Father, we ask that the Holy Spirit would fall with fresh power upon us at this time.
We are here to be in your presence, to receive from you in a worthy manner.
Help us, Father, to be here, knowing that we are in your presence,
that we are in the presence of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit.
And, Father, we ask that you speak to us through your word,
that your word would come deeply into our hearts,
and that we would respond in a way that is for our true good,
for the good of this city, the good of creation, and for your great glory.
So, Father, do that wonderful work of your Holy Spirit, we pray.
And we ask this in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Please be seated.
One of the things I tell people,
sometimes if people are asking me for a little bit of advice about how to handle a Bible study or a small group,
or for sometimes when I'm talking to people about sermons and how to do them,
is to, I mean, there's lots of different questions that we can ask,
but one of the questions to ask is, or just to realize,
that everything in the Bible is always speaking about something in our human condition.
It's speaking about some loves that we have, some fears that we have,
some hopes or yearnings that we have.
It's speaking about problems that we face.
It's speaking about the human condition, speaking about human problems, the human experience.
So part of the thing you can do is ask yourself, like, just for a second,
well, what human, and it can be more than one,
so what human thing is actually being addressed in this text?
We're preaching through the book of Haggai.
We're going to be doing a series in the summer called Knowing God,
where we'll look at a range of different texts about who God is.
But we're going through the book of Haggai.
And the text that we're looking at today actually speaks, not actually,
as if it's, well, what a surprise.
This week it does something different than the other weeks.
I have a bad habit of saying actually when I shouldn't.
This text talks about a very common human problem.
Maybe some of you are dealing with it now or have dealt with it in the past,
but if you haven't dealt with it yet, you're going to deal with it.
And the human problem is that you think about the situation you're in,
and the past was way better.
Either the present sucks, and the future either is just going to continue to suck
at the current level or it's going to even suck worse.
So you're in this situation.
The past was great.
The present sucks.
The future sucks.
So how do you deal with that?
Like how do you have hope when it just seems to be,
and not only that, it's not only that you know that the past seemed to be way better.
The present sucks.
The future sucks.
But the people around you would say the same thing.
Yeah, yeah, George, the past was way better.
Your current situation sucks.
And I don't see much hope.
All I see, as far as I can see, is just it sucks.
And how do you deal with that?
How do you live?
Or how do you actually try to do some things and actually accomplish something
if that's the situation that you're in?
And that's the situation that, in fact, one of the things that's so interesting about this story
is that's the situation, and God speaks into it.
And I think if we look at it, if you start to think,
okay, well, that's what's going on in this weird-sounding story
with these names that we can't pronounce,
you start to realize that the Bible says something very profound and powerful and wise
about the human condition and about hope, because we need hope to live.
So if you turn in your Bibles to Acts, I'm not Acts,
Haggai chapter 2, let's look at the text together.
Haggai chapter 2, verses 1 to 9.
And just the context, some of you, I know, are visual, very visual people.
And so if you're trying to imagine this text,
imagine photographs of Aleppo in Syria.
Imagine an area which has been completely and utterly devastated by war,
where, you know, there's the odd wall standing up, but there's rubble everywhere.
And that's the context of what's happening here.
And the context further is that this is taking place 66 years
after Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonians.
And so Babylon had destroyed the nation.
Jeremiah had prophesied that that was going to happen.
And it came true. But Jeremiah also prophesied that God was going to do another miracle,
that God was actually going to help some of the people would maintain their Jewish identity
and their worship and their reading of the Torah,
and that some would actually return to this place,
and that Jerusalem would end up eventually being rebuilt.
And that was partly what...
And so here we are, 66 years later,
we have a situation where people have come back to the city of Jerusalem,
and it's all in rubble.
They began to rebuild the temple,
but they got very severe pushback by the locals,
and so they gave up.
And it was in this context that Haggai begins to speak to them.
And first of all, he confronts them and says,
you need to put first things first.
If you want to have God bless you, you need to put first things first.
You need to have...you need to rebuild the temple.
And his word convicts them, the Holy Spirit convicts them,
and they start to rebuild the temple.
Just sort of before we go any further on that,
there's...you know, you've heard me say this a lot,
but it's well worth being...
I mean, one of the things we do about on Sunday mornings
is we come to be reminded of the truth that we need to be reminded of.
And what's at work in all of this
is that the people have forgotten God.
They've forgotten the Lord.
And because they'd forgotten him and rebelled against him,
they came under his judgment.
But the Lord had never forgotten them.
And the Lord had never forgotten his promises to them.
And here's the Christian context for us.
And this is very, very important to remember.
The Christian life is not about how strong your grip is in Jesus' hand.
The fact of the matter is, there will be times you really think,
yeah, I'm really holding on to Jesus really tight.
But there's going to be times when you've let go completely
or your hand is very weak.
But what matters isn't how strong your grip is in the hand of Jesus,
but his grip.
That's what matters.
That's your hope.
My hope is not that I have a really strong grip on Jesus.
My hope is that he has a very strong grip.
He has my hand and he will never let it go.
That's my hope.
And so it's in this context.
There's ruins.
They're just starting to rebuild.
It's been seven weeks since the last prophecy.
They've just begun to try to build and clear up the things
and to start to build the temple.
And it's in that situation that this text comes.
And here's how it goes.
In the seventh month, on the 21st day of the month,
the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai, the prophet.
Now, just sort of pause here.
This little seemingly meaningless little piece of information
is actually quite significant for a variety of reasons.
So first of all, it's telling us that there's been seven weeks.
In that seven weeks, there's been some Jewish festivals,
which they've kept.
They would have brought in some more of the harvest.
And they've also begun to rebuild the temple,
clear away some of the rubble,
and maybe try to figure out what stones they might be able to use
and looking for bits and pieces of wood they can use
and maybe even begin to think about how they could go out
to get the beams that they're going to have to get lumbered
and brought in close.
But they're just finishing the Feast of Tabernacles.
That's one of the things that this date tells us.
And this is actually not a sad thing for them,
but it's a reminder that God delivered their forebears,
their ancestors, out of slavery in Egypt
and to bring them into the Promised Land.
But when he brought them to the edge of the Promised Land,
they refused to go in.
They rebelled against him.
And so they spent 40 years in the wilderness
before eventually going into the Promised Land.
And in those 40 years in the wilderness,
they lived in tents and God provided for them.
And the Feast of the Tabernacles or the Feast of Booths
is that when they remember that.
But here's the thing.
Those of them that would have known their Tanakh,
they would have known their Torah,
they would have known that it was on this exact day
in the year 960 B.C.
that Solomon's temple was completed.
Now, one of the things to my shame is
my wife has lost both her mother and her father,
and I don't remember the dates of their death
or the dates of their birth.
But we all know that remembering the date of a lost one,
even many, many years later,
can cause some sadness, some sorrow.
I'm sure to my shame, not to my credit,
there's been some time my wife might be sad
and I might not remember that the reason she's sad
is that it was on that day,
whatever number of years ago,
that her mom died or her father died
or their birthday or something.
But anniversaries matter.
And so here we have a group of people amidst the rubble
trying to rebuild the temple.
And the day, some of them would remember,
this is the day 500 and some odd years earlier,
that the great temple of Solomon
was completed and dedicated.
And they just think of that
and they think of all that's been lost.
And they would definitely be looking
at what is in front of them
and thinking,
this doesn't look too good.
In fact, actually, God is going to walk towards that.
Look what happens in verse 2
and verse 3.
Speak now to Zerubbabel,
the son of Sheolatiel,
governor of Judah,
and to Joshua,
the son of Jehoshadak,
the high priest,
and to all the remnant of the people,
and say,
who is left among you
who saw this house in its former glory?
How do you see it now?
Is it not as nothing in your eyes?
Now this is one of the remarkable things about the Bible,
one of the powerful things about the Bible,
and one of the powerful things
that the Bible has to say about hope.
For the Bible,
hope isn't the same as optimism.
Optimism is,
things are going to get better.
I can make things better.
We can make things better.
I'm strong,
and you do that,
and we can do it.
We can all jump up and down
and do some chanting
and get psyched
and get pumped,
and we can deal with it,
and we can do things far better.
But the Bible never sugarcoats things,
and it's very interesting.
You see,
the beginning of hope
is the acknowledgement
of how bad the situation actually is.
Don't think about how bad things are.
The Bible doesn't say,
okay,
don't think about how bad things are.
Don't think about the past.
Repress those memories
of how the temple looked.
Because the temple
had been destroyed 66 years ago,
there would have been some people there in the crowd
who were 71 or 72 or older.
They would have remembered
what Solomon's temple looked like,
and even those who weren't there,
they would have heard stories
about how beautiful.
They would have heard the Tanakh read,
and they would have heard the stories
about how this temple was so beautiful
and the proportions
and the skilled workmanship
and the gold plating everywhere,
and it would have just looked
so majestic and glorious.
And they're thinking about all that past.
They have all that memory,
and they're looking at how the present,
the past was great,
the present sucks.
And as they're looking at these things,
what's going through their mind
is this is like nothing.
Like, this is like crap.
And God speaks right into it.
He doesn't say,
don't think in those terms.
He says, don't you think
that this is like nothing?
You see,
and this is another important thing
for us to remember as Christians.
It's one of the things
that the gospel makes
a very big difference for you and me.
It's not only in the gospel,
what really matters
is that Jesus,
when I put my hand in Jesus
to ask him to be my Savior and my Lord,
my hand will get weak often,
but his hand will never get weak.
He will never let me go.
He will never, ever, ever, ever,
ever let me go.
And one of the other things
which is so remarkable
is it's not that he's going to
never let me go
because everything within me
is just hunky-dory wonderful.
But he knows the confusion,
the problems,
the doubts,
the sin
that I have in my own life,
the sins of commission
and the sins of omission.
And still he loves me.
He knew all of that
when he died for me.
Still he loves me.
You see,
the fact of the matter is
is that part of the reason
that many of us
have problems praying
is that we sort of think
there's a certain type of way
we're supposed to be
and a certain type of wording
that we're supposed to say
before we can talk.
But the fact of the matter is
is that we say,
okay, I guess I better pray.
And the inside of our head,
if people could look
at the inside of our head,
the inside of our head
would look as if
there were 50 bees in there
all buzzing around
like this constantly.
And the fact of the matter is
is each one of those bees
is a thought.
And that's what's going on
inside of our head.
Or that we're just feeling
completely and utterly low
or completely depressed
or completely angry.
And what we do
is we try to repress that
or pretend it's not there
so that we can say the prayers
that we're supposed to pray.
But the fact of the matter is
is that Jesus isn't going
to let go of my hand
if I let slip
that my head is like 50 bees
buzzing like crazy.
He's not going to say,
oh gosh,
I'm going to let go
of George's hand.
No.
He already knows it.
In fact, prayer is the meeting
place of the reality
of who I am
with the reality
of who God is
and the reality
of his word
that I can say,
Lord, I can hardly put
one thought together
because that's what's
going on in my mind.
And in a sense,
I don't know what these people
are trying to pray,
but the fact of the matter
is is that God knows
that they think this sucks.
And when they look around
the rubble,
they think the future sucks.
Yes.
Gosh, the past was great.
And that just makes you
feeling more despondent,
more depressed,
more despairing.
And God just names it.
Listen to verse 3 again.
What does he say?
Not, oh, don't think
about those things
or oh, don't think about,
oh, he says,
who is left among you
who saw this house
in its former glory?
How do you see it now?
Is it not as nothing
in your eyes?
So what does God say
into this situation
after he's been realistic
with them about
what they're actually thinking,
what they're actually feeling?
Well, he walks towards
the problem
and then he says,
we'll look at verse 4 and 5
and then verse 6 and 9.
He says some very remarkable
things to them,
which,
and then actually
in verses 6 to 9,
we show up in the text,
believe it or not.
Yeah, actually,
we show up in the text
in between verse 6 and 9.
But first,
listen to what it says
in verse 4 and 5.
Okay, so it says,
nothing in your eyes?
Verse 4,
yet now be strong,
O Zerubbabel,
declares the Lord.
Be strong,
O Joshua,
son of Jehozadak,
the high priest.
Be strong,
all you people of the land,
declares the Lord.
Work,
not just work or else,
but work,
for I am with you,
declares the Lord of hosts.
According to the covenant,
he's with them,
how?
He's with them
according to the covenant
that I made with you
when you came out of Egypt.
My spirit,
my Holy Spirit,
remains in your midst.
Fear not.
That's the first word
that he says
when they think
the past is great,
the present sucks,
the future looks like more suck.
And he,
first of all,
for some of them,
there's this great resonance,
an echo,
of the book of Joshua.
If you go back
and read Joshua 1,
in fact,
I was sharing
at the earlier service,
when my kids were younger,
we used to have these cassettes
that we'd play all the time
when we were driving.
And they were GT
and the Halo Express.
I don't know
if they're still available,
but we loved them.
My kids liked them
at the time,
and they were able
to learn Bible memorizing verses.
As soon as I see this,
I'm thinking,
have I not commanded
you be strong and courageous?
Have I not commanded
you be strong and courageous?
Do not.
Anyway,
I won't sing anymore for you.
I'll drive you all away.
But the fact of the matter
is if you read Joshua 1,
there's this constant refrain
as they're about to enter
into the promised land.
They've ended the time
in the tent.
They're about to enter
in the promised land,
and God says to Joshua,
be strong,
be strong.
And so here they are.
They're embarked
in the midst of the rubble.
They're still under
the Persian Empire,
and they're about to,
they've just begun the work
of rebuilding the temple.
And why does the temple matter?
The temple,
well,
we'll get to that more
in a moment.
And God's word to them
is be strong,
be strong,
be strong.
And for some of them,
they'd go,
that just is like
what God said to Joshua
and the people of Israel
as they're about to build.
But there's something else
which is here.
It's not just that
they're to work,
but they're to work
knowing that God is with them.
And God isn't with them
just sort of as some type
of a presence
or some type of judgmental presence
or just some mere,
like, power.
No,
he's present
as the God
who is in covenant
with them.
He has never,
they have forgotten
his promises.
They have not wanted
him to be with them,
but he wants
to be with them
and that's what matters.
And he's with them
as the Lord.
Now,
this,
we can't really get,
I came up,
hopefully this analogy
will help you a little bit.
All the gender neutral stuff
and I don't know
how many different pronouns
there are.
In some ways,
it made me realize
that in the Jewish people,
there were a generic word
for God.
God.
And then there was,
you know,
other names for specific gods.
And then there was the Lord.
And the significance is
they don't use the word Elohim,
which is generic God.
They use the word Lord.
And the difference between Elohim
or generic God
and Lord
is the difference between
my children referring to me
as the sperm donor
or dad.
It's the difference between
my wife referring to me
as the sperm donor.
Or husband.
The difference is huge.
I'm not just
yet another sperm donor.
I am the kid's dad.
And they get to call me dad.
They don't get to call me sperm donor.
They get to call me dad.
And these are relationship words.
These are not only relationship words,
but they're covenant words.
And so all the way through this text,
if you were,
like an interesting activity for you
would be to write out
or type out
all of Haggai
or print it out
and then go and take a marker
and highlight
every time the word Lord
or Lord of hosts
appears in the text.
And it's just saturated with this.
All of this speaking
is he's using the words
to remind them
that he is not just
the generic God.
He is their God.
That he has created
a covenant for them.
He has never given up
on the covenant.
They have given up on it,
but he has never given up
on the covenant
with them
and he will continue
to fulfill it.
And that is the God
who has led them out
of slavery and bondage
that he did it
by his own power
and he led them out.
He kept them
in the wilderness.
He brought them
into the promised land
and it's the same Lord
who is in covenant
with them,
who's speaking with them
and he says,
what he's saying to them
is that I don't care
about the building
so much
is that the building
is just a sign
that you want me
to be with you.
It would be as if,
you know,
it's the same type
of thing.
If Louise and I
were going to go out
to go to a patio
and as we're going out
I'd said,
I think I'm going to
take my wedding ring off
and leave it home.
She'd go,
what?
I could take your,
well actually
she might not say anything.
The whole evening
we're in the patio
she might not say anything
and then I would get it.
And you know what?
All of you folks
would say,
you go girl.
You lay into him.
He deserves it.
Why?
Well because this little
piece of metal
isn't just a piece of metal.
It's a sign
that I'm married to Louise.
And if she knew
that I was going out
taking the ring off
she'd know that
that was something wrong.
She'd say,
George,
the ring is a sign
that we're married.
The ring is a sign
that I matter to you.
The ring is a sign
that you have forsaken
all others.
And so that's what's going on
with the temple.
God says,
the temple is a sign
that you want me
to be with you.
I don't need a temple
but it's a sign
that you want me
to be with you.
That's why last week
you have to put me first.
And putting me first is,
you know,
like you could just
well imagine,
George,
I'm not going to have,
Louise could say to me,
I'm not going to have
the conversation with you
until you put the ring
back on your finger.
And we're going to have
a conversation.
Put the ring on,
let's talk.
And God is saying,
you've got to put me first.
Build the temple.
And be strong.
Why?
Because I am with you.
Now some of us might say,
well, George,
that's all interesting.
It's all this Jewish stuff
that's all the way back.
And some of you
might be wondering,
you know,
why did they actually believe
that this came from God?
Like,
why did the Jewish people
put it in the Bible?
Well,
it's actually the next verses
that both are why
they would have put it
in the Bible,
understood that this was something
that really did come from God,
and it's also the next verses
that give this whole other
area of hope.
Like,
their hope in the midst
of the fact that the past
seemed to be great,
the present sucks,
and the future sucks.
Part of the thing is,
God just says to them,
listen,
I'm with you.
I am your Lord.
I am the God of covenant.
You've got to just go ahead
and work on those things.
But then,
the promise continues
in a very different way
that helps to shape
our understanding of hope.
We show up.
Listen to what it says.
Verses 6, 7, 8, and 9.
For thus says the Lord of hosts,
yet once more in a little while,
and I will shake the heavens
and the earth
and the sea and the dry land,
and I will shake all nations
so that the treasures
of all nations shall come in,
and I will fill this house
with glory,
says the Lord of hosts.
The silver is mine
and the gold is mine,
declares the Lord of hosts.
The latter glory of this house
shall be greater than the former,
says the Lord of hosts.
And in this place,
I will give peace,
declares the Lord of hosts.
Now,
just sort of not going that in order,
one of the things
which is really interesting there
is when he says,
the gold is mine
and the silver is mine,
because you see,
one of the reasons
they're so depressed
about the present
is,
I mean,
the original temple
had all the gold,
everything,
everything was covered in gold.
It would have looked
just so spectacular.
And they're looking at this,
and they're going to be
taking things of rubble.
The Babylonians
stripped the temple
of everything,
all the,
anything of value
in the entire land
was taken to Babylon.
The Ark of the Covenant
was lost,
taken to Babylon.
Everything's been taken away.
They're just dealing
with rubble
and some stones.
But God says,
listen,
I don't care about gold.
I own all the gold.
You think I'm worried
about gold in the temple?
I own all the gold.
You think I'm worried
about silver?
I own all the silver.
I don't need any silver or gold.
Like,
it's not about silver or gold.
Right?
He said,
build my house.
But then there's
all this language
of shaking
and I didn't know this
before I started
to work on the sermon,
but it's a Hebrew idiom.
It's a way of expressing
what happens
when God shows up.
That God shakes.
It's a theophany.
That's the geeky
theological word.
It's theophany language.
It's the language
of God showing up.
And if you go back
and you read Exodus,
when God shows up
to make the covenant in Exodus,
there's a lightning
and there's earthquakes
and all of that type of stuff.
And even in the New Testament,
when God shows up
in different ways,
like when Jesus appears
to Saul of Tarsus
on his way
to kill Christians
or throw them in jail,
Jesus just shows up
and the first thing
that happens
is everybody
gets knocked off
their horses.
Everybody just gets
knocked on the ground.
In one of the,
I think it's in John's gospel,
when they come,
Judas comes to capture
Jesus
and they say,
are you Jesus?
And he says,
I am.
And it just,
the Holy Spirit,
God shows up,
the Holy Spirit just,
they all fall down.
They get shaken.
They can't stand up.
And it's this powerful image
of that when the true God comes
and things get shaken up.
And so he says,
I'm going to come
and I'm going to be amongst,
I'm going to shake up the earth
and the heavens
and everything.
I'm going to shake up the nations
so that the nations will come in
and they're going to fill
this house with glory.
And there's going to be,
in a sense,
the treasures are going
to be brought in
and all of these types of things.
And this is one of the reasons
then why it is
that they would have known
that this was a prophecy
that was actually from God
that they had to keep
and remember.
Why is it?
Well,
because they knew
that within a year or two
of this prophecy,
why were they able
to finish the temple?
Because the emperor of Persia
paid for it.
I mean,
just think of it
in today's terms,
the Ayatollah of Iran
says to the Jewish people,
I want you to build my temple.
And I'm giving you
a blank check.
And they would have gone,
what?
We don't have the resources
to build the temple
and the emperor of Persia
just sent a directive
to all of his bureaucrats
in the region
that I want the tax money
from this region
to build the temple
for Yahweh?
That's what happened.
And fast forward,
Herod's great temple
that Jesus appeared at.
Herod wasn't Jewish.
An Edomite
built
one of the marvels
of the ancient world.
The temple
to the God of Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob
was built for
by Edomites.
And his friends
were all pagans.
Pagans
paid for the temple
to make it glorious.
And here's where
we show up
in the story.
You see,
the Jewish people,
in a sense,
the Jewish people,
they look at this
and they just see
that part about
the shaking of the earth
and they think
that they didn't,
it wasn't until
Jesus came
and authenticated himself
and vindicated himself
as the Messiah
that we realize
that God
is fulfilling
these prophecies
in a series of stages
that the full shaking
of the heaven,
I mean,
there was a shaking
that did happen
with Jesus
when the temple,
the curtain in the temple
is torn in two
from the top to the bottom
so that the access
to God
is now shown
to be open
because of Jesus
having died upon the cross.
But we see there,
you know,
at the Easter sermon,
I talked about
how in the Big Bang
you have
all of the universe,
all it emerges
out of this Big Bang
in a moment
and everything
can be traced back
to this propulsion.
Things are moving
apart from each other
and in the same way
that's what God does
on a Friday afternoon
and an early Sunday morning
in Jerusalem
where there is a man
that is rejected
by the people
and he dies
a shameful death
upon the cross
and on the third day
the tomb is empty,
he appears alive
and from this one little
tiny insignificant moment
there becomes an explosion
that nobody believed
on an Easter Sunday
all of a sudden
Mary knows.
And then some people
going to Emmaus
and then Peter knows
and then John knows
and then the eleven disciples,
ten of the disciples know
and then Jesus' mother
and brothers know
and then five hundred know
and then with Pentecost
it continues to grow
and from that one little moment
on Good Friday
and on Easter Sunday
from that one insignificant event
that was so insignificant
that no historian
at the time
would have thought
that it mattered
there has been
this propulsive growth
of the Christian faith
so that it is the only
universal faith
of every culture
and it continues to grow
all from that one moment
of propulsion.
See the fact of the matter is
what does it say here
in verse nine?
And in this place
I will give peace
declares the Lord.
In this place
the one greater
than the temple
shows up at the temple.
Jesus, the true meeting place
between the human being
and God.
The true temple
arrives at the temple
and the true sacrifice
that the temple
is all about
is about to take place.
That all of the sacrifices
specified in the laws
are just a foreshadowing
of the one true Lamb of God
who would die
for the sin of the world
not only in the earth
but in the heavenlies
and that would be
the one sacrifice
that makes all the sacrifices
that had happened before
have any value or worth
and that from now on
that we no longer need
because the one complete
perfect Lamb of God
sacrificed himself
so that human beings
could have peace with God.
And so this text continues.
The even greater temple,
the glory of God himself
showing up
is all fulfilled
in this text
which prophesies
that it's all fulfilled.
And even the nations
coming to Israel
is all fulfilled.
If you have not yet
had a chance to go to Israel,
someday go to Jerusalem.
And it is so wonderful.
You go to Jerusalem
and you see the pilgrims
from Uganda,
from Nigeria,
from South Africa,
from Korea,
from China,
from Argentina,
from Canada,
from the whole world
coming there
from all people groups.
And we know that
at some point in time
Jesus will return
and all things
will be shaken
and there will be
a new heaven
and a new earth
and God will dwell with us.
And it's all there
in this particular text.
Just sort of bringing
this whole thing
to some type of closing.
See, here's the way
it works psychologically
for us
and one of the reasons
we need to come to church
and gather around the word
is to be reminded of it.
What's my fallback position?
I can't do it,
so I won't.
What does the Bible say?
George, I want you
to know that you can't.
But he will and can
so that I can say I will.
You see, this is,
and you know,
some of you know
I've just been so
enraptured with the story
the last year or more
of Jesus turning the water
into wine
and it's more and more
just made me realize
that a big part
of the whole Christian life
is in that very first miracle
that Jesus ever did.
That, you know,
Jesus asks for my obedience
and he does the great work
of grace.
If I just trust him
that he loves me
and he's asked me
to be obedient with him
with my money
or with my sexuality
or with my time,
that he does the great work
if I'm obedient.
Because in that miracle,
it's such a wonderful miracle,
Jesus asks the men
to put water into a stone jar
and take it to the feast.
And that's all they do.
He turns the water into wine.
And that's so much
of what the Christian life
is like.
George, just trust my word.
Obey me in this.
I'm going to turn
the water into wine.
You don't have,
that's not even your job.
You can't even do it, George.
Like, stop thinking
you can do it.
Don't be stupid.
Just obey.
It's my job
to turn the water into wine.
And that's the thing here
that he gives the people hope.
He says, listen,
just start building the temple.
And they start to build the temple.
And a year or two later,
they get the news.
They're probably just doing it.
Who knows?
They don't tell you about it.
They're just doing it.
Read Ezra and all a little bit about it.
And then they get the news
that the emperor of Persia
is going to give them
all the money they need.
And little did they know
that they're just fulfilling
what God has said
and that by them fulfilling
what God has said,
the people would continue.
And one day there would be a person,
in a sense,
from their loin
in the line of Jeroboam,
who would come
and be the temple
who is greater than the temple,
the true temple
and that true peace would be made.
And all of these great
and glorious things
will culminate
with Jesus coming a second time.
And all they do
is their tiny little bit
of obedience.
And God makes
this most remarkable wine
down the road
that they could never
possibly imagine.
And God invites us
to do the same thing.
Many of us are old enough
to remember
when churches
were way more full
and there were way more churches
and youth groups
were way more big
and it's really easy to say
what's the point
of trying to build things?
The past was great,
the present sucks
and I don't know
all of the trends
and say the future
is just going to suck.
And Jesus says,
build my church,
preach the gospel,
sing my praises,
invest in youth groups,
invest in ministry,
invest in missionaries,
proclaim Jesus.
You be obedient,
I'll make the wine.
Just one final thing
to close it.
I was talking to somebody
this week
who's gone through
a long season
of great sickness.
And this is one of the things
which is so wonderful
about biblical hope
and the reason
we need to be reminded
about it.
See, the Christian hope
doesn't say,
hope in me
and all your lesser hopes
I'm going to annihilate.
No, the Bible doesn't say
you shouldn't plant tomatoes
and plants
and hope that you'll get tomatoes.
It doesn't say
I shouldn't go to school
and hope I get a good job.
It doesn't say
I should maybe hope
I can get married
and all that.
No, it doesn't.
But what the Bible does
is it both grounds your hope
and reorders your hope
when he is first.
But the fact of the matter is
there will come a point in time
when humanly speaking
there is no hope.
There will come a point in time
when the cancer diagnosis
is final.
There will come a point in time
when you will be
in a very, very long season
of sickness
and when it's over
there still might be
some disability
that might be the rest
of your days.
Some of you might be
already facing that diagnosis
at the beginning of dementia
the cancer of which
is now inoperable.
But not only does the Bible
ground the small hopes
but the important hopes
that make up our daily life
but the Bible portrays
for the people of Jesus
who put their faith
and trust in Jesus
that there is an ultimate
final hope
that death is not final.
And I was able to pray
with this person
and say,
Father, thank you so much.
Father, we ask for healing.
We ask for wisdom
for the doctors.
We ask for comfort
and healing of memories
and the ability to handle
the situation
which is for you.
But Father, most of all
we ask that you fill us
both with hope.
Father, it is so good to know
that the day will come
when you,
I was referring to the other person,
when we will have
resurrected bodies.
And we will be in the new heaven
and the new earth.
And that is our final hope.
You see, because at the end of the day
the final hope
for all of us as Christians
is that even when we do come
to the valley of the shadow of death
and we have to walk
and enter into the valley
of the shadow of death
and we will not emerge
on this side of death
but that we will actually walk
into the valley of the shadow of death,
that we do it in the hands of Jesus,
that he is our victor,
he is our great sacrifice.
And when we emerge
from the valley of the shadow of death
on the far side
in the presence
of our heavenly Father,
he will look at us
with the world's biggest smile
and say,
I am so glad you are with me.
Welcome.
I love you so much.
I have a kingdom prepared for you.
I have a new body prepared for you.
And every day that you have been mine,
I have seen you face to face,
but now today you see me face to face
for the first time.
And your seeing me face to face
will be the end of your story
for the end of your days.
And that is the final word
for even the most least
and most broken Christian.
that is our ultimate hope.
It can never be taken away.
I invite you to stand in closing.
Just stand.
Let's pray.
Father, we give you thanks and praise
that you have made us
as human beings
to be able to hope in the future
and that hope is in fact important for us
as being fruitful
and being fruitful in the earth.
We thank you, Father.
We thank you that even when we sinned
and rebelled
and things got all broken
and twisted within us,
that that didn't get taken away from us
and we thank you, Father,
that you are the God of hope,
that our faith in Christ
is to shape our hope
and ground our hope,
our main big hope
that goes into all eternity
and those lesser hopes
that we are important
in day-to-day affairs
and week-to-week
and month-to-month.
And Father, we ask that you make us
deeply aware of Jesus
and what he did for us on the cross.
We thank you that he will never let us go
when we put our hand in his,
that he will never let us go.
And we give you thanks and praise
that in him,
you have prepared for us
an eternity beyond our worth,
beyond what we deserve,
purely as a gift,
that we are your child
and we will know you face-to-face.
And so, Father,
we ask that you help us
to be more hopeful
as we face each day,
as we rebuild this church
and help the rebuilding
of other churches,
as we spread the gospel
and share the gospel
and lift Jesus high.
Father, fill us with hope.
And we ask this in the name of Jesus,
your Son and our Savior.
Amen.