It is Time to Rebuild the Temple

Haggai 2:15-19
” ‘Now give careful thought to this from this day on —consider how things were before one stone was laid on another in the LORD’s temple. 16 When anyone came to a heap of twenty measures, there were only ten. When anyone went to a wine vat to draw fifty measures, there were only twenty. 17 I struck all the work of your hands with blight, mildew and hail, yet you did not turn to me,’ declares the LORD. 18 ‘From this day on, from this twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, give careful thought to the day when the foundation of the LORD’s temple was laid. Give careful thought: 19 Is there yet any seed left in the barn? Until now, the vine and the fig tree, the pomegranate and the olive tree have not borne fruit.
“ ‘From this day on I will bless you.’ “

It is Time to Rebuild the Temple

Haggai has a strong message for us in this hour. Then, it concerned a remnant of people that came out of the captivity in Babylon. They have returned to their holy city and temple that has been reduced to ruins. The basic message here is that we have a temple of God that needs to be rebuilt, but we have been too focused on building our own little kingdoms and attending to our own needs that God’s house lies in ruin. God is asking this people through Haggai, “Have you wondered why everything you touched and labored at come up short? Why things don’t ever seem to work out or come together?” God is speaking to them that just as when a person touched a dead body they became unclean and everything they touched became unclean so it is with our spiritual works. They have been defiled because they have been mixed with the flesh, the dead body that was crucified with Christ.
If we wonder why we only see God working in a small measure of His glory and power here is where we may find our answer. If we want to see the glory and power of God and if we want to see the release of His blessing upon our lives then it has to become about Him and not about us. God is giving His people a promise and I believe it is the promise He is speaking to us in this hour. If we will come together, lay aside our agenda and our dead works we will see the blessing of God.
More than ever before I find myself praying, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done.” This is the day and the hour for the temple of God to be restored in the spirit. He is restoring a spiritual house that will worship Him in Spirit and in Truth. In that place He will be Lord and He will move according to His will and purpose and no longer ours. Church will no longer be a place we meet once or twice a week to go through religious motions and exercises. It will become a central part of our lives, because we will all come together, to labor together that the body might be built up into spiritual maturity and wholeness. In that spirit will we see God’s Spirit poured out upon us. It is God’s heart to bless us in ways that we can’t imagine, but He is waiting for us to step into our purpose as the body of Christ and to walk by the Spirit and no longer in the flesh. When His body is in proper alignment and place He will shake heaven and earth. Even now we are beginning to see the shaking taking place. This is not a place for us to fear, but a sign to us to move into the purpose of God for our lives personally and corporately. God has a blessing awaiting us and the increase of His kingdom is upon us, as we will move into the restoration of His house. Those called out ones from Babylon which are represented by Zerrubabel will become His government and the signet ring which represents His divine authority to bring to pass His will in this earth.
It is a day not to look to the economies and systems of this world. They are passing away. We are moving into a divine economy and kingdom whose builder and maker is God. That means our way of thinking and doing must change drastically for many of us. The principles of God’s kingdom are the principles of His Word and Truth. Today we are called to line up with these principles. People aren’t going to be made holy just because they brush up against the holy flesh we are carrying in the skirt of our garment, or the Christ in us. They are going to be made holy, as they personally become partakers of the flesh and blood of Christ. God is looking for the laborers and the priesthood to take this message to the world. Come and let us labor in His house by His Spirit that we might partake of His blessing and be a part of that blessing to others.

Blessings,
#kent

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His Provision

Philippians 4:19
And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.

His Provision

As I spent time with the Lord this morning I talked with Him about provision and blessings, not just for our needs, but for the needs of the body of Christ. So many are struggling in these times. You can imagine my delight as I came this morning to write and the Lord spoke into my spirit Philippians 4:19. I had no idea that this was the content of the scripture when He spoke it to me.
For over a year now I have been hearing he Lord speak about divine provision through the things that I’ve heard Him speaking, but honestly I haven’t seen those expectations manifest yet, but just as honestly I continue to have the faith and confidence that the Lord is our provision. There are areas that He is dealing with in our lives and with the body in general.
One of those areas is in the unity and the function of the body. We are like a husband and wife with separate checking accounts and finances. We are possessive of our own things. We haven’t yet begun to move in the area of unity that Christ has called us too. We are fearful of being taken advantage of or we are jealous that someone else appears to be blessed more than we are. There are dynamics within the body of Christ that we need to move past, because truly most of us aren’t operating out of kingdom principles. If we don’t have the kingdom principles down then we are never going to see the kingdom power manifest. Just as there are rules of aerodynamics there are rules of kingdom dynamics. If we ever want to see our lift out of this earthly and into the heavenly then we all need to begin to apply these kingdom principles. The body doesn’t work where one member supplies every other member’s need; it works as we jointly supply one another’s needs.
One of the areas so many of us need to release to God is in the areas of our finances. We have become so fearful that we tend to horde what we have and dole it our quite sparingly. We not only rob the body, we rob God and even more, we rob ourselves. A seed planted will always produce more than a seed eaten. There is a need for the body of Christ to begin moving back to the book of Acts principles of having all things in common. It doesn’t mean that we don’t have things that are personal, but that we are all more willing to share of the resources and the talents that we all possess. We are family. If we are flesh of His flesh and bone of His bone then the same holds true for those who are our brothers and our sisters in Christ. We are each other’s responsibility. Maybe you don’t have finances, but you are skillful in building, or sowing or accounting. I am reminded again of Haggai 1:3-6, “Then the word of the LORD came through the prophet Haggai: 4 “Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses, while this house remains a ruin?”
5 Now this is what the LORD Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways. 6 You have planted much, but have harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it.” This is what the LORD Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways. 8 Go up into the mountains and bring down timber and build the house, so that I may take pleasure in it and be honored,” says the LORD. 9 “You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little. What you brought home, I blew away. Why?” declares the LORD Almighty. “Because of my house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with his own house. 10 Therefore, because of you the heavens have withheld their dew and the earth its crops. 11 I called for a drought on the fields and the mountains, on the grain, the new wine, the oil and whatever the ground produces, on men and cattle, and on the labor of your hands.”
God is telling us why there is such lack in our lives and in the body of Christ in general. We are still dwelling in the houses of our making, our agenda, our own prosperity, while God’s house lies in ruin. God’s promise to us is that if we build His house first we will see blessing in our own lives. This is that promise that He gave me a year ago. He concludes it in Haggai 2:15-19 by saying, “” ‘Now give careful thought to this from this day on —consider how things were before one stone was laid on another in the LORD’s temple. 16 When anyone came to a heap of twenty measures, there were only ten. When anyone went to a wine vat to draw fifty measures, there were only twenty. 17 I struck all the work of your hands with blight, mildew and hail, yet you did not turn to me,’ declares the LORD. 18 ‘From this day on, from this twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, give careful thought to the day when the foundation of the LORD’s temple was laid. Give careful thought: 19 Is there yet any seed left in the barn? Until now, the vine and the fig tree, the pomegranate and the olive tree have not borne fruit.
” ‘From this day on I will bless you.’ ”
It isn’t God that is withholding our blessing, it is us. His desire is to bless us, but we have to get things in order in our personal lives as well as our spiritual lives for the Lord to be able to release to us our divine provision. We are moving into times where it is more and more important that we learn the value of corporate unity and oneness in the sharing of our resources. It is no longer about us as individuals living the American dream, filling our pockets and others be damned. We are about putting each other’s needs before our own, reaching out in the love of Christ and often personal sacrifice to meet the needs in one another. This is building the house of the Lord. This is the restoration of the unity that Christ longs to see in His body.
We are the stewards of the Lord. In order for a Stewart to be entrusted with much, he must prove himself first faithful in little. Do not despise the days of small beginnings for they are the foundation stones to the days of greatness and blessing. Let us be faithful where we are at and with what we have. Be willing to give of yourself to the body in all of the areas that you are blessed and gifted. Isn’t this what God is looking for in His people? God is able to meet all of our needs according to His riches in Christ Jesus, but there are hindrances that we must deal with first. We are all looking to God for our needs to be met and He is looking to us to start meeting the needs in one another and to faithfully give to Him what is His. If we will follow kingdom principles we will see kingdom results.

Blessings,
#kent