Haggai 1

Scripture Reading:  Read Haggai chapter 1.   

When “God’s Will” Becomes an Excuse: 

Haggai 1:2-4 - This is what the Lord Almighty says: “These people say, ‘The time has not yet come to rebuild the Lord’s house.’” Then the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai: “Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses, while this house remains a ruin?”  (NIV)

Something Christians are good at is coming up with clichés that are often not rooted in God’s truth.  One of those clichés is claiming something isn’t “God’s will” when it just so happens that life merely became difficult.  When difficulty comes, a temptation for all of us is to justify taking the comfortable road rather than obeying God’s plan.  For Haggai’s audience, “God’s Will” became their lame justification for prioritizing their desires over God’s plan. 

Haggai was written after the Babylonian captivity.  By God's gracious provision, the Jews returned to Jerusalem to rebuild the Temple.  They laid the foundation for the work on the Temple, but they started to face significant opposition.  This remnant of Jewish returnees took that opposition as a sign that it must be God’s will for them to stop building the Temple. 

The interesting thing about their justification is that this apparent opposition wasn’t too significant to keep them from building themselves luxurious homes.  The homes they built were not the issue; the issue was their choice to construct their fancy homes instead of building the Temple. 

The message from Haggai is to put an end to the clichés and get to work.  We often find ourselves in a similar situation.  We usually know what God wants for us; we must stop justifying and boldly pursue His plan.   

Reflection: In chapter one, the Lord challenges His people twice to “Give careful thought to your ways.”  That is a timely challenge for God’s people in every age; let us slow down today and prayerfully consider our ways.