Mike Bickle emphasizes the prophetic call to build the house of prayer as illustrated in Haggai's messages to the Israelites in 520 BC. He draws parallels between their struggles and the challenges faced by modern houses of prayer, urging believers to recognize the significance of their work in the context of God's eternal purpose. Bickle highlights the importance of perseverance, spiritual resolve, and the understanding that their efforts contribute to a greater divine narrative that connects past, present, and future worship sanctuaries. He encourages the community to see beyond immediate challenges and to embrace the calling to create a place of continuous worship and prayer.

Father, we come to you in the name of Jesus. And we ask you for a spirit of inspiration. We ask you to strengthen our spirit by your word and by your spirit. I ask that you would supernaturally help us with even a greater resolve than we have right now to take hold of your purpose, to see your purpose in the building of the house of prayer of this hour of history. We thank you in Jesus' name, amen. Haggai, the prophet, gave four prophetic words. And it's only a two chapter book. It's a very, very little book. Haggai chapter one and chapter two, it's four prophecies. And those four prophecies were given to the people of God in Jerusalem in 520 BC. They were given actually in a four month period. And they were given in context to strengthen them in their understanding and strengthen them in their resolve to build the house of prayer in their generation. It was a very historic year in Israel's history, 520 BC. And the story that Israel was walking out in 520 BC and that Haggai the prophet was prophesying into and his friend, Zechariah, they were friends. They were contemporaries, both in the city of Jerusalem at the same time in 520 BC. And they were prophesying specifically to strengthen the building of the house of prayer. Now, the reason I'm giving you this handout with these notes, we're not going to cover all the notes, but I want you to have the verses and the dates and the names real specific. It's a short handout. It's four pages. Just, it's enough that it's easy enough to learn the dates and the names because the story that the drama and the story that unfolded in that hour is the same storyline that many houses of prayer are experiencing all around the earth today. And the prophetic words that God gave the people of God to build the house of prayer in that hour are the same prophetic words he's giving to his people to build the house of prayer in this hour. It's a very dramatic story. Paragraph A, we're talking about the dramatic story of rebuilding the house of prayer in the days of Zerubbabel. Now, Zerubbabel was the governor of Judah. The story of Zechariah and Haggai, these two prophets and what they said, they provide powerful encouragement to anybody building the house of prayer in this hour because we see our story in their story. And the thing that stirs me is that many people who are committed full-time, I'm talking about full-time intercessors, intercessory missionaries, to build the house of prayer, they're unfamiliar with these passages of Scripture. I mean, Haggai is only two chapters. It's four prophecies. We need to know this story well because part of our story is connected to it. Paragraph B, the drama that we're gonna focus on in 520 BC, it started when God told Jeremiah some 70 years earlier that the nation of Israel were going to go into captivity in Babylon for 70 years. Now, this was a very negative word when he gave it, but it was a very positive word 70 plus years later when it came to pass. He says, you're going into captivity. And they said, no, we don't receive that word. He said, but after 70 years, you will return. And the generation that heard that, they didn't like it. 70 plus years later, when it was ready to be fulfilled, that was the word that they really hung on to. Let's read it, Jeremiah 29, verse 10. Thus says the Lord, after 70 years are completed at Babylon I will visit you. There will be a visitation of the spirit. I will perform my good work towards you. I will cause you to return back to this place. And he was in the city of Jerusalem. And my opinion is, he was actually pointing at the temple site. You will return right back to this place and you will build a house of prayer again. Now again, he's telling them they're gonna go to Babylon, which is modern day Iraq. 700 miles away, you're gonna go to work camps. You're gonna go to slave camps for 70 years. They didn't appreciate this word, but I'm gonna visit you. Now that's a key phrase. Because 70 plus years later, when the visitation of the Lord came, it didn't, it had the mark of the spirit in the visitation, but it had tremendous human dynamics and troubles and problems mixed in to the visitation as well because if you think I'm gonna visit you, you might be tempted to think everything will be easy and good because it's a visitation of God. But when we read Haggai and Zechariah and Ezra, we find out that in the midst of the visitation, the work was very difficult and the challenges were real and they were great. But the visitation of the spirit was being released in that hour of history and many of them could not see the visitation. And those that did, some of them even became discouraged in the midst of a season of visitation. Paragraph C, now from God's point of view, the temple, the building of the temple was the building of the house of prayer because from God's point of view, the temple was the house of prayer. Its purpose was first and foremost to be a place of encounter. It was to be a worship sanctuary where singers would lead night and day. And they did in the days of David and then in Solomon's temple, his son built a building and the singers went night and day. It was to be a worship sanctuary where the presence of God was released, where the people could pray and encounter God. That was at the core of God's mind when he told them to build the temple. Isaiah was the first one in the Bible to call the temple the house of prayer. Isaiah 56, verse seven. The Lord speaking prophetically through Isaiah, my house shall be called a house of prayer. He was talking clearly about the temple. And if there's any question about that, Jesus in Matthew 21 quotes Isaiah when he was in the temple. It says that Jesus went into the temple and made it clear that when he said, my house shall be a house of prayer. In that Jewish context, he was actually talking about the temple being a worship sanctuary where the presence of God could be experienced and the people would encounter God and worship in prayer. Paragraph D. Now the dramatic story that I want you familiar with, because it's part of your story. There's three passages of scripture. Ezra chapter one to six. And I wanna encourage you read Ezra one to six, read it a number of times, mark it, get familiar with it. It was what happened to the Jewish remnant when they began to build the house of prayer. They had a good beginning. The visitation of God, they became discouraged and actually quit for 16 years after they signed up. The very group that signed up drew back in discouragement and quit. And after 16 years, God raised up Zechariah and Haggai, the two prophets, and they began to declare the purpose of God. And it broke off the spirit of slumber and the spirit of discouragement. And these prophecies had such power on the hearts of these workers, they rose up and completed the task. That's why we wanna know these prophecies. What would God say if he was going to encourage people not to quit in the building of the house of prayer? I could tell you what he would say. Haggai chapter one, Haggai chapter two, Zechariah three to Zechariah eight. That's what he would say. So if he has said it and it's in the book, why wouldn't we make it a priority to be familiar with these passages in an intimate way? So the story is told in three passages, Ezra chapter one to six, Haggai chapter one and two, and Zechariah, you can say one to eight, but in particular, chapter three to eight. Okay, now there's four leaders that God raised up in Israel in Jerusalem in that hour, in 520 BC. Now they were raised up before that, but there's four leaders that are in the city working together. Zerubbabel, he's the governor. He has a political position, but he's a spiritual man. He's a spiritual leader. He functioned as the apostolic leader over the entire divine commission to build a house of prayer in that generation. Then there was Joshua. He was the high priest. He was responsible for the day-to-day functioning of the worship community, I mean of the community that led worship, the singers, the musicians, which were the Levites and the priests. Now not all Levites were singers and musicians, but from a biblical point of view, all the singers and musicians that are mentioned are Levites. So Joshua, his responsibility was to mobilize and oversee the day-to-day function of the teams, if you will, that led in the worship inside of the temple, not just the singing and the music, the offering of the sacrifices that were pictures of Jesus's death and resurrection and his ministry. He oversaw that function as well with the priests. Then the other two leaders, you guys, Haggai, he's an older prophet. He gave four messages in a period, actually it's a period of four months. It's late August to late December in 520 BC. And we're gonna look at his second message, the one on October 17th. That one has a peculiar, I think, relevance to us right now in this hour. We're gonna look at that in just a few moments. We're gonna look at that specific message. Then the fourth leader was Zechariah. He was a younger prophet. Now his longest prophecy, perhaps the longest prophecy in the Bible in terms of a prophecy given in one setting. We don't know how many settings the book of Revelation was given to John. It's believable that he had several encounters and he put them all together in one book, we don't know. But in terms of one night of prophecy, I don't know of any other in the whole word of God that equals in terms of direct length what Zechariah received that one glorious night in January 519 BC. It's just a month after Haggai was done. Haggai gives his four words to this young prophet Zechariah the next month in January because Haggai was August, September, October, November, December and now he's done and the young prophet comes in and one night has this amazing impartation of the spirit and gets eight visions in one night. And several, well, they all affect the house of prayer but several of them were directly, specifically to encourage the building of the house of prayer in that hour in 520 BC. Now there's two Persian kings that are in the story, King Cyrus and King Darius and you can read those details later. Let's go to top of page two. Let's get a short overview of the story. Short overview of the story. They've been in captivity for 70 years, the Jewish people. They're 700 miles away from home in Babylon again, which is modern-day Iraq, 70 years. So most of the people were born and raised in the work camps. Very difficult conditions to live in. A few guys were maybe five and 10 years old when they were put into the camps and it's 70 years later now they're in their 80s and they actually remember what it was like back in Jerusalem. It's about a five-month walk, 700 miles. Now the 70 years is up. The 70 years that Jeremiah said, you'll be in this slave camp for 70 years and the spirit of the Lord moved on Cyrus the king. We'll get to that in a minute. And he said, anybody, any of the Jews that want to go back to Jerusalem, you can go, you're free. And 50,000 of them out of many estimate, as many as a million Jews were now in the work camps at that time, up to a million. Nobody knows the exact number, but different sources have different numbers, but that's a number that you'll run into. Like over a million, 50,000 say, hey, I want to go back, walk five months, 700 miles. I want to go to a broken, desolate city, Jerusalem, because remember 70 years earlier, the Babylonian army that took them captive and brought them to Babylon, they burned the city. They tore the temple down. So the city was that was desolate. It was a heap of ruins. When you think of the temple, think of a big building like municipal auditorium. And when the Babylonian army came in 70 years ago and tore it down, it was stones were laid everywhere. I mean, it was significant work to put that building back together. It was a gigantic task. It wasn't just they were going to come back home and have prayer meetings. They were going to build the city and build, rebuild this massive structure. Of course, they didn't have architectural school. They've been in slave camps. They didn't have tools. They have good ones. They didn't have the knowledge. They were slaves in essence. I mean, minimum wage workers minus about three. And they were going to go back and build a city and build this building and put singers and musicians in place. I mean, what a daunting task in the natural, but they said yes to it. Paragraph B, now after about a year, it's a little bit longer than a year, a few months longer, their excitement is gone. I mean, they were going strong for about a year. One to two years. I mean, they were full of faith. They walked 500 miles. I mean, five months. They finally came to the city of Jerusalem. They saw this desolate city and they thought, oh no, it's worse than we thought. I can imagine them, you know, coming up over the hill and they get Jerusalem. We, oh my, well, they work at about in the second year. They just lose their enthusiasm. I mean, we can relate to that. We know what it means to get prepared, get, you know, take a long time, hear the word of the Lord, get your house in order, move to Kansas City and build the house of prayer. And I mean, it's exciting. It's scary. You're ready to go about a year or two into it. It's like, oh man, those 6 a.m. prayer meetings are hard. Well, they laid the foundation of the temple. They only put the foundation in. They didn't build the structures, just the foundation. That's a massive job, by the way. But then the enemies around about them were causing trouble. And they had economic and agricultural crisis going on as well. So they had lots of problems. They had enemies everywhere because remember when they, when the population was deported to Babylon, the surrounding nations said, hey, free land, free houses, free fields, let's move in and take over their farms and their houses. So now it's 70 years later. And these Samaritans, they don't want to leave. They go, we've been here 70 years. You've been far away. This is our farm. It's not your farm. So you can imagine the conflict. Paragraph C, the two most important years to remember in this story, 536. That's when they first laid the foundation, 536 B.C. There's only two dates. You just have to remember 536 B.C. That's when they laid the foundation. That's, they've been there about a year in 536. And then they get discouraged because of the opposition, the agricultural and economic crisis. There was an economic crisis going on in the land. How many of you know God's going to build the house of prayer in the earth in the midst of economic crisis? In the midst of agricultural crisis, He will build it. You wait and see. And I know you already know that. Well, they quit for 16 years. Now it's 520 and God raises up two prophets, Haggai and Zechariah. And they go to the main leaders, Zerubbabel and Joshua and all the people. And they said, rise up and build the house. Rise up and build the house. Rise up, build the house. And after 16 years of discouragement, they cast off their discouragement and they set about the task of building the house of prayer, building the temple, and they did it and they completed it. And the Lord was pleased. Paragraph D, there's three main obstacles in the city of Jerusalem. The Samaritans, the people that took over the Jewish homes and farms and land, they didn't want to leave. Then there was the remnant of Israel themselves, the 50,000 who marched or who walked five months, 700 miles. The remnant themselves, they became spiritually lethargic after they got there. They were fired up when they said yes. But when it came down to doing it day by day by day, spiritual lethargy, passivity. They, well, you know, it's too much work. It's not worth it, became the word. That became the dominant word. It's not worth the hassle. Spiritual lethargy. They couldn't see the purpose that God was building, that God was accomplishing in the building of the house of prayer. They couldn't see it. They lost sight of the big picture. And that's what we're going to really focus into in just a moment, the big picture. Well, not only did they have spiritual lethargy, it's not worth it. It works too hard. They got into compromise in their own lives. They found themselves compromising in sin in their individual lives. And Zechariah had to come, we'll see in a minute, and call them to repent, not just of lethargy, repent of compromise in their private lives. They had some secret things going on all over the side. And the other thing that came, that was a resistance was fear. They began to be afraid. It won't work. The enemies are too big. The Lord won't help us. His presence won't be with us. And they had all kinds of fears. Now, this is exactly the issue that the house of prayer people in the earth are dealing with today. Then they had the economic crisis that was intensified by drought and agricultural crisis. Let's go to Roman numeral three. In Ezra chapter one to six, we see the story told. It's a quite, the significant events are right there. And again, you want to know these six chapters. I'd encourage you to read Ezra one to six, maybe once a week for a month or two or longer. You want to get to know these chapters. Part of our story is found in that storyline. And this could be true of anybody building a house of prayer across the earth. Of course, it's true of anybody in ministry, anywhere in the local church. But I mean, they were actually building a worship sanctuary. They were building the buildings, but more than that, they were organizing the people to actually have night and day worship ascending to God out of those buildings too. Paragraph B. Well, it's 538 BC. King Cyrus, he's the new king. He's the king of Persia. He just, that very year, Persia, which is modern day Iran, he just defeated Babylon, which is modern day Iraq. So back in the ancient world, it was Iran versus Iraq, the same story. So the king of Iran, Persia, defeats the king of Iraq, Babylon. And so he puts in his government in Babylon. And the spirit moves on this Persian king, this, if you will, Iranian king, using today's kind of grid. And the Lord moves on him, the Holy Spirit, just like Jeremiah said, I will visit you. Well, he first visited this king, this pagan king. And he rose up and shocked the earth. He said, thus says the God of Israel, I will build a house in Jerusalem. I'm at 700 miles away. I'm going to build a house of prayer in Jerusalem. And the, you know, the Persians are confused, like what? The Babylonians are confused. All the other nations that he had conquered, they're confused. But the Jewish remnant said, we knew it because God said he would visit us after 70 years. And right there at the 70 year mark, the visitation of God comes. The spirit moves on this king. He makes this absolutely astounding announcement that an Iranian king is going to build the house of prayer in Jerusalem for the God of Israel. Now, how many of you know that could encourage you if you saw that happen on a global level? He made a world proclamation. And here we have the world proclamation. It is Ezra chapter 1, verse 1 to 5. We'll just read a little bit of this. And I'll have you, you know, encourage you to read this on your own, but I want you to feel the drama. In the first year of king of Cyrus, king of Persia. Now, Cyrus, it was in his first year of conquering Babylon. He'd been a king before that, actually from 550 BC on. He'd been a king for some time, for about 12 years before that. But in the first year of conquering Babylon in his new enlarged empire, the word of the Lord by Jeremiah, 70 years earlier, 70 years plus. The, the, the Lord stirred the spirit of a ungodly king. How many of you know God can stir the spirit of authority figures in finance, military, government? God can stir the spirit to build his house. And he's doing that in these days, but we're going to see it more in the days to come. The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus. He made this shocking proclamation throughout his whole empire. It was the largest empire in history at that time. No empire had ever been larger than his. He says, verse 2, I want all the kingdoms of the earth that the Lord God of heaven has given me. I want him to know something. God commanded me to build him a house in Jerusalem. He makes this worldwide announcement. I just can't get over this. Now imagine the exiles or the, or the remnant of Israel. They're in the camps. They are so excited. It's, it's too good to be true. It's exactly what Jeremiah said. He even gave money to them. Verse 3 to 5, the king did. He even, he said, I'll let every Jewish person go back if you want to in 50,000. Look at verse 5. All those that were talking about the Jewish remnant, when God stirred their spirit, they moved. They moved. They went to Jerusalem. Now here's what the story tells us. The stirring of the spirit of the individual is real, but it didn't, it didn't stay steady. The, I mean, the people didn't follow through with it. They were really stirred. It wasn't make believe. It wasn't emotionalism. It was truly the stirring of the Lord in that hour in Babylon. It was real. You think of the time when God said, I want you to build the house of prayer full time. Doesn't matter what city it's in. The calling is real. The marking is real. The stirring is real. That doesn't mean it will be easy. And that doesn't mean that everybody will follow through to the end faithfully. But the stirring was real. Paragraph D, 50,000. You can find the number there in Ezra chapter two. Let's go to now to paragraph E, top of page three. Now, so that you understand, it's not just a, so that you know, it's not just a building where they offer sacrifices. They're actually, it's a worship sanctuary. I don't mean building right now. It's much more. I'm talking about the people are mobilized to offer up night and day worship with singers and musicians. I want you to know that it's more than a quote church building. But when I say a worship sanctuary, I'm talking about the people were mobilized into a worship community. I'm talking about the people themselves became the sanctuary of the Lord that gathered collectively. And they offered up prayers night and day before the Lord. Let's read this in Nehemiah chapter 12, verse 45, both the singers and the gatekeepers kept charge, kept the charge of their God, according to the command of David. Now the gatekeepers in our context would be all the support ministries. There's the singers and the musicians and everybody else that keeps the lights on the money flowing, the parking lots, working, the plumbing, working all that's involved in keeping that prayer sanctuary go going. Look what it says in verse 45, the singers and all the others. They kept the charge of their God in the days of a Zerubbabel. Of course, they quit for 16 years, but once they signed up the second time, they stayed true to the end of their life. Verse 47, in the days of Zerubbabel, the governor, and in the days of Nehemiah, which was almost a hundred years later, all of Israel gave money, all of Israel gave money to keep the singers going. They gave money to keep the gatekeepers, the support ministries, they gave enough money for a portion for each day. In other words, that's a way of saying the finances were in place for full-time singers and full-time musicians. Look at the next verse in Ezra 2 65, there were 200 singers. Some of them were men, some of them were women, male and female singers, 200 of them. And we have found here at the 10 year mark at the house of prayer, it takes, I mean, that's a remarkable because when we were just doing the numbers the other day, as we're working on our budgets, it takes 200 full-time singers, musicians, and sound techs to keep the prayer room going 24-7. And 200 is not a, a magic number, but when I look at that 200, I, as a, as a builder of a house of prayer, I go, you know what? That's a practical number, because we thought we could do it with 100, and you can for a year or two, but then everybody starts getting weary. It takes about 200 full-time singers, musicians, and another 100 or two, if we didn't have any outreaches, which, you know, we have many, but if we had none of those, it'd take another 100 just to keep the, the lights on and the plumbing going and the finances working in a, in a proper way. At the 10 year mark, I look back and say, it takes about 300 full-time people to sustain a 24-7 worship sanctuary with full worship teams going 24-7. You can do it with less number for a year or two, but they'll start getting, their legs will start getting weary after a while. But if you're gonna sustain it for a decade, I would guess it'd take 200, 100 singers, musicians, sound techs, I put them all together, and then another at least 100 to keep the systems going. Paragraph F. Now, look at this. The king, we're talking about the king of Persia now. In Nehemiah 11, verse 23, it was the king's command, not just Zerubbabel's, not just King David from generations past, it was the king's command concerning the Jews in Jerusalem that a certain portion of the money would be for the singers. But the unbelieving king said, I'm gonna make sure they have enough money to function full-time, a quota for each day, enough for a full day's work, enough money. Paragraph G. Well, they're now in the first year. It's the seventh month of the first year. They built the altar. Now, not the foundation, just the altar to offer some sacrifices. The foundation's a little, it's a bigger job than just building the altar. Some months pass, they build the altar. They laid, I mean, they laid the foundation. Remember, it's a building, not exactly, but think of municipal auditorium, getting that foundation in place. They didn't get the whole foundation done, but they got a bit of the foundation. We find out through other verses, the foundation isn't completely, I mean, finished in the full sense of the word in 536 B.C. Now, look at this. On the day, here they are, they're into the second year. They're still pretty excited. The troubles are beginning to increase, but they're still pretty excited. They lay the foundation. They haven't built the building yet, just the foundation. They're singing in the open air. Says in verse 10, they laid the foundation of the temple. The priest stood up with trumpets and Levites, that's the singers, musicians, with symbols to praise the Lord, just like King David commanded. Verse 11, and they sang responsibly. That's antiphonal singing. One group would sing, the other group would answer them. King David is the one that taught them the antiphonal singing, because around the throne of heaven, that's how they do it. They mix the singing and the proclamation, and different companies around the throne are interacting together in total unity before the throne. David picked up on that, and here, Zerubbabel sets this into place. Paragraph H, now the trouble starts increasing. And you can read in Zechariah 4, 1 to 5, the adversary, I mean, Ezra chapter 4, 1 to 5, the adversaries heard that the Jews were building the house of prayer. After a while, the people hear, the news gets out. Verse 4, the people of the land, the adversaries, they wanted to discourage the Jews. They troubled them. They did anything they could to create rumors and troubles and frustrations. They even hired counselors to think of crafty ways to frustrate them by lies and rumors and all kinds of ways to stop them. Look at 20 verses later in verse 24 of Ezra 4. This is one of the saddest moments, one of the saddest moments of the story. The work on the house of God that God stirred their spirit, God stirred Cyrus' spirit, God prophesied through Isaiah about it. He prophesied through Jeremiah about it. Daniel went on fasting and prayer related to it. But the work ceased and it discontinued for 16 years. Paragraph I, after 16 years, God sent prophets. God will always stir through the prophetic spirit. When God has commissioning a sovereign worship sanctuary that's going to go night and day, there will always be the need of the prophetic word to strengthen because they couldn't shake off the discouragement without the new, fresh, powerful word from God. Now we have the written word that's prophetic and we have the contemporary, subjective words that God gives the different prophets, dreams, visions, and they strengthen our hands in the work. Look at Ezra chapter 5 verse 1 and 2. Then, here it is 16 years later, it's now 520. This is the key year, 520 BC. The prophet Haggai and Zechariah, they prophesied to the Jews in Judah. Verse 2, Zerubbabel and Joshua, it says, Joshua, he's the same man as Joshua, they rose up. Isn't that awesome? When the prophets prophesy, the leaders rise up and they shake off the slumber. They begin to build. They begin to build the house of God, the temple, the house of prayers, what God calls the temple, the house of prayer. The prophets of God were with them and the prophets of God were helping them. Paragraph J, Ezra 6, it gives the end of the story. You can read that on your own. And they build for five more years. They're building the actual temple complex. And they completed the temple complex. That was the external building of the house of prayer. But the internal ministry of worshiping, functioning as a worship sanctuary, a God-commissioned worship sanctuary, night and day, it continued far beyond the five years it took to build the building. Top of page 4. Again, I'm going through this fast. But I'm wanting to familiarize you with the story for those that are new with us. I've shared this through the years. But I want us all to know this story well. Not just so you can preach it and say it, so you can think about it when you're in the prayer room or before the Lord. I draw from these passages regularly to strengthen my heart. Top of page 4. Now the prophet Haggai, he's the older prophet. He has four messages from late August to late December because each of the prophecies are actually identified the exact day. And so commentators today are universally, I mean, there's, I mean, significantly agree. There's always one guy who disagrees. But the vast majority disagree, I mean, agree on the actual day in the Julian calendar, in our calendar, the Western calendar. So we know the exact days. And the prophecy that I'm going to focus in on was Haggai's second one. It was on October 17th, 520 BC. But all four of them were in a four-month period of time. And we need all four words constantly. Let's look at it. I only have it in abbreviated form here. It says here, verse 3, this is Haggai. Remember, they've quit for 16 years. Now they're stirred up. They're ready to go to work. They come to the temple site, and they've been at it for about a month or two. They've been kind of going hard for about a month. When you read the other prophecies of Haggai, they've been going for a month, technically about six weeks. They're ready to go. Haggai says in verse 3, who is left among you who saw this temple in its former glory? My question now, he says, how do you see it now? In comparison with it, is this not in your eyes as nothing? Now there's a number of points to make here. So Haggai, the older prophet, comes. He goes, now who remembers the old days, 70 years back plus? And there are some really elderly men who remember. They were just kids. Here's the question of the day. He said, how do you see this work right now? Now they're looking at a work. They've quit for 16 months. They've only been reengaged for six weeks. The worship teams, they're probably not doing great right about the six-week mark. The building's still a heap of rubble. He said, here's the question. What do you see when you see this heap of rubble and this broken down house of prayer? What do you see? We'll find out in a minute in Zechariah 4.10. We know they despised it. They looked at it and said, it's ugly. It's not anointed. The work's too hard. God could not possibly be interested in this. That's all they could see was how weak and broken it was. Is this the visitation of God that Jeremiah promised us? Is this what it means to be in a visitation? Because remember, Jeremiah 29.10, God said, I will visit you. Haggai the prophet says, look again. Can you see anything else when you look at this broken down little temple? They couldn't see anything else. Because in their eyes, they compared it to the former days, and it was as nothing. Now, what Haggai is going to do, we'll look at this in a minute, he is going to connect in their thinking the temple they're building with the one that Solomon built nearly 500 years earlier. He's going to connect it. He says, it's the same temple from 500 years where the Shekinah glory came in. We're going to see that he's going to use the word this. He says this temple, and he's going to use it in reference to the Solomon's temple 500 years ago with the Shekinah glory. He's going to use it in reference to the little broken temple they were building in that day. But more than this, he's going to connect it to the millennial temple at the end of the age that Jesus builds. It's the same temple, but the people of Haggai's day, they could not see the continuity of their labors with the millennial worship sanctuary, and they couldn't see the continuity with the heavenly sanctuary. And what he, the prophet, was saying is in essence this. God has sovereignly established a worship sanctuary in Jerusalem. There's a worship sanctuary in heaven, the new Jerusalem that goes 24-7, it never stops. There's a millennial Jerusalem's worship sanctuary, and there's a historic one before you 500 years ago with David or with Solomon. He said, all you can see is how little weak and broken your labors are, because you cannot, you don't have any sense of the continuity between what you're doing and how it connects with the heavenly worship sanctuary and how it connects with the millennial sanctuary, because it's one reality to God. He was trying to shake them out of their slumber. Now some people, when they build a house of prayer, all they can see, well, it's a place where we're laboring for revival. That's good. We are laboring for revival and social transformation. Other people, they go, well, that's good that we're laboring for revival, but I see the prayer, the worship sanctuary as a place for personal renewal. I go in and read my Bible and get a spirit of revelation. I feel renewed. I get deliverance. I get renewal, and I get touch being in His presence. So to some people, the house of prayer is a personal renewal place. That's good, it is. To other people, it's a revival center, laboring for revival. In both groups, all they can see is the house of prayer as a means to an end. It's helping people get renewed, the believers that are inside, and it's helping the church get revived and society transformed. It is a means to an end. The house of prayer does affect individuals and it impacts the church and society, but the house of prayer is more than a means to an end. The worship sanctuary is an end in itself like it is in heaven. The end in itself is that the worth of God is declared. His supremacy is declared. That is an end in itself around the throne of heaven. The worthiness of the Lamb is declared night and day, forever, because His supremacy must be declared. The rocks will cry out if the saints don't. The worth of Jesus. But what Haggai is saying, in our language, there's more going on here than a personal renewal center, which is good, and a revival center for transformation of society, which is good. Those are a means to an end, but this is an end in itself as well. We don't have to choose between the two. Both realities are real. Beloved God started a worship sanctuary, sovereignly started one in Jerusalem with David. He didn't have a building, he only had a tent. He put worship, worshipers, singers and musicians in place. They went night and day for 40 years before Solomon actually built the building. They had a worship community going night and day. Why did David do that? Because he wanted personal renewal? Yes. I gaze on the beauty of the Lord in the house of the Lord. Yes. Because he wanted to defeat his enemies? Yes. But because he had a revelation of the value of declaring the supremacy of the Lamb, like they do in heaven. It was Jesus who said, in Matthew 6 10, on earth, like it is in heaven. It's not just that God's government is on earth, but there would be worship on earth like there's worship in heaven. It's both. David had the vision of the continuity of his worship sanctuary. He didn't have a building. He saw the continuity of his worship sanctuary with the heavenly worship sanctuary and with the millennial one. So David saw the value of what he was doing in his generation. Well, the remnant of Israel, they couldn't, they couldn't see that. So Haggai comes and he goes, you realize what you're doing is bigger than this generation. It's connected to the heavenly temple, worship sanctuary. It's connected to the millennial one. There's a divine connectedness by the Holy Spirit in these Jerusalem worship centers that were sovereignly called that went night and day. Now, in our context, God is sovereignly igniting and commissioning worship sanctuaries. I don't mean a Sunday morning worship service, though I love that. That's powerful. I'm talking about he is sovereignly commissioning night and day worship sanctuaries all over the earth. And these worship sanctuaries, they're not the same as the Jerusalem worship sanctuary, but they have a dynamic connectedness to a grand purpose for which these Jerusalem worship sanctuaries make clear and are a picture of. Beloved, what we're doing right now has a connectedness, not just a renewal in our own lives, sit in the prayer room, gaze on the beauty, not just on transformation of society. Yes, but we are connected with every other worship sanctuary that is going night and day. The God is sovereignly called. There is a calling that God gives. There's a dynamic connectedness with a worship movement. Again, I'm talking about God has separated people all over the earth. They will labor together to build a sanctuary and to keep the worship going. When I mean build it, I don't mean the building, though the buildings are important. I'm talking about the worship community that offers praise night and day on earth like they do in heaven, but infinitely less glorious, of course. So he looks at them. He says, what do you see? And that's always the question of the hour. What do you see? I hope. What do you see when you go into a little week prayer room? What do you see? Do you only see what's on the stage? What's in the chairs? Do you only see the literature in the foyer? There's more to see. There's a divine connectedness with the worship center above, and there's a millennial worship center that will cover the entire earth with worship. So verse 4, now he looks and gives the word after he asked them what they saw. Verse 4, he gives two words in verse 4. He said, be strong, Zerubbabel. Be strong, Joshua. Be strong, all the people who are working, and work, because I am with you. Now he's giving two exhortations. Here he goes, be strong and work. Be strong, work. He goes, Zerubbabel, be strong. In other words, be resolved and don't quit in the face of the difficulty. Be strong. Don't draw back. Give up and give in. Stay the course if God stirred your spirit. He looks at Zerubbabel, and Zerubbabel says, okay, I am. He goes, no, you've only been on the job for six weeks now. You quit for 16 years. Don't ever quit again. Don't ever quit again if God has called you to do this. Now I'm not talking in our context, full-time, part-time. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about, well, if I had the money, I would. I'm not talking about the practicality of who does it full-time, who does it part-time, who does it some. That's not on my mind when I say, be strong and don't quit. I mean, pressing in in our spirit to the purpose, and whether we're full-time, part-time, a little time, we're laying hold of it with all of our spirit. We're not drawing back with lethargy, giving up and giving in, saying, well, who cares if the worship sanctuary continues? That's what I mean by be strong. Now Zerubbabel, the leader, he had one set of challenges. He looked at Joshua, who had an entirely different set of challenges, which I won't go into right now. Then he looked at the people. They had another set of challenges. And there's another day we'll look at the three sets of challenges. But each one of them had the same word, be resolved. There is a worship sanctuary that God has commissioned you to build. It's connected with the heavenly one. It's connected with the millennial one. It's connected with the historic one, with David and Solomon. Get about the work and see what's in front of you. Don't only see a desolate building with broken down structures with stones and weeds. See the big picture of what God has called you to do. Then he says to them, okay, be strong. Don't quit. Don't quit in your spirit. Keep the vision going. Because every single person is tempted to quit. That's the devil's strategy. Then he gives them the next exhortation. Work. Diligent. The house of prayer movement. It's a worship sanctuary. It's a man. It's a sovereignly mandated bit mandate to build a worship sanctuary so that renewal happens. Yes. Transformation flows out of it to society. Yes. But the lamb, the worth of the lamb is declared. Yes. He said, build it. And when God sovereignly says, do it, there is no option but to do it. He called us to keep a sanctuary. And many that have joined us, they came for good music or a chance to get on the stage or a chance to improve their spiritual life. Those are good. I appreciate people wanting to be on the stage. I don't mind that. I want to get help, get people, some of them on the stage. That's not bad. But there's a bigger picture going on. It's bigger than launching your worship ministry. We are a part of something that's going to fill the earth. And I don't mean every place will be 24-7 worship. That's what I mean. But God will raise up strategic centers and places of the earth. I don't mean even connected to us. We're talking about the Lord will organize it. I'm not talking about an IHOP organization. I'm talking about a sovereign move of God. These worship centers, some will go 24-7, some won't. They'll be led by worship teams all over the earth. And there's a connectedness between them to a grand worship center that's going to come in the millennial kingdom when Jesus builds His worship center that spreads out to the whole earth. The whole earth will be filled with the glory of God. That will, there will be going night and day worship. Not just, not just preaching and godly people will fill the earth when the Lord returns. Worship will fill the earth night and day. The glory like the waters covering the sea. Beloved, we're a part of that reality even now, even today. He says work, be diligent. As a matter of fact, the work is hard. That's why they quit. The work was so hard. The work is hard. The devil doesn't want this. Beloved, it's hard. Do the work. Well, when I signed up, I saw the IHOP poster and I thought, oh, that's me. I'll be like David. I'll go there and I'll be worshiping. And you got here and it's work. The devil's real and they're weak and fallen people. That's how the work is done. In the midst of us folk, but the work is going to be completed. He said, I'll be with you. My eyes will be on you. My hand will be with you. Now, look what he said in verse 5. This is an interesting promise. He goes, according to the word I covenanted with you, the nation of Israel. Back when you came out of Egypt, we're talking a thousand years earlier, because this is about 500 BC. Moses was 1500 BC ballpark. A thousand years earlier, he goes, I made a covenant with you in the days of Moses. And here's the covenant that my spirit would remain with you. So he says in verse 5, according to the covenant I gave to the nation of Israel when they came out of Egypt. So I promise you my spirit remains with you. Do not fear. They were saying your spirit remains with us. We don't see any evidence of your spirit even being with us. What do you mean remain? We want the spirit to show up before we concern ourselves with the spirit remaining. And the Lord could say, no, there's evidences of my spirit in your life. I'm working in your life right now. Beloved, there are so many evidences of the spirit working in our individual lives, in our corporate community. The fact we're forgiven. That's the evidence of the spirit. We're forgiven and we have confidence in God. That's supernatural. The fact that we don't quit. We might quit, but we keep signing back up. Beloved, that's the evidence of the spirit. The fact that God keeps supplying with supernatural direction, supernatural finance. Yes, five tell 12, but it keeps coming. We say barely, but the Lord says it's not the devil doing it. It's not the flesh doing it. I'm doing it. You have callings. I've called you. You have a relationship with me. The evidence of my spirit is in your midst. Now, here's a question. How did you end up in this chair, in this staff meeting? I mean, of all the people, and I got to say this just right, because I don't feel pride about that, but I'm wanting you to get a sense of destiny and how God is leading you. I talked to Jono the other day, emailed him, and he's, you know, our kind of in-house historian. And he has studied the House of Prayer movement through history. And he has, he's writing a book on it. And guys like Stephen Vitable and others are studying this in depth. And I said to them and some others, I asked, I sent out a number of emails. I go, tell me about the House of Prayer movement in the last 2,000 years. Of course, I've studied it a bit myself. I said, has there been another worship sanctuary that's gone night and day with worship teams in 1,000 years, anywhere in the earth? And each of them that I asked said, no, there's no evidence of it. As a matter of fact, there are evidences of 24-7 singing the Psalms through the night, 24-7, but not with instruments. Different ones I talked to. I don't know the exact information on this, but the best as we can tell, a instrument-led 24-7 music worship sanctuary. This may be the only one so far in 2,000 years. Now, my point isn't so you go, wow, didn't we do something? That's not my point. Because before the Lord returns, there will be many of them across the earth. My point is this. How did you get involved in this? There is something happening. Again, I don't feel any pride in it at all. I'm not, I'm not aiming for aren't we something. That's not my point. My point is whether it's been a thousand years since worship has gone 24-7 or 2,000 years with instruments. I don't know. I don't overly care about that piece of information. But what I'm saying is something unique has happened. Something unusual and God called your name, said, I want you to put your hand to it. Now again, before the Lord returns, they will be all over the earth. I don't mean our version. God's Holy Spirit version. There will be a worship movement that will fill the earth that has full dynamic connectedness to the heavenly worship and to the millennial worship sanctuary that is yet to come. My point is this. God's Spirit is remaining with us. And he, Haggai said, told him, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid the Spirit's going to lift. He's going to keep leading, directing, visiting. Don't fear that you're going to get halfway out there and God's going to abandon the worship movement. He's not. Do not fear. The fear is about will God continue to bless, provide, and guide? That's where the fear was. And many people have that fear. Well, when I get older, in 10 years, in 20 years, in 30 years, and the Lord says, don't fear. I will remain with you. There's a purpose bigger than personal renewal and revival. As valid as those are, I love those two purposes. I want to say over and over. You're a part of a connectedness to something in God's heart that's been going in heaven for the ages. It's going to be established on the earth in Jerusalem forever. These God-commissioned worship sanctuaries that go night and day. God's going to fill the earth with them. Now, the great revival and the revived church is going to be far bigger in number. But God's going to use these worship sanctuaries as a catalyst to serve and to just be a testimony in the heaven and the geographic regions around the earth. And it's God's business that he's setting these things in order. Look at what he says in verse 7. We'll bring this to an end. He said, I will shake all the nations. Now he's talking about the millennium. I mean, the great tribulation leading to the millennium. And they shall come to the desire of all nations. That's got to be one of your favorite titles of Jesus in the Bible. He's called the desire of all nations. Now look at this. He says, and I will fill this temple with glory. He's pointing at the little temple they're working on. I will fill this temple with glory after the heavens and the earth shake. And they go, this one? He goes, yeah. Well, it's 520 AD. This is going to be filled with glory in God's economy. That Jerusalem worship sanctuary was already connected historically back to Solomon and David up in the heavens to Revelation 4 and 5 and forward to Jesus. And this is the Jesus house of prayer. I'm talking about the one that he will personally sit on the throne on the earth in Jerusalem. He said, I will fill this temple with glory. And he points, he goes, this little 520 BC house of prayer is the same one as that one. You just can't see it, but God sees it. Verse 8, the silver is mine. The gold is mine. God's going to shake the nations. He's going to release the gold and the silver. There will be a transfer of wealth and the house of God will be built in the generation of the Lord returns. Now that's the whole church, the house of God. The great revival will take place. But now in a more specific way, in a secondary way, I'm talking about the house of God worship sanctuaries. I mean, the whole body of Christ is the house of God. But beloved, God's going to shake the heavens and earth. He's going to release gold and silver. And he is going to fund worship sanctuaries that will be strategically placed across the earth that will stand as a witness to the worthiness of the lamb in the darkest hour and the greatest hour of human history that's yet ahead of us. Yes, they will be renewal centers. And yes, they will be used by God to release revival. But they will be prophetic testimonies. When deep darkness covers the earth, they'll be on earth, echoing the worship that goes on in heaven, declaring the worth of the lamb. God has called us to build a worship sanctuary. I'll end with this point. He's called us the sign that's on the wall in the prayer room, Ezekiel 44, 15. God gave a blessing to the priests of Zadok because they kept the worship sanctuary. They kept it. They put their time and energy. They wouldn't let that fire go out. And the Lord says, I'm going to bless them in the age to come because they kept it back in this temporal age. In this age, they did it. God says, I'll remember it in the age to come and I will bless them. And I will bless their heritage. You know, we got, I was talking to a man the other day and I said, he was saying, what's the motivation for the house of prayer? I said, well, it is personal renewal. It is revival. There's lots of things happening. Great harvests, many things. But I said, some of our worshipers have the revelation of the connectedness to a nonstop worship sanctuary, a connectedness by the Spirit, to the worship sanctuary in heaven and the one that's coming in the millennial kingdom. I go, they have a revelation. There's more that's going on than it means to an end. And I go, some of these guys and gals, they would turn down a mega church position with lots of money and prominence to be in the sanctuary of the Lord, building a night and day worship sanctuary. I go, it's an issue of revelation. IHOP isn't just a stage to give them a chance to do a big conference so they can launch a CD and start a worship ministry with their worship band. I go, that's not what IHOP is to them. It has a connectedness to a heavenly and a millennial sanctuary like all the other worship sanctuaries through history do. I'm talking about the night and day worship sanctuaries that never go out. The fire doesn't go out because God commissioned them sovereignly from heaven to exist. And He has them for His own pleasure, for His own reasons. But the issue is the Haggai chapter 2, verse 3, where the prophet says, what do you see? It's all an issue of what you see when you build the house of prayer. Do you see a room with worshipers and that's it? Or do you see a bigger purpose of God's heart? I tell you, I see a bigger purpose. Let's stand. And the Lord says, He says to us, let's just posture ourselves before the Lord for a moment before we bring this to an end. The Lord says, be strong leaders. Sir Rubbeville, be strong. Joshua, those that are building the worship community, I mean the actual ones leading worship, section leaders and all of those that are actually building the internal infrastructure, those that are building the external infrastructure, all the people, be strong. Don't quit. Don't quit in your spirit. Again, I'm not talking full-time, part-time. That's not what I mean right now. Don't quit in your spirit. Keep the vision. Work. The Lord says work. Work. This is about work. This isn't a Holy Spirit vacation center. This is work. There's work in it. Yes, there's pleasure, but there's work. There's work to be done. He said work. Keep the sanctuary and do not fear. My spirit will remain. My spirit will not lift. I will meet you. I will direct you. I will provide for you. Do not fear. I will be with you in your future. In Jesus' name, let's just take a moment and just say to the Lord, yes, I want to see something more than an opportunity to have a popular worship band. I want to see something more than getting on the stage or getting a preaching ministry. I want to see I'm a part of something that's bigger. I say yes to you, Lord. I say yes.