SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together, family church.
SPEAKER_00: We bow before you, Heavenly Father, our God, our Creator, our King, our Savior, and our Friend.
SPEAKER_00: In the name of Jesus crucified and raised from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: We've gathered to meet with you this morning.
SPEAKER_00: God, I pray this morning as we open the Bible, your word, that our hearts will be wide open to receive everything that you have for us this morning by faith.
SPEAKER_00: We do pledge to receive it by faith, and we receive it all in Jesus' name, and all God's people say.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: You can't be seated.
SPEAKER_00: Welcome again to Family Church.
SPEAKER_00: I'm glad all of you guys are here.
SPEAKER_00: My name is Jimmy Scrogins.
SPEAKER_00: I'm one of the pastors here.
SPEAKER_00: If I haven't had a chance to meet you yet, I would love to meet you before you leave today.
SPEAKER_00: But every Sunday at Family Church, we have a Bible study.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to have our Bible study right now.
SPEAKER_00: So go ahead and get your Bibles out.
SPEAKER_00: Turn your Bibles on on your devices.
SPEAKER_00: Grab a Bible from the pew in front of you and open up to the book of Haggai, chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: The book of Haggai chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: The book of Haggai is one of the shortest books in the whole Bible.
SPEAKER_00: It's only two chapters long.
SPEAKER_00: It's easy to read.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't know how to find things very good in the Bible, it's okay.
SPEAKER_00: Use your table of contents.
SPEAKER_00: Use what you have on your device, but Haggai chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: I'd also encourage you to get out your program.
SPEAKER_00: There's a place on there for you to take notes and write some things down while we're having a Bible study.
SPEAKER_00: I do just want to echo what Pastor Derek said just a moment ago.
SPEAKER_00: Guys, we had the most incredible, awesome week of camp with the teenagers from Family Church.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was unbelievable.
SPEAKER_00: When you see, I'm telling you, people can say what they want.
SPEAKER_00: They can say what they want about this generation, and all the old people can have their little get off my lawn fits, you know, that they want to have.
SPEAKER_00: But I'm telling you right now, we have some young people at this church that are fired up about the future.
SPEAKER_00: They are excited to do what they're going to do for the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: They're excited about the freedom of living in this country and having the opportunities that this country affords, and they're excited about making a difference for Christ and all the different ways that they are going to do it.
SPEAKER_00: And it's because you pray and you give and you encourage them, and moms and dads, you partner with us.
SPEAKER_00: So thank you for doing that.
SPEAKER_00: I wish all of you could see it.
SPEAKER_00: I wish you could just be there and see what I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_00: It is really, really awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, back to our text.
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you our big idea for our talk today from the book of Haggai.
SPEAKER_00: Our big idea is you should seize your moment and you will see God's glory.
SPEAKER_00: If you will seize your moment, you will see God's glory.
SPEAKER_00: We're in the middle of a teaching series on the minor prophets.
SPEAKER_00: The minor prophets, there are 12 of them in the Old Testament.
SPEAKER_00: This is number 10 in a 12 message series on the 12 minor prophets.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Haggai is my personal favorite minor prophet.
SPEAKER_00: I wish we could teach on it longer, but just one message today.
SPEAKER_00: I find Haggai extremely motivational to me when I read this two-chapter book.
SPEAKER_00: When I read the book of Haggai, I want to get up and run through a brick wall.
SPEAKER_00: That's how I feel about it.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you'll feel that too as we study this morning.
SPEAKER_00: You guys know what I mean when I say right time?
SPEAKER_00: Right place?
SPEAKER_00: How did you do me?
SPEAKER_00: How did you get that job?
SPEAKER_00: How did you become friends with him?
SPEAKER_00: How did your business actually take off?
SPEAKER_00: How did you get that idea and make it a reality?
SPEAKER_00: Right time, right place.
SPEAKER_00: And most people in the world talk right time and chalk it up to dumb luck.
SPEAKER_00: Pure chance.
SPEAKER_00: And even people who aren't Christians will still kind of say things like, Well, the man upstairs was smiling on me on that one.
SPEAKER_00: Or they'll say, you know, everything happens for a reason, even if they're irreligious.
SPEAKER_00: But Christians don't believe in dumb luck, and we don't believe in pure chance because we believe in the sovereignty of God.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, we believe there is a God who is always in charge.
SPEAKER_00: Why does God have you where you are right now?
SPEAKER_00: Why are you in the family that you are in?
SPEAKER_00: Why are you in the city that you are in?
SPEAKER_00: Why are you in the relationship that you're in right now?
SPEAKER_00: What is God up to in your life if He's in charge?
SPEAKER_00: See, Christians believe that all things work together for our good and for God's glory.
SPEAKER_00: Did you catch that?
SPEAKER_00: Our good and God's glory.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why if you're going to live like a Christian, your job is to figure out what God wants you to do right now and then do it.
SPEAKER_00: And don't wait and don't quit.
SPEAKER_00: And don't get distracted and don't be afraid, but definitely don't quit.
SPEAKER_00: And I see people quit all the time.
SPEAKER_00: Even Christians, they quit on things that they should not quit.
SPEAKER_00: You should figure out what God wants you to do and do it and then see it all the way through.
SPEAKER_00: Seize your moment and you will see God's glory.
SPEAKER_00: Let's look at our text of scripture, Haggai chapter 1, verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: This is what the word of God says.
SPEAKER_00: In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet to Zerubbabel, the son of Sheeltiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the son of Jehosadak, the high priest.
SPEAKER_00: And I want to pause right there.
SPEAKER_00: The prophet that we're talking about today is Haggai, the audience that we're going to focus on this morning of Haggai's prophecy is Zerubbabel, who is the governor of Judah.
SPEAKER_00: So let me give you a history lesson because, again, if you don't understand the timelines and the history, you can read a two-chapter book and you won't understand one blooming word about anything that it says.
SPEAKER_00: But the history brings it all together.
SPEAKER_00: So let me remind you of the history of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: I think we've got a timeline we can put up here.
SPEAKER_00: You guys remember that after the people of Israel made it to the promised land, God raised up uh Saul as a king, then David as a king, then Solomon.
SPEAKER_00: One of Solomon's, King Solomon's primary job was to build the temple, which he did in 959 BC.
SPEAKER_00: That temple took seven years to build.
SPEAKER_00: And let me tell you what happened.
SPEAKER_00: When Solomon built his temple, that uh was a was a dwelling place for uh God's presence on this earth.
SPEAKER_00: He built this massive temple and they had a huge celebration when they dedicated the temple.
SPEAKER_00: There was a massive sacrifice.
SPEAKER_00: They sacrificed tens of thousands of animals.
SPEAKER_00: Don't email me, PETA people.
SPEAKER_00: That's what they did in the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: They they they sacrificed tens of thousands of animals to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: They had a huge choir, they had a huge orchestra.
SPEAKER_00: And what happens when they start offering these sacrifices at this temple?
SPEAKER_00: The fire of God, the Bible says, comes out of the sky, consumes all the sacrifices, and then the glory of God comes down on the temple like a cloud, and it's so thick the priests who are in there trying to do the work have to leave the temple premises because the glory of God is so thick on that day.
SPEAKER_00: You can look it up and read it for yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Huge celebration.
SPEAKER_00: Well, then Solomon dies, and as great as the glory of God is in Israel, the nation falls into civil war.
SPEAKER_00: And at the end of the civil war, there are now two nations, the northern kingdom called Israel, and the southern kingdom called Judah.
SPEAKER_00: Well, this temple that Solomon built that was finished in 959, lasted for 380 years.
SPEAKER_00: But in 586 BC, because of the judgment of God, the Babylonians invade the kingdom of Judah.
SPEAKER_00: They ransacked the city of Jerusalem, and they destroy the temple that Solomon built.
SPEAKER_00: And the Babylonians had a policy.
SPEAKER_00: When the Babylonians would invade, they would try to decimate the whole society.
SPEAKER_00: They would go in and find the greatest leadership-oriented young people and kidnap them and exile them back to Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: They would destroy their religious institutions.
SPEAKER_00: They would try to just destroy the economy.
SPEAKER_00: And they did it because they wanted to make sure when Babylon gets through invading you and destroying you, you will never rise up and rebel against Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: They wanted to devastate it, and that's what they did to Judah.
SPEAKER_00: But no kingdom lasts forever.
SPEAKER_00: In 539 BC, King Cyrus the Great and the Persians take over the Babylonian Empire.
SPEAKER_00: Now Cyrus has some different thoughts because Cyrus is very superstitious.
SPEAKER_00: And Cyrus thought it was very bad Juju.
SPEAKER_00: It's in the Bible, look it up.
SPEAKER_00: Very bad juju for him to have all of these foreign gods displaced and brought back to Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: He thought it made the gods mad at him.
SPEAKER_00: So he said, we're not going to keep doing that.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to send all the gods and all the people back where they came from.
SPEAKER_00: So in 538, Cyrus the Great appoints Zerubbabel, who was a Jewish exile, to take 50,000 exiles and sends them back to Judah so that they can rebuild the temple and rebuild their society.
SPEAKER_00: Now, when Zerubbabel gets to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple, there's all kinds of problems.
SPEAKER_00: There are political problems.
SPEAKER_00: There are critics because Zerubbabel doesn't have the kind of resources that King Solomon had when King Solomon built the first temple.
SPEAKER_00: And the temple's not going to be as large.
SPEAKER_00: And it's just really a lot more difficult, but it takes two years, and Zerubbabel gets the foundation of the new temple, the second temple.
SPEAKER_00: He gets the foundation laid in the ground.
SPEAKER_00: Now Zerubbabel's done his best.
SPEAKER_00: He's done everything a human being can do.
SPEAKER_00: He's taken the resources that he has and the opportunity that he has, and he's laid the foundation.
SPEAKER_00: He's trying to do what God wants him to do.
SPEAKER_00: But the book of Ezra, which I'm going to read for you in just a second, tells us they had this dedication event when they laid the foundation of the new temple, and there were definitely mixed reviews.
SPEAKER_00: Let me read you what it says.
SPEAKER_00: Ezra chapter 3, verse 11.
SPEAKER_00: I'll put it on the screens.
SPEAKER_00: This is what happened when Zerubbabel lays the foundation of the new temple.
SPEAKER_00: All the people shouted with a great shout when they praised the Lord because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid.
SPEAKER_00: But many of the priests and Levites and heads of fathers' houses, old men who had seen the first house, wept with a loud voice when they saw the foundation of this house being laid.
SPEAKER_00: Though many shouted aloud for joy, so that the people could not distinguish the sound of the joyful shout from the sound of people's weeping, for the people shouted with a great shout, and the sound was heard far away.
SPEAKER_00: So back to the timeline.
SPEAKER_00: The second temple started in 538.
SPEAKER_00: It's been fifty years since the destruction of the first temple.
SPEAKER_00: So by the time they lay the foundation of this second temple, it means that all the people who could remember, everybody who's like 60 years old or older, they could actually remember the first temple.
SPEAKER_00: They had been to the first temple, they had seen the first temple.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody younger than that has no memory of the first temple at all.
SPEAKER_00: So they lay the foundation of the new temple, and what do you find out?
SPEAKER_00: The people who could remember the old temple, all they wanted to talk about was, well, back when we had the good temple that Solomon built, and they wept.
SPEAKER_00: They just said, This new temple we're building, this is this is gonna be a crummy little temple compared to the one we grew up with.
SPEAKER_00: But you know who didn't care about that?
SPEAKER_00: The young people who never had a temple before.
SPEAKER_00: They said, I don't know about that, but this looks pretty amazing to us because all we've had is a burned down, beaten-up city of Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: And now we're gonna get to have our own temple for our kids to grow up and for us to worship in.
SPEAKER_00: They were fired up.
SPEAKER_00: When those old people started crying about that old temple, you know, you can look up this ancient rabbinical literature that goes way back centuries and centuries, and if you look it up and you read the ancient rabbinical literature about what happened, there's a little note in there, and it says that they had an ancient song that was attached, and it says, Glory days.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they'll pass you by, glory days in the blink of a young girl's eye, glory days.
SPEAKER_00: Look it up, it's in rabbinical literature.
SPEAKER_00: And if you get that reference, you are one of the old men I'm talking to.
SPEAKER_00: Because you know who's fired up?
SPEAKER_00: The people who've never had a temple before.
SPEAKER_00: But the internal criticism and the negativity of the grandparents stings the young leaders when they're trying to do something great for God.
SPEAKER_00: And Zerubbabel, after all of that criticism, decides it's not worth it, I'm not putting up with all this anymore, and he quits.
SPEAKER_00: He quits, he builds the foundation, they give him all of that, and he just says, I'm done.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not doing anymore.
SPEAKER_00: So the work just stopped on the Lord's temple.
SPEAKER_00: The work stopped for 16 years.
SPEAKER_00: The foundation is there, nobody's working on it.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody just goes about their business.
SPEAKER_00: They start building their own houses, building their own business, building their own lives.
SPEAKER_00: No one wants to really get fired up about God's temple.
SPEAKER_00: The old people are all mad about it.
SPEAKER_00: Just forget it.
SPEAKER_00: We're just not going to do it anymore.
SPEAKER_00: But God wants the second temple built.
SPEAKER_00: God wants to have a house for his name in Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: So God sends Haggai and another guy named Zachariah.
SPEAKER_00: He sends these two guys to preach to Zerubbabel and the people in Jerusalem to tell them to get up off their blessed assurances and get back to work.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he wants them to do.
SPEAKER_00: Well, it takes four more years, but Zerubbabel does get the temple finished.
SPEAKER_00: So what you have in the book of Haggai is the preaching of the preacher Haggai, motivating Zerubbabel to get up and get to work.
SPEAKER_00: So with that in mind, let's read Haggai chapter 1 again.
SPEAKER_00: Are you ready?
SPEAKER_00: Here we go.
SPEAKER_00: Haggai chapter 1, verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: This is what the word of God says.
SPEAKER_00: In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet to Zerubbabel, the son of Sheal Tiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, son of Jehosadakh the high priest.
SPEAKER_00: Thus says the Lord of hosts, these people say the time is not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Then the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet.
SPEAKER_00: Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses while this house lies in ruins?
SPEAKER_00: Now, therefore, says the Lord of hosts, consider your ways.
SPEAKER_00: You have sown much and you have harvested little.
SPEAKER_00: You eat, but you never have enough.
SPEAKER_00: You drink, but you never have your fill.
SPEAKER_00: You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm.
SPEAKER_00: And he who earns wages does so to put them into a bag with holes.
SPEAKER_00: Thus says the Lord of hosts, consider your ways.
SPEAKER_00: Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house that I may take pleasure in it, and that I may be glorified, says the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: So you can see what's happening.
SPEAKER_00: They stopped working on the temple.
SPEAKER_00: That's God's thing that He wanted done, and started putting all their resources and priorities on their thing, the stuff they wanted to do.
SPEAKER_00: And they just start living their best life now while God's house is not built.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 4.
SPEAKER_00: Look what it says in your text right there.
SPEAKER_00: Their houses are in great shape, paneled houses, but God's house is not a priority.
SPEAKER_00: So what is the remedy?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 8.
SPEAKER_00: God says, get your priority straight, get back to work, and get God's house built.
SPEAKER_00: And Zerubbabel hears this, and he indeed gets it in gear, and he gets back to work.
SPEAKER_00: Look what it says in verse 14.
SPEAKER_00: Skip all the way down there to verse 14, chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel, the son of CLTL, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua, the son of Jehosadak, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people, and they came and worked on the house of the Lord of hosts, their God.
SPEAKER_00: Now that's some pretty solid preaching by Haggai, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: I would like that.
SPEAKER_00: If I was preaching and after I got done preaching, uh everybody started doing the thing that I was trying to preach them into doing, I would say, well, that works good.
SPEAKER_00: The Spirit of God used it.
SPEAKER_00: The Spirit of God used the preaching of Haggai, which is why we have it in our Bibles right now.
SPEAKER_00: So what can we learn in 2026?
SPEAKER_00: Because you're like, hey, we live in 2026, none of us are building temples.
SPEAKER_00: Like what is happening right now?
SPEAKER_00: If you're gonna write some things down, here's some things you might want to write down.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, don't be paralyzed by the past.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be paralyzed by the past.
SPEAKER_00: Now look, the past is important.
SPEAKER_00: Your past is your story.
SPEAKER_00: And if you've been a Christian for a while, and some of you have, and some of you are new, and some of you aren't Christians yet.
SPEAKER_00: If you've been a Christian for a while, what happens is you have a lot of memories about things that God did in your past.
SPEAKER_00: One of the reasons we have student camp is we want those kids to have some memories about things God did for them in their past.
SPEAKER_00: I want them to remember the rest of their lives when they were 16 years old and they were at Lake Placid Conference Center and the Spirit of God spoke to them.
SPEAKER_00: I want them to have that as a core memory the rest of their lives.
SPEAKER_00: But if that's all you ever have, and you turn 26 and 36 and 46 and 76, and that's all you ever have, then all you'll ever do is think about man, I wish we could just go back to Lake Placid.
SPEAKER_00: But that's not life.
SPEAKER_00: And adults have our own version of that, don't we?
SPEAKER_00: I wish we could just go back to when I was in my 20s.
SPEAKER_00: We had a great small group back then.
SPEAKER_00: I wish I could just go back to when I was a young adult.
SPEAKER_00: Well, when we had Pastor So-and-so, then the preaching was real.
SPEAKER_00: When we had we had this over here, the music was really good.
SPEAKER_00: We had these programs, man, everybody's got their favorite era of church.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody's got their favorite moment, their favorite time, and that's awesome because that's what God has done in your life, and you should never forget those times, but don't let those great experiences with God in the past paralyze you right now.
SPEAKER_00: Now, a lot of people are paralyzed in the past, and when I say that, you're thinking of bad things that happened in your past.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't want to be paralyzed by the bad things.
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about your divorce, I'm talking about your sexual sins that you used to be involved in, I'm talking about your parenting mistakes that you've made.
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about your addiction that you're still having to deal with.
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about when you've lost your temper and hurt people, I'm talking about those kinds of things.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're a Christian, you definitely should not be paralyzed by your past sins, because Jesus Christ has been crucified on the cross for your sins.
SPEAKER_00: He has taken his shame on himself on your behalf, and he has been crucified to the cross for you.
SPEAKER_00: He's been raised from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: If you will repent of your sins, turn from your sins, turn to Jesus, receive Jesus by faith for yourself.
SPEAKER_00: You do not need to be paralyzed by your past because your past, even the most shameful parts of it, have been nailed to the cross and you bear it no more.
SPEAKER_00: But this text is not really about bad past that paralyze you.
SPEAKER_00: It's about good past that paralyzes you.
SPEAKER_00: Don't let the nostalgia for when your kids were little cause you to miss your moment now in your marriage.
SPEAKER_00: Don't cause the nostalgia from when your kids were in preschool to cause you to miss your moment when your kids go to student camp.
SPEAKER_00: Don't lest your nostalgia for what your church used to be like cause you to miss your moment about what God is doing right now.
SPEAKER_00: And just let me go ahead and speak to the old people in the room because this text is about old.
SPEAKER_00: The text says old people, so if you're like who you talking, old people, you.
SPEAKER_00: If you think it applies, it probably does.
SPEAKER_00: Now I was watching an Instagram reel this week.
SPEAKER_00: It said that if you're in your 50s, you're like the youth group of the old people.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if that's supposed to make you feel better or worse.
SPEAKER_00: I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: Why would we be discouraging to young people about what God is doing in their life right now?
SPEAKER_00: Why would we not do everything we can to encourage people who are younger than we are, the next generation, to love God and follow God and serve God in their own moment, in their own time?
SPEAKER_00: Who cares?
SPEAKER_00: Man, it's a lot better when we used to have, you know, no cell phones.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but they got cell phones.
SPEAKER_00: It was a lot better when we didn't have social media.
SPEAKER_00: They have social media.
SPEAKER_00: It was a lot better.
SPEAKER_00: Who cares?
SPEAKER_00: Nobody cares about when you walked uphill both ways to school in the snow with no shoes.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody cares.
SPEAKER_00: And you lived in Florida, and we know it's a lie.
SPEAKER_00: There's no Hills and there's no snow.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody cares.
SPEAKER_00: You know what you ought to be rejoicing about?
SPEAKER_00: Look around this room and see all these young adults in this room.
SPEAKER_00: Look around this room and see all these teenagers and children in this room.
SPEAKER_00: Praise God for what He's done in the past.
SPEAKER_00: But don't let nostalgia for yesterday cause you to stop celebrating what God is doing right now.
SPEAKER_00: You should seize your moment in the present.
SPEAKER_00: Don't get paralyzed by your past.
SPEAKER_00: Number two, on your notes.
SPEAKER_00: Seize your moment in the present.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be paralyzed by the past.
SPEAKER_00: The good things are the best things.
SPEAKER_00: But seize your moment in the present.
SPEAKER_00: Let's look at our text again, back to the scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 2, starting in verse 2.
SPEAKER_00: Listen to what Haggai says.
SPEAKER_00: He says, speak now to Zerubel, the son of S L T L, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the son of Jehoshatak, the high priest, and to all the remnant of the people, and say, Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory?
SPEAKER_00: How do you see it now?
SPEAKER_00: Is it not as nothing in your eyes?
SPEAKER_00: Yet now, be strong, O Zerubbabel, declares the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Be strong, O Joshua, son of Jehosadak, the high priest.
SPEAKER_00: Be strong, all you people of the land, declares the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Work, for I am with you, declares the Lord of hosts.
SPEAKER_00: According to the covenant that I made with you when you came out of Egypt, my spirit remains in your midst.
SPEAKER_00: Fear not.
SPEAKER_00: And yes, God's done awesome things in the past, just as He had for them.
SPEAKER_00: He got them out of Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: He gave them a great temple when Solomon was king.
SPEAKER_00: But God says, I'm with you right now.
SPEAKER_00: I'm in the midst right now.
SPEAKER_00: Don't complain about the past.
SPEAKER_00: Work right now, because I am with you, right?
SPEAKER_00: Now.
SPEAKER_00: Look at the text, verse one.
SPEAKER_00: He says, I'm talking, he says, speak now.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse three.
SPEAKER_00: How do you see the temple now?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse four.
SPEAKER_00: Yet now be strong and work.
SPEAKER_00: That's an important word in the book of Haggad.
SPEAKER_00: It's an important word in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: The word now.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 1, verse 5.
SPEAKER_00: Now stop and examine your life.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 2, verse 4.
SPEAKER_00: Now be strong and get back to work.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 2, verse 15.
SPEAKER_00: Now learn from your past.
SPEAKER_00: Consider it.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 2, verse 18.
SPEAKER_00: Right now you should be believing God for a better future.
SPEAKER_00: Don't spend too much time romanticizing the past.
SPEAKER_00: And don't spend too much time regretting the past.
SPEAKER_00: Lock it in.
SPEAKER_00: Seize your moment right now.
SPEAKER_00: You say, well, are we doing that at family church?
SPEAKER_00: We're trying.
SPEAKER_00: We love that this church right here was founded in this neighborhood in 1901.
SPEAKER_00: We have a great history and a great past.
SPEAKER_00: A great history and a great past.
SPEAKER_00: Our church started at Palm Beach Atlantic University back in the 60s.
SPEAKER_00: Our church has a great past, but it's only worth anything if we seize our moment where we are right now.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we're going to have a family church in Pompano Beach in 2027.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to have a family church in North Palm Beach in 2027.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to have a family church out here on Lake Worth Road at Florida Gardens in 2027.
SPEAKER_00: We are seizing our moments now.
SPEAKER_00: We're not waiting.
SPEAKER_00: We're not paralyzed by the great things God has done.
SPEAKER_00: We're not paralyzed by regret over the mistakes we've made as a church.
SPEAKER_00: We are seizing our moment now.
SPEAKER_00: And we're doing it as a church, but you should do it in your own family.
SPEAKER_00: You should do it in your own life.
SPEAKER_00: You should do it with your finances.
SPEAKER_00: You should do it with your business.
SPEAKER_00: Seize your moment now.
SPEAKER_00: What does God want you to do?
SPEAKER_00: And right here at Family Church Downtown, next year, we're going to have a massive construction project start, and it's going to take about two years.
SPEAKER_00: And when this construction project starts, if you think the parking is crazy now, come back in 2027.
SPEAKER_00: And you'll be just like, oh, I remember when we had all this parking.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I'm going to give the book of Haggai out and beat you over the head with it, man.
SPEAKER_00: Because you know why?
SPEAKER_00: Because we're going to seize God's moment now because we believe God's doing something important.
SPEAKER_00: And construction is part of it.
SPEAKER_00: And renewing our facilities for new generations is part of it.
SPEAKER_00: Are we going to have to be inconvenienced for a little while while that happens?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to have to be majorly inconvenienced for a little while while it happens.
SPEAKER_00: But we're still going to have church and we're still going to hold together because we're believing what God is doing now.
SPEAKER_00: And I would just encourage you, if God has put something on your heart to do, stop putting it off, stop being paralyzed and seize your moment and see the glory of God right now.
SPEAKER_00: In your family, in your business, with your life, in your walk with God.
SPEAKER_00: If God's been putting something on your heart and you've been kind of waiting and you're just not sure, stop messing around and do what God's calling you to do.
SPEAKER_00: Seize your moment.
SPEAKER_00: And you should do it because God has a future.
SPEAKER_00: God always has a future.
SPEAKER_00: And God's a future God.
SPEAKER_00: He's not some ancient God from the past.
SPEAKER_00: He is an ancient God from the past, but he's an ancient God from the past who's an ancient God in the future.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, this God, He's always moving forward.
SPEAKER_00: Look what it says in Haggai chapter 2, verse 6.
SPEAKER_00: For thus says the Lord of hosts.
SPEAKER_00: This is my all right, guys.
SPEAKER_00: This is the best part of the whole book.
SPEAKER_00: I'm reading you like the pinnacle of the book of Haggai.
SPEAKER_00: Ready?
SPEAKER_00: For thus says the Lord of hosts, yet once more and in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land.
SPEAKER_00: And I will shake all nations, so that the treasures of all nations shall come in.
SPEAKER_00: And I will fill this house with glory, says the Lord of hosts.
SPEAKER_00: The silver is mine and the gold is mine, declares the Lord of hosts.
SPEAKER_00: The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former, says the Lord of hosts.
SPEAKER_00: And in this place I will give peace, declares the Lord of hosts.
SPEAKER_00: You don't think you have enough resources, God says, to make it what it ought to be?
SPEAKER_00: All the silver is mine, all the gold is mine.
SPEAKER_00: When I get ready to, I'll bring in all the wealth of all the nations and bring them right in here.
SPEAKER_00: You think this foundation is too meager to have the glory of God fall on it?
SPEAKER_00: God says, I will fall on this place so that the former glory is nothing compared to the latter glory.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's what God's doing all the time.
SPEAKER_00: Which brings me to number three on your notes.
SPEAKER_00: Believe God for greater things in the future.
SPEAKER_00: It was hard for some people to be excited because the footprint of the foundation was smaller and it was less impressive than Solomon's temple.
SPEAKER_00: And people questioned Zerubbabel's motives.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they'll question yours.
SPEAKER_00: And people questioned whether or not Zerubbabel was competent to do the job.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes people will question you.
SPEAKER_00: But all of that made it hard for Zerubbabel to seize the moment.
SPEAKER_00: Now, can you imagine being in the nation of Judah and looking at this little building after you saw the first temple?
SPEAKER_00: And people back then must have been asking, How is God ever going to actually use this?
SPEAKER_00: Well, we have really missed it around here.
SPEAKER_00: We used to be so great.
SPEAKER_00: Now look at what it is.
SPEAKER_00: And you can hear him talking about the leader too.
SPEAKER_00: Look at Zerubbabel.
SPEAKER_00: He thinks he's all that.
SPEAKER_00: Let me tell you, he's no Solomon.
SPEAKER_00: Well, how do you know?
SPEAKER_00: That the temple that Zerubbabel built ended up standing there and being used for the next 600 years.
SPEAKER_00: And that temple was the temple that was in Jerusalem when Jesus was alive.
SPEAKER_00: Which means that Jesus preached in Zerubbabel's temple.
SPEAKER_00: Saint Peter preached in Zerubbabel's temple.
SPEAKER_00: It's incredible how things with humble beginnings can have a massive impact.
SPEAKER_00: And you might be saying, How is God going to use me?
SPEAKER_00: And how is when is God going to start working in my family?
SPEAKER_00: And what about my marriage and my wife?
SPEAKER_00: And what about my kids who are really in a tough spot right now?
SPEAKER_00: And what about my health?
SPEAKER_00: And what about my addiction?
SPEAKER_00: And what about my depression?
SPEAKER_00: Did you hear what God said?
SPEAKER_00: Verse 6, I'm going to shake the heavens and the earth.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 7.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to fill this house with glory.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: The latter glory is going to be greater than the formal glory.
SPEAKER_00: So what you see with your eyes right now does not tell the whole story about what God's going to do in the future.
SPEAKER_00: What you see with your eyes right now does not tell the whole story about what God's going to do in the future.
SPEAKER_00: If you'll seize your moment, God will show you his glory.
SPEAKER_00: And one more thing.
SPEAKER_00: Every story in the Bible points us to Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, great, Pastor Jimmy.
SPEAKER_00: I did not see Jesus Christ in the construction story of Zerubbabel and Haggai preaching to them.
SPEAKER_00: Number four on your notes.
SPEAKER_00: This is really important.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is the latter glory.
SPEAKER_00: The latter glory will be greater than the former glory.
SPEAKER_00: People back then must have been asking, when?
SPEAKER_00: When is this going to happen?
SPEAKER_00: When are God's people going to see this glory?
SPEAKER_00: But you got to keep reading the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: We're not just Old Testament people.
SPEAKER_00: We're Old Testament and New Testament people.
SPEAKER_00: We're Christians.
SPEAKER_00: And what if you read through the New Testament?
SPEAKER_00: Here's what happened.
SPEAKER_00: You get to the Gospel of John chapter 1, and it says that the word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the Bible says.
SPEAKER_00: John chapter 2, Jesus says, if you'll tear down this temple, meaning his body, I'll build it back in three days, referring to the resurrection from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus told Saint Peter, upon your faith, the kind of faith that you have, I will build my church, and the gates of hell will never prevail against it.
SPEAKER_00: And then in Revelation, the Bible says that the heavenly city of God comes down out of heaven.
SPEAKER_00: And when Jesus returns, and every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus is Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And at that time the dead in Christ shall rise, and all of the people from all of the ages who are people of God will be gathered into one family.
SPEAKER_00: And the people from every tribe and nation and ethnicity and language will be gathered in heaven and we'll all be there worshiping Jesus together, each of us in our own language, and we'll be reunited with our friends and our family and even characters from the Bible who've gone to heaven ahead of us and we'll all be together on that day when the latter glory is greater than the former glory.
SPEAKER_00: But our job right now is to seize our moment and let God show us his glory.
SPEAKER_00: Because one day we will see Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So let me ask you just a real personal question.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever been saved?
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever turned from your sins and received Jesus by faith for yourself?
SPEAKER_00: Because if you've never done that, what you should do today is seize your moment and come to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: To seize your moment and come to Christ today, let that be your step today.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever been baptized?
SPEAKER_00: So I'm a Christian, but I've never been baptized.
SPEAKER_00: I've never been baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Since I've been a Christian, you should do that today.
SPEAKER_00: Let that be your step.
SPEAKER_00: Seize your moment and make a decision to do that.
SPEAKER_00: Seize your moment.
SPEAKER_00: And some of you used to walk with God.
SPEAKER_00: It's been a long time.
SPEAKER_00: You should come back to God today.
SPEAKER_00: You should come back to Him today.
SPEAKER_00: Seize your moment.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be paralyzed by the past.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I can do that.
SPEAKER_00: I can't do it.
SPEAKER_00: And people all around you have done it, and people all around you are doing it.
SPEAKER_00: Turn from your sins, humble yourself, turn to Christ, receive him by faith, because Jesus is the ladder of glory.
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus was crucified for our sins and raised from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus never missed his moments.
SPEAKER_00: And to help us remember what Jesus has done for us every Sunday at Family Church, we take the Lord's Supper, which we're going to do right now.
SPEAKER_00: We take the Lord's Supper, we remember the body of Christ broken for us.
SPEAKER_00: We remember the blood of Christ shed for us.
SPEAKER_00: We eat the bread and we drink the cup in his memory and with grateful hearts.
SPEAKER_00: Now the Lord's Supper is only for people who are Christians.
SPEAKER_00: If you're here today and you're not a Christian, you should not take the Lord's Supper.
SPEAKER_00: Just wait.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not embarrassing, a lot of people don't take it.
SPEAKER_00: It's not embarrassing.
SPEAKER_00: Don't take the Lord's Supper.
SPEAKER_00: Just wait until after you become a Christian for yourself, and then you could take the Lord's Supper with integrity.
SPEAKER_00: We teach and we believe it's best for you to take the Lord's Supper after you've been baptized as a believer by immersion in water in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: And you should really wait until you become a part of a neighborhood church.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you say, Well, Pastor Jimmy, I'm new here, I'm checking this out, or I'm a guest, I'm a Christian, I've been baptized, this just isn't my church.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, then you should take the Lord's Supper with us as part of the extended family of Jesus that goes around the world.
SPEAKER_00: But right now, I'd invite you to bow your heads and pray to the Lord, draw close to the Lord, confess your sins to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's a moment that you need to seize, a decision that you need to make.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe the book of Haggai speaks to you from centuries ago and tells you to seize your moment and see God's glory.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together, let's humble ourselves before God, and in just a moment we'll all eat and drink the Lord's Supper together.