Consider Your Ways

The temple lay unfinished for about 16 years.

Overview

'Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your cieled houses, and this house lie waste?' 'Consider your ways. Ye have sown much, and bring in little.' The people obeyed and God said, 'I am with you.'

Going deeper

Priorities shape blessing. Obedience is met with God's presence.

Key verses (KJV)

Haggai 1:4 Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your cieled houses, and this house lie waste?
Haggai 1:5 Now therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts; Consider your ways.
Haggai 1:13 Then spake Haggai the Lord’s messenger in the Lord’s message unto the people, saying, I am with you, saith the Lord.

From the commentaries

4. Is it time—It is not time (Hag 1:2), ye say, to build Jehovah's house; yet how is it that ye make it a fit time not only to build, but to "dwell" at ease in your own houses? you, O ye—rather, for "you, you"; the repetition marking the shameful contrast between their concern for themselves, and their unconcern for God [Maurer]. Compare a similar repetition in 1Sa 25:24; Zec 7:5. ceiled—rather, "wainscoted," or "paneled," referring to the walls as well as the ceilings; furnished not only with comfort but luxury, in sad contrast to God's house not merely unadorned, but the very walls not raised above the foundations. How different David's feelings (2Sa 7:2)!
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown, Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory (1871)

Verse 4 Is it time for you - If the time be not come to rebuild the temple, it cannot be come for you to build yourselves comfortable houses: but ye are rebuilding your houses; why then do ye not rebuild the house of the Lord? The foundation of the temple had been laid fourteen years before, and some considerable progress made in the building; and it had been lying waste in that unfinished state to the present time.
Adam Clarke, Adam Clarke's Commentary (1810-1826)

4. Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your ceiled houses, and this house lie waste? 4. An tempus vobis, ut habitatis vos in domibus vestris tabulatis, et domus haec deserta?
John Calvin, John Calvin's Commentaries (16th century, Calvin Translation Society, 1840s-1850s)

Application

What 'house' have you neglected?
Where have you sown much and harvested little?
What does 'I am with you' mean today?

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