Home

Sermons Index

Meetings & Location

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Back to Top

Haggai
Haggai 1:13

'I am with you.' Those words, spoken through the prophet Haggai, found numerous other times throughout the Bible, are God's words to comfort and to strengthen.

If a child awakens, screaming from a horrible dream, the words 'Daddy's here' are embraced tighter than a favorite teddy bear.

If a person is on his deathbed, the words 'I am with you' are more valuable than gold.

If a child is suddenly disoriented in a crowd of unfamiliar people, the words 'I'm right here, honey' from a still watching parent are a relief of reliefs.

If a person is overwhelmed with opposition to his noble cause, even to the point where he ponders giving up, the words 'I am with you' from a familiar friend renew the conviction to press on.

And in the case of the returned exiles from Babylon in Haggai's generation, the words 'I am with you,' which we will consider today, spurred renewed and greater confidence in the Lord.

When people say 'I am with you,' it usually brings comfort. But when God says 'I am with you,' it always brings comfort - major comfort. And that has been our focus as we make our way through the Minor Prophets. As we take another step through the line of these the Lord's men, we see from the prophet Haggai that, indeed, it is a major comfort to have God - God! - say to you, 'I am with you.'

Not everybody can lay claim to that special comfort. In fact, God explicitly says He is against the wicked. God says, 'I am against you,' to those who rebel against Him (Leviticus 26:17). And the Bible presents God's opposition not as mere rivalry, like one baseball team against another, both of whom can still shake hands after the game.

Instead, God is against some like a hunter to the hunted. The Bible says that God shoots arrows at those who plot and do iniquity (Psalm 64:7); He aims his bow at their faces (Psalm 21:12). Can you imagine that? How would you feel if someone came up to you, and with a bow and taut string, aimed an arrow right at your face? Or how would you feel if someone stood right in front of you, loaded and then aimed a double-barreled shotgun right at your face? You know you would be in a panic of panics! And such is the relation of God to the wicked, to sinners, and to all who look not to Jesus Christ for forgiveness and removal of their sin and guilt. There are those against whom God is and with whom He is not.

And yet, some - despite the reality of this - lay claim to a comfort that God is with them, when in fact, God is not with them. To continue the picture, they deny that the gun is loaded. Or that if it goes off, only a little red toy flag will come out the end. Or perhaps they laugh about it saying, 'Ah, it's just a water pistol.' Or they tell themselves that the arrow is merely rubber. 'God would never send anyone to hell. God is a God of love! God knows I've tried to be a good person. I'm not as bad as some. I've never killed anyone or cheated on my wife. I've tried to frame my life around what is moral and wholesome. I go to church. I'm generous.' These are the thoughts of some who believe God is with them. And yet in reality, God is against them because their trust and boast are in themselves, and not in Christ.

It is a major comfort to know in truth that God is with you and not against you. This morning I am telling you who trust Jesus Christ for your salvation that God is with you. Those of you who do not, God is most surely against you. But in whatever place you are, Haggai's message, which has become my message, shows you how you can receive and grow in God's comfort.

And so to this end, you must look at two features of the passage if you are to receive and grow in this major comfort of God being 'with you.' You must see:

1. What this major comfort comes after

2. What comes after this major comfort

1. What this major comfort comes after (vv.1-12)

It is not incidental or mere happenstance that the comfort noted at v.13 comes after the corrections of vv.1-12. Major comfort is a priceless thing. There are conditions to be met in order to obtain it. Although it is freely offered to all, not all obtain it. But it can be yours if, and only if there is:

a) Repentance in your experience.

Major comfort will be yours if repentance is in your experience. By repentance I mean, as the Scripture means, a turning away from what God calls sin with sight of, grief over, and hatred for that sin as an offense against God. It is not turning over a new leaf, or making a resolution. It is not even turning away from one sin to another sin, but a turning from all sin. As the child who touches the hot stove removes his hand immediately, so a sinner turns from sin.

For some of you, repentance may be in your theology, but not in your experience. You know that you must be always turning from sin, but turn from sin you do not always do. Perhaps you seldom turn from sin. And I would not be surprised if you do not sense the comforts of God as you once did. Major comfort belongs to those who have repentance in their experience.

You can see this in Haggai's confrontation of the Jews. Look at him belting out his refrain on behalf of the Lord, 'Consider your ways! (v.5). 'Consider your ways!' (v.7). Literally, 'set your heart on your ways.' 'With all intensity of focus and concentration, with all substance of mind and sobriety of thought, evaluate and examine yourselves.' 'Make repentance your experience.'

And what 'ways' should be 'considered?' What about your experience should be isolated and considered in terms of repentance?

The repentance that should characterize your experience is the repentance that regards your priorities as subject to God's. That is what you must consider - how your priorities relate to God's. Listen to Haggai's reproof: Is it time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses while this house lies desolate? Consider your ways! (vv.4-5).

Do you see what was going on here? The Jews, now returned from their seventy-year exile in Babylon, were living in paneled houses while the house of God (the temple) lay in heaps of rubble! They returned in 536 BC. It was now 520 BC. For sixteen years they worked on their own houses, and not only worked on them - finished them. (Haggai said they were dwelling or living in them). No one knows when they finished them - whether it took sixteen years to build them or just a few with many years of enjoyment of them - but regardless, their priority clearly was the comfort of their own home rather than God's house.

And it is significant that their houses were 'paneled' (v.4). Some translations, interestingly, refer to it as 'wainscoting.' (I suppose paneling was a thing of the 70's and 80's, but wainscoting is still pretty much 'in,' as long as it's done right). It, whatever the precise nature or translation of this coating material, was certainly 'in' for the Jews. 'Paneling' (we'll call it) was a symbol of affluence, wealth. It was an extravagance. In fact, Solomon paneled the exterior of the temple with rows of cedar, sort of like clapboard siding (1 Kings 6:9; 7:3). And inside the building, the hall of his judgment throne was 'paneled from floor to floor with cedar' (1 Kings 7:7).

And so there were the Jews, taking what should have gone to God and giving it to themselves. They neglected their God-given duty and fulfilled their selfish desires. We call these sins of omission and commission. Their priority was self over God. Their heart was miles away from David, who was grieved that he himself had royal palaces, and yet the Lord had no house of His own (2 Samuel 7:1-3). And so, when the plan for a temple was first given to David, the house was to be built 'for God's name' (2 Samuel 7:13). It was not for David's name, and even though Solomon his son built it, neither was it for Solomon's name. Even when Solomon prayed at its dedication - centuries before Haggai's time - the name of God was the focal point of everything that went on in the temple (1 Kings 8-9, especially 9:3).

It was the visible display that God was with His people.

But a display that was pointing beyond mere wood and stone. The temple anticipated God's presence with His people in a person. It was but a picture of God's personal presence among His people. And so, as Malachi said, 'the Lord suddenly came to His temple' (Malachi 3:1). As the gospel teaches, He 'became flesh and tabernacled (dwelt) among us' (John 1:14). This One, as Matthew cites the prophet Isaiah, is Jesus Christ, Immanuel, 'God with us' (Matthew 1:21 with Isaiah 7:14).

And so the Jews' neglect of the temple was in essence a rejection of God. It was a rejection of Jesus Christ, their Messiah and hope to come. Though perhaps unintended, but certainly real, their negligence to rebuild the temple was a statement to the effect, 'We do not want God. We do not want Christ.'

And there is many a man today running around, spiritually distracted, voicing the same. He pursues his own selfish desires to his eternal judgment. He follows this pastime and that entertainment, this interest and that hobby, without any interest in Jesus Christ. And he, too, builds a paneled house.

The time God gives him, he uses for his own pursuits. The breath and strength God gives him, he uses to chase his heart's desires. Sports, hobbies, interests, entertainments, and recreations - he puts all these and more as a priority over Jesus Christ, a priority over the eternal welfare of his own soul. Multitudes, multitudes saying in their heart and by their actions, 'I do not want God or Christ with me.' And as they do, in their impenitence, they refuse a Savior, who having died and risen, can save them from their sin and folly.

Jesus said, 'If any man wishes to follow Me he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel's will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?' (Mark 8:34-36).

Do you know what that kind of person does? He robs God. He actually steals from God. He steals pleasure and glory from God by taking it from something other than Him and giving it to himself. That's what the Jews did with their houses. And you can do it with anything. That's why God said 'rebuild the temple that I may be pleased with it and be glorified' (v.8). God delights in what He does, and what we do by Him and for Him. Any pleasure or glory you get before or apart from God is sheer robbery, thief.

Does this describe you? Are you building a paneled house? As you examine yourself: what God-given priorities are you neglecting for the fulfillment of your own desires? Which selfish desires or pursuits are you putting before the things of the Lord? Is it that project in the dining room that conveniently takes the place of, say, a Bible study? Is it a television program over family worship? Is it money spent to vain ends?

Now I'm assuming you know that this passage is not saying it is wrong to wallpaper your dining room; or to drywall your garage. If you use your tithing portion to do it, it is. If you do it at 10:00 Sunday morning, it is. The point is the prioritization of your things over God's things, the replacement of God's things with your things, especially when God says to do His things over and before your things. You must 'consider your ways.' Then you will be comforted, for then God will be with you.

But there is another element of this repentance.

The repentance that lays hold of the major comfort that God is with you, is not merely one that regards your priorities as subject to God's, but also one which regards life frustrations as wrought of God. It regards life frustrations as brought about by God Himself.

Listen to Haggai again. He reveals that the frustrations the people were having were not just quirks of a wild world inexplicably turned against them. They were the frustrations set in place by a sovereign God toward a people who had prioritized themselves over Him. Note v.9, 'I blow it away,' v.11, 'I called for a drought.' In vv.3-5, God rebuked the people for their mispriority, and then there is a word about their frustrations (v.6). Again, at vv.7-8 they are rebuked for neglect, followed by words explaining that God sent them their frustration (vv.9-11). And in case there is any doubt that this principle is sound, just note v.9:

"You look for much, but behold, it comes to little; when you bring it home, I blow it away. Why?" declares the LORD of hosts, "Because of My house which lies desolate, while each of you runs to his own house.

Imagine that - filling acres of field with seed, only to get a few husks of corn; sitting down hungry at a table to eat, but having to ration it among many people; wanting to get drunk, but finding that you don't have enough wine; putting on sweaters, but the drafty windows still make your hands cold; bringing home your paycheck, investing it in the stock market, only to have your portfolio continually decline. Expecting much, but receiving little! Hopes dashed to pieces! Dreams and desires impossible to fulfill! What a frustration! This is what the Lord brought upon the Jews. He frustrated them. And He did it in the very things from which they were hoping to get the greatest pleasure.

That's the lesson: you will never find true, lasting pleasure for your heart apart from Jesus Christ. God will not allow you to. Look at the Jews. Did they receive pleasure as they sought to obtain it apart from Christ? No, but they got a lot of frustration. And unless you repent of your self-centeredness you will only have frustration after frustration. If you are frustrated in trying to get all your heart's desires, that is just the problem. The problem is not God or 'things.' It is you, your self-centeredness, your impenitence. As v.10 makes clear, 'Therefore, because of you the sky has withheld its dew and the earth its produce.'

That is one of the snares of the prosperity gospel. They lure people to believe that gain is godly. They preach that God wants you to be financially prosperous. 'Just sow a 'seed offering' in faith. Send a check, and God will open the storehouses of heaven for you.' And all they do is draw people into a place of utter frustration. People exhaust themselves and their money - without the expected yield - and they are frustrated.

And yet, if they heard the Scripture, they would know that 'godliness is a means of great gain when accompanied by contentment;' that 'those who want to get rich fall into temptation, a snare, and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some, by longing for it, have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs' (1 Timothy 6:6, 9-10). There were the Jews, piercing themselves with grief by their paneled houses.

But what about you?

For what are you 'looking much' that 'comes to little?' Is your life filled with frustrations? I'm not talking about trials, difficulty, and the usual challenges. I'm talking about frustration in the very things you're putting before God; frustration in your sins. If you're frustrated in these, I'm glad, in a sense. Because that is God calling you to stop and repent. He is telling you 'that way won't work. The way of Christ is the way of sacrifice, selflessness, and regard of Me. In short, it is the way of repentance. In that path you will know so clearly that I am with you.'

As one commentator said (Motyer), God 'will be central or He will be at odds.' So 'consider your ways' on this matter as well.

Third, the repentance that obtains the major comfort of God's abiding presence is one which reveals one's obedience as reverence for God. The Jews obviously took Haggai's words to heart. Look at Zerubbabel and Joshua, together with all the remnant of the people obeying the voice of the Lord (v.12)! See their hammers drop! Hear their saws stop! See them solemnly come from their houses! What humility! What righteousness! What good! What recognition of the Lord's message through the Lord's man!

They obeyed the Lord and it was acknowledged as reverence. As Abraham 'believed God and it was reckoned as righteousness,' so these obeyed God and it was reckoned as reverence! If you would revere God, then obey God. And if you obey God, you revere God. We see here a sweet reminder that their sins obviously were forgiven them, for the Psalm says 'with You there is forgiveness that men may reverence You' (130:4). And if they revered God in obedience, then what freed them to obey was the Lord's forgiveness of their sins. That is the great reward for repentance!

Have your sins been forgiven? Have you turned from your sins and come to Jesus that He might apply His blood, like soap, to wash away all your sins? And will you not then obey, as you should? Will you not bring forth from the root of forgiveness the fruit of your repentance - new obedience? Will you not render obedience as a means of thanksgiving to God for His mercy to you the sinner? For as you do you will know so well that voice of God saying, 'I am with you.' Is that not the same idea our Lord Jesus expressed when He said, 'he who comes to Me I will in no way cast out' (John 6:37)? It is.

And so there are conditions to be met in order to obtain the major comfort of God's presence. One is that repentance must be in your experience. You will regard your priorities as subject to God's. You will regard life frustrations as wrought of God. You will reveal your obedience as reverence for God. These are some of the components of true repentance.

But with this repentance in your experience, there must be a second, related condition met. There must be, absolutely must be, a:

b) Review of your excuses.

A repentance that merely addresses external behavior, and does not get to the core of things going on in the heart and mind, is undoubtedly a doubtful repentance. In the words of a well-respected theologian (J.I. Packer), repentance involves a changing of one's mind so that one's views, values, goals, and ways are changed and one's whole life is lived differently. The change is radical, both inwardly and outwardly; mind and judgment, will and affections, behavior and lifestyle, motives and purposes, are all involved. I urge you to consider this point, as this was the real occasion for Haggai's commission, and it will be that which you need to face if you would repent. Look at vv.2-3, "This people says 'the time has not come for the house of the Lord to be built.' Then the word of the Lord came to Haggai the prophet." That which was at the base of their sin and impenitence was an excuse that justified the sin of which they needed to repent.

There was something deeper than just an unrefurbished temple, or paneled houses. There were the excuses that justified these sins. And you and I have these, too. And like them, you and I need to be isolating and addressing these by God's Word and Spirit. And so see preaching in that light; it is God's way of drawing you away from yourself and focusing you on Jesus Christ.

The Jews of Haggai's time likely were filled with excuses. It seems as if there was only one - 'it's not time to build' (v.2). But as is often the case, many lurked in the background. As they said here, they rationalized around the word of God. God told them that after seventy years they would return to their land (Jeremiah 29:10).

Seventy years from when the captivity began would be 535 BC - the year after they were freed under the Persian king, Cyrus. But that was now fifteen years past! (The text before us occurred in 520 BC). Do you know what they did? They calculated the date of building from a later segment of the captivity (586 BC) which gave them a justification for saying, 'it is not time to rebuild.'

It was a justification for building their paneled houses. But at this point they undid themselves! They had already begun to rebuild once before, according to Ezra 4:1-5. But they stopped because they were getting flack from their godless neighbors. And so you can see why their response was such an excuse! It was easier to rationalize and massage their fear of man with a clever calculation than to go about the difficult work of rebuilding.

And so you have to ask yourself, 'What is my lie that is excusing me from my God-given duty? What excuse am I making for this and that particular sin? What is my thinking as to why it is legitimate for me to think it, say it, or do it?' What seeds of denial are maturing into black irises of sin?

Now you can lay hold of v.13! 'Then,' i.e., at the point that they reviewed their excuses, turned from their sin, and obeyed the Lord, "then Haggai spoke to the people saying, 'I am with you' says the Lord." This major comfort comes after the fulfilled conditions of open repentance in your experience, and honest review of your excuses. If you are occupied with these things, then - and only then - you will rightly sense by faith those words of God spoken to you - 'I am with you.' But there is something that comes after this major comfort, and so let us move on and conclude with it. It is:

2. What comes after this major comfort (vv.14-15)

The major comfort that God is with you comes only after repentance in your experience and review of your excuses. But what comes after this major comfort that God is with you is:

a) Reinvigoration of your spirit

Note that from the passage - 'So the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people' (v.14). That occurred in the context of repentance. It was the fruit of repentance, renewed obedience, and reverence. What God requires to be accomplished He provides the means to accomplish.

They were to put away their sins and rebuild the temple. And so God, in His grace and mercy, drew near to them through the preaching of Haggai and said in effect, 'Now, now I am with you. As you left your tools of sin, and came to Me, I drew near you to be with you. And I am with you.' And by this he reinvigorated their spirits in order that they could perform the work of rebuilding.

And by repentance and the obedience of faith, your dead or lethargic spirit will be stirred also, if you do the same. You will be reinvigorated, just as though you dove into a refreshing pool in the humid heat of summer.

And after this major comfort of God's presence being true in your experience, you will have a:

b) Reorientation toward your Lord

Note that - after they repented, after they reviewed their excuses, after the Lord stirred their spirits, 'they came and worked on the house of the Lord of hosts their God' (v.14). I.e., their focus was on the Lord Jesus, who was the sum and substance of the temple. They were daily consumed and attentive to Him. Their work and livelihood consisted of Him.

Such is obviously the case! If you turn from your sin, what have you turned to but the glorious Lord Jesus Christ?! Repenting from sin is reorienting toward Christ. Is the parent a pleased parent when his young child walking with him continually pulls away from his hand to go and meddle with the dangers of the street? Is it a happy walk when two who are joined in the bonds of holy matrimony look in opposite directions in silence and do not join their hands? Then is it a pleasant experience when a child of God pulls away from his heavenly Father to mingle with the ways of this life?

Repentance in your experience, and review of your excuses, not only reorients you toward Christ, but is the way of much blessing.

Now, today you may hear these things with great conviction. Perhaps your heart is low. But the Christ I'm talking about is the God of grace. He is the One who lifts up with major comfort. He is the God of 'second chances,' and third chances, and fourths, and fifths, even gazillions.

Our Confession of Faith offers this warm, pastoral reminder: 'As there is no sin so small, but it deserves damnation, so there is no sin so great, that it can bring damnation upon those who truly repent' (15:4). Will you repent of your sins today? Will you examine and be honest about your excuses? Will you draw near to God that He draw near to you? Will you look to the crucified, risen Savior for the needs of your soul? His comforting promise is to every disciple of His, 'Behold, I am with you always' (Matthew 28:20).

Having told you that God will be with you if you repent of your sins and review your excuses, and having told you that He will reinvigorate your spirit and reorient you toward your Lord, I close with these simple words, and if you have ears to hear, hear them: 'God be with you.'