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Free Will Baptist Church
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Ironton, Ohio 45638

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PUT GOD FIRST

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Bob Bradley

_________________________ 

 As we have been studying over the past several months in our Sunday school, about how that God had told the children of Israel, Judah, in particular that they were going to into captivity if they did not repent.  We know that God sent prophet after prophet.  We know that they did not listen so we know that they went into captivity. 

 

We even studied about many things that happened.  The city of Jerusalem was burnt with fire in 586 b. c.  The temple tore down and the walls were torn down.  They left a few people in the land to take care of some things.  Those that were not killed or deported were taken over into the land of Babylon.  They were over there living in a foreign land a long way from home.  Everything that was dear to them was gone.  Many lost families, children, mommies and a daddy, but the great thing that they lost was the temple.  The place where the Jews would come and worship Almighty God.  For so many years, the Spirit of God was there in a great way.  They would come and do those things that God asked them to do.  The presence of God was there and He was blessing them in a great way.  However, all of that is gone now.

 

God told them by the mouth of the prophet, Jeremiah, that they were going to be down there 70 years. 

 

In last week’s lesson, we talked about Ezekiel and his message to the people that were there in the land and how that they needed to trust God.

 

Tonight, we are going to look Haggai for a moment.  Haggai, Zachariah, and Malachi they all prophesied, preached to, or talked to the people after they came back from Babylon.

 

God said they were going to be there 70 years.  As we go forward in time, Haggai‘s messages [four in these two chapters]; he is writing and prophesying about 520.  606 was the first invasion by Nebuchadnezzar who carried some of the captives away.  In 586, the temple was completely destroyed.  Jerusalem was torn down and so forth.

 

As we come forward 70 years from 606 b. c., we get to 536 b. c., which is 70 years from 606.  At that time, when we look at the scripture we find out that Ezra [the scribe] in 536 came and there were 50,000 of the Jews that had been taken to Babylon, they were allowed to come.  We know that Cyrus gave a decree that if you wanted to return to the land of Israel and you wanted to return to Jerusalem.  He is speaking to all the prisoners of war that had been there.  If they wanted to return to Jerusalem, they could do that.

 

He gave that decree that people could go back.  Many people did not go.  Many people stayed in Babylon.  What is significant about that?  They were in captivity in a land that they did not belong in.  They were in a place that God had judged them.  Now they were getting the opportunity to leave, but many didn’t want to leave.  They got too comfortable being a long way from God.  They got comfortable being a long way from the blessings of God.  They were in Babylon.  They did not worship Jehovah over there.  They worshiped all kinds of other idols.  When he gave this decree or permission to return, not all of them went.  However, fifty thousand of them did.  This happened in 536.  The decree or command was for them to go, if they wanted to go, back to the land here, to the city of Jerusalem and to rebuild the temple.  That was the command.  That was why Cyrus was letting them go back into the land.  It was to rebuild the temple.

 

There was rubbish everywhere.  There were rocks, stones, weeds, brush think about a place that had not had maintenance on it for 70 years.  Think about not mowing your yard for 70 years.  What would it look like?  I could imagine in my mind how bad it looked.

 

Even when you read Nehemiah, and when Nehemiah gets there in 445 b. c., some hundred years after these first 50,000 come back.  We can still yet read about all the rubble being there. 

 

Here they are.  Fifty thousand of them come back.  They come back with one thing on their mind.  They come back with one purpose when they get back is to rebuild the temple.  That was their command.  That was what they were supposed to do.  In 535 b. c., they laid the foundation of the temple.  They start working on the temple, but something happens.   When you read what happens here in the book of Ezra, when the foundation is laid, we had some old folks here and we had some young folks here.  When the old folks saw the temple and how small it was compared unto Solomon’s temple, they wept.  We had some young people, and they were just glad that God was doing something.  They were just glad to be a part of something for God, they shouted.  When you read what goes on here, some were crying and some were shouting, but the enemy heard that.  The enemy heard what was going on. 

 

I heard Dale Earndhardt say something many years ago.  Someone asked him about people booing him when he was introduced.  He said, “At least they are doing something.”  He said, “When you really have to worry is when they introduce you and nobody does anything and everybody is quiet.”

 

That is really saying something when you think about that.  Some were laughing.  Some were praising God.  Some were shouting and some were crying.  A lot of emotion going on, but when that happened, the enemy heard that.  When the enemy heard the noise and the shout and what was going on, the enemy starts to try to discourage the work and stop the work.  The enemy of our soul, the enemy of the nation of Israel, satan, did not want to see the temple rebuilt to where people could come and worship Almighty God.  He knew that is where God would come and meet.  He knew that is where people would come and offer their sacrifices, worship, and praise God.  He knew that.  He did not want this place rebuilt.  He starts a little ruckus.  He starts a little gossip and he starts a little talk going on.  When the gossip starts, when the enemy starts oppressing the work, the work stops.  That was why these fifty thousand came back was to lay the foundation and build the temple.  Now just after a little bit of opposition, the work stops.

 

It is one thing to get people to work, but it is altogether something else to keep them working.  We could have all kinds of projects.  Years ago where I was pasturing at, we had a bus ministry.  We went and bought three buses and everything went all right for the first month or two.  We had everybody volunteer to want to drive a bus.  You had to come about an hour and a half before service and pick up your bus.  You would go pick up people.  Then you would be another hour and a half after service.  For a while, everybody was just so happy that we had buses.  We were going and getting their families.  We were running up and down hollers.  Everything was just fine.  However, as months or weeks went the 25 or 30 that we had working on our bus ministry dwindled to 15 or 20.  Then it wasn’t very long after that we had 10 or 12.  Then it wasn’t very long after that we had 4 or 5. 

 

It is one thing to get people to work, but it is something else to get people to continue to work.  It says a lot about our dedication.  It is great to be enthused.  It is great to get up and talk about how much we are on fire for God.  Where are we going to be a month from now?  Where are going to be six months from now.  What are we going to be doing? 

 

That is what was going on here.  They were enthusiastic about getting started, but now here they are they laid the foundation, the opposition started and now they just quit.  That happened in 535 b. c.  The opposition came, the work stopped and for the next fifteen years, nothing happened.  The temple set here with just a foundation, with weeds and brush growing up all around it and nothing happens.

 

God had allowed them to leave the land where they had been captive.  God allowed them to return.  He even called Cyrus.  He even named Cyrus, the guy that was going to allow them to come back and gave him a name several hundred years before he was even born.  God said, he is going to be my shepherd and he is going to allow my people to come back.  It was 300 years before he was even born; God called him and named who he was going to be.  God has done some great things for these folks.  Yet, they come, they lay the foundation of the temple and the enemy arises.  The work then stops.

 

Do you honestly think that you as an individual and we as a church or as a body here at Campbell Chapel are ever going to do anything for God without opposition?  Do you think that when we do things that glorifies God that the enemy is going to come along, pat us on the back, and say hey keep up the good work guys?  He is not going to do that.  The enemy is going to do everything that he can to discourage us.  He is going to do everything that he can to get us to quit.  He is going to tempt us with evil.  He is going to try to get us to do things that will defile ourselves before Almighty God and get us to where that we won’t do anything for Him.  You all know that.  There is an enemy out there that tempts us everyday.  There is an enemy out there that tempts us in a lot of different ways everyday to get us to do things that will break our fellowship with God.  He knows that if he breaks our fellowship with God and we don’t have any communion with God, then he has won.  He doesn’t want us to be happy.  He doesn’t want us to do anything that is going to glorify God.  The enemy doesn’t want us to do that.  He is going to do whatever he can and use whatever he can and he will use anybody that he can to do that.

 

Sometimes it is the people that are sitting beside of you.  Sometimes it is your husband. Sometimes it is your wife.  Sometimes it is your children.  Sometimes it is your neighbor. Sometimes it is you and sometimes it is me.  The enemy will use anybody that will listen to him.  He will use anybody that will listen to him to stop the plan of God. 

 

For fifteen years, nothing happens.  How long is fifteen years?  We are going to find out that for fifteen years, these folk are absolutely miserable.  There is nothing going right in their life.  Everything they do is going backwards.  They cannot do anything that is prospering.  They cannot do anything that is seemingly going right because the house of God that they started fifteen before is still yet sitting here in rebel.  There are weeds, trees, grass growing up all around it.  That was what they were going to come back for.

 

The first thing that we want to look is in Haggai 1:1-15.  We are going to look at what was causing them so many problems.  They were putting self ahead of Almighty God.  I don’t care what generation you live in.  I don’t care who you are.  I don’t care whether you are male or female.  I don’t care who you are then it never works. 

 

The second thing that we want to look at is in Haggai 2:1-9.  We need to look ahead instead of looking back.  We need to look ahead what God is going to do, what God can do, and what God wants to do.  We need to look at things in a broad perspective; what God will do, instead of looking back at all the failures of yesterday and all the failures we made yesterday, the week before that, and the month before that.  We need to look ahead and understand that God wants to bless us and will bless us if we will do what we need to do.

 

1 In the seventh month , in the one and twentieth day of the month, came the word of the LORD by the prophet Haggai, saying,

2 Speak now to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, and to the residue of the people, saying,

3 Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do ye see it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing?

4 Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the LORD; and be strong, O Joshua, son of Josedech, the high priest; and be strong, all ye people of the land, saith the LORD, and work: for I am with you, saith the LORD of hosts:

5 According to the word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you: fear ye not.

6 For thus saith the LORD of hosts; Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land ;

7 And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the LORD of hosts.

8 The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the LORD of hosts.

9 The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the LORD of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the LORD of hosts.

 

The third thing that we want to look at is Haggai 2:10-19.  These folk were failing to confess their faults.  There is nothing that will cut off the blessing of God in your life like not confessing our sins.  Every one of us sins from time to time.  Every one of us mess up.  Everyone of us do things that we should not do and when I have unconfessed sin in my life then it is just like cutting the water hose or turning the spicket off on a water hose; it cuts off the blessing of God.  When I fail to confess my sin, when I fail to agree with God that I have sinned then the blessings stop.  Then we are miserable people.

 

10 In the four and twentieth day of the ninth month , in the second year of Darius, came the word of the LORD by Haggai the prophet, saying,

11 Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Ask now the priests concerning the law, saying,

12 If one bear holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt do touch bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any meat, shall it be holy? And the priests answered and said, No.

13 Then said Haggai, If one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean? And the priests answered and said, It shall be unclean.

14 Then answered Haggai, and said, So is this people, and so is this nation before me, saith the LORD; and so is every work of their hands; and that which they offer there is unclean.

15 And now, I pray you, consider from this day and upward, from before a stone was laid upon a stone in the temple of the LORD:

16 Since those days were, when one came to an heap of twenty measures , there were but ten: when one came to the pressfat for to draw out fifty vessels out of the press, there were but twenty.

17 I smote you with blasting and with mildew and with hail in all the labours of your hands; yet ye turned not to me, saith the LORD.

18 Consider now from this day and upward, from the four and twentieth day of the ninth month, even from the day that the foundation of the LORD'S temple was laid, consider it.

19 Is the seed yet in the barn? yea, as yet the vine, and the fig tree, and the pomegranate, and the olive tree, hath not brought forth: from this day will I bless you .

 

The first thing that happens here is this:

 

They lay the foundation in 535.  Fifteen years go by.  God is going to raise up Haggai, Zachariah, and Malachi.  These guys go together.  They are going to be prophesying, teaching, and preaching unto the exiled that have returned.  Here they are and God speaks to Haggai on September 1, 520 b. c. 

 

Haggai 1:1-15

 

1 In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, in the first day of the month, came the word of the LORD by Haggai the prophet unto Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, saying,

2 Thus speaketh the LORD of hosts, saying, This people say, The time is not come, the time that the LORD'S house should be built.

3 Then came the word of the LORD by Haggai the prophet, saying,

4 Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your cieled houses, and this house lie waste?

5 Now therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways.

6 Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.

7 Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways.

8 Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the LORD.

9 Ye looked for much, and, lo, it came to little; and when ye brought it home, I did blow upon it. Why? saith the LORD of hosts. Because of mine house that is waste, and ye run every man unto his own house.

10 Therefore the heaven over you is stayed from dew, and the earth is stayed from her fruit.

11 And I called for a drought upon the land, and upon the mountains, and upon the corn, and upon the new wine, and upon the oil, and upon that which the ground bringeth forth, and upon men, and upon cattle, and upon all the labour of the hands.

12 Then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the LORD their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the LORD their God had sent him, and the people did fear before the LORD.

13 Then spake Haggai the LORD'S messenger in the LORD'S message unto the people, saying, I am with you, saith the LORD.

14 And the LORD stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people; and they came and did work in the house of the LORD of hosts, their God,

15 In the four and twentieth day of the sixth month, in the second year of Darius the king.

 

I saw something here that I have never saw before in all the years that I have read this.  The people were using this excuse because they were not building the house of God.  They were saying that it was not time to do that.  They could remember that Jeremiah the prophet and the others had said that you are going to be down for 70 years.  You are going to be in captivity for 70 years. 

 

There is no doubt in my mind, these guys could remember enough about preaching that they were saying it is not time yet. 

 

If you go to 586 b. c., that is when the temple was destroyed and you back up 70 years from that, then it is not time for us to build the temple.  Isn’t that a poor excuse?  They were trying to take what God had said and to use it or to justify what they were not doing. 

 

That never works.

 

The reason that they were doing that is because they had quit working on the house of God.  When they left Babylon to come back here to Jerusalem, when you read what happened here, they come with a lot of wealth.  I don’t know how much it would have been it you would have added it all up, but they come with probably millions of dollars to come back here to work on the house of God.  They laid the foundation and for fifteen years, they did nothing.  What they did do for fifteen years, they were saying it was not time for us to build God’s house, but it is time for us to build us a house.

 

When we put self before Almighty God, we are not going to go anywhere with God.  When we put things, self, houses, our wills and our desires before the work of Almighty God, then we will absolutely go nowhere in our spiritual relationship with God.  That is where these people went.  They had not gone anywhere.  They were saying that it was not time for us yet.  We know what the prophets said, we know what God said.  We know about the 70 years, it is not time for us to build it yet.  However, it was time for them to build their houses of luxury. 

 

When you look up the words “sealed houses”, it means that were building houses fit for kings to live in.  They just weren’t building a house.  They were building a mansion.  They were building houses luxury here and yet the house of God was lying waste. 

 

5 Now therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways.

 

The God of heaven, he uses the word here, the LORD of hosts, the LORD of armies, the LORD of the great multitude of armies that are out there in heaven; he is saying that the LORD of hosts is saying to you that you need to consider what you are doing.  You need to consider your ways. 

 

For fifteen years, these people were miserable.  For fifteen years, everything that they did was wrong.  They could not do anything right.  Everything that they tried, everything that they did, it just didn’t work because they put self, self-things, self-ambitions before working for God.  When I do that, when you do that nothing is going to work in your life.  I don’t care how much money you have.  I don’t care how much you might be making today, when your self-ambitions, your will, and your desires above what God has said, it is all going to come to naught.

 

6 Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.

 

He is saying, “You guys have went and sown field after field of crops.  You have sown all these fields full of everything.  You have sown a lot, but you have not brought in much.”

 

6 …ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.

 

He is saying, “You are sowing a lot, but you are not bringing in any.  You are eating all of this stuff, but you are not being satisfied.”

 

6 …ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.

7 Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Consider your ways.

 

They were sowing.  They were working.  They were laboring.  They were going through all the emotions.  They were doing all that.  They had good jobs.  They had money.  They had all that stuff, but they couldn’t keep any of it.  They worked.  They sowed.  They labored.  They ate and they were not satisfied.  They drank and were not satisfied.  They earned money, they were putting it in this end, and it was going out that end.  It was just like putting money in a bag with a hole in it.

 

Do you know why these things are happening to them?  It wasn’t just bad luck.  It wasn’t just coincidence.  It wasn’t any of those things.  The reason that they were in the shape that they were in and the reason that they were never satisfied was because they were putting self and self-things above the work of Almighty God.  When you do that, you are going to be miserable.

 

There is nothing worse than eating and not being satisfied. 

 

Let me put this on a scale that we all can understand.  There will be times in our life…when you worked, you worked, you get your check and you come home.  You think that you are going to be fine, you pay all of your bills or you think you do and just as you get them all paid and think you have enough for the next two weeks, the refrigerator blows up or the stove quits, or the car breaks down, or the roof leaks.  You never get ahead.

 

I don’t know your situation, but these guys were sowing much, they were not bringing home much.  They were working, they were laboring and they were not satisfied.  They were drinking and they were not being satisfied.  They were earning money but it was just as if they were putting it in a gag that had holes in the bottom of it.  They put it in this end and it went out that end.

 

The reason it was this way in their life was because they had put self ahead of the work of Almighty God. 

 

Here they are for fifteen years and they have been miserable.  They have worked and they have labored.  Fifteen years later they are not any better off that they were when they started.  Many times, we put God’s work second place in our life.  When we do that, then we cannot expect God to continue to bless us because it is not going to happen. 

 

8 Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the LORD.

 

The Lord is saying here, “You guys are miserable.   For the last fifteen years, nothing has worked right in your life.”  You have worked.  You have labored.  You have not been satisfied.  You have ate and not been filled.  You have drank and you are still yet thirsty.   Your have money, but it is like putting it in a bag with holes in it.  It’s gone and you don’t have anything to show for your work. 

 

He says all you need to do is go to the mountain, get some wood, build a house, and I’ll take pleasure in it.  I’ll be glorified there and I’ll bless you.  Does that sound simple?  It is simple.  The command was simple but the project was going to require work, effort, planning, and labor by many.  These people had become lazy.  These people did not want to work.  They wanted to live in their own house and do their own thing.  They didn’t want to work for God.  They wanted to work for self, but they didn’t want to work for God.

 

Remember this.

 

If we are not willing to work and put God first in our lives, you say that you are living at the foot of the cross, if you are not willing to put God first in your life then everything else that you are going to do will not amount to nothing.  You are going to be miserable.  You might say, “Preacher, it is my life.  I’m getting older.”  Praise God for that and get to work.  I can’t find anywhere in here where God says we can retire.  We get to a place where we think that we can retire.  You cannot retire from working for the Lord.  When we get that way, the blessings of God stop.

 

Sometimes we want to separate our Spiritual life from our material life.  In other words, when we want to separate my Spiritual being, we want to put that over here and then we want to take our own material life and put that over here.  We want to separate that.  My spiritual life depends upon what I am doing, what I’m working and what I am doing with what God has given to me brings glory.  If I try to separate the spiritual from the material, we want to do that, but I cannot do that because what I have physically, God has blessed me with that.  If I have anything at all then it is because God has blessed me.  It does not matter if I have much or if have little; whatever I have, God has blessed me with it and it all belongs to Him anyway.  Why would I want to think that I could put self above the work of God and God will continue to bless me?

 

When we move outside the will of God and do things for self then don’t expect God to bless you.  Don’t expect your prayers to be answered.  Don’t expect the hand of blessing to be upon your life.  Don’t expect that because it will not happen.

 

Here the plan was very simple.  You need to consider your ways.  You guys have built your own houses.  You built houses of luxury.  You have ate a lot, but you are still not satisfied.  You drink, but you are still yet thirsty.  You have put your money into a rat hole; you put in top and it comes out the bottom.  He says, “All you need to do is just go to the mountain, get some wood, come and build my house, I’ll take pleasure in it, I’ll be glorified and everything will be just fine.

 

Have you ever been there?  I know that we have been.  If we are not there tonight, we will be one time.  We may have been there one time, but we will be.

 

8 Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the LORD.

 

That is a promise.  God is saying, if you will just go get the wood, build my house, I’ll take pleasure in it, I’ll be glorified here and I’ll bless you.  When we glorify Him, we cannot stop the blessings of God upon our lives.  When I glorify God with my life, with the things that He has blessed me with, with the money that He has allowed me to have or the things that I may have; when I glorify God with those things, then I cannot help but be blessed. 

 

9 Ye looked for much, and, lo, it came to little; and when ye brought it home, I did blow upon it. Why? saith the LORD of hosts. Because of mine house that is waste, and ye run every man unto his own house.

 

God is telling them why that they are in the mess that they are in.  God is telling them why that for fifteen years that they have not been able to prosper.  For fifteen years, they have been in a stand still in their own lives.  Their material lives have just been at a stand still because their spiritual lives had been at a stand still.  When I move up in my spiritual life, then the material things—when I eat, then God will satisfy me with that.  When I drink then I will be satisfied with that.  No.  I may not have a mansion, but I can be satisfied with the lot in life that I have.  It is a wonderful place to be.  There are people today that have everything and they are not satisfied with anything because their relationship is not right with God.  That is why they are not satisfied.  They probably have stuff, anything that money can buy.  They are not satisfied because they are not right with God. 

 

God said that they needed to build a house.  They were more concerned with self than they were with God’s house.  God says it is not going to work.

 

10 Therefore the heaven over you is stayed from dew, and the earth is stayed from her fruit.

11 And I called for a drought upon the land, and upon the mountains, and upon the corn, and upon the new wine, and upon the oil, and upon that which the ground bringeth forth, and upon men, and upon cattle, and upon all the labour of the hands.

 

God says that the reason you are not prospering, the reason that you are not getting anywhere financially, the reason that you are not satisfied is because I am the one who called for the drought.  I’m the one that caused the drought.  The corn is not growing.  The grain is not growing.  The grapes are not growing.  God says, “I am the one that done that and the reason I did that is because you are living in your houses of luxury and my house is laying over here with weeds, and trees growing up in it.  You have forgotten about me.”  That is the reason the drought came. 

 

Our lives get dry when we forget about looking for God, when we forget about putting Him first in our lives; our lives get dry.  When we are working for God and just simply doing those things that we can do…

 

These guys knew how to build buildings.  They knew how to hew stone.  They knew how to go to the Mountains.  God was not asking them to do something that they could not do.  God was asking them to do something that was very simple that they could do.  If they would just do it then God was going to bless them.

 

God does us the same way.  God will never ask you to do anything that you cannot do.  God will never you to do anything that he will not enable you to do.  You may not have the ability to do it today but if God is calling you to do it then God will give you the ability to do that which you need to do what He has asked you to do.

 

These people here, for fifteen years they were suffering.  They were not satisfied.  Everything financially that they had laid their hands on just fell apart and God says I’m telling you why.  “You have put self before me.  I am the one that caused the drought.  I am the one who stopped the rain.” 

 

In my life and in your life…you may have money in the bank today, you may have the world by the tail or you think you do…but you are one heartbeat away from the funeral home.  You are one heartbeat away from ICU over at KDMC or Bellefonte.  You are just that close.  I don’t know what life holds.

 

There have been times in my life that things have been going great, I thought that they could not get any better but in a split second, I got a phone call that tore my world upside down.  One minute, nothing could be any better and the next minute, my whole world collapsed. 

 

One time many years ago, there a fellow that was like a dad to me.  We loafed, we ran, we did everything together just a friend just like my dad or like my own brother.  Where you saw him, you saw me and where you saw me, you  saw him.  One minute everything was fine, the next minute I get a phone call that he is gone, he’s dead.  He died very tragically.  That changed my whole direction in life from that time to this day that changed things. 

 

Put God first in your life.  He will not ask you to do anything that you cannot do. 

 

It was a complex job to build the house of God but there were some smart people here.  When you look at the 50,000 people, when you read the book of Ezra in chapter 4 or 5 and you read about these people coming back, they were no dummies.  Some people were smart. 

 

Put God first in your life.  We don’t have any people here that have PhD’s, I don’t imagine.  I know that we have some people that have some degrees, but we don’t have Einstein’s sitting here tonight.  We might have a few wise guys but no Einstein’s.  God expects something out of us; God simply expects out of us for Him to be first in our lives.  When He is first in our lives…

 

It was going to be work for them to go to the mountains and get wood and stone.  They brought from a long way away to build the house of God.  They have limestone over there everywhere and they would choose stones.  I read something on some of the stones that they hewed to put in the temple.  Some of them were six to eight hundred tons.  I think I read that some of them were twelve to sixteen hundred tons.  Some of these were big stones.  Plus there was a lot of wood.  God was not asking them to do anything that they could not do.  God was telling them for the last fifteen years, the reason that you have not been blessed is that you chose to work for self and you forgot about my work.  God let them do that but they never got anywhere spiritually, they never got anywhere financially because of putting self first. 

 

Put God first in your life.  Put God above your job, husband, wife, children, money, and whatever else.  God has to be first in my life.  When God speaks to me about doing something, I don’t go ask Deb about it.  I have talked to people before about doing certain things and they say, “I better go talk to my husband or my wife.”  If you have to go ask your husband, wife, or children about doing what God has asked you to do?  You are wasting your time.  Sure, we need to communicate with one another.  Sure, we need to tell one another about our visions and our burdens.  However, when God says we need to build the house, when God says go to the mountains, get the wood, bring it down, build me a house and I’ll be glorified in it.  They did not need to have a business meeting to discuss that.  They did not need to do that.  I know that it  has been several thousand years ago that this event happened, but the same God told these folks is the same God that is telling me today to put Him first in my life.  If we will do that, you will be blessed and you will be happy.  You will be able to be satisfied.  You will be able to be content with the lot in life that you have whether it is much or not so much.

 

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