The Lord's Agenda Versus Ours - Ruminating in the Word of God

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fearsome, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him and what came to my heart and mind in 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?'"

The Lord sent Haggai to tell the Israelites that they needed to get the new temple completed for them to worship him in. They had started the building of it, completing the foundation, and by this time they had left the remainder of the work unfinished for sixteen years.

A couple of thoughts strike me here. One of them being that there often is an element of time in the things of God. Some things need to be done in a timely fashion - not just whenever we might get around to it (whatever "it" may be.)

I also note that God's timing may not be our timing. If the Lord wants things done in a timely way, I just might not see it that way. In other words, if there is something I need to do for the Lord, putting it off till I might feel moved to do it just may not be what God wants at all.

Another very obvious thing that I thing we all struggle with (well, I shouldn't speak for others, so I'll speak for myself), my priorities just might not be God's priorities. Why didn't the building of the temple get done? Because, as the Lord pointed out, after a good start, they all went about building their own "paneled houses" leaving the temple undone. They pursued what suited their own personal and possibly selfish interests, leaving the interest of the Lord behind. How often I have been guilty of that!

There is a clear lesson here. The Lord has his priorities and it won't due for us to neglect those to pursue our own self-oriented interests. For those of us who read the Scriptures (and, sadly, many Christians don't these days because we are all guilty of the very same thing as the Israelites in Haggai's day), we know the Lord has his agenda. He is building his family, his kingdom, and we all have a part to play in the building of it. This is the very purpose of this age. To neglect this agenda in the pursuit of a comfortable  lifestyle will place us squarely in the same position as the Israelites when the Lord finally decided he needed to send the prophet to get them moving again on his agenda.

The Lord has done so much for us. In addition to giving us life and providing for our daily needs, he sent his Son to die a miserable death to pay the penalty for our sins, that we might live an eternity in his family, that we might have a place at his table.

In light of all the Lord has done for us, does his agenda not deserve our focus, our attention, our pursuit, our passion?

Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share what moved you about him from your Bible reading today. I'd love to hear from you!

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Trevor Fisk

trevor.fisk@gmail.com