The Glorious House

“For thus says the Lord of hosts, ‘Once more in a little while, I am going to shake the heavens and the earth, the sea also and the dry land. I will shake all the nations; and they will come with the wealth of all nations, and I will fill this house with glory,’ says the Lord of hosts. ‘The silver is Mine and the gold is Mine,’ declares the Lord of hosts. ‘The latter glory of this house will be greater than the former,’ says the Lord of hosts, ‘and in this place I will give peace,’ declares the Lord of hosts” (Haggai 2:6-9).

I had the joy of speaking during the last session of a women’s conference at our church yesterday morning. We looked at the great contrast between Solomon’s Temple, destroyed in 586 B.C. by the Babylonians, and the second Temple, completed in 515 B.C. At the dedication of its foundation, the weeping of the folks who remembered the splendor of the first Temple blended with the joyful shouts of the young folks, who were excited to be rebuilding the Temple, even if it were much smaller (Ezra 3:10-13). The LORD, aware of the temptation to discouragement, asks, “who is left among you who saw this temple in its former glory? And how do you see it now? Does it not seem to you like nothing in comparison” (Haggai 2:3). He spoke the thoughts of many of them, no doubt. He then gives them a triple “take courage…take courage…take courage” (2:4), reminding them of the promise of His presence rooted in the Exodus itself (2:5). He ends the sermon with a foreshadowing of a greater glory.

That glory is the global Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. I didn’t have time to trace this out in yesterday’s sermon (I was focusing on taking courage for God’s glory), but Haggai’s prophecy here fits into a cover-to-cover theme in the Bible. The “wealth of the nations” will be brought into God’s “house,” and He will fill it with a glory that will make Solomon’s Temple look like nothing. And there, He promises, He “will give peace.”

Let’s go back.

Noah, after the Flood and after his being sinned against by “Ham, the father of Canaan” (Genesis 9:20-24), gives this prophecy:

“Blessed be the LORD,
The God of Shem [father of the Semites, the Jews];
And let Canaan be his servant.

May God enlarge Japheth [the father of the nations],
And let him dwell in the tents of Shem;
And let Canaan be his servant” (Genesis 9:26,27).

The LORD is blessed. His old covenant relationship with the children of Shem (and Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) is foretold (“the LORD, the God of Shem”). Here’s the awesome part: God’s plan to bring the Gentiles into the new covenant is also foretold! God will cause the nations to grow, and will bring them into the “tents” of His covenant people. This is the new covenant, the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s the glory described in Ephesians 2:11-22. As Peter the apostle (a Jew) said at the first Church Council in Antioch, “God…made no distinction between us [Jewish believers in Christ] and them [Gentile believers in Christ], cleansing their hearts by faith…we believe that we are saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, in the same way as they also are” (Acts 15:9,11).

The nations are brought into the house of God.

Eleven generations after Noah, Abraham shows the depth of his faith and almost sacrifices his son Isaac on Mount Moriah. After God provides “for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering” (22:8), another Gospel promise is made by the LORD to Abraham: “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 22:18). The nations will find their blessing “in [Abraham’s] seed.” The apostle Paul will tell us this “seed” (singular) is Christ (Galatians 3:16) – Jesus, Jewish descendant of Shem and Abraham. In Shem’s descendant the descendants of Japheth will be blessed.

That two examples of the beginning of the Book. Let’s go the end of the Book.

“I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. And the city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illumined it, and its lamp is the Lamb. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it. In the daytime (for there will be no night there) its gates will never be closed; and they will bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it; and nothing unclean, and no one who practices abomination and lying, shall ever come into it, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life” (Revelation 21:22-27).

What is brought into the city? The “glory” of “the kings of the earth” (21:24). This is paralleled with “the glory and honor of the nations” in 21:26, but it is not until 21:27 that we get a third parallel that makes clear what this “glory and honor” is. Just as “glory” is brought “into it” (21:24) and “the glory and honor” is brought “into it” (21:26), “those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life” come “into it” (21:27). The “glory and honor of the nations” are the saved from out of the nations, “whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.”

God has brought the wealth, the glory, the honor of the nations into His house, making it glorious. We know that the “house of God” in the New Testament is the Church, the people of God in Christ (1 Corinthians 3:9-17; 6:19,20; 2 Corinthians 6:16; Ephesians 2:19-22; 1 Timothy 3:15; Hebrews 3:6; 1 Peter 2:4,5). Seeing all of this, then, we know that God’s house is global – all believers in Christ throughout the nations. He dwells with them through His Holy Spirit. While Solomon’s Temple was on Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the new covenant House of God covers the planet. It is greater than the kingdoms of this world – God’s shaking of “the heavens and earth” is an overthrowing of kingdoms and their powers during His gathering to “fill this house with glory” (Haggai 2:21,22). Solomon’s Temple was visited by those faithful old covenant Jews who obeyed the pilgrimage feasts, but the new covenant House of God is filled with Jews who believe in Christ and those “from every tribe and tongue and people and nation” (Revelation 5:9).

“Arise, shine; for your light has come,

And the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.

For behold, darkness will cover the earth

And deep darkness the peoples;

But the LORD will rise upon you.

Nations will come to your light,

And kings to the brightness of your rising.

Lift up your eyes round about and see;

They all gather together, they come to you.

Your sons will come from afar,

And your daughters will be carried in their arms.

Then you will see and be radiant,

And your heart will thrill and rejoice;

Because the abundance of the sea will be turned to you,

The wealth of the nations will come to you…

…and I shall glorify My glorious house” (Isaiah 60:1-5,7).

She is beautiful. Rejoice!

Jeremiah's Turning #9: Supernatural Evangelism

Following the word “turn” (שוב) through Jeremiah’s prophecy.

“‘If you will return [שוב], O Israel,’ declares the LORD, ‘Then you should return [שוב] to Me. And if you will put away your detested things from My presence, and will not waver, and you will swear, “As the LORD lives,” in truth, in justice and in righteousness; then the nations will bless themselves in Him, and in Him they will glory.’ For thus says the LORD to the men of Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘Break up your fallow ground, and do not sow among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to the LORD and remove the foreskins of your heart, men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, or else My wrath will go forth like fire and burn with none to quench it, because of the evil of your deeds. Declare in Judah and proclaim in Jerusalem, and say, “Blow the trumpet in the land; cry aloud and say, “Assemble yourselves, and let us go into the fortified cities.” Lift up a standard toward Zion! Seek refuge, do not stand still, for I am bringing evil from the north, and great destruction. A lion has gone up from his thicket, and a destroyer of nations has set out; he has gone out from his place to make your land a waste. Your cities will be ruins without inhabitant.’ For this, put on sackcloth, lament and wail; for the fierce anger of the LORD has not turned [שוב] back from us.” (Jeremiah 4:1-8).

God commands that His people be a repentant people, a people who do not mingle the world with Himself. What’s at stake? The Gospel fulfillment of the promise to Abraham:

• “...in you all the families of the earth will be blessed” (Genesis 12:3).
• “The Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, ‘ALL THE NATIONS WILL BE BLESSED IN YOU’” (Galatians 3:8).
• “And they sang a new song, saying, ‘Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain, and purchased for God with Your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth’...after these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands; and they cry out with a loud voice, saying, ‘Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb’” (Revelation 5:9,10; 7:9,10).

“And you will swear, ‘As the LORD lives,’ in truth, in justice and in righteousness; then the nations will bless themselves in Him, and in Him they will glory” (Jeremiah 4:2). This is God’s Gospel promise through a repentant, faithful people. No where in this does the Gospel promise extent to a worldly entertainment or gimmicky strategy for drawing the lost. God attaches a promise of supernaturally successful evangelism to a faithful, holy, and repentant people. The "then" is God's promise.

The only alternative to being a people of circumcised heart is being a people under the wrath of God.

This is how the nations will be blessed by the Gospel, and this is how God will ultimately receive the most glory in their sight.

Repent, Church. This is what the unbelieving world needs.

“Saving repentance is an evangelical grace by which a person who is made to feel, by the Holy Spirit, the manifold evils of his sin, and being given faith in Christ, humbles himself over his sin with godly sorrow, detestation of his sin and self-abhorrency. In such repentance the person also prays for pardon and strength of grace, and has a purpose and endeavor, by supplies of the Spirit’s power, to walk before God and to totally please Him in all things. As repentance is to be continued through the whole course of our lives, on account of the body of death, and the motions of it, it is therefore every man’s duty to repent of his particular known sins particularly. Such is the provision which God has made through Christ in the covenant of grace for the preservation of believers in the way of salvation, that although even the smallest sin deserves damnation, yet there is no sin great enough to bring damnation on those who repent. This makes the constant preaching of repentance necessary” (1689 Baptist Confession, 15.4-6).

An Ancient Song for Today's Church

(1)Give thanks to God, call on His name;

to men His deeds make known.

(2)Sing ye to Him, sing psalms; proclaim

His wondrous works each one.

(3)See that ye in His holy name

to glory do accord;

And let the heart of ev’ry one

rejoice that seeks the Lord.

(4)The Lord Almighty, and His strength,

with steadfast hearts seek ye:

His blessed and His gracious face

seek ye continually.

(5)Think on the works that He hath done,

which admiration breed;

His wonders, and the judgments all

which from His mouth proceed;

(6)O ye that are of Abr’ham’s race,

His servant well approv’n;

And ye that Jacob’s children are,

whom He chose for His own.

(7)Because He, and He only, is

the mighty Lord our God;

And His most righteous judgments are

in all the earth abroad.

(8)His cov’nant He remember’d hath,

that it may ever stand:

To thousand generations

the word He did command.

(9)Which covenant He firmly made

with faithful Abraham,

And unto Isaac, by His oath,

He did renew the same:

(10)And unto Jacob, for a law,

He made it firm and sure,

A covenant to Israel,

which ever should endure.

(42)For on His holy promise He,

and servant Abr’ham, thought.

(43)With joy His people, His elect

with gladness, forth He brought.

(45)That they His statutes might observe

according to His word;

And that they might His laws obey.

Give praise unto the Lord.

- Psalm 105:1-10,42,43,45, Scottish Psalter (1650)

This song, in the day it was inspired and first sung, looked back into ancient history to the miraculous salvation of God and His covenant preservation of His people. However, this song doesn’t just look back. It serves as an arrow pointing forward, Church, pointing forward to the salvation of Christ and your in-grafting into the ancient purpose of God to save you as His people:

• The Gospel promise to Abraham (Galatians 3:8) is fulfilled in the seed of Abraham, Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:16).
• The Gospel blessing belongs to those true children of Abraham who have put their faith in Christ alone (Romans 4:12; 9:7,8; Galatians 3:7,29; 4:22-31).
• The Gospel obedience is an expression of love to Christ (John 14:15,21; 15:10; 1 John 5:3) and the true fruit of genuine faith (John 3:36; Romans 1:15; 15:18; 16:26; Acts 6:7).

So sing the song, Church, for it speaks of God’s purpose from long, long ago to save you and preserve you today for His praise and a loving, faith-based obedience.