Today's Daily Lesson comes from Haggai chapter 2 verses 1 through 7:
In the second year of King Darius,1in the seventh month, on the twenty-first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the prophet Haggai, saying: 2Speak now to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, and say, 3Who is left among you that saw this house in its former glory? How does it look to you now? Is it not in your sight as nothing? 4Yet now take courage, O Zerubbabel, says the Lord; take courage, O Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; take courage, all you people of the land, says the Lord; work, for I am with you, says the Lord of hosts, 5according to the promise that I made you when you came out of Egypt. My spirit abides among you; do not fear. 6For thus says the Lord of hosts: Once again, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land; 7and I will shake all the nations, so that the treasure of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with splendour, says the Lord of hosts.
Today is the Feast of the Presentation, the 40th day after Christmas and the day when the infant Jesus was said to have been presented to God in the Temple.
For those who know Jewish history, the Temple was actually the second or perhaps even third edifice to sit on the same spot over centuries of Jewish life. And like any old building, it had seen its better and worse years.
The text today comes from the time of the Jewish exile 500 years before Christ was born. It speaks of the Temple's emptiness and ruin, the sadness of its destruction following the City of Jerusalem's fall to the Babylonians. The people were carried off in captivity, and the Temple was left to sit alone in ruin. But the promise of the prophet spoke of a coming time when the Temple would again be restored and the filled with the splendor of God's people from all the world.
Our Temples are sitting in a kind of emptiness now. The people are in exile. We thought it would be a short while, but it has turned out to be no less than a year and probably quite a bit longer.
But the Scripture comes to us today to speak of a coming day when the Temple will once again be filled. Once again, God will shake the heavens and the earth and our Temples will be full of the splendor of the nations. They will be full of people. And the presentation and dedication of the children will happen again in the Temple before the congregation.
It will happen. In God's good time it will happen. "And the glory of the latter days will be even greater than the former."
So may it be -- and may our aged even have eyes to see and say what old Simeon said when the baby Jesus was brought before him:
"Now the LORD is dismissing His servant in peace . . ."
Ryon Price is Senior Pastor of Broadway Baptist Church in Fort Worth, Texas.
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