Consideration

9/27/2015

Haggai 1.2 “Thus says the Lord of hosts: These people say the time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord.”

I’ll get around to it. That’s what we say. Priorities. Scheduling. Importance. Necessity. When it becomes important, I’ll get it done, but in the meantime, I know I need to give it some attention at some point and when the timing is right, I’ll get around to it. When God says, Go, rebuild My House, then it probably ought to be done. It ought to get done.

Darius, the king of Persia felt like the Lord told him to send some people back home – whomever would go – and get His temple rebuilt. The days of the exile were ending and God knew one way to get His people off the stick was to give them a priority – something He knew they’d buy into – to go back home after a seventy year vacation. So God told Darius to tell the Jews, go back and rebuild.

It’s amazing what seventy years can do. Seventy years can change one’s perspective. Seventy years can age you. Seventy years of seeing the sun come up and go down can cause one to get used to one’s surroundings. Everything seems to be normal after seventy years. Most of the people reading this haven’t yet lived seventy years. For that matter, I haven’t lived seventy years, but I’ve lived sixty, and even now, I’ve aged, my perspective has changed, and things have become normal. I’ve yet to get to the point where what doesn’t hurt, doesn’t work…

Life gets complicated. Stuff comes up. Lives need to be lived and houses need to be built. It seems the focus of Haggai is simply this: can we do all these things and still do them with God as our Priority? Apparently, the invitation to go home sounded exciting at first and then petered out to the usual personal preferences and priorities. Haggai was a wake-up call to not forget about God, which got them deported in the first place.

How many times do we put off the great and settle for the good? Nothing wrong with good but good can also mean comfort and inaction rather than action. I may not smoke and may not chew, and may not go with girls who do, but what really matters is what I am doing, making a difference in this world for the Kingdom of God? What has God called me to do, and is it my first (and really only) priority? I guess what Haggai said still has bearing upon all this today: Consider your ways.

I think considering my ways on a daily basis is probably more important than what I actually do. Is God a part of my process, or is God my process? I can flat talk myself out of things. It’s easy. But what I am called to is to do what God says first, and everything falls into place after that.

Lord, as I consider who I am and what I am to do, may it be in consideration of You. Help me to focus on the great and be real about the good. My best and my all trumps just showing up. You have spoken to me today, may I act in accordance with that – amen.