Two years ago we took our sailboat down to the Thousand Islands. Launched at a particular boat ramp and enjoyed a marvelous few days there. Came time to return home. Backed the trailer to the ramp. Loaded on the boat. And the tires on the van began to spin. Didn’t move an inch forward. It was a gravel covered ramp, and the more the wheels spun, the deeper it sunk. No matter what you tried. No progress.

        You’ve probably had your own experiences - perhaps in snow, or mud. No progress. Just getting deeper in.

        That’s what was happening to the nation of Israel in the years after their return from exile. 70 years they’d spent in the land of Babylon. That as their punishment for choosing to honour idols over the Lord. Eventually some were able to return and rebuild Jerusalem and the surrounding area. Which they did. Homes were restored from the rubble. Shops went up. The city wall was rebuilt. And some semblance of normal life began to take place.

        And yet.....
        Somehow.... Things just didn’t go really right. No matter how hard they worked there always seemed to be some problem of some sort.
        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. [1.5-6]
Spinning in the gravel.
And only sinking deeper.

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." [2.16]

Nobody was able to make much sense of it.
Not till Haggai shows up on the scene and points to an eyesore sitting on Jerusalem’s hilltop.
        The temple remained in ruins.
 
 

"Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses, while this house remains a ruin?" [1.4]

"You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little. What you brought home, I blew away. Why? Because of my house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with his own house." [1.9]
 
 

We know better than to imagine that God was actually homeless, left to sleep on a park bench while the people went inside to their luxury suites.

It was the symbolism of the thing.
        All the effort of these Jewish people went into self-development.
        Anything with God’s name written on the front was immediately labelled with a "B" or "C" on the priority listings in their daytimer, and left for tomorrow.

        Of course, we all know - "tomorrow never comes." Somehow at the end of the day the people couldn’t much find any leftover time to get round and help out with whatever tasks the priests would ask their help for. Money to support the work of God? "We’ll see when what we’ve got leftover when the other items are out of the way." Which was nothing - ever.

Not a new problem.
Always has been that way. Still is.
If you don’t deliberately plan and carve out space, time and resources to devote to the Lord, there won’t be any. You can’t count on things just sort of falling into place. Because they don’t.

It’s the "tyranny of the urgent" thing.
The stuff that is right there in our face manages to convince us that it is THE most important agenda item. It’s what MUST have our time. It’s where we HAVE to sink our precious few dollars.
        Squeaky wheel and the grease.

Try running your home that way - you’ll be all muddled up in no time.
Try and suggest the management team at work operate in this fashion - you’ll be laughed right out of the board room.
Try and get through school without any advance planning - you’ll not be too likely to be in the running for any serious awards or scholarships.

Interesting, then, isn’t it how for some reason it is so easy to fall into this trap when it comes to our faith life. Some folk have the idea that you just need to let it happen. The more spontaneous, the more spiritual. If it just doesn’t happen, it wasn’t meant to be. If you have to force yourself to do something, so the idea goes, you’re obviously not sincere and may be bordering on religious hypocrisy.

Where that comes from, I’m not too terribly sure.
Because there’s not a shred of scriptural evidence to support that view.
In fact, what you do read all points to a deliberateness about the world of faith.
        Deliberate effort.
        Deliberate devotion.
        Deliberate work.
        Deliberate prayer.
        Deliberate giving.
        Deliberate love.
                Planned. Factored in. Budgeted for. Priority.

In the ten commandments God calls for the people to build their calendars around six days of work and one of rest..... not waiting till the work happens to be finished before taking time to worship.

In the Mosaic laws comes the command – not an optional extra – to love the Lord with all one’s heart and soul and mind and strength. Neighbour, too.
        A command - something to be consciously obeyed.

When it comes to giving, the Lord picks a number, the tithe, 10%, and commands the people to budget for that in their financial planning – the first 10% goes to the Lord. Firstfruits giving. Not seeing whatever happens to be leftover at the end of the month.

St.Paul on a few occasions uses the example of an athlete who deliberately pounds his body into submission; practices diligent training; works hard at getting better in sport in order to ensure the results come.

Happenstance faith; come what may kind of religion simply doesn’t fit the picture. Those who practice such a faith eventually find themselves with no faith.
        Just like the Jews found themselves without a temple years after it should have been completed.

So Haggai speaks up. And the people respond.
"And the people feared the Lord." says verse 12.

Doesn’t mean they fell down in a quivering heap.
Rather, it means they finally got serious about God.
Took His priorities off the "tomorrow" list and wrote them in at the top of their agenda. And began to build.

Did everything immediately go well?
Was it an easy thing to keep those priorities in place?
Think about it –
        When you commit to tithing of your income to the Lord, will you never find a month where things pinch?
        When you volunteer to use your talents in a concerted way for a Kingdom cause does it mean you’ll never feel tired?
        When you commit to beginning and ending your Sabbath days in worship, does it mean you’ll never have a day when you’d rather sit on the beach?
        When you begin to work at daily devotional times, or regular prayer times will you never fall asleep while doing it, or be tempted to answer the phone instead, or rush right off to whatever’s next on the agenda?

My friends, deliberate action by believers will also mean deliberate opposition.
Do you think that the Devil will take easily or kindly to a person determined to serve the Lord with diligence?
        Not very likely!

Which is what drives chapter 2.
Catch the refrain of the opening verses -
        "Be strong, O Zerubbabel... Be strong, O Joshua.... Be strong, all you people. For I am with you, declares the Lord Almighty..... Do not fear."

1. Be strong.
2. Says the Lord Almighty.
3. Do not fear.

 
 

So -
Consider tonight -- what temple needs building in your life?
And what are the squeaky wheels that keep getting in the way?

The challenge that the prophet Haggai presents to us is that of fearing God - keeping Him as the deliberate focus, the deliberate #1 priority in our lives.
When we fear Him, and live that way, we’ll find that like God promises the Jews, the other challenges of life will begin somehow to sort themselves out.
        They really do.

But should we allow ourselves to get distracted; or should we convince ourselves that really – let’s not overemphasize the commitment to faith, to giving to the Lord; to sacrificial service – that paying down the mortgage has to come first; that making time for golf memberships or other recreational activities takes higher priority on the must-do list than getting involved in Kingdom causes; that getting ahead is something we’ll have to arrange for ourselves because no one else is going to do it –

– the words of Jesus’ parable in Luke 12 echo in my mind - God speaking to the rich man who was contemplating an economic restructuring in order to accommodate his growing portfolio – "You fool, this very night your life will be required of you."

Or blessed living. Living with God first.
Something we’ll be publically proclaiming as we march the city streets next Saturday. The kicker, of course, being — is it living reality all the time in our daytimers and on our priority lists?