King James Bible Study – “And when he had called the people unto him with his disciples also, he said unto them, Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.” – Mark 8:34
Date: Thursday, September 19, 2019
Chapters: Book of Haggai
Message: Consider Your Ways, And Build My House
Hello My Friend,
Did you work so hard at something only to see it crumble? We have all been there, but when everything we are doing seems to keep crumbling, perhaps it is time to reassess what you are doing. You see, as Christians, the jobs, businesses, and professions we have are what God has blessed us with, and He does this to provide for us. Well, what happens when we get that much desired promotion or business picks up? Much of our time goes into our jobs, our homes, and other things that can take away our time from God’s work. Remember, God is a jealous God, He always comes first, and if His blessings get more attention that Him, then He will start taking them away until we get back to doing His work. “Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love. Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent.” – Revelation 2:4-5.
I know it seems like I am using this Scripture quite a bit lately, but God is trying to tell us something. As His churches decline in number, as more of His people live impoverished, and as the world becomes more corrupt by the day, we need to get back to our first love, the work of Christ. The Book of Haggai contains two chapters, the author is Haggai and it was written to the Jews who had returned to Jerusalem from Babylon after being in captivity for seventy years, the timeline is approximately 520 BC. The purpose of the book was to inspire Israel to have a new zeal for God and make the leaders aware of their responsibility to rebuild the temple of worship. What we are to learn from the book is that when God’s work comes first, He prospers us. When the Jews returned to Jerusalem to start rebuilding the temple they were so excited to get the foundation laid, but after some opposition from the people they were forced go beyond that, and for fourteen years they rebuilt their own homes, but not God’s. We heard of Haggai being one of the prophets to help encourage the Jews to get back to the rebuilding of the temple in the Book of Ezra.
“Thus speaketh the LORD of hosts, saying, This people say, The time is not come, the time that the LORD’S house should be built. Then came the word of the LORD by Haggai the prophet, saying, Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your cieled houses, and this house lie waste? Now therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways. Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes. Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways. 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 the LORD.” – Haggai 1:2-8.
“Consider your ways.” Think about it. God takes pleasure in blessing us, when we put His work first. I have to admit that I have struggled with this off and on for years. In fact, for the past two years every message I wrote on this book I had struggles financially. I can honestly say that my best years of prosperity came when I was just starting out in my faith. I had a zeal so strong for God, went soul winning every Thursday and Saturday, never missed one service, was a part of every church event, even sang in the choir. And I feared God as though He was right there in the room with me. Life somehow has a way of taking away our zeal for God and hindering us from doing His work effectively, and you can be sure that He will put the fire on us to get us back to doing His Work, and when we do we will start to see His blessings again. That is what happened after Haggai went to Zerubbabel.
“Then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the LORD their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the LORD their God had sent him, and the people did fear before the LORD. Then spake Haggai the LORD’S messenger in the LORD’S message unto the people, saying, I am with you, saith the LORD. And the LORD stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people; and they came and did work in the house of the LORD of hosts, their God,” – Haggai 1:12-14.
“I am with you, saith the LORD.” God is always, always, always with us. Let me tell you, today, I work a part-time job, twenty hours a week, and make more money now than I did when I worked two, with over forty hours. And here is the thing, my pay is not much more, and I even have more expenses now, yet, I am able to take care of every need. Rather, God is able to take care of every need. Amen! One thing we can be sure of is that when we put God’s work first He will be there for us and see us through every step of the way of it. And the work we do for God is not necessarily in a church, it is wherever He takes us. Remember, we are the church. God will use us in whatever place He needs us, whether it be an office, a store, or a parking garage, but if we do not have His best interest, He will not have ours. Now, this is the first time God has spoken to the Jews since their captivity, He reminds them of His covenant with them since they left Egypt. And the blessings they will be receiving for their hard work will be nothing compared to what they will get when all nations come to Him.
“Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do ye see it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing? Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the LORD; and be strong, O Joshua, son of Josedech, the high priest; and be strong, all ye people of the land, saith the LORD, and work: for I am with you, saith the LORD of hosts: According to the word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you: fear ye not. For thus saith the LORD of hosts; Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the LORD of hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the LORD of hosts. The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the LORD of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the LORD of hosts.” – Haggai 2:3-9.
“is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing?” Remember where you were when you first got saved? When you first started serving Him? When He started changing your life? None of our work for God is vain, and it never returns void. The blessings we receive now for our work are amazing, and yet will be nothing compared to when we get to spend eternity with Him. Amen! “So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.” – I Corinthians 15:54-58.
Are you doing God’s work and still everything you worked so hard for is crumbling? Then perhaps it is time to reassess to see if we are doing it wholeheartedly. God knows, and if there is some sin, or if our heart is really not into it, He will see it, and He will not be pleased with our work. Three months into building the temple God sent Haggai to the priest with a message, some of them were working with unclean hands.
“Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Ask now the priests concerning the law, saying, If one bear holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt do touch bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any meat, shall it be holy? And the priests answered and said, No. Then said Haggai, If one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean? And the priests answered and said, It shall be unclean. Then answered Haggai, and said, So is this people, and so is this nation before me, saith the LORD; and so is every work of their hands; and that which they offer there is unclean. I smote you with blasting and with mildew and with hail in all the labours of your hands; yet ye turned not to me, saith the LORD. Consider now from this day and upward, from the four and twentieth day of the ninth month, even from the day that the foundation of the LORD’S temple was laid, consider it. Is the seed yet in the barn? yea, as yet the vine, and the fig tree, and the pomegranate, and the olive tree, hath not brought forth: from this day will I bless you.” – Haggai 2:11-14,17-19.
“and with hail in all the labours of your hands;” Working for God is twofold, it blesses us, and others with the knowledge of Him so that we can lead them to Christ. If our work is halfhearted, or there is some sin, God will chasten us to repentance. You know, the thing that keeps me fearing God is the fear that if I did anything sinful my church kids would find out. I drove some of them home last night because our church bus broke down, if they got in the car and heard rap music or saw cigarettes then that would not have looked very good. We are the church, and if we are going do God’s work, no matter where we are, we need to be clean. Perhaps the most important work we will ever do for God is showing them Jesus in our lives. Our greatest blessings come from being a witness of how Christ has worked in our lives. Notice that God says, “Consider now from this day and upward,”. Forget about yesterday, move forward. We mess up, I mess up, but you confess your sin, clean yourself up, and go forward, and then you will see His blessings unfold like never before. “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you.” – Philippians 3:13-15.
Jesus Christ Magnified: “The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the LORD of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the LORD of hosts.” – Haggai 2:9.
Today’s Prayer: God, Thank You for the reminder of Your amazing promise to always be with us. You have purposed every one of Your people to work for You in some way so that we can bring others to Your Son. As life starts to overwhelm us it is easy to set Your work aside in order to try to endure it, and of course, that brings more problems instead of solutions. Lord, Help us to make and keep Your work first place in our lives so that we can find the solutions to our problems and not become so overwhelmed that we lose sight of You. Give us Your power, strength, wisdom, mercy, grace, and guidance to do the work You called us to do, and open our hearts so that we can do it with all our heart. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
God Bless You, I am praying for you,
Christina
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