A challenge from the Book of Haggai

“Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in paneled houses while this house remains a ruin?” This is the word that popped up to me this morning as I sat down and felt I needed to share it here.

Haggai is a wonderful book that reminds us of the right priorities in life, it is only a couple of pages long so take the time to read it in one sitting.

I quote from the NIV application study bible;

“Pressures, demands, expectations, and tasks push in from all sides and assault our schedules. Do! Be There! Finish that! Call them! It seems as though everyone wants something from us – family, friends, employer, school, church, clubs. Soon there is little left to give, as we run out of energy and time. We find ourselves rushing through life, attending to the necessary, the immediate, and the urgent. The important is all too often left in the dust. Our problem is not the volume of demands or lack of scheduling skills, but values – what is truly important to us.

Our values and priorities are reflected in how we use our resources – time, money, strength, and talent. Often our actions belie our words. We say God is number one, but then we relegate him to a lesser number on our “to do” lists.

Twenty-five centuries ago, a voice was heard, calling men and women to the right priorities. Haggai knew what was important and what had to be done, and he challenged God’s people to respond.” … Although Haggai is a small book, it is filled with challenge and promise, reminding us of God’s claim on our lives and our priorities.

The people had started to rebuild the temple but then got distracted and busy and the Lords temple got left behind. Haggai brought the call to start again on what was important and that was to build the Lords house. But in so doing there was great encouragement of what the Lord would do.

2:6 “This is what the Lord Almighty says; “In a little while I will once more shake the heavens and the earth, the sea and the dry land. I will shake all nations, and the desired of all nations will come, and I will fill this house with glory, says the Lord Almighty. The silver is mine and the gold is mind. Declares the Lord Almighty. The glory of this present house will be greater than the glory of the former house, says the Lord Almighty. And in this place I will grant peace, declares the Lord Almighty.”

This is what we look forward to as we build the house of the Lord, His glory and His peace which for me, far outweighs the place in which we often live in that natural when we seek after the temporal things. So I want to encourage you this morning to see where you are spending your time and resources and perhaps lay aside some of those things which seem important but in reality are just distracting us from the truth and of what we can have in Christ, which is way more than we can ever hope to imagine.

6 legged sheep???

In the weekend I saw a vision of a sheep that had six legs. And what I believe the Lord is saying, there are many sheep, (followers of Christ), but they are trusting in their own strength and not in mine. When we trust in our own strength and abilities we forfeit the grace that can be ours, the enabling that comes from stepping out in faith in the impossible, the testimonies that give God the glory rather than the expectation of what should be because we have put our hand to something. God is the God of the impossible and in order for the miracles, the testimonies, we need to be a people that step out in what we can't do and allow God to come in and do the impossible. That may simply be asking the Lord to help you to forgive someone that has hurt you so much, to getting on a plane with no finances because the Lord has asked you to, to continue to stay in a job/church/marriage/relationship you don't want to because that is where God has placed you, to praying for a

Sleeping while driving?

How many of you have ever driven a car and you become so sleepy that you either need to pull over and sleep or you will crash or you continue to drive only to find yourself swerving to avoid a car that comes upon you or even worse find yourself in a crash. The other day I had a vision where I was preaching and the whole back row in the gathering of men were asleep while I was preaching. And today I had another vision of driving a car while so sleepy that it was going to cause an accident. This is what is like for many in our spiritual walk in the Lord, we are going around in our lives spiritually asleep and if we continue to do so will have a serious crash at some point not only causing damage to yourself but to other people who you may not even know. Men particularly I challenge you to take a look at your lives to see whether you are hearing from the Lord, whether you are responding truthfully to the Holy Spirit and living as He would ask you to live or whether

"A man's enemies will be the members of his own household" Matt 10:36

Recently we have been pondering how to deal with situations in our family that don't line up with the word. What action do we need to take? Are we being too harsh? Do we accept the behaviour or be considered by those around us as "too radical" or "too black and white"? "Where is grace in all of this? How do we love the sinner but hate the sin? What about forgiveness? What is the role of discipline? What makes that sin any worse than lying? What is true love? And there are a lot more questions going through the mind in how to work through this and know God's will and desire for the situation and the person. And firstly to say we have not come to any conclusions and are growing and learning day by day in this but I want to throw it out there. In Matt 10:34-39 says "Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn "a man against his father, a daughter

Obedience and Commitment are big things in Gods Kingdom

Reading in Acts 7 this morning the story through Stephen of Abraham being told by God to " Leave your country and your people and go the the land I will show you" So he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. After the death of his father, God sent him to this land where you are now living. He gave him no inheritance here, not even a foot of ground. But God promised him that he and his descendants after him would possess the land, even though at that time Abraham had no child." As I reflected on this and the journey of Abraham stepping out in faith into a land that he received no inheritance in but a promise of what was to come for his descendants of which we live in the fruit of that, I thought of todays generations in which often is only doing things that we want to do or that will benefit us personally as we live for 'today' not worrying about tomorrow. A sense of if it feels good then do it, if it doesn't then we will move on - perhap

Prophetic pictures: Burnt Flesh, Big Fish, Expansion, Signs and Wonders

A couple of weeks ago I have had several visions which I believe is a prophetic picture of what God is currently doing and what He is about to do. Fi rstly, I saw ahead on the highway a huge explosion with black smoke billowing up and as I came to it I saw people had been burnt and I could smell the smell of burnt flesh. Our God is consuming fire (Heb 12:29). His love is in the fire. Something the Lord has been talking to us about is the fall of the acts of the flesh, the strength of man. This vision I saw was a representation that of the fire of Gods love is coming and going to burn away the things of the flesh, the things that were not of the Lo rd, the things that may have been good in their time but today is a new day. Perhaps the familiar things we are so used to that we don't even know it's there. The way we might speak, the way we might act, the way we might respond that are familiar with us but aren't necessarily of the Kingdom nature we have in Christ.

Do you feel small and insignificant today? Well be encouraged!

Reading Psalm 68 and verses 24-27 struck me ……Verse 27 “There is the little tribe of Benjamin, leading them…. What struck me this morning in the great assembly of Israel, in the great congregation, the Little tribe of Benjamin led them. It hit me how it was a little tribe that led the great congregation. Straight away I got other pictures that came to mind, that of a small tug boat that leads a huge ship safely into harbour, and of the story of the Lion and Mouse where the lion was caught in ropes but the mouse ate the lions ropes around him, setting him free. “God chose the weak things of the world to shame the wise” You may feel you are little, you may feel you are small and what effect could you have, but like that of Gideon with only a small number of warriors, came up again defeated thousands in the Lord. Like David in the eyes of Goliath and yet David overcame Goliath. Like yeast in a loaf of bread and how it infiltrates everything, so too can the little thi

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