Title: Big words, Bigger Promises
Our reading today comes from the prophet Haggai chapter 1 verse 15b through chapter 2 verse 9
Let us listen now for the word of God:
In the second year of King Darius, in the seventh month, on the twenty-first day of the month, the word of the LORD came by the prophet Haggai, saying:
Speak now to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua – son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, and say,
Who is left among you that saw this house in its former glory? How does it look to you now? Is it not in your sight as nothing?
Yet now take courage, O Zerubbabel, says the LORD; take courage, O Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; take courage, all you people of the land, says the LORD; work, for I am with you, says the LORD of hosts, according to the promise that I made you when you came out of Egypt. My spirit abides among you; do not fear.
For thus says the LORD of hosts: Once again, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land; and I will shake all the nations, so that the treasure of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with splendor, says the LORD of hosts.
The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, says the LORD of hosts.
The latter splendor of this house shall be greater than the former, says the LORD of hosts; and in this place I will give prosperity, says the LORD of hosts.
This is the word of the Lord
Thanks be to God
Let’s unpack this passage a bit. There are a lot of names and players involved and it’s important to understand why these people would have been named and important to the community when Haggai spoke these words of prophecy.
As best we can tell this prophecy was written and spoken in 520 BCE. This is about 18 years after Cyrus, the founder of the first Persian Empire, had conquered Babylon and subsequently issued a decree in 538 BCE allowing for those Judean captives in Babylon to return to Jerusalem and more importantly, to rebuild their temple that had been destroyed in 586 BCE during the Babylonian conquest of Judah.
That is a lot of change happening in a pretty short time frame historically. In just under 50 years after the destruction of their home and temple by the Babylonian empire; after they were forced to relocate to other places in Babylon; after the rise of yet another governmental state; the ruler of the Persian empire comes along and issues a decree saying that all the captive Judeans can return home to Jerusalem and not only can they return home but they are directed to rebuild the temple. Cyrus, the Persian ruler, believed that the restoration of the temple was necessary for the religious practices that would help restore the Judean’s cultural identity after the Babylonian exile.
The temple was the center of Jewish religious and cultural life, its destruction was a major blow to their cultural identity – as in we were/ are the chosen people? But how, if the temple was destroyed can we be those chosen people, Babylon has taken us far away from home and put us in a new land and tried to stomp out who we are or who we were and now the Babylonians have been destroyed and this new guy – Cyrus comes along and says – go home. Rebuild. Be who you are supposed to be.
Take a moment and just imagine how life giving that had to have been. The stories your parents told you are finally coming true. God is looking out for God’s people. The temple is going to be restored.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t as simple as all that. If you were the remnant that was left in the destroyed Jerusalem to try and rebuild after the Babylonian departure you have spent a great deal of time learning how to survive but how do you trust and how do you rebuild?
Now, 50 years later, here come these people that have new customs and new languages and they don’t remember what the temple looked like before the destruction and the wars. These returnees don’t know the people left behind and the remnant doesn’t know them. They all just know that Cyrus said go, rebuild.
Imagine it – what is supposed to be a triumphant return for the exiles quickly becomes a massive disappointment. The Judah they returned to was a wilderness and the Holy City that they had heard all the stories about was nothing more than rubble. These people that had been left behind, distrusted the returnees on multiple levels – Zerubbabel who is supposed to be one of them – has a Babylonian name and was educated in the Babylonian courts and now he has been put in control of Judah.
It has been 18 years since Cyrus told the faithful to go home and rebuild – 18 years the people were supposed to be restoring the temple. They have built a foundation and an alter and nothing else. 18 years. God tells Haggai to speak words of prophecy to Zerubbabel – the governor of Judah, and to Joshua – the high priest and, to the remnant, those people that remained in Judah during the Babylonian exile.
Through Haggai, God asks – Who remembers how this place used to look? Remember how full it was and how the sounds of worship filled this place? How does it look now? Empty? A shell of its former glory?
Upon their return Zerubbabel spent a few years – fighting with the people, those who returned and those who remained, to get the foundations of the new temple laid and the altar built. Then the work stopped for 15 years. 15 years of neglect and complaints about how the temple used to look, and how full it used to be, and how the worship was held, with stories of how every place was full, and how we were the biggest denomination, and how everybody who was anybody came there to worship…
Are we still talking about the temple?
Haggai stands up and tells all the people, the remnant and the returnees alike – God is saying to us that we need to get back to work; that we need to trust in the promises that God made to you and I as God’s people – trust – and get back to work.
I am with you, says the LORD of hosts, according to the promise that I made you when you came out of Egypt. My spirit abides among you; do not fear.
Do not fear – I am with you.
Once again, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land; and I will shake all the nations, so that the treasure of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with splendor. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine. All of this belongs to me – remember my promises to you – remember whose you are.
God says – You haven’t seen what is coming next. The latter splendor of this house shall be greater than the former, where there was scarcity in this place, I will give prosperity.
Big words. Bigger promises.
It might be useful to talk for a moment about how seriously God takes God’s promises. Way back in Genesis – God promised Abram (who was not yet Abraham) and Sarai (who was not yet Sarah) a child if they would just follow God. And as we may remember from our Sunday school lessons, Abram follows God. When Abram questions God on the lack of a child, God doubles down and says your descendants will be as numerous as the stars. And again later, when Abram is impatient that God’s promise still hasn’t been fulfilled – God promises God’s own destruction if God does not fulfill God’s promises.
It would be an understatement to say that God does not take God’s promises seriously. These stories would be known by every member of the returning and remaining community. So when Haggai speaking as the voice of God to the community says “Remember I am with you, according to the promise that I made you when you came out of Egypt. My spirit abides among you; do not fear.” This is telling the people to trust in God’s promises – so yes. Big words. Bigger promises.
This temple will outshine the glory of that which came before it. It will be even more beautiful than its predecessor. It will be filled with worship and bursting at the seams for all the people. Trust in the promises that I have made.
If we look to the book of Ezra, we find that the people went back to work and the temple was rebuilt in 515, in the 6th year of King Darius.
I believe that this passage is relevant to us here in the 21st century as well. I am a graduate of Union Presbyterian Seminary and ministry is my second career. The state of the modern church was a common theme when I went to seminary and even more so in the subsequent years. I have heard lots of comments, often accompanied by hand wringing about how the church is in decline and how we don’t look like we used to back in the good old days. We are smaller than we were and sanctuaries are are not as full as they were. We hear that we can’t do the work because we don’t have enough people.
I read reports that highlight the decline of American religious life. Did you know that roughly a quarter of the American population now identifies as part of the “nones,” those who do not ascribe to any religious beliefs? And that number seems to be growing year over year.
And yet. I hear Haggai saying to us – Get up. Do not be discouraged. Do the work. Remember the promises that God has made to God’s people:
“My spirit abides among you; do not fear. The latter splendor of this house shall be greater than the former, and in this place I will give prosperity, says the LORD of hosts.”
These are the promises that the prophets remind us of that tell us what God has said to God’s people.
Trust the promises that God has made to God’s people. As a trained historian – I love the past. It’s fun to explore and look at the situations and circumstances that shaped the decisions that people made. History and understanding it is useful, but only in so far as we understand that we need to know our history, so we can build upon it. We can not continually look backwards and live in fear of the unknown by focusing on what was.
In May of 2017, the Stated Clerk of the PC(USA) J. Herbert Nelson proclaimed – We are not dying. This church is not dying – We are Reforming. He spoke about how we as a church are coming together to do a new thing and that, as a church, we are constantly reforming to be what God has called us to be.
We know what God has promised us – we know how the story ends. The tomb will be empty come Easter morning. So do not fear. God is with us and will be with us.
I argue that we cannot make decisions based on fear because if history has taught us anything, it is that decisions made from a place where fear is a primary motivator are the decisions we come to regret.
That is easier said than done. We live in a time and a place where we are asked to make new decisions about what it is that we believe almost daily. We are asked how we can prove it. We live in a time where the decisions we make can ostracize us from friends, family, or our communities. Our 24 hour news cycle stokes outrage and division and the politics of fear have become part of the norm for our discourse about the church, about culture, and about society as a whole.
Yet God continues to tell us – Get up.
Do not be discouraged.
Do the work.
Remember the promises that God has made to all people.
You can’t drive while looking in the rear view mirror all the time. It’s helpful to look back and see what was, and where you have been, but you have to look where you are headed. God has promised all things – we get a glimpse of the new Jerusalem in Revelation – streets of gold and clean running water for everyone – food for all. The building of the temple in Haggai was a response to God’s promise that God was and is with the community.
That new temple was as much a sign of God’s presence in the community as it was a place to gather for worship and to be in community. God acknowledged that the new temple would be different than the old one, but in the same phrase, God affirms that God’s works would be the same merciful and glorious works that God had been doing all along.
In our church calendar we are just 2 weeks from the advent season – a season that anticipates a new beginning that we celebrate as the Birth of Jesus – a moment in time where God decided to do something new that we had never seen before. And as we approach advent we can’t go into a store without seeing the ads or displays reminding us that Christmas is coming and we have just a few short weeks to prepare. The days are starting to be filled with joyous anticipation even as there is anxiety about how we will get through this year and into the next. We live in anticipation of a future we don’t know yet, coupled with the exhortation to trust God.
We live in a moment where the prevailing discourse says – what we had was wonderful, when our sanctuaries were full, and when we were the dominant cultural influence, and we worry that we no longer look like we did and we hear everyone – inside and out is telling us that we are dying.
We choose to say that is not our story. We choose to say right now, that we trust that God is with us, here and now. And we prepare to do the work, because the promises that God has made are true and we will trust in those promises.
Change is scary and it takes courage to persevere, to believe that God is building a new Jerusalem. The remnant felt this as the exiles returned. The exiles felt this as they returned to a home they had never known. We feel it as we continue to reform in a tumultuous and divisive world that doesn’t look like anything we have ever seen. It is hard to look around in our 24 hour news cycle and not feel a sense of fear and division. But we don’t have to live like that. We know how the story ends.
We are building the new church every time we reach out to our neighbors. We are building the new Jeruselum when we help the less fortunate members of our community. We are rebuilding the temple when we help veterans navigate this world after their discharge from active duty. We are building the church when we serve food at the homeless shelter. We are the church when we live into God’s promises and do the work.
As we come toward this advent season we know that something new is coming. God has told us that what comes next will outshine the glory of that which came before it. It will be even more beautiful than we can imagine and it will be bursting at the seams with joyful worship and filled with the people of God.
Trust in the promises that God has made.
I argue that it is an act of courage to remember that God keeps God’s promises – and our response to God’s promises is to do the work that God has called all of us to do.
Big words, Bigger promises.
Trust God.
Do not be discouraged.
Do the work.
Amen.
Matthew Messenger 