This prophesy happens just over 2 months since the last one (3 months into the building work).
Word definitions:
consecrated - separated, set apart, holy, dedicated
defiled - unclean, impure (sexually, religiously or from idolatry)
Unholiness is more easily transferred than holiness.
one drop of filth will defile a vase of water. Many drops of water will not purify a vase of filth [Moore]
The people were not holy by association with the temple, or the sacrifices, or the feasts, or by being the nation of Israel. Their attitude towards building the temple had revealed the impure attitude of their hearts. Disobedience had revealed their impurity. Whatever good stuff they offered later would be defiled/impure. Compare with the Pharisees - lots of good works, but they became tainted because of their impure attitude towards God.
We can not make ourselves holy by doing enough good stuff to outweigh the bad stuff, or by associating ourselves with holy things. So, if you give to charity, do acts of service, give money to the church, preach good sermons and play a part in someone becoming a christian but you've put your own kingdom above God's kingdom, if you're disobeying Him, then you are defiled/impure. Obviously some good could come out of it (eg. the person becoming a christian) because God can bring good from anything, but for you it's worthless if your heart is not right before God.
- We are defiled. His death makes us consecrated.
We are not saved by our good works outweighing our bad ones. What makes us holy is Jesus, not the external stuff.
curse into blessing
God tells them to remember the conditions that they have just endured when they were disobedient - famine. It would be easy for them to forget their former condition which would make it more likely that they would fall back into disobedience. Even when everything they did was failing, they did not turn back to God. We need to remember that it was not our effort or good sense to turn back to God - it needed Him to intervene through Jesus (or Haggai in this case).
While remembering their sin they can now be encouraged by God saying that He will bless them and make the trees bear fruit. They should remember this day, when they repented and obeyed God as the time when the curse turned into blessing. In a few years they shouldn't be thinking, "oh remember that famine, I'm glad that ended due to a bit of luck/those new farming techniques". No, it was God who turned things around.
It's Jesus who has turned a curse into a blessing. You used to be angry, arrogant, violent, selfish, greedy and now you're not? You didn't knock it on the head yourself. Jesus did it. You haven't worked your way into God's good books. Jesus put you there.
How does it link to Jesus?
- We should remember our former sinful stated and recognise that we haven't done anything to turn that around. Jesus has.
Remember the former cursed state and recognise that God has turned it into a blessing because of repentance and obedience.
the future
This prophesy occurs on the same date as the last one.
The heavens and earth and kingdoms will be shaken:
- On Jesus death - literal earthquake, power of devil's kingdom shattered
- On Jesus return - earthquakes in revelation, kingdoms shattered.
Signet ring = seal. Zerubbabel is in the genealogy of Jesus (Matthew 1:12-13, Luke 3:27). The sign of God's kingdom, the seal that shows His work, His signet ring is Jesus. The whole book shows man's disobedience and God's redemption but it also looks forward to the final act of redemption - Jesus
No comments:
Post a Comment