Consider Your Ways

There is a book in the Old Testament, which I feel is relevant for us today, in regard to the message that God spoke to his people through his prophet. Our study today, Francis, found in the book of Haggai. You may turn in your Bibles there now.

My message is entitled, Consider Your Ways. Haggai is the first prophet to speak to the exiled Jews after they had returned to Palestine. And he preached four messages to them over four brief months.

And the result was a remarkable revival as the people of God responded to God's word through obedience and reprioritized lives unto God. Solomon's temple had been destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar. And in the rebuilding of the temple under King Darius, the returned exiles had become discouraged beneath their labors because they could not recapture the former glory, the original size and magnificence of the former temple.

And they became distracted away from God's work to live self-centered lives as they were intent on decorating and improving their own houses while letting the house of God remain in ruin. In chapter 1, we see the circumstance where the people of God had let their priorities get out of focus as they had forgotten that God must have first place in their lives. This is seen in verses 3 through 5, which I will read to us at this time.

Here now is the word of God, and may the Spirit of the Lord be pleased to attend the reading of His holy word. Then came the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet, saying, Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your sealed houses, and this house lie waste? Now therefore, thus saith the Lord of hosts, consider your ways. I will stop there.

God had a bone of contention with His people, and He had to make that known to them by His prophet. He tells them what the problem is. Their neglect of God's work and their self-centeredness of their own agenda.

And God makes a remarkable statement here in three impacting words. Consider your ways. For they were not considering their ways and lighted their priorities.

They had placed self-interest over that of God's kingdom work. And He confronts them and asks them to consider their ways. In verse 9 we see how God confronts them with their displaced priorities and their personal struggles in their fruitless labors.

Ye looked for much, and, lo, it came to little. And when ye brought it home, I did blow upon it. Why, saith the Lord of hosts.

Let me pause here, friends. God is making His people think and address their circumstances, not from their perspective, but to see things from God's perspective. Their hard labor was producing little in what little they had.

God was making it even less in the imagery of blowing upon the thing to scatter it and to decrease it. God confronts them in their personal circumstances and asks them to give Him an answer. Oh, why their circumstances was such.

Oh, why. And then God tells them why by answering His own question. Because of mine house that is waste, and ye run every man unto his own house.

God is speaking to them and revealing truth to them that they are suffering personally because God's work is suffering from their neglect. There are several aspects here, friends, that I'd like to explore from this passage today. God was speaking to the Jews and revealing a thing in their personal lives that stood between them and God's blessings upon them.

God wants them to see and recognize their error and adjust themselves accordingly as a parent would confront a child and point out a thing which was displeasing to that parent and then point out a way to fix the problem through instruction because the parent had the child's best interests at heart. God was speaking to the Jews in Haggai's day, and I believe God is speaking to His church today, both corporately and personally, as we evaluate our priorities and consider our ways. There are five aspects I want to bring before you today.

1. God has something He wants to say to us, a particular truth, regarding a personal thing in our lives. 2. We are to hear what He has to say and to understand what that truth means to us personally. 3. We are to consider our ways because God wants us to change our ways.

We are to accept the truth of God's revelation to us through conviction of the Holy Spirit and repent and make the necessary change to apply that truth to our lives in a personal application as we consider what God has spoken. 4. We are to respond to Him, respond to that revealed truth about us, and as we reflect on that truth, we are to ask God to grant us the necessary grace to effect that change which God desires on our part. Perhaps there needs to be a change in both our attitude and our obedience to God regarding a thing in our lives that has become displeasing to Him.

5. When God speaks, He expects a response. How do we hear? How do we heed? How do we honor Him with our changed behavior regarding this thing? In other words, what is our response to what He has spoken to us? In our passage of Scripture, when the leader Zerubbabel heard God's voice through God's prophet, we see the results in verse 12. 12 The high priest, with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the Lord their God had sent him.

13 And the people did fear before the Lord, meaning they came under conviction of sin, and repented of their sin, and resumed the rebuilding of the temple in obedience to God, as they made the work of God their priority, and God's glory their chief aim. 14 And the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel, the son of Sheitel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua, the son of Josedek, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people. 15 And they came and did work in the house of the Lord of hosts their God.

The response of the people of God to the revealed truth of God led to a mighty revival, where the entire remnant is revived with a new spiritual vigor to go out in obedience and further the work of God. 16 God confronted the Jews in Haggai's day to hear him and to heed him. They were living self-centered lives, improving their creature comforts in their sealed houses, while God's house lay in decay.

God asked them to consider their ways. 17 And they did. They did it to their profit and to God's glory, as they altered their behavior and made God the center of their lives once again.

God may be speaking to you today, friend, to consider your ways. 18 He has something to say to you about a particular thing in your life that hinders the gospel and robs him of his glory. He is looking for your response to this truth about your life.

19 As I studied this passage, I considered my ways, and I realized I was lacking in the distribution of gospel tracts and reaching the lost. Formally, I had made it a point to hand out at least one tract a day to a stranger, but as of late I had become derelict in this means of advancing God's kingdom. 20 I confessed my sin, my lack to God, and reordered my life, making the distribution of gospel tracts a top priority once again.

But first I had to consider my ways, and in obedience change my ways to align myself more with God and the work of God. 21 I leave you today, friend, to ponder what we have seen in our passage today out of God's word and to take an introspective look into your heart and hear from God and to consider your ways. Change your way toward God, friend, and he will change his way toward you.

Let us pray.