE: YOUTH / ADULT Put on a chalkboard a sketch of the “ foundations of the temple” (drawn simply as a rectangle). Point out that the foundations of Judah’ s commitment had been laid, and that God withheld blessing because the people had not carried through on their commitment. They had been distracted by the “ cares of life” and had not put God first. Ask each person to look quietly at the rectangle, and meditate for 90 seconds. Have the foundations of any special commitment to God been laid in their own lives — foundations on which they have not built while going about other business? Make no other comment, but move on with the rest of this study.

The Second Message: Haggai 2:1-9The people had worked for nearly two months when Haggai received another message from God. This was a message of encouragement: encouragement that took several forms. First, the postexilic temple did not compare in size or beauty with the temple of Solomon which Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed. It must have been discouraging for the people to compare what they were able to do with what David and Solomon had accomplished with the resources of a wealthy and powerful kingdom. Yet God announced through Haggai that “ the glory of this present house will be greater than the glory of the former house” (Haggai 2:9). How true these words proved to be! It was not expansion and beautification of the temple hundreds of years later under Herod that the Lord had in mind, however. It was the fact that in the person of Jesus, God Himself would come to this temple of the exiles, to preach His good news of salvation and peace. The glory of the second temple is that the very Son of God stood on its porches, and beautified it with His presence. But there was another, pressing need for encouragement. The Jewish remnant was poor. How could they build and decorate a temple that would be worthy of the Lord? Speaking to this issue, the Lord said through Haggai, “ The silver is Mine and the gold is Mine” (Haggai 2:8). The Book of Ezra tells us how God solved this problem. The peoples of the land objected to the Jews’ rebuilding program, and tried to stop it (Ezra 5:1-17). But a search of empire records showed that Cyrus had actually commanded that the temple be rebuilt! As a result, orders came from the present king, Darius, that the house of God was not only to be built, but that the full cost was to be paid by the royal treasury, through taxes collected in the Trans-Euphrates province (Ezra 6:1-12). In essence, the enemies of the Jewish people bore the expense of rebuilding their temple! How ironic. And how clear a demonstration that we need never hold back from full commitment to our God. Truly the silver and the gold are His. God provides what we need to complete any task to which He calls us. LINK TO LIFE: YOUTH / ADULT Ask your group to brainstorm. What are some of the fears that hold people back from following through on commitments to the Lord? List their ideas on the chalkboard. Then give a minilecture, explaining the Ezra background that helps us see the significance of Haggai’ s word from God, “ The silver is Mine and the gold is Mine.” Then return to the list on the chalkboard. How do the words of Haggai and the experience of the people help us deal with each fear listed on the board? There is a third thread of encouragement in Haggai’ s message. He speaks of the future, saying, “ In a little while I will once more shake the heavens and earth, the sea and the dry land” (Haggai 2:6). This imagery of shaking the heavens and earth is associated with history’ s end and divine judgment. Isaiah cried: Men will flee to caves in the rocks and to holes in the ground from dread of the Lord and the splendor of His majesty, when He rises to shake the earth. Isaiah 2:19The writer of Hebrews picks up this imagery in Hebrews 12:1-29. At that time [on Sinai] His voice shook the earth, but now He has promised, “ Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” The words “ once more” indicate the removing of what can be shaken — that is, created things — so that what cannot be shaken may remain. Hebrews 12:26-27It is important to put God first now, for ultimately only what we do for Him will not be shaken and destroyed when Jesus returns. And it was important for the people of Haggai’ s day to look ahead, to realize that only what they did for the Lord would remain. Yet perhaps the most important encouragement was given in these words: “‘ Be strong, all you people of the land . . . and work. For I am with you,’ says the Lord Almighty” (Haggai 2:4).

The Third Message: Haggai 2:10-19In the age before the Exile, the Jewish people had been confident that Jerusalem at least was safe. After all, wasn’ t God’ s temple there? Surely God must protect the place He had chosen for His name to dwell. This thinking had been wrong! The Babylonians had come, sacked the city, and destroyed the temple. Now, as the new temple was being constructed, Haggai was sent with a special message to that generation. The message came in a distinctive way. The prophet was sent to ask the priests about a point of Law: “ 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?” (Haggai 2:11) The answer was no. He asked another question: “ If a person defiled by contact with a dead body touches one of these things, does it become defiled?” (Haggai 2:13) The answer was yes. What is Haggai’ s point? Simply this. The presence of God’ s holy temple could not make the people holy. In fact, according to the Law, even the touch of a sinful and defiled people should make the temple itself unholy! The people of Judah must not put their hope in their own supposed holiness, or in the supposed holiness of the house of God. What basis then is there for hope? Haggai’ s response is, essentially, God’ s grace. God is good to us, not because we deserve it, and not because His presence makes us holy, but simply because He has chosen to bless us. “ Whatever they do and whatever they offer there [in the rebuilt temple] is defiled,” God said (Haggai 2:15). And yet, God was determined to pour out His blessings on this people who had at last put Him first! “ Now give careful thought to this from this day on — consider how things were before one stone was laid on another in the Lord’ s temple. When anyone came to a heap of twenty measures, there were only ten. When anyone went to a wine vat to draw fifty measures, there were only twenty. I struck all the work of your hands with blight, mildew and hail, yet you did not turn to Me,” declares the Lord. “ From this day on, from this twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, give careful thought to the day when the foundation of the Lord’ s temple was laid. Give careful thought: Is there yet any seed left in the barn? Until now, the vine and the fig tree, the pomegranate and the olive tree have not borne fruit. “ From this day on I will bless you.” Haggai 2:15-19According to Old Testament law a person who was ceremonially (ritually) “ defiled” or “ unclean” was not permitted to approach or worship God. Explain Haggai’ s point — the temple would not make Judah a holy community. But their obedience in building it, their demonstration of readiness to put God first, freed God to give them gracious, unmerited blessings. What is more, God committed Himself to do just this! How like our own experience. Even when we are fully committed to the Lord, and express that commitment in obedience, the blessings we experience are not merited, but evidence of the overwhelming grace of our God.

The Last Message: Haggai 2:20-23The last message of Haggai, given on the same day as the promise of divine blessing, looked far ahead. Zerubbabel, though of the royal line, was not Judah’ s king. The little district of Judah was merely a minor region, one of the Persian Empire’ s 120 great provinces! Yet the word is directed to Zerubbabel as a representative of the kingly line. Though insignificant now and for centuries to come God will one day act: Tell Zerubbabel governor of Judah that I will shake the heavens and the earth. I will overturn royal thrones and shatter the power of the foreign kingdoms. . . . On that day . . . I will take you, My servant Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel . . . and I will make you like My signet ring, for I have chosen you. Haggai 2:21-23The rebuilding of the temple, like the restoration of the Jews to their land, is but a reminder of the greater promises that God has given His ancient people. The day will come when this earth is shaken, and when the kingdom is possessed by Jesus, David’ s greater Son.

Teaching Guide Prepare Are unfulfilled commitments keeping you from an experience of the gracious blessing of God?

Explore

1. Play a tape representing a radio preacher’ s appeal for funds for evaluation by your group members (see “ link-to-life” above).
2. Or give a minilecture outlining the situation before Haggai began to speak. Ask each group member to write out what he or she might expect God to say to this particular generation. Then compare with the prophet’ s first message (Haggai 1:1-15).

Expand

1. Examine fears that people have concerning full commitment to the Lord. Then look at how God provided financially for poverty-stricken Judah so that the temple could be built. See “ link-to-life” above.
2. Or give a minilecture, explaining each sermon. Then divide into teams, each of which is to examine one sermon and list applications for people of today.

Apply Draw a sketch of a foundation on the chalkboard. Ask your group members to meditate on any commitments they may have made to God, but like Judah, have set aside because of daily life concerns. Then close in prayer, thanking God for His willingness not only to supply what we need to finish building, but also His gracious willingness to bless us as we are obedient to Him.