Haggai 1:3-11

Sometimes our concept of God limits our ability to recognize His acts. Yet God gives numerous clear statements and examples of what He will do to get His people to choose differently so He does not have to act more severely. Please turn to Haggai. In Haggai, God is dealing with a remnant of Judah after its return from Babylon, and He uses some creative ways to communicate that the nation’s focus and priorities are out of alignment with Him.

God’s communications—His nudges—come in more forms than lightning bolts or the earth opening and swallowing people. Here God called for a drought, a curse, on their productivity because they were focused on their own interests rather than God’s. He wanted them to work on His house so true worship could be restored, but the people had other priorities. They were putting off what God considered to be most important. So, He kept their work from prospering.

But this word through Haggai also shows that the people were out of alignment with God enough that He had to send someone to connect the dots for them. They were unable to do that on their own because of their condition. Maybe they recognized that things weren’t working out as expected, but because of where their focus truly was, they weren’t making the cause-and-effect connection, and God had to send Haggai.

For years, I have told people that when God acts or He wants us to act, we’re not going to miss the memo. My thought has been that God has ways of making things clear, and that is true. However, I either need to stop saying that or at least qualify it, because there are biblical examples, such as this one in Haggai, that show that God’s people can miss His memo if they are more concerned with their own things than the things of God.