“So the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel son
of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua son of Jozadak, the
high priest, and the spirit of the whole remnant of the people. They came and
began to work on the house of the Lord Almighty, their God,”
Haggai 1:14
As God stirred up the
hearts of the leaders and the people who returned from the captivity,
He is stirring up the heart of the people of
His church to build His house,
though not a house
made with human hands. We are His temple.
God has certainly been
‘de-emphasizing’ the brick and mortar in our church while
teaching about the
‘basic, foundational truth of ‘love’.
The building we meet
in or call home is so unimportant to God right now – at least on one level
anyway.
The Hebrew word for
stir found in verse 14 has an interesting definition
– it literally means
to open the eyes or wake up.
We might say that God
has opened our eyes or awakened us to
the outside world in
a fresh, new way.
At the same time He
has ‘reduced us to love’ because He wants our works of service to be motivated
by His supernatural love for us and working
in us.
So what is the bottom
line for us?
I believe God has us
in a season of:
Opening our eyes to
His love, stirring up our spirits as the
Prophet Haggai said and: spurring us on to
good works
This is how, in part,
we build up the NT sanctuary, temple or house of the Lord.
I believe He is ‘with us’ just as He was with
them in the passage above.
As they built, we too
are building a temple for the living God. •
God is stirring our
hearts to love and good works.
This requires that He
challenge our motivations because it is
only through supernatural love
that we can truly
affect the world for Christ as we ought.
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