For thus says the LORD of hosts: Yet once more, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land.
Discouraged exiles were rebuilding the house of God, and their work looked like nothing beside the empires around them. God answers their disappointment with a promise to shake heaven and earth. So what is this shaking, when does it come, and why should it comfort people whose work looks small?
Who is speaking
The title matters as much as the promise. The people lived under a ruler they had not chosen. The One who promises the shaking holds that ruler in His hand.
George DavisonVerse 6 raises another interesting matter. It was especially relevant in the day Haggai prophesied, but it is just as important today. "For thus says the LORD of hosts" — a sentence appearing many times in this book — "Yet once more, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land." The people were living under the decrees of a man who had seized the kingdom by cunning, pretending to be the rightful king. But about these outward conditions the Lord of hosts makes known that He is in full control of them all.
Still ahead, not behind
Commentators say the shaking is still ahead of us. They answer the objection that "a little while" must mean something in Haggai's own century.
Arno Clemens GaebeleinFirst comes the announcement, "I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land." Have these violent shakings happened? Kingdoms have been shaken in politics, and the earth has often been shaken physically and in other ways. Even so, this prophecy is still to be fulfilled... Critics object to this view because this shaking of everything is to come in "a little while." So they apply it to the nearer political events of that period. But prophecy often foreshortens the future. Besides, the little while is not man's little while, but God's. With Him a thousand years is as a day. Also, in the political events after the Jews returned from Babylon, not all nations were involved.
The finality of "once more"
The New Testament takes up this verse, and one small word in it carries the weight.
F. B. HoleIn these words the writer of the Letter to the Hebrews gave a free rendering of a prediction first spoken by the prophet Haggai. He quoted them to stress the word "once." Let us note it well! "Once more" — then of course, since no further shaking will take place, it will be the final thing. It will be an act of God. So the next verse of the chapter explains: "This phrase, 'Yet once more,' indicates the removal of things that are shaken—that is, things that have been made—in order that the things that cannot be shaken may remain." So we know how everything that sin has undermined will end.
What the shaking clears the way for
The shaking is not the end in itself. It clears the way for an arrival promised in the next verse. Older translations read there, "the desire of all nations shall come," where the ESV has, "the treasures of all nations shall come in."
A J PollockOthers think the desire of all nations will be the Lord Jesus Christ, and surely they are right. Examine Haggai 2:6-9, and that will appear very plain. The words "The Desire of all nations shall come" stand between the Lord of hosts shaking all things in judgment and His filling the house of the Lord, the Temple, with His glory. That glory will surpass even the scene at the first dedication by King Solomon, when the priests could not stand because of the overwhelming glory.
Commentators differ on whether the nations themselves desire Him. One writer reaches the same destination by another road:
F. B. HoleNow Christ personally can hardly be spoken of as the "desire" of all nations, since when He appears in glory, so that every eye sees Him, "all the tribes of the earth will wail on account of Him"... But the nations have always desired such peace and fruitfulness, such prosperity, and quietness and assurance for ever, as is predicted in Isaiah 32:15-18. These very desirable things will only come to pass and be enjoyed when the Lord Jesus comes again.
Why this steadies a small work
Haggai spoke to a small group of returned exiles whose building work looked like nothing. A shaking that removes empires changes how you measure such a work.
Hamilton SmithIn the day of the remnant the world empires looked very imposing, and the work of the remnant in connection with the house of God appeared to be very insignificant. But whatever the outward appearance might be, in fact the remnant were engaged with a work that will last. That work will be displayed with all the glory of the Lord when the mightiest kingdoms of the earth have crumbled to dust and passed away.
The same logic is applied to readers today, with a warning about where the heart makes its home.
Other AuthorsWe are brought to what is forever stable and beyond all risk of change or decay. Unless our souls are truly settled in this truth, we cannot serve God acceptably. Our thoughts and hopes will be taken up mostly with things that belong to the earth, which will soon be shaken.
Summary
- Shaken by whom — the speaker is the Lord of hosts. The ruler over the builders was already in the hand of the One who promises the shaking.
- Shaken when — commentators place this still in the future, since the Letter to the Hebrews holds it out as a promise. "A little while" is God's measure, not man's.
- Shaken once — the word "once" makes it final; nothing is left to be shaken afterwards.
- Shaken for whom — the removal clears the way for the coming of Christ and the filling of the house with glory greater than before.
- Shaken, but not you — work tied to God's purpose outlasts the empires that dwarf it. That certainty frees you to serve God instead of clinging to what will be shaken.