Chapter 9

CONSIDER YOUR WAYS

WE MAY NOW RESUME the story of the heroes who failed. We  saw in chapter 7 what wonderful people they were, and how they responded to the call of God. We saw that they left their homes and their security to make the dangerous journey to Jerusalem for one special purpose, to build a house for God. We realized that they had no other reason for making such a trip. God had called them out with no other challenge but to build a house for God.

Then in chapter 8 we saw the tremendous significance of the house of God. It was not just another building, it was to reestablish the centrality of God. They knew that when the building was finished, God would make His presence real. Just as in the case of the tabernacle and the temple, they could count on God’s presence—His name, His eyes, His heart. God’s promise would guarantee God’s presence and God’s presence would guarantee God’s power. For seventy years there had been no temple and the reality of the Lord was missing from their Jewish culture. They had sung sad songs and lived on memories, but now was an opportunity to
know God in a new and living way.

But we also know that they failed. We met them first in Haggai 1:6, in all the misery of failure: no crops, no clothing, no money. They who had once known wealth and luxury were now destitute. Let us find out how this came about. Remember, the Bible tells us to examine their failure, so that
we can be helped, warned, and challenged by their mistakes.

We will turn back to Ezra 3 and trace their foosteps and their failure. We see in verses 1 and 2 that the leaders of the new group were Joshua, the priest and spiritual leader, and Zerubbabel, the prince and political leader. These two men gathered all the people together in the seventh month and
built the altar of the God of Israel. Verse 6 tells how they began “to offer burnt offerings unto the Lord. But the foundation of the temple of the LORD was not yet laid.”

Verse 8 begins with these remarkable words: “Now in the second year of their coming unto the house of God at Jerusalem. . . began. . . they to set forward the work of the house of the LORD.” It was two full years before they made a start on the job they had come to do. We can only assume that these two years were spent on clearing the site and making it ready
for the great task ahead.

Think of the wild, unchecked growth of vegetation covering the whole area. Think of the way the great army of Nebuchadnezzar had toppled over every wall in every build ing, and had so destroyed the city and its surrounding walls that the main problem was knowing where to begin. And all they had were bare hands with which to clear away the vegetation and to move the tumbled stones and heaped-up piles of rubble. Their hands had once been soft and well cared for; now they knew the hardness of daily toil. Their backs and limbs suffered much as they sweated in the heat of the day.

The remainder of chapter 3 tells that they laid the foundation of the house of the Lord. It is a pathetic story to read, recapturing the scene as it took place. Here were these heroes with their fervent enthusiasm seeking to repeat what happened when Solomon had finished the first temple. You
remember from 2 Chronicles 5:13 the glorious choir in white linen, the orchestra, the 120 trumpets, and how they sang, “For He is good: for his mercy endureth for ever.” It was at that moment that the glory of the Lord had filled Solomon’s temple hundreds of years before.

Now these brave people tried to imitate that tremendous performance. Verse 10 tells, “they set the priests in their apparel with trumpets and the Levites . . . with cymbals, to praise the LORD.” Verse 11 tells us what they sang: “Because he is good, for his mercy endureth for ever.” The same words as were sung in Solomon’s day. Here they were, standing in the broken shambles of what had once been the glorious city of God, singing and praising the Lord with such sincerity—and all they were doing was laying the foundation stones!

Solomon had done this only at the end of the building program; but these heroes were so eager to anticipate the presence of the Lord that they did it at the very beginning. What abounding enthusiasm! The emotions aroused by the occasion are well described in verses 12 and 13. Here we learn that “many of the priests and Levites and chief of the fathers, who were ancient men, that had seen the first house, when the foundation of this house was laid before their eyes, wept with a loud voice; and many shouted aloud for joy: so that the people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping of the people . . . the noise was heard afar off.”

This was, without doubt, a wonderful start to the glorious task of building a house for God. But then they ran into trouble, real trouble. There were other people living in the area, non-Jews, people who are called the adversaries. These people come with the request, “Let us build with you: for we seek your God” (4:2)

To these the Jewish leaders replied, “Ye have nothing to do with us to build an house unto our God; but we ourselves together will build unto the LORD God of Israel” (v. 3).

We see the reaction of the adversaries: “Then the people of the land weakened the hands of the people of Judah, and troubled them in building” (v. 4) . They even went so far as to hire counsellors who wrote a letter to the new King Artaxerxes. In this letter they told a pack of lies. They described the Jews as being well on their way with the task of building the walls of the city. Then they suggested that the king search in the records of his country and discover what a “rebellious and bad city” Jerusalem had been. It had caused much trouble in past years and would no doubt renew
that same trouble if rebuilt.

The king searched his records and found “that this city of old time hath made insurrection against kings, and that rebellion and sedition have been made therein” (v. 19) . He then commanded, “that this city be not builded.” The adversaries, as soon as they received the king’s letter, rushed round and “made them to cease by force and power. Then ceased the work of the house of God which is at Jerusalem.”

What a blow that must have been to these heroes; a lying letter and an ambiguous reply brought everything to a halt. And nothing was done about it for fifteen years. Just imagine, for fifteen years with half-built walls the house of God stood empty and open to the skies. As time went by, people lost their fervor and vision and turned to other things. They
accepted the failure and did nothing about it.

Then a new era opened in their history: “Then the prophets, Haggai the prophet, and Zechariah the son of Iddo, prophesied unto the Jews that were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel, even unto them” (Ezra 5: 1). These two men changed the whole situation.

Now we can turn to Haggai and see what brought about such a needed dramatic change. The first chapter of Haggai opens with a tremendous challenge from God. Haggai was possibly only a boy when he came with the group seventeen years before. Now he was moved and stirred to the depths of his being. For fifteen years he had seen the house of God lying open, unfinished, uncared for. He exploded, “Thus speaketh the LORD of hosts saying, This people say, The time is not come, the time the LORD’S house should be built” (Hag 1:2).

What had happened to that glorious enthusiasm and devotion to God? The tears and the shouts of joy of fifteen years before were lost in the indifference of a careless people. When Haggai had asked when they intended to continue building, he had received the same answer everywhere: “The time is not come, the time that the LORD’S house should be built.” In other words, “There are more important things to do just now. Of course we intend to build the temple, but let us get on with what we are doing now!” It is hard to believe that these were the same people. They had set out with a burning zeal for one purpose only, and now they have lost their vision.

Haggai returns to the attack: “Is it time for you, 0 ye, to dwell in your cieled houses, and this house lie waste?” (1:4). Here he points to their own houses, all finished and beautiful, and then he directs their attention to the half-built house of God.

In England we have some wonderful ruins of castles. I can see one from my home, the castle from which came the last wife of King Henry VIII. It is falling down as the years go by, but even so, it has served its purpose. People lived there and worked out the business of daily life. For years it was occupied; now it is a ruin, a graceful ruin that has fulfilled its purpose. All such ruins have a satisfied appearance; history has used them and abused them, and now it is all over.

But this was not so with the half-built temple in Jerusalem. Such abandoned buildings, wherever they are, have a sad, unloved, unwanted appearance. They have never fulfilled a purpose! So it was in Jerusalem. There was the lonely, forgotten, half-built temple of God. The whole thing was an insult to God and a shame to the people; but no one cared, they were seeking to live with an unfinished witness. Strangers passing by might say, “What is that strange place?” and the Jews would reply, “Oh, that is the house of God.” What a mockery.

The whole purpose of the house of God was to bring God into the picture: His name, His eyes, His heart. But because they had given up, they had no sense of the presence or power of God. They were in Canaan without God, in Jerusalem without Jehovah! The whole thing was a travesty of the
truth.

At this point the Holy Spirit comes to us and challenges us as to our way of life. Is Christ real in our experience? Are we seeking day by day to recognize His presence and allow Him to control our lives as we make a new behavior pattern? Being saved by the death of Christ is one thing; being daily saved from fear and failure by His life indwelling us is some-
thing else. Always remember that God did not save us to be failures. As we recognize the indwelling Christ we are demonstrating a finished temple. Indwelt by His Spirit we can go on to know the glory and the grace of His presence and power.

But as we go on to live the Christian life in our own strength, we become like these people in Haggai’s day. We believe in the indwelling Christ, just as they believed in the house of the Lord. But we say, “The time has not come to make Christ real in my life” repeating almost word for word the feeble, defeated words of verse 2.

Then it was that God spoke the words we have already heard: “Consider your ways. Ye have sown much, and bring in little” (vv. 5-6). God challenged them to take a long, hard look at their lives: “Ye looked for much and, lo, it came to little; and when ye brought it home, I did blow upon it. Why? Saith the LORD of hosts. Because of mine house that is waste, and ye run every man unto his own house.” God told them that all the failures in crops and shortage in production had come through His will. God had been trying to speak to them, to get them to wake up to their real problem.

They had reasoned that when they could make a success of their business, they would build the house of the Lord. God told them it was the other way around; if they would build the house for Him, then and only then would they know blessing through His presence and His power.

Can you see yourself in this story? Are you seeking to get on in life, to become a real success so that you can then settle down and live a useful life for God—after you have done all that you have planned?

Then God moved in with a new approach. We will see, in a moment, the absolute and amazing love of God stepping out in new areas of blessing. God challenged them once more to consider their ways and then He added: “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”
(vv. 7,8).

Here was a positive challenge, some way in which they could demonstrate their response to God. God told them to stop everything they were doing and give their full time and attention to the temple: go, bring, build. This is the actual turning point in this story. They have had a challenge, now
what will they do? On their immediate decision rests the whole future of their life in Jerusalem. God sometimes brings us to such moments: do we really mean business with God, or are we content to go on playing church?

Here I want you to see the response of the people. The old burning desire for God was not lost but was just buried beneath the dust of doubt and failure. A tremendous response came. Zerubbabel and Joshua and all the people “obeyed the voice of the LORD their God. . . and the people did fear before the LORD” (v. 12). They became the people we met earlier in their story. They had been the heroes who failed; now they became the heroes who found their faith once more.

What a joy this was to the heart of God! He had been yearning over them all those fifteen wasted years, loving them and waiting for them to turn once more to His ways. See now the most amazing part of this story. God did something for them He had never done before. In the days of Moses
and Solomon, God had waited until the structure was completed before He filled the tabernacle and temple with His glory. But now see what happened: “Then spake Haggai the LORD’S messenger in the LORD’S message unto the people, saying, I am with you, saith the LORD.”

They who had been so discouraged, so cut off from God by their own willful failure, now were assured of the presence of God. God was with them, even though the building was not finished. All that had changed was their attitude to God. No one had as yet been to the mountain to bring wood and build, because there had not been time. But the heart of God could wait no longer. He saw them, He loved them, and He pitied them.

And so God did a new thing. He became real to them even in the midst of their failure. This is what God can do for us. He can become real to us, vitally and wonderfully real, in the midst of all our failure, if we will do what they did. If, by a change of attitude, we are prepared to recognize ourselves as the house of God, to yield our lives to the indwelling Christ,
to be willing to make new behavior patterns to His glory, then we too will know the wonder of those same words: “I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.”