Put God First and Trust Him to Provide

Put God First and Trust Him to Provide  

 

God gives all of His children a test or a challenge. And that challenge is the same for every generation.  God challenges or commands us to put Him first, to give ourselves to Him and then to trust Him to provide our daily necessities. The first commandment of the Ten Commandments calls us to put God first. “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.” .  (Exodus 20:3)  

 

Along with God’s challenge, He gives us a promise.  He promises that if we put Him first, He will bless our lives and that His Presence will be with us and help us. One of the many Bible passages repeating this God-given promise says: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these other things shall be added unto you.”  (Matthew 6:33) God calls us to believe and reckon as true His promise that when we focus on serving Him, He will be with us and bless us.

 

In the Bible in the book of Haggai, we read of a time when the Jewish people were struggling with this very challenge – the challenge of putting God first.  The year was 520 B.C. and God had called the Jewish people to re-build His temple, which had been destroyed.  It was important that God’s people have a place to worship Him.  With enthusiasm they had started re-building, but then trouble came!  The Jewish builders let a few things discourage them and they just quit!    

 

People from nations or tribes nearby who didn’t believe in God had been mocking their efforts as they started working on the temple.  And also, a near-by king was threatening to harm them if they kept on working to build God’s temple. And an enemy nearby threatened to tear down any new temple they would build.  Nothing has changed. So often when God’s people try to build for God they are mocked or put down.

 

 Some of the older Jewish people who were living before the first temple had been destroyed were upset and disappointed that this new temple wasn’t going to be as big or grand as the first temple had been.  These older folks could remember how magnificent Solomon’s temple had been and they felt that this new smaller temple wouldn’t measure up.

 

So, from their own people as well as from their enemies outside, the workmen working on God’s temple were criticized, threatened and discouraged with their work for God.

 

Instead of listening to God’s call, the Jewish people listened to the mockers and the hecklers.  They put their tools down and quit working on God’s temple.  Instead they put their energies into re-building their own houses, doing their own thing.  Sixteen long years passed, and they were still busy doing home improvement projects and buying fancy paneling and putting it into their homes.  Showing off.  And God’s temple was still laying there abandoned and forgotten in the ruins.  They could do it all.  They didn’t seem to need to meet with God?

 

After a while a drought came over the land and the crops of our little Jewish community weren’t doing so well. The Jewish people wanted to be practical and not start re-building the temple until they had a better year.  Anyway, perhaps they didn’t need to worship together in the temple or bring their sacrifices to God.  Couldn’t they be religious on their own terms without taking time out for God? 

 

God missed His people and wanted them back.  He sent the prophet Haggai to the Jewish people with a message.  Haggai was God’s messenger and His prophet.  God often sent prophets to the nation of Israel with His messages and the Jewish people had learned that often God spoke to them through prophets that He raised up.  Haggai, the prophet, told the Jewish people that God wanted them to make Him important in their lives again, to put Him first.  God wanted His people to finish their work on the temple so that they could worship Him there. (Haggai 1 and 2)

 

Haggai told the people that their crops were failing because they were more concerned with building beautiful houses for themselves than in re-building God’s temple. That all their efforts at building their own kingdom could never produce lasting results.  God’s prophet, Haggai talks about clean and unclean things and their influence.  He speaks of how allowing unclean things into the fellowship of God’s people can contaminate the whole group.  Perhaps these unclean things were referring to the lack of faith these people showed – their lack of concern for God and for finishing His temple.

 

God answered the people’s disappointment that the temple they had started to re- build would be smaller than the former one.  Haggai told the Jewish people that God had revealed that if they would be strong and work hard to finish His temple that in the future that God would shake the nations and “they shall come to the Desire of All Nations, and I will fill this temple with glory.” (Haggai 2:7) “The glory of this latter temple (the one they had neglected) shall be greater than the former one, says the Lord of Hosts.  And in this place, I will give “Peace” says the Lord of Hosts.”  (Haggai 2:9) In other words, the Jewish builders’ hard work for a little while would be used by God into eternity!  The One whom all the nations have desired (Jesus Christ) will be displayed in splendor in the temple.  – the little temple that they would build!     

 

The Jewish people listened to God’s message from Haggai and they all repented of their sin of neglecting God’s work for so long.   They all agreed to get back to the work of finishing God’s temple.  (Haggai 1:12-15) And God stirred up the spirit of the builders and the people and they all came together and worked on the house of the Lord of hosts, their God.   God promised the people that He was with them and that from that day on that He would bless them.  (Haggai 2:19) They would have abundance again – not only in their crops but in their spirits.

 

What can we learn from this little Bible story from so long ago?  First, we can remember that God also wants us to put Him first. That we are not to just selfishly take care of ourselves – build up our own houses or fortunes and ignore God’s.  We do not belong to ourselves; we belong to God.  He (Christ) has paid the price (His blood) for our salvation.  Scripture says: “You are not your own, you are bought with a price.” (1 Corinthians 19b and 20a)   

Also, we can learn that we must not abandon His church, or the habit of coming together on a regular basis to worship Him with fellow brothers and sisters in Christ.  Scripture says: “Let us not forsake the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much more as you see the Day (when Jesus comes again) approaching.”  (Hebrews 10:23) We need to find a church that worships God and believes the Bible and get involved. 

We can learn that just as God promised to be with His people long ago in our story, He promises the same for His people today.  The Holy Spirit is an abiding gift to the people of God.  And God also promises to bless us and to make our work prosper. That even though we may be disappointed with how little our work for God seems to be, that God will use what we give Him and multiply it and cause it to shine throughout all eternity!