Today I begin a brief series of lessons from the minor prophets. On this day when we dedicate our facility improvements and commit ourselves in the special thank offering to additional renovations, I would like for us to consider the challenge and promise of the prophet Haggai. Next week we will begin a three week series on the book of Jonah.

On September 21st, 2525 years ago Jews began rebuilding the Temple in Jerusalem. That specific date comes to us courtesy of the prophet Haggai who dates everything precisely. Haggai was the first prophet of the Jewish community that returned to Jerusalem from exile in Babylon in 536 BC. Very little is known about him, except that he was likely quite old. He apparently could remember the glories of Solomon's temple that had been destroyed sixty-seven years earlier when Jerusalem fell. But now in the summer of 520 BC he has just one message: If God's people would put God and his temple first, they would be blessed; otherwise they'd stay frustrated and dissatisfied . No other prophet I know was ever more successful. People actually listened to what he said. Five years later the temple was complete.

Prayer

He might have succeeded in getting the people to hear him, but Haggai was working against very long odds. The Jews who had come back from Babylon were mainly the old, the really religious and the maladjusted. Jerusalem looked more like Leisure Village than Westlake Village. The “achievers”—the successful people—were too well settled in Babylon. This was an older bunch, probably content to build a nice home, make life as comfortable as possible and settle down. They weren't looking for any big projects to consume their wallets or their time. They did not initiate the “Temple 2530 Millennium Campaign.” This little band of people just set an altar up and resumed offering sacrifices in the ruins of the old temple (Ezra 3:2). That would do for now. And with great enthusiasm they laid the foundation of a new temple.

Church building projects always do seem exciting until the work starts and the money is needed. Then it gets difficult. The neighbors of the temple got all worked up too, as they always do with building projects. The half-pagan Samaritans got involved: disrupting things, frightening the people, probably sabotaging the construction site, even hiring lobbyists to block them at the court of the kings of Persia.

As a result, work on the temple stopped for sixteen years. And there were lots of reasons to just let the project languish, or to just ignore it and hope it restored itself or just went away. “The Samaritans don't like it. It'll make our neighbors mad. It makes bad press, bad community relations.” “We don't have the resources. We're barely making ends meet as it is.” “Besides, it's not the right time yet. There's too much to be done, and too few to do it. The same people are called on for everything. And how can we both make a living and rebuild the temple?” The real problem, however, was simply indifference. The people didn't care that much about the temple, and didn't see anything wrong with the way things were. The temple might be in ruins, but they could still sacrifice. It would do. They had better things to be doing – like constructing their own homes, renovating the living room, or sitting around feeling like your home just isn't as tranquil and perfect as Martha's or those rooms in the Pottery Barn catalog.

So Haggai makes really only one point: You've built your own houses, but have neglected the house of the Lord . “You say, ‘The time has not yet come for the Lord's house to be built, but is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses while this house remains a ruin?” (Haggai 1:2 and 4). We hear “paneled” and think of Ethan Allen luxury, or Tim Hill's wood carving in an expensive Malibu hillside home. Wood paneling would have been very scarce in arid Palestine. So Haggai on the surface seems to be talking to some fairly comfortable people. We hear Haggai asking, “How can you live so luxuriously in your houses, with perfect hardwood floors, state-of-the-art kitchen, five bedrooms, a high-tech alarm system, three flat-screen TVs, and two computers, when this house is a dump?” And for those of us with nice houses but struggling to afford a plasma television with TIVO, we say to Haggai, “Preach it! Tell those rich people how it is!”

But that's not what Haggai was really saying. You see, the word translated “paneled” in the NIV would be better translated “roofed-over,” as the KJV actually has it (the word in the KJV is “ceiled” as in “ceiling-ed”). The hard times of drought and poverty in Palestine compellingly argue against “paneled.” So depending on the translation, Haggai probably wasn't talking to wealthy people at all. He was talking to people of normal means, maybe even poor. So what Haggai is really asking is: “Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your roofed-over houses while this house remains a ruin?” Surely it's unreasonable to expect anyone to live in a roofless house—but Haggai finds the opposite unreasonable, that people would leave their tents and roof-over their own houses before they finished the building devoted to God. Haggai is then simply saying what Jesus did in Matthew 6:33: “Seek first the kingdom of God.”

Seeking first of course means seeking first. God comes before even what we would consider the necessities of life . God gets the first money. Off the top. God gets his building first. First his building, then mine. But let's get beyond the building and “house” language. It really isn't about the building. The building only symbolizes something more important: which is the place God gets in our lives. When people look at our church building, does it communicate that God gets our best efforts, our best hours? When people watch us scurrying around exhausted from our busy lives with no time for contemplation, prayer or play, do our lives communicate that God gets on the schedule first?

That's the challenge before our church. A year ago, our building was suffering from some neglect, but because of our passion for God and our vision for the church in this community, we began a project to restore and rededicate our building for the purposes of God. Much has been done, and this afternoon we will celebrate what we have accomplished together. But the challenge still remains. The auditorium needs a renovation. We dream of more space to house a preschool or after school program. We envision a full-time youth and family minister, and a children's minister. We have many dreams of what we would like for this church to be in this community. So it's not all about “the house.” It is about how this house, how our ministries, represent our passion and our priorities. Honestly, have you spent more time in the last week thinking about what you would like to see done to your house or to this house? Is it bothering you more that your couch at home is still country blue and not sage green, or that the carpet here is faded and the auditorium appears untouched since its construction? Have you spent more time thinking of what you need in your life than what the kingdom of God requires? It really is not about the house. It's about the passion.

Is it a time for you to be living in your paneled houses while this “house” remains a ruin? Is it a time for the projects at work and at home to get such long hours, such concentrated attention, and the needs and ministries at church to get the remainders? Is it a time for such concern to be given to our own living spaces, and much less concern given to the space devoted to God? Is it a time for giving only a little or none of your income to God's work here?

I'm sure that you all agree that this building and the ministries we do here are important. You probably agree that they are ways that we experience God's presence among us, and hold the possibility of helping others connect with God. You might even want to support them and give more than you do. If only you could afford to. Maybe next year … after the house project is done, or when the child has graduated from college, or when the debt is paid off, or when George W. lowers your taxes. Maybe the market will take off again. But this year just isn't a good time. You would love to participate in the rebuilding of God's kingdom in the world. But this is not a good time to be giving. “I've got needs too you know.”

In response to those objections, Haggai challenges you to a kingdom vision where your needs do not define you . If you let your needs define you, then you will never be more than a needy consumer. And you will always need one more thing, so you will just keep consuming. There will be clutter everywhere. The credit card debts will mount. But you will be no happier, no more fulfilled, no less lonely.

The New York Times ran an article last week entitled “The Five-Bedroom, Six-Figure Rootless Life” about the effect of corporate relocation on families and communities. “Relos”, as the article called the upwardly mobile families who move into the suburbs of large cities for brief periods then relocate within a few years, are finding their lives torn by the tensions and strains of suburban living where there are beautiful homes, nice cars, clean streets, good schools and opportunities for the children, but no rootedness. The article profiles an upwardly mobile family named the Links who moved into the far suburbs of Atlanta. In Alpharetta, they found good schools, safe streets, neighbors who they like, and a big house and a yard. But they spend their week battling grueling traffic, long commutes to a church they like or an errand that needs doing, and they even feel the strain of being asked to do so much to sustain their church and their community. They have no deep connections there, no old friends, no parents to sit their children. They are constantly exhausted, and all they can think about is just the daily grind. Ms. Link said of the culture, “Everything you want is here, but it is an hour drive away. It's like go, go, go. We're just going, going, going. I call it drowning. It's when you can't see the top of the water.”

Haggai says to us who are consumed with consuming, with the go, go, go in order to have a nice life: “Consider how you have fared. You have sown much, but you have harvested little; you eat, but you never have enough; you drink, but you never have your fill; you clothe yourselves, but no one is warm; and you that earn wages earn wages to put them into a bag with holes.” (Haggai 1:5-6). A bag with holes. That is a vivid description of a desperate life that knows only how to work to consume, and to consume to be filled. And at the end of the day they are left with nothing. They have not made the most basic passion of their lives, the passion for God, their real priority. They have not made investments into the things that really matter. It is a great recipe for a life with holes in it.

These people got the image, and they heard the words of Haggai. The response was that within twenty-four days they started to build. The people saw the problem, that is was wrong for the building devoted to God to lie in ruins while they lived in paneled houses. So they reorganized their lives and started to build.

Haggai didn't just challenge these indifferent people to recover their priority for God. He also gave them a great vision that would compel their work, and their money, and their energy. Haggai could see the possibilities. Yes, the temple he pictures is still modest. But he could see much more that the temple only represented. Haggai could see that one day the treasures of all nations will come, and God will fill his house with splendor (Haggai 2:7); that the future will be brighter than the past (Haggai 2:9), that one day Jesus of Nazareth will grace this house; that from this day on the people will be blessed (Haggai 2:19) for building the house devoted to God. Most of all, in building it, they would recover their spirit, their zest, their vitality, knowing that they have put God first and knowing it every time they look at His house.

Our plans for this building are modest. It consists of some dry wall, some paint, some carpet, some furniture, some asphalt. No great cathedrals or corporate church campuses are envisioned here. But please do see what is possible: that if our faith, if our passion, is true, people will come . They are going to come, not because of what we build, but because of what we believe and the centered, compassion-filled lives that we live. They will come because our investment into this place and into ministries reveals a deeper passion that drives us, and it is that passion that will draw them. There are people everywhere seeking the safest place on earth. People everywhere are hungry for “a future we can trust.” Those are the quests and the convictions of this church family, and as we build, and minister, and love, and as the word gets out, people will come. When we follow this calling, ways will open up. Opportunities will flow. God will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land. If we build it, they will come.

Do you remember what it feels like to be “in the zone”, connected to God, knowing you're right with God, focused on what lasts, feeling invincible like you can touch the heavens, filled with previously unimaginable power? This is, in fact, the real issue. It's not that God needs the most glorious of temples; what he needs are a group of people in the zone, energized by the presence and centrality of God in their lives. Is God getting the first fruits of your mind, your wallet, your emotion, your passion? We don't need new buildings. We need new hearts energized by the Spirit of God. Then the splendor of God will fill this place, Christ will be lifted up, and He will draw all people to Himself. It is a great vision, and it all begins with the question of what vision really is driving your life. Is it a bag with holes, or a house where the splendor and aroma of God fills every room? It is a question worth considering, and a vision worth pursuing.

June 5, 2005