AS we have seen in our previous sermon, God has reassured Israel in their work of re-building the temple in an amazing way. God called them to stop looking at things in an earthly way, but to look up, and see God was with them, as he had been in the past, and would be in the future. God called them not to fear. God enlarges on this assurance in these next verses, and although the verses have a particular reference to God's people in the days of Haggai, the assured promise stretches forward into the future to the coming of Christ, and the life of the church. Because of this the words of Haggai to Israel in his day, have an assured promise for the church of the present, and also in a particular way to each and every believer.

It is a fact that God's people individually and in congregations can become depressed as Israel was in the days of the restoration when we see the insignificance of the church in our time, and in the trials and difficulties which surround us personally and corporately in our world today. The words of God's assured promise in the verses before us are a word of encouragement and strength as we abide in the truth set forth in God's word.

THE LORD ALMIGHGTY.

In these verses before us the words 'says the Lord Almighty' and 'declares the Lord Almighty' are repeated five times. In each assured promise which God makes through Haggai he declares himself as the Lord Almighty. This truth about the Lord is repeated so often in God's Word that we read of it without paying attention to its significance. It is God who speaks and makes his promises, and unlike promises made by human beings, because God is Almighty, there is no doubt that he is able to carry out his promise. What we see as impossible, is far from being impossible to God. After all he is the creator and sustainer of the universe. He is in control of all history, and though the power of nations seem so vast, and we tremble as we see their power, yet to God they are like a drop of water in a bucket in their insignificance. (Isaiah 40: 15). As we meditate on the declaration of the Lord's limitless power here before us, let us read again Isaiah 40: 12-31 and drink in the blessing the truth about the God who is our God by sovereign grace in Jesus Christ reveals to us here.

As individuals we face times of difficulty and trouble in our lives. Things may seem against us, and it may seem that there is no light at the end of the tunnel, but the truth is that we are the children of the Almighty God, and what seems impossible to us is altogether possible to God.

SHAKING.

Shaking is the word used by God through Haggai to describe his action as the Almighty. There were two particular directions of dread and fear which worried the Israelites of the restoration as they sought to engage in the rebuilding of the temple. One was the power and opposition of the heathen nations all around them. The other was the insignificance of the temple they were building and the feeling that the glory of the Lord had departed from Israel. It is the problem of the power of the nations against Israel that God addresses first.

God tells his people through Haggai that he was going to shake the physical elements of the world and the powerful nations opposed to Israel. How comforting this would have been to the people as they engaged in the building of the temple. Their God who is Almighty was going to shake the nations, and bring the earthly environment to work against them.

History records that God did precisely this. The Babylonian empire had already been brought down, and history records that the Persian empire, followed by the Greek empire, and then the Roman empire, all were brought down. History of our world reveals that powers rise and are brought down e.g. the empire of Napoleon and the power of Hitler.

What do we learn from this for our own comfort and strength? We learn that whatever the outward reality we see in the national powers in our own day, and the rise of militant evil forces, yet God is in control of the nations, and he has a purpose and plan which he is working out and will complete, in spite of all the powers raised up by Satan to oppose God and the Gospel. We may not be able to see the power of God working today, but that is because we live bound by time, and are unable to see God's power working as the future unfolds. The Bible records history of the exercise of God's power. It records that in spite of the virulence of Satan's opposition and the failure and sins of God's people, the plan of God to provide a Saviour in our Lord Jesus Christ never failed, in spite of all the opposition Satan brought against it. God is continuing to work in the world by his might power until he has gathered all his elect children into his eternal kingdom.

THE DESIRE OF THE NATIONS.

The other fear and dread manifest amongst the Israelites of the restoration who had returned from exile to rebuild the temple and the walls of Jerusalem was the insignificance of the temple being built which was so much less than the glory of the original temple built by Solomon. They feared that the glory of Israel had departed and that it seemed worthless to proceed where God's glory had seemingly departed from Israel. The people just could not see Jerusalem and the land of promise being glorious again. Spiritual depression had set in, and the strength to go on was ebbing away. To this God speaks the next words of encouragement and reassurance. God tells the people through Haggai that the desire or beauty of all the nations would come, and that He would fill this temple which was being built with his glory.

Let us observe first of all that the glory of the church of God is not to be found in its physical buildings and wealth, but in the spiritual health of the people making up the church, and their faithfulness to the Lord, and the increasing of the number who believe. God's glory is not seen in buildings but in the lives of God's people who reflect in every way the light of Christ and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

There is a difficulty here and that is as to what 'the desire of all the nations' actually is describing. In the context the word 'desire' can be translated as 'beauty'. The English Standard Version of the Bible gives the translation of 'treasure'. So it seems plain to me that the immediate meaning of this phrase is the fact that God was going to so work for Israel in the building of the temple, that they would never be short of materials, not only to raise the structure of the building, but to adorn the building in such a way that it reflected something of the glory of God. The materials and treasure which was what the nations desired and lived for would be brought into Israel to furnish all that was required for the completion of the temple. In this outward way God would fill his temple with his glory which would be a beacon for God in the world. Surely such a promise and assurance would have been strong encouragement to the Israelites to persevere in the building and not feel their labour to be unable to achieve something worthy of God.

But is this all that the words of Haggai speak to us of? The closing words from Haggai in these verses surely assure us that there was more than purely physical glory that was meant. However glorious this new temple would be in a physical sense, it certainly could not compare with the riches and beauty of the original temple which Solomon built. Yet God promises that this temple would bring greater glory to God than the former temple in Jerusalem built by Solomon. The promise goes further in the last sentence of our text where the Lord declares in this place he would grant peace.

It is clear to me at least that what God is promising here is something that was lacking all through the Old Testament history, which meant that Israel was continually departing from the Lord. They lacked peace because they were continually departing from the Lord. But the promise of peace goes even deeper than this. The peace, which shows most clearly the glory of God, is the peace brought into the soul by the Gospel of peace which Christ won for his people in his death and resurrection. This is the peace with God which brings peace of conscience, and peace as we face the future, and the peace with God which comes from faith in Jesus which results in being totally justified and accounted righteous in the sight of God.

Something of this peace and the spiritual glory of God was promised through Haggai to Israel, the church of God, at this time in history. However we know that Israel soon again departed from the Lord and Israel became afflicted under the rule of the Romans, and by the time Christ was born Israel had lost all spiritual life altogether as a spiritual temple to the Lord. Because of this the promise of greater glory and peace given by God through Haggai speaks to us of God's continued abiding by his promise, given in Genesis 3 and continued through out the Old Testament history, that he would not fail to bring his peace through the promised 'seed' which we know as the Christ. (Galatians 3: 15ff; Galatians 4: 4).

The promise of spiritual glory, found in everlasting salvation through Christ, was the continual promise, the assured promise, of God given throughout the whole of the Old Testament, and realised in the New Testament at the coming of Christ, in the Christ giving his life as a ransom for sin, so securing peace to all who believe. The glory of God shines in this eternal peace brought in through and by Jesus Christ in a way that was never revealed in such fullness in the Old Testament. We see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

This is the promise held forth in the building of this temple in the time of Haggai. God promising that he would support and provide for the building of this temple, and set his glory there, is God reiterating his everlasting promise that he would bring in everlasting salvation for sinners. The temple rebuilding was an indication that God was preserving the human line through which the Christ would be born, according to his promise, which was that the seed of the woman would crush the serpents head.

CONCLUSION.

For God's people today this assured promise to Israel through Haggai is a comfort and assurance to us today. In the first place we can look back and see the faithfulness of God in bringing in his glory when he kept his promise to send the 'seed', his only begotten Son, to be victorious over Satan in his life, death, resurrection and ascension. God's promise is always assured. He never fails to keep his promises.

Together with this we who serve God today and seek to build his spiritual temple can be assured that God will not fail to save all those he gave to Christ for redemption. Christ assures us of this in his prayer in John 17: 2. The book of revelation assures us that God will protect his true church until this is accomplished, as is made clear in the revelation of the two witnesses in Revelation 11: 3-6.