Sixteen years after the first exiles came home, the temple was still a ruin. The people said the time had not come to build. They were busy with their own houses. Over four months in 520 BC, Haggai brought them four short messages from God.
He asked whether it was time to live in paneled houses while God's house lay in ruins. Consider your ways, he said: you sow much and harvest little. The governor Zerubbabel, the high priest Joshua and all the people obeyed and began to work within weeks. When older people wept because the new temple looked like nothing next to Solomon's, Haggai told them to be strong and work, for God was with them, and that the latter glory of this house would be greater than the former.
“
Consider your ways.
Name means
Possibly “festive”
Home
Jerusalem, after the return
Role
Prophet to the returned exiles
Read in
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Haggai's story
The foundation stones
Beginning
Consider your ways
He confronts a people living in fine houses while God's house lies in ruins.
High point
They obeyed
The leaders and people begin to build.
High point
Be strong and work
To those who weep at the small temple: God is with you.
High point
From this day on
From the day they build, God will bless.
Ending
A signet ring
God promises to make Zerubbabel like a signet ring.
Starts as a prophet to a stalled people. Ends as the prophet whose four sermons got the temple built.
Where Haggai lived and went
Only places Scripture records. Softer, dotted pins are traditional or uncertain sites. Tap a pin for the passage.
HomeMinistryKey momentTraditional or uncertainPinch or use + to zoom. Tap a cluster to spread it out.
Haggai's four messages were given in Jerusalem.
How Haggai is wired
Why there's no type here
Haggai's book is four dated messages and almost nothing about him, so a type would be guesswork.
Strengths & struggles
What's good in Haggai
Clear and direct (). Effective: the people obeyed (). Encouraging to the discouraged ().
Where Haggai struggles
Scripture records nothing of his failings.
What Haggai wanted most
For God's house to be rebuilt and the people to put God first ().
Haggai promised that the latter glory of the house would be greater. Jesus walked into that temple.
Haggai said God would fill the house with glory and give peace there (). Jesus taught in that same rebuilt temple and said something greater than the temple is here (). He spoke of his body as the temple (). Zerubbabel, the signet ring, is in Jesus' family line ().
Questions to sit with
1
Consider your ways. What have you been building for yourself while God's work waits?
2
Be strong and work, for I am with you. What small, unimpressive work is God asking you to keep at?
Study Haggai with your group
Ready-to-lead group studies with discussion questions and a leader's note are on the way.
