Haggai 1:6-7

“You have sown much, but harvest little; you eat, but there is not enough to be satisfied; you drink, but there is not enough to become drunk; you put on clothing, but no one is warm enough; and he who earns, earns wages to put into a purse with holes.” Thus says the Lord of hosts, “Consider your ways!^[1]

Nothing happens by accident in the economy of God. We live in a time when people want to credit chance for the things that happen around us or to us. But God does not operate by chance. He does not, as Albert Einstein said, “play dice with the universe.” Instead, there is a cause and effect principle with which we all must contend. It is this one simple principle most of use learned in school early on, “for every action there is a corresponding and equal reaction.”

Such was the case with the Jews to whom Haggai wrote. They were enduring very hard times for which their actions, or in this case their inaction, was responsible. They were responsible for the rebuilding of the temple but acquiesced that responsibility and as a consequence were experiencing God’s retribution. Their harvest was not equal to what they had sown. There was not enough food to go around; not enough libations to make them drunk; it was so cold that they could not put on enough clothes to get warm; and, the very ones who paneled their house were suddenly in an economic crisis.

Many people today believe that God is too good to exact such retribution. They look at occurrences like this in the Old Testament and credit the incident to just another example of a vengeful, wrathful God that no longer exists since Jesus rose from the dead. But the God of the Old Testament is the same God of the New Testament. We should see from the Book of Haggai just how serious God is about the instructions that He gives. The drought, famine, and general economic collapse that the community experienced were a direct consequence of their failure to follow the instructions of the Lord. Should we presume that God no longer moves in this same way or is it possible that we simply do not make the connection to our personal circumstances?

There may be, and likely is, a direct correlation between our disobedience to God and the various crises we encounter. If nothing happens by chance; if, as we discover in Deuteronomy, we are either blessed with a blessing or cursed with a curse instead of operating by luck, then perhaps it is reasonable when we find ourselves in a crisis to do a systems check. What is our obedience level? What directives have we overlooked or ignored? If we are willing to be honest we may discover that Haggai’s last word to the Jews in Jerusalem is a relevant word to us today as well, “Consider your ways!”

Dear Heavenly Father, our earnest desire is to walk in obedience to Your will and way, Yet we confess we are unable and sometimes unwilling to do as You have commanded. We humbly repent of our procrastination and our outright disobedience and ask that you would relent in your retribution. Speak to us again and remind us of those things You have committed to our hands that we might faithfully perform them for Your glory. Amen.

^[1] New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995), Hag 1:6–7.