MY TEXT:  Haggai 1:14 - “The Lord stirred up the spirit”.  WOW!!!!!
I want to excite you today to see that which Almighty God has for this moment and in this time in which we are living.
                                         
I believe that God is giving to passionate believers a window of opportunity to be “Stirred up by the Holy Spirit” for this hour that we are living in.

Our God has something for:
•    Passionate first love believers
•    Kingdom shakers – Matt 11:21
•    Holy Ghost people
•    People of faith and expectancy
•    Kingdom minded people
•    Those who have a sense of urgency.

Today, I am boldly declaring to you that the waiting time is over.
•    NOW IS THE TIME - 2011 is time for God’s provision from heaven.
•    GOD IS SAYING THAT HE IS ABOUT TO MOVE IN HIS PEOPLE.
•    There is an emerging people that have transformation on them.
•    They are people prepared by God himself in the wilderness as portrayed in the likes of John the Baptist and Elijah the prophet.  
•    Those who are now emerging are as ‘Preparers of the way of the Lord”.

Here in this book of Haggai, we have something that starts off as a sad story, but then ends up revealing something that can only be described as a God intervention.

Nearly 20 years had passed in a building program:
•    How many know that time can pass you by so quickly?
•    On a street corner in England is a sign on a undertaker’s building that says: ‘Tempus Fugit” the Latin expression meaning "time flees".  I am sure that the undertaker was saying something like this: “Are you prepared, because one day you are going to end up here”.
•    So many people just have the attitude to life that another year or so won’t make much difference...  What does it matter anyway?...
•    A young boy was taken by his grandfather to hear the clock ‘Big Ben’ strike 12 times for midday.  For some reason on that day the clock struck 13 times.  The young boy turned to his grandfather with a sense of excitement and astonishment, saying, ‘Grandfather, it’s later than we think’.

I want you to see how the confession and mindset ruled these people here – Verse 2 :  “The time has not yet come”.

How many know that your confession and thoughts can rule your world and rule out something from God?  William James was a great man who said this in 1860:  ‘A person can change their whole world by changing their attitude.’

Today we see people carrying on as if they have all the time in the world.

They are leaving their lives to chance.

We need some sense of urgency today.  (Isa 64).

How did these people know that the time had not yet come?
•    This text shows that God was not saying that, they were!
•    He is not saying that now!!!
•    All around the world people are talking about the end of the world.
•    God does not always have a special day of His visitation on His calendar, but He has and always will visit people who are humble, yet passionate for Him.
•    Can you imagine if Elijah, Moses, Joseph, John the Baptist or even Jesus Himself had thought that it was not the time for God to do something?

Let me tell you what this type of thinking does to people?
•    They become self-absorbed and consumed in self-centredness.
•    They are always postponing immediate action.
•    They are always waiting for the right time to come.
•    They are always waiting for favourable conditions.

The thing that struck me here is that God had a quick thing in mind:  
•    Friends, something amazing and powerful happened here in just 3 weeks.
•    Let me say that God can do something quick with Holy Ghost stirred up people.
•    I wonder if there is anyone who is reading this today that believes that God can do a quick work.

Well, it will demand change on our part.

GOD WANTS US TO HAVE A REALITY CHECK:  
•    The contentment attitude will leave you high and dry.
•    This attitude must be challenged!
•    Verse 10 :  “The heavens over you are stayed,” said the prophet.
•    The people of God here have been content with nothing for 20years.
•    CAN YOU IMAGINE: 20 years of unexciting Christianity?
•    Time just goes by ever so quickly.  
•    When earthly things satisfy you and give you contentment…heaven closes over your life!!!
•    God has no reason to open heaven when you are content.

I am going to show you today how we can open heaven over our lives?  
•    One thing I know for sure is that Heaven is always opened to Holy Ghost hungry people
•    Matthew 11:12 tells us that “the kingdom of heaven suffers violence” not indifference.

Today I want us to look at what it was that turned these people around?  

God wants to awaken this nation to His visitation.

1.    First, I see the challenge to instant obedience to the word of God brought here through the Prophet – verse 12:

The word came and it apprehended them and they believed it.    

We need more than just comforting sermons.
We need prophetic sermons that not only apprehend us with God possibilities, but also with words that project us into now action and capture our hearts for the future.
We have lost the art of standing on the Word and expecting God to confirm it.
Unbelief is an insidious sin that leaves us in a state of indifference to the claims of God.

I hear God saying:  Obedience will bring about immediate blessing.
Some of us have to get out of the dry places.
Your contentment is only producing dryness.
Your lack of passion leaves you like these people.
You need to get where there is a river of the life of Holy Spirit.
Repentance will open the heart of God to forgive you.
Faith will move the hand of God to give you something from heaven that shifts you into another realm.                         

           
2.    Secondly,  I see here a total submission to the work of Holy Spirit in vs14:
They let Holy Spirit stir them up to first love.
The Holy Spirit will never impose Himself on us.
If you are not desperate for what he can do, things will stop like this building project did.
He will not work where self satisfaction rules your life.

Up to now they were experiencing loss.
Working hard only to see it go into a bag with holes in it.
They had got away from God’s order and they were paying the price for such.
But everything was about to change.
HOLY GHOST STUFF WAS BACK ON THE SCENE.
THINGS BEYOND THEIR WILDEST IMAGINATION AND EXPECTATION WERE ABOUT TO CATCH THEIR ATTENTION AGAIN.

Profound promises from God as to His purpose were about to lift these people up and get them into faith and focused onto something that God had for them as described in the next chapter.
I am constantly amazed at the heart of God to want to act on our behalf in spite of our disregard of Him.

I HEAR GOD SAYING:      Let Holy Spirit stir you up and get you ready for what is about to break out.

3.    Thirdly, I hear God challenge us to look ahead because God has great things ahead:  vs 1-5:

Expectation for God to fulfil His word now is a really important response from us.

Holy Ghost stuff is for people of destiny - those going somewhere.

It is for those who know that they are powerless in their own strength.
The only thing that will keep Holy Ghost stirred up people going is expectation based upon promises and the possibilities of their future fulfilment.
It is about God’s people expecting Him to empower them and use them.

I HEAR GOD SAYING:  Don’t accept things as they are.  Look up and look ahead, the best is yet to come.

4.    Fourthly, I hear God challenging our expectation for now action: vs6:
Note what God promises here of a “Little While” - in other words it won’t be long now.
This implies that expectation was needed here.
Not long now, says the prophet, and Jehovah will do a work of wonders.
We can be so close to breakthrough, but give in.
Just let me remind you that, in just three short weeks, God brought about a radical change in them.

I HEAR GOD SAYING:  Expectation is essential for manifestation.

5.    Fifthly, I see in ch 2:4, God giving us again the promise of His amazing presence:
God said:  “I am with you, says the Lord.”
God is looking for those who will appropriate His presence.

FRIENDS, TO GET MORE, You have to stop settling for less!
God said in verse 5 , “My Spirit remains among you.”
WHAT A POWERFUL INCENTIVE!!!
WHAT A WONDERFUL PROVISION!!!

The presence of God in His people is not optional, but paramount today.
A program must never take the place of His presence.
His presence is the antidote to fear and powerless religion.
It is the power we need to succeed in this hour.
Holy Spirit is the very life of the church, but He is so often the One we neglect the most!
MORE THAN EVER WE NEED HIM TODAY!

I HEAR GOD SAYING:  It’s time to make His presence our priority.
It is time to embrace His presence in worship.

6.    Sixthly, I hear God challenging us about renewed faith for this hour:
Verse 4 :  “Be strong says God”.  Eph 6:10.
FAITH IS ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL IN THIS WALK WITH GOD.
It is the antidote to fear.
Faith in God gives you courage.

7.    Seventhly, I hear God challenging us to get ready to embrace the supernatural:
Verse 6 :  “I will shake the heavens and all nations.”
This is God getting our attention.

I HEAR GOD SAYING:  Get your spiritual ears open    .
God is shaking things.
God is about to create the most amazing opportunities.
God is saying that He is going to work supernaturally.

Then in verse 7 the Prophet announces the key to it all..
IT IS WHAT I CALL THE STAR ATTRACTION.
His name is called: “The Desire of all nations” - CHRIST.
Not Islam.  Not some movement.  Not some personality who seeks attraction and a name, but Christ alone.
People need to run from the person-super-star movement and follow the “Desire of nations”.
Only Christ can redeem.  Only Christ can heal.  Only Christ will be there in the end.  Kings and kingdoms will all pass away, but there is something about that name.

I HEAR GOD SAYING:     Christ alone is, Saviour, healer, deliverer.
He alone is the star attraction.
When He is made attractive, look out, the nations will seek Him out because they recognize that attractive God-factor that is on certain people that make Him so attractive!

In verse 9 I hear God challenge us about His coming GLORY.
“The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former.”
Something is on the way that is called Glory.  That which has appeared in the past has NO comparison to what is about to be manifest.
Glory is about God prominence.  The Hebrew is called ‘Kabod’ and is means God’s weighty manifest presence.
Glory is always about God and His presence.

I HEAR GOD SAYING:  It is all about to change ever so powerfully.
God’s Glory about to be manifest.

FINALLY: I hear God saying that He is going to do some invasion.
Look at verses 7 and 9:  “I will fill this house,” says God.
This time He is not talking about some building that is the work of man’s hands.
He is talking about Christ in His people being glorified by what He is doing.

Christ is about to come to His temple again. But what will He find this time?
Hopefully it will be very different from what Jesus found when He came to His temple as recorded in Matthew’s gospel chapter 21 .  Here Christ goes into the temple of God and cast them all out because they had turned the temple into a place of merchandise.

I HEAR GOD SAYING:  I will fill my people with Glory and power, says God.

HOW DOES CHRIST’S PRESENCE RENDER THIS TEMPLE AND HIS PEOPLE MORE GLORIOUS THAN THE FIRST?
The first temples had great kings – the second has the King of Kings.
The first temples had mere symbolism - the second has the true living Son of God.
The first temple was for a few – the second is for all (Luke 4:18) .
The first temple had the former glory – the second a glory that supersedes it.
The first temples were built by men – the second is built by the Holy Ghost.

FINALLY:  Look in verses 20 and 21:
The prophet declares that this awesome God will exhibit His supremacy over all other kingdoms.
I WONDER IF YOU BELIEVE THIS.
FRIENDS, THIS IS THE KINGDOM THAT WE BELONG TO!
It is where the King of Kings rules even now through His redeemed people.

GOD SAYS:  THE GLORY OF THIS LATTER HOUSE SHALL BE GREATER THAN THE FIRST.
But then He warns in the following verses of this passage about what He calls defilements.
This is another important aspect that needs to be talked about among God’s people today.
There is so much sexual defilement even among God’s people that must be addressed if we are going to see God move in power.
Every easy choice today will have its consequence tomorrow.

Ross Monk

My Father's House

Churton Park

NZ

email: [email protected]