Haggai 1:13–15

What follows teaches us this. If the Lord disciplines, or if He speaks words of warning and correction, He does it only to remove every barrier to His people's blessing. He had watched the effect of the prophet's words. The moment the signs of repentance and self-judgment appeared, He sent them a message of comfort — "I am with you, declares the LORD."

When God sends a messenger, He is pleased to identify Himself with His servant... This is a solemn thing for the people of God, because the opposite is true too: if someone who is really sent by the Lord is refused, it is the Lord who is refused in the person of His servant... The Spirit of God, it seems, expands the description of the prophet — the LORD's messenger, with the LORD's message. This identifies him with his Lord. It gives the people certainty that his message is true.

It is very gracious, I think, to see how God provides with special care for a day of weakness. As far as I know, no earlier prophet ever carried the title "the LORD's messenger." Of the prophets after the captivity, Haggai's book is the shortest and the earliest. Yet he is the one given this unusual name of honour. Men would never have chosen him for it. Critics would call him the flattest in style, the plainest of all the prophets. He was the LORD's messenger for all that. He deals with the commonest things — their panelled houses, their sowing much, their bags with holes. They seem the most ordinary appeals. Yet he was the LORD's messenger.

"I am with you" is the saving principle for faith in the weakest possible day. And let me repeat it: what better did they have in the brightest day? Indeed, what else is so good as having the Lord with them? To have the most blessed servants would be a small thing if they did not have the Master Himself. This was the great safeguard and the unfailing source of supply and counsel when Israel came out of Egypt. How gracious to have His presence assured again after Babylon, when everything seemed gone and broken! The words were few, but they carried every help and blessing. They sank deep into devout hearts.

As we have seen, fear of their enemies kept the people from building the LORD's house. Now He gives the antidote... Nothing drives away fear like the assurance of the Lord's presence. But if it is comfort, it is also encouragement. It reminds the people that if the Lord called them forward into danger, He Himself was among them. He would go before them, as He had done in the wilderness, to show them the way.

And the place where power comes is most instructive. It is not before but after obedience... This would clear away the mistake often held, and sometimes spoken, that we must wait for power before we obey. It is not so; on obedience the Lord gives power. For example, the Lord said to the man with the withered arm, "Stretch out your hand." The man might have replied, "I have no power." Instead, in a spirit of obedience, he hurried to obey. He received strength, and was made whole.

They did not start building again because the king's decree reached them. They started because they feared the LORD and did not fear the king's command, seeing Him who is invisible. God was no more to be feared under Darius than under Cyrus or Artaxerxes. The source of their weakness was that they had forgotten God. This makes clear the great grace of God in waking them by the mouth of Haggai.

And the place in which power comes is most instructive. It is not before but after obedience, and is connected with the assurance of the Lord's presence among His people. Grasping this would clear away a mistaken idea, often held and sometimes spoken: that we must wait for power before we obey. It is not so. On obedience the Lord gives power. First there must be the obedience of faith, and then the Lord gives power to walk in the divine paths. For example, the Lord said to the man with the withered hand, "Stretch out your hand." He could have replied, "I have no power." But in the spirit of obedience he hurried to do what he was told, and he received strength and was made whole.

Notice also the source of the power for work. It was not in the people, but in the Lord. It was He who stirred up the spirit of His people and urged them forward in His service. He had done the same at the start, when He "raised" their spirit to go up from Babylon to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple. It takes us a long time to learn that there is no power except in the Lord. In the Lord's work human energy, will, or persistence count for nothing. They are real barriers in the way of divine strength. As was said to this same remnant, "Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of hosts" (Zech. 4:6).

This rebuke brings the people back to the fear of God. Fear is awakened, the conscience reached, the hard ground of nature ploughed up. Then the same voice of God through Haggai begins its ministry of comfort and encouragement: "I am with you, declares the LORD." But the Spirit visited the heart of the people as well as the lips of the prophet, and so the ministry reached its goal.

As to the spirit being a separate formation of God in every man, and not a mere influence, we read of "the spirit of Zerubbabel," and "the spirit of Joshua," and the "spirit of the remnant," in Haggai 1:14; of the "spirit" of Elijah (2 Kings 2:15) … as well as of the "spirit" of Cyrus (Ezra 1:1).

The remarkable fact here is that they built without waiting to hear that the king approved it. They did the work because it was the LORD's message, not because it carried the king's signature. His approval came later. They had gone on boldly in faith, acting on the word of the LORD and waiting for nothing else. Nor did the Lord fail to work for them. If there is opposition, the Lord knows how to turn the many adversaries so that the work goes forward.

The text also gives the date when they restarted their work. It was the twenty-fourth day of the sixth month, in the second year of Darius the king. That is twenty-three days after Haggai began to prophesy. Three short weeks were enough for the recovery of the people from their backsliding. When God acts in power His work is soon done. The record of the date plainly shows His delight in the obedience of His people. How closely He watches over His saints! How carefully He notices the first movements of response to His word!

Moreover, if the LORD is with us we shall find, as the remnant of old found, that He will stir up our spirits to "work in the house of the LORD."

Scripture records the date when they started their work again … twenty-three days after Haggai began to prophesy (compare verse 15 with verse 1). Three short weeks were enough for the people to recover from their backsliding. When God acts in power His work is soon done, and He makes His people rejoice in His restoring grace and pardoning mercy. The record of the date shows how He delights in the obedience of His people. How longingly He watches over His saints, and how closely He notices the first movements of response to His word!

We should also notice the source of the power for their labour. It was not in the people, but in the Lord. It was He who stirred up the spirit of His people and pressed them to go forward in His service. He had done the same at the first, when He "raised" their spirit to go up from Babylon to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple. It takes us a long time to learn that there is no power except in the Lord. In the Lord's work, human energy, will, or persistence not only count for nothing. They are real barriers in the way of divine strength.

And the place where power comes is most instructive. It comes not before obedience but after it. It is also tied to the assurance of the Lord's presence among His people. Grasping this would clear away a mistake many hold, and sometimes say out loud: that we must wait for power before we can obey. It is not so. On obedience the Lord gives power. First comes the obedience of faith. Then He gives power to walk in the divine paths.

Having obeyed the LORD, they can count on the presence of the LORD: "I am with you, declares the LORD." How much blessing is wrapped up in this short message!

They did not begin to build again because the king's decree reached them. They built because they feared the Lord and did not fear the king's command, as seeing Him who is invisible. God was no more to be feared under Darius than under Cyrus or Artaxerxes. The source of their weakness was that they had forgotten God.

The striking fact here is that they built without waiting to hear that the king approved. They did the work because it was the LORD's message, not because it carried the king's signature. The king's approval came later. They had already gone ahead in confident faith, acting on the word of the LORD and waiting for nothing else. And the Lord did not fail to work for them. Israel had lost, for the time, their public place in the world, but the Lord still tested, guided and blessed the faithful. His righteous government goes on just the same in these times when Gentile powers rule.

Comparing Haggai 1:13-15 with this passage, we see that it was exactly three months from the day the people started work on the Lord's house to the day the foundation was laid. It is striking that the Lord did not begin to bless them until that foundation was laid. He waited through those three months to test His people's hearts and the reality of their restoration. He worked in them a sense of their past condition, and so prepared them to receive the blessing He was about to give. It is always so in His ways with His people. His heart towards them never changes, but the showing of His heart must depend on their condition.