Defying all odds

Haggai 2:1-9                        1 Peter 2:4-5; 9-10                         John 1:1-14

Defying all odds

How does one pick up the pieces of a broken life? The rising astronomical numbers of poverty and war-related deaths around the globe stun the mind and one cannot help but wonder how those who have lost loved ones, friends, homes, and most if not all their possessions will ever manage to salvage the battered wreckage of their lives again. How will they rekindle meaning and purpose after their whole world has been ripped apart? How will they piece together the fragments of their shattered hopes and dreams when they reflect on what appears to be the futility of it all? Humanity only seems to make peace to break peace.

In our Old Testament reading for this Christmas Eve, we read about the struggles of the returning Jewish exiles living in the ruins of what had once been the thriving and prosperous city of Jerusalem. In chapter one, the prophet Haggai wrote about how he had to deal with the discouragement that threatened to destroy them religiously, economically, politically, and socially. The people had initially returned with great excitement and enthusiasm, but their expectations were soon reduced to rubble by the sheer magnitude of the devastation that greeted them. Most began to think that any form of rebuilding was pointless and so had given up and turned to a life of self-preservation…an attitude rebuked sharply by the prophet. “Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your panelled houses, while this temple lies in ruins?” (Haggai 1:4)

He then challenged them to review their experience since they had returned. Had God blessed them? No, they had remained poverty-stricken despite their best individual efforts to gain personal wealth and stability. The solution was quite simple. If they were to rebuild anything, they had to unite and work together for the common good. To live in the shadow of grief and despair would restrict all forms of healthy recovery and growth. 

The response to this challenge was a unanimous decision to band together and resume work on the rebuilding of that which was the focal point of their lives as the people of God. A building that served to remind them of God’s presence among them. 

No doubt, a lot of preliminary work had to be done first…clearing the rubble, redressing usable stones, testing the safety of remaining walls and structures, and organising work teams to do the various tasks. In many ways, the same is necessary for emotional rebuilding. We must deal with the rubble cluttering our inner being. Some things must be removed before we can start the process of reconstruction. As painful as it is, there comes a time when one must dry all tears, take stock of the losses, and press on ahead. 

The theme of Haggai’s second sermon is that despite snags and hassles and delays and disappointments, the people needed to remain focused…not to lose courage…to be strong. He first addressed the nostalgic…those who remembered Solomon’s Temple in all its former glory. He knew that nostalgia often produces negativity. A morbid and often unrealistic preoccupation with looking back over your shoulder can have a paralysing effect on life. 

Nostalgia can also cause people to make disastrous decisions. Nostalgia can cause people to live in a fantasy world…to think that if they could only go back things would be better again…like the liberated Jews in the wilderness wanting to return to Egypt…or the liberated Jews in Haggai’s time wondering if giving up or even going back to Babylon would be a better option than trying to live in what must have seemed like a pipedream. 

For the Jewish returnees, nostalgia confused the issue. “Look,” they seemed to say. “This new Temple can never measure up to the one we remember. We don’t have the resources needed to get the job done properly. It simply cannot be done.” Backwards gazing can very easily cloud the present and make the future seem dark and foreboding. 

But Haggai’s message cast some light on their gloominess. “Be strong,” he said, echoing words spoken many centuries earlier as Israel faced the formidable task of taking the Promised Land. Two seemingly impossible situations and yet, in both cases, God promised that he was with them. Three times in this discourse God reminded them, “I am with you”. It is not by your effort, nor by your power or expertise or ingenuity or your resources, but by my Spirit. I will accomplish all I have promised. Trust me…believe me and move forward in faithful obedience.

This promise is repeated in the opening chapter of John’s Gospel. “And the Word became flesh and dwelt (or tabernacled or, if I may, “templed”) among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” How many times in the Gospels are we not reminded of his constant present and future abiding with us…even amid trial and trouble, suffering and sorrow, Jesus promised that he would be with us even to the end of the age. 

Knowing that God is with us is enough reason to pluck up our courage, renew our determination and strengthen our conviction that he will not permit his cause to fail. We base our hope on God’s track record, as it were. Not only do we see his faithfulness in the Exodus, the Conquest, the Restoration, and, indeed, throughout the 2nd Temple Period, but we also see it in the life, death, resurrection, ascension, and crowning of our Lord Jesus Christ as the triumphant and universal Davidic King of kings. And we have the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit as well as the continuing growth and expansion of the Church, despite severe persecution, oppression, resistance and, I dare say, despite ourselves.

Has God ever failed his people? Many thought he did as they struggled with frustration, and disillusionment, and despair. “How long, O Lord?” was and still is a frequently asked question. But Scripture and history testify to the fact that God has never deserted his people. 

Through the prophet Haggai, God reminded his people that his covenant cannot be annulled by circumstances be they ever so bleak. “Work,” God said, “for I am with you…according to the covenant that I made with you when you came out of Egypt. My Spirit remains in your midst. Fear not.”

In the final verses of his second message, Haggai gave the people a glimpse of God’s purpose and goal. Regardless of small beginnings, struggles, and setbacks, in the end, their efforts would not be in vain…God would prevail. Haggai portrayed the vindication of God’s people using an image of a global earthquake. Earthquakes are usually unexpected, devastating, and life-changing…there’s nothing like a massive shakeup to wake up humankind. Sad, but true.

But Haggai was not predicting a literal earthquake. What would shake the earth was not the earth itself, but rather the Messiah who, in the words of Simeon was destined for the rise and fall of many in Israel. His advent would change and has changed the world forever…nothing will ever be the same again. Immanuel. God is with us.

This messianic “upheaval” would result in a great influx of resources from the nations. The returnees complained that they could not build an adequate Temple because they lacked adequate resources, but Haggai told them that God would bring aid from unexpected sources, and the Temple that seemed so small in their eyes at that moment would become more glorious than anything they had ever experienced before. 

In one sense this was fulfilled when their oppressors were instructed to pay for the repairs and much later when an Idumean pretender to the throne built a Temple so vast and so luxuriously and magnificently decorated that it stunned and delighted visitors to Jerusalem. Herod began with an enormous expansion of the Temple Mount itself quite literally doubling its original area. From 7 hectares to 14.4 hectares. 

But like a gold ring in a pig’s snout, the spectacularly beautiful building was deceptive…it was not what God had intended it to be. Unlike the pagan gods of the nations, God does not live in buildings made of stone…he lives in the hearts of his followers. 

Haggai’s prophetic word concerning the Temple was fulfilled and is still being fulfilled as the people of God are joined together by the Holy Spirit to become a spiritual house made with living stones…where a holy priesthood offers themselves as living sacrifices to God through Jesus. His glory in and through the Church surpasses the glory of the former and latter Temples as much as the peace he gives surpasses the brittle and breakable peace offered by the world. 

If there is any value to be found in the message of Christmas at all, we must find it in the one who chose to be born amid the rubble of this devastated world…the Divine Son of God who took on human flesh so that he might become the cornerstone upon which broken lives can be rebuilt.

And so, we need not fear what to so many may seem like insurmountable odds. God will and does see us through if we trust him and continue to follow him in faith. The physical, mental, emotional, financial, and spiritual devastation experienced by so many people around the world cannot and must not be dismissed or diminished or demeaned. The losses are real, and the pain is real, and the horrors are real. 

But no one can move forward in the light if they are shackled to the darkness of the past. Through Haggai, God tells us we can do more than survive…in Jesus, we can, and we must thrive. Out of the pain of betrayal…out of the terrors of trial and torture…out of execution and death, the Babe of Bethlehem rose…not only to conquer but to reign. 

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2023