Day 267 Reading Schedule: Haggai 1-2 

Haggai 1: Building the Temple by God 

[Overview]

This chapter is Haggai's first sermon, and it shows that the first thing the Israelites had to do after being taken captive was to rebuild the temple. At that time, the serious problem for them was that the Israelites' passion for Jehovah had cooled, they were lethargic, and they wanted to settle for reality. Therefore, God commanded Haggai to rebuild the temple, the center of Israel's life, along with a spiritual awakening movement. This chapter, which contains this content, can be divided into the first half (verses 1-11) that conveys God's instructions to rebuild the temple, and the second half (verses 12-15) that shows that the people obeyed the instructions.

Haggai 2: Promise of Blessings to Israel

[Overview]

After hearing God's instructions, the Israelites began to rebuild the temple. However, less than a month after starting construction, the construction was halted again.  This is because the grandeur of this temple was so shabby that it could not even be compared to Solomon's temple. However, God again gave Haggai a message to continue rebuilding, showing that although it was not as good as the temple being built now, God's glory could shine even brighter. The core of the message that Haggai was conveying was that the way to receive God's grace was not in any external conditions, but in true faith that relies on God, so do not be discouraged or disappointed, and continue rebuilding the temple. In fact, human judgment cannot help but be based on the appearance of the object. Therefore, when the foundation stone of Zerubbabel's temple was laid, many elders of Israel who remembered the grandeur of Solomon's temple before it could not help but fall into great sorrow and disappointment. They even began to doubt whether God's glory had left Israel. However, this message that God gave through Haggai at this time, "The glory of this temple will be greater than its former glory" (verse 9), cannot but be a hopeful message from the perspective of the history of redemption toward Jesus Christ, in terms of the gradualness of revelation.  This chapter, which contains such content, can be divided into the first half (verses 1-9) that announces the glory of God that will come to the temple in the future and urges the rebuilding of the temple, and the second half (verses 10-23) that points out Israel's impure faith and ultimately announces that God will give blessings.