ASSASSIN
05-02-2008, 06:39 PM
New Sunday School Lesson for May 4, 2008
SETTING PRIORITIES -
Haggai 1:1-10, 12-15
BACKGROUND:
In today’s lesson the scene changes from Babylon back to Jerusalem . It is now some 20 years since those 50,000 or so Jews left Babylon at the urging of King Cyrus and returned “home” to the ruins of the Holy City . Their “number one” task was to rebuild the temple. After all, it was the temple that stood at the center of Jewish religious culture. It was, in short, the single most important goal in the country...
But what would on the surface appear to be an unquestioned goal would soon take a back seat to something else. Think about this: if you had only a fraction of the money you needed to complete a number of tasks, how would you choose which ones to make a priority? In real life today, how do we choose how much to give to God?
In order to better understand today’s lesson, it will be important to keep an eye on the Book of Ezra, since the history there contained will help clarify the words in Haggai. Here we will see (Ezra 3) that the task of rebuilding the temple actually got under way; it just was not completed. The people erected the altar and laid the foundation, but then got sidetracked. It is in the lull created by their being sidetracked that the lesson for today open...
TEMPLE NEGLECTED (Haggai 1:1-4)
The two main characters here are Zerubbabel the governor and Joshua the high priest. It is to these two men that God sends His prophet Haggai to deliver an urgent message: there is a problem with the unfinished temple. Haggai points out that the “people” claim the time is not right for the temple to be completed. Why was this the case? Because of opposition (Ezra 4:1-5). There, we see that the enemy offered to “help” build the temple, but wound up plotting to have the project halted. This led to a 20-year lull in the action (Ezra 4:24)...
Haggai then raised a question that is worthy of consideration today: should you be living in luxury in your own home while the House of God is in disrepair? The reason that this question was raised was that the people had taken great pain (and money) to make themselves comfortable and had put not even a roof on God’s house! Somewhere, Israel ’s priorities had been reversed...
BLESSINGS FORFIETED (Haggai 1:5-10)
How would the average person “interpret” a financial shortfall? The Jews had a choice: they could either say (since they didn’t have enough for everything) “I don’t have enough to build a house for myself”, or “I don’t have enough to build the temple”. One could almost hear many saying: “God, if the crops would grow, I would turn my attention to the temple”. What they failed to realize was that the failure to give to God FIRST was the very reason that the crops were not growing. They were hungry because God was not blessing them; God was not blessing them because they were not trusting HIM...
It probably made little sense to many: go and build my temple and your crops will begin to prosper. After all, it’s not the soil that causes the crops to grow, it is GOD who in His wisdom and might causes the ground to bring forth its fruit. The source of ALL blessings is God. As a result, God gave the Jews a somewhat unusual formula: if you really want the crops to grow, don’t spend a lot of time tilling the soil – just build the temple, and watch the crops multiply!
WORK STARTED (Haggai 1:12-15)
It is not often that the words of a prophet are so promptly heeded. Look at verse one and then read verse 15. It took just 20 days to resume a project that had lain dormant for 20 years! This came from a very positive response to the Word of God through His prophet (cf. Ezra 5:1, 2)...
But just because God gives a directive does not always mean that the task will be accomplished without pitfalls. So Haggai not only gave the people the advice to get back to work on God’s House, but he gave them the assurance that God would be with them. Now the fact that God is “with” someone still does not guarantee smooth sailing; rather, it guarantees that through it all, victory will be the final outcome. After all, Jesus Himself claimed victory via death. What are YOU willing to sacrifice? Are you ready to begin RIGHT NOW?
A
SETTING PRIORITIES -
Haggai 1:1-10, 12-15
BACKGROUND:
In today’s lesson the scene changes from Babylon back to Jerusalem . It is now some 20 years since those 50,000 or so Jews left Babylon at the urging of King Cyrus and returned “home” to the ruins of the Holy City . Their “number one” task was to rebuild the temple. After all, it was the temple that stood at the center of Jewish religious culture. It was, in short, the single most important goal in the country...
But what would on the surface appear to be an unquestioned goal would soon take a back seat to something else. Think about this: if you had only a fraction of the money you needed to complete a number of tasks, how would you choose which ones to make a priority? In real life today, how do we choose how much to give to God?
In order to better understand today’s lesson, it will be important to keep an eye on the Book of Ezra, since the history there contained will help clarify the words in Haggai. Here we will see (Ezra 3) that the task of rebuilding the temple actually got under way; it just was not completed. The people erected the altar and laid the foundation, but then got sidetracked. It is in the lull created by their being sidetracked that the lesson for today open...
TEMPLE NEGLECTED (Haggai 1:1-4)
The two main characters here are Zerubbabel the governor and Joshua the high priest. It is to these two men that God sends His prophet Haggai to deliver an urgent message: there is a problem with the unfinished temple. Haggai points out that the “people” claim the time is not right for the temple to be completed. Why was this the case? Because of opposition (Ezra 4:1-5). There, we see that the enemy offered to “help” build the temple, but wound up plotting to have the project halted. This led to a 20-year lull in the action (Ezra 4:24)...
Haggai then raised a question that is worthy of consideration today: should you be living in luxury in your own home while the House of God is in disrepair? The reason that this question was raised was that the people had taken great pain (and money) to make themselves comfortable and had put not even a roof on God’s house! Somewhere, Israel ’s priorities had been reversed...
BLESSINGS FORFIETED (Haggai 1:5-10)
How would the average person “interpret” a financial shortfall? The Jews had a choice: they could either say (since they didn’t have enough for everything) “I don’t have enough to build a house for myself”, or “I don’t have enough to build the temple”. One could almost hear many saying: “God, if the crops would grow, I would turn my attention to the temple”. What they failed to realize was that the failure to give to God FIRST was the very reason that the crops were not growing. They were hungry because God was not blessing them; God was not blessing them because they were not trusting HIM...
It probably made little sense to many: go and build my temple and your crops will begin to prosper. After all, it’s not the soil that causes the crops to grow, it is GOD who in His wisdom and might causes the ground to bring forth its fruit. The source of ALL blessings is God. As a result, God gave the Jews a somewhat unusual formula: if you really want the crops to grow, don’t spend a lot of time tilling the soil – just build the temple, and watch the crops multiply!
WORK STARTED (Haggai 1:12-15)
It is not often that the words of a prophet are so promptly heeded. Look at verse one and then read verse 15. It took just 20 days to resume a project that had lain dormant for 20 years! This came from a very positive response to the Word of God through His prophet (cf. Ezra 5:1, 2)...
But just because God gives a directive does not always mean that the task will be accomplished without pitfalls. So Haggai not only gave the people the advice to get back to work on God’s House, but he gave them the assurance that God would be with them. Now the fact that God is “with” someone still does not guarantee smooth sailing; rather, it guarantees that through it all, victory will be the final outcome. After all, Jesus Himself claimed victory via death. What are YOU willing to sacrifice? Are you ready to begin RIGHT NOW?
A