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Taking Care of the Temple: Haggai & Zechariah
Relationships are everything. You can imagine what it might be like to suddenly experience a loss of communication. Communication is what connects us with each other. But communication (at least good communication) does not take place by accident - it requires intentionality. Communication - relationships - require effort.
What makes things complicated for us is that much of our communication conveys things that are not quite true, painting pictures that do not quite match what is real. Not all the messages are accurate or clear. We get caught up with other stories, other narratives, other views of reality that distract us from what is genuinely real.
The message of Haggai and Zechariah calls us to return to the real story, to reorder our values and priorities. To build the temple once again - that place where the true stories are told and the real narratives written. Without the temple we become overwhelmed with the other stories that are being told around us, and we lose perspective. When we lose perspective, we lose our way. As we reflect on the messages of Haggai and Zechariah, we hear a call to rebuild, to finish the work of rebuilding the temple. What is communicated there matters. Not because some sort of rite or ritual purity is required to make us acceptable to an annoyed god of some sort, but because it is there the stories are told, and that we engage the Great Story that we are a part of again. It is there that we find the presence of God in rich and meaningful ways that are rich and unique.
Most importantly of all, it is there in the context of the Temple, the place where the Great Story is told, that the messiah will come, and the greatest Story of all will be told. The clearest picture of what is really real will be revealed. This is what Zechariah anticipates when he urges them to rebuild and complete the temple. In fact, when Jesus comes, He tells that He is indeed the One toward whom the temple pointed. That He Himself would fulfill, and replace, the temple. (You can read about this in John 2). What's more, as Paul speaks of in 1 Corinthians 12, we too would get to be a part of that Story that Jesus told, lived and was, by being a part of the body of Christ - the Temple of God. For us the message rings true - it is time to rebuild the temple, to re-engage the stories, to let what is really real be restored to the central place in our lives, and allow that Story to shape ours.
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Haggai 1
(TNIV)
2 This is what the Lord Almighty says: “These people say, ‘The time has not yet come to rebuild the Lord’s house. ’”
3 Then the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai: 4 “Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses, while this house remains a ruin? ”
5 Now this is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways. 6 You have planted much, but harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it.”
7 This is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways. 8 Go up into the mountains and bring down timber and build my house, so that I may take pleasure in it and be honored, ” says the Lord. 9 “You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little. What you brought home, I blew away. Why?” declares the Lord Almighty. “Because of my house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with your own house.
Zechariah 3
(TNIV)
Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan[a]standing at his right side to accuse him. 2 The Lord said to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you, Satan! The Lord, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebuke you! Is not this man a burning stick snatched from the fire?”
3 Now Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes as he stood before the angel. 4 The angel said to those who were standing before him, “Take off his filthy clothes.”
Then he said to Joshua, “See, I have taken away your sin, and I will put fine garments on you.”
5 Then I said, “Put a clean turban on his head.” So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him, while the angel of the Lord stood by.
6 The angel of the Lord gave this charge to Joshua: 7 “This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘If you will walk in obedience to me and keep my requirements, then you will govern my house and have charge of my courts, and I will give you a place among these standing here.
8 “‘Listen, High Priest Joshua, you and your associates seated before you, who are men symbolicof things to come: I am going to bring my servant, the Branch. 9 See, the stone I have set in front of Joshua! There are seven eyes[b] on that one stone, and I will engrave an inscription on it,’ says the Lord Almighty, ‘and I will remove the sin of this land in a single day.
10 “‘In that day each of you will invite your neighbor to sit under your vine and fig tree, ’ declares the Lord Almighty.”
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