The Old Testament book of Haggai is 2 chapters, 38 verses, long and recounts one of the minor prophet’s missions to get people to help rebuild the temple. This message could have been delivered one of two ways. For many of us, we’d go directly to guilt and shame. “How dare you work on other things! Why isn’t the house of God built first?!” I’m sure we’ve all seen (and hopefully left) leaders who try to manage with guilt and shame.
Haggai, however, gives a message of positivity and encouragement. Haggai challenges the people: the reason they were not being blessed was because they had not rebuilt the Lord's temple. Instead, they had focused on rebuilding their own homes and fields. This is classic modern American Christian, “I just don’t feel like I’m hearing any encouragement from God,” while in the same breath, “I don’t think I’ve studied my Bible in over a year.”
Haggai says this in 1:5-7, “5 Now, therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts: Consider your ways. 6 You have sown much, and harvested little. You eat, but you never have enough; you drink, but you never have your fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns wages does so to put them into a bag with holes. 7 “Thus says the Lord of hosts: Consider your ways.”
The world went and got itself in a big hurry. We are all so busy. We move frantically from appointment, to errand, to soccer practice, to whatever’s next without ever considering why. It’s just what we do. Especially in the Northeast, if they weren’t complaining/bragging about being so busy some people wouldn’t have anything to talk about.
Haggai’s challenge for the people and for us is simply to reexamine our motives and priorities. Sure there are things that need to get done in the day to day, but it is much more important to put your focus on things that will last.
Haggai 1:13 …I am with you declares the LORD.