Re/Turn to Holiness
Re/Turn to Holiness
Sermon Synopsis
Jesus is busy building. By the Spirit, He is active establishing a dwelling for Himself. At the center of it all, He is seated upon the Throne. What it is has not been fully realized. It is a coming Kingdom that cannot be thwarted, a dwelling of God in the midst of His people.
As in the days of Haggai, the need today to recognize, humbly re-commit, and practically dedicate ourselves to His building is paramount (Psalm 132). Haggai and his people were commissioned to rebuild a Temple once destroyed. We have been commissioned to be built together in love to become a House of living stones ready to offer spiritual sacrifices to God the Father through Jesus (1 Peter 2:5). The building is in us and through us, together.
As we unite our hearts with that of the Great Master Builder, we become the hands and feet walking out His eternal, master plan to bring His Kingdom come on earth as it is in Heaven.
Jesus is coming soon. Are you down for what He is building up?
Isaiah 40:1-5
40:1 Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.
2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and cry to her
that her warfare is ended,
that her iniquity is pardoned,
that she has received from the Lord's hand
double for all her sins.
3 A voice cries:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord;
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
4 Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
5 And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”
Haggai 2:10-19
10 On the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came by Haggai the prophet, 11 “Thus says the Lord of hosts: Ask the priests about the law: 12 ‘If someone carries holy meat in the fold of his garment and touches with his fold bread or stew or wine or oil or any kind of food, does it become holy?’” The priests answered and said, “No.” 13 Then Haggai said, “If someone who is unclean by contact with a dead body touches any of these, does it become unclean?” The priests answered and said, “It does become unclean.” 14 Then Haggai answered and said, “So is it with this people, and with this nation before me, declares the Lord, and so with every work of their hands. And what they offer there is unclean. 15 Now then, consider from this day onward. Before stone was placed upon stone in the temple of the Lord, 16 how did you fare? When one came to a heap of twenty measures, there were but ten. When one came to the wine vat to draw fifty measures, there were but twenty. 17 I struck you and all the products of your toil with blight and with mildew and with hail, yet you did not turn to me, declares the Lord. 18 Consider from this day onward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month. Since the day that the foundation of the Lord's temple was laid, consider: 19 Is the seed yet in the barn? Indeed, the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, and the olive tree have yielded nothing. But from this day on I will bless you.”
John 11:25
25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live,