Join us as we delve into the book of Haggai with Dr. J. Vernon McGee, exploring the profound lessons of spirit over structure. Through insightful commentary, Dr. McGee guides us in understanding the significance of the temple in Haggai’s time and how the presence of God was valued over grandeur. Whether you’re traveling through the Bible for the first time or a returning listener, this episode offers rich, timeless wisdom for your journey.
The foundation, ye saints of the Lord, is laid for your faith in God.
SPEAKER 02 :
Welcome to Through the Bible. We’re in the book of Haggai in our five-year journey through the Word of God. And this time our teacher, Dr. J. Vernon McGee, is going to be talking about an important life principle. So if you can, turn in your Bible to Chapter 2. Now, if you’ve been on the Bible bus for long, then you know that we love your letters, emails, your texts, and even your voicemails. We love to share them here on this program, too, and we’ve done this for decades. And to tell you a bit more about this tradition and to introduce our study, here’s Dr. McGee.
SPEAKER 01 :
And we would like to be in touch with you. That is, you know, we come to you on one side of the freeway down the right side with the Word of God. And you can come back to us on the other side of the freeway going on the right side with a letter. And if we don’t have that kind of a communication, we won’t be able to continue to come down our side of the freeway. Now, I hope you understand that. And if you do, we’ll have a letter from you, I’m sure. And you’ll want to help us to get the word out to the world. We’re coming to something unusual today in the little book of Haggai. Here in the second chapter, at verse 10, the people have built a new temple. We’re living in a day when many churches are building bigger churches, better churches, the more ornate churches, and we are going that direction. Israel went the other direction. They built a temple, but it was just a little thing compared to Solomon’s temple. And the important thing is that the Spirit of God was with them in the small temple. He had departed from the big temple. And in all of this moving today, let’s be sure the Holy Spirit goes with us. I don’t misunderstand. I do not think God indwells buildings, as we’re going to say today. He indwells believers. But let’s make sure that the Spirit of God works in the new building. Sometimes that doesn’t happen. But for Israel, it did happen.
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Before we get to our study, Greg’s here, and he’s got some letters to share. And I guess Dr. McGee might say that you got some incoming news from the freeway.
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We are. We are flying down the freeway with exciting information. And I always love that picture Dr. McGee paints. But let’s hear from North America. We often go around the world, but we never tire of hearing from the home team here in North America.
SPEAKER 02 :
Absolutely. This first one comes from Teresa shares this. I was a teenager when I accepted Jesus in my heart, but somehow got stuck on the idea that since he had paid for all my past, present and future sins, I was set for heaven. I am now 65. I’ve been listening on TTB.org for almost a year now. And although I knew about the program, I waited too long to get back into it. Steve, your consistent invitation and seat reservation on the Bible bus helped me to stick with it this time, and I am so grateful for this decision. I am at a point where I see how much I have missed, and my thirst to get close to God is beyond anything else around me. I’m eager to make it through the five-year program and stay in God’s word to know him more personally. Thank you to Dr. McGee for his dedication and humility in sharing TTB in this unique style. And thank you, Greg and Steve, for remaining faithful to fling the seed worldwide.
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Thank you, Teresa. It really means a lot to us that you’re with us and that you’re being blessed. So please, if you’ve never told us your story, share your story. We need to hear it. So let’s hear from Tim, who lives in Oklahoma and tells us this. I wanted to share about how happy I am to be back on the Bible bus after many years away. I was serving in churches and moving along, thinking I was getting fed, being challenged, and encouraged through my church. Once I got back on the Bible bus, I realized how much I’d been missing. Dr. McGee has always been a steady hand with his studies in the Word, and most of all, his love for God’s Word. I am a supporter of the program and the efforts to take the whole Word to the whole world. God bless you in your continued efforts to reach people for Christ, both here and around the world.
SPEAKER 02 :
Thank you, Tim. Thank you for your encouraging words. And now our last letter comes from Christina, who shares this. I listen to Dr. McGee in the morning and before I leave for work. I am a mother of five and now in my late 40s. I continue to plant that seed in my kids as my mother did with me. I grew up as a Christian. Even though I no longer have grandparents or mother, your ministry has taught me to keep close to God, Jesus, and his word. I pray that you can continue to reach many and help us Christians through this world till Jesus comes.
SPEAKER 04 :
Amen. You know, a couple things I just love from those letters is, you know, Teresa’s a newer listener. She may be in her 60s, but she’s only been with us a year. And then Tim said he kind of got away from the program. And that’s why we’re here, folks. We’re here so that you can get on the Bible bus. Steve’s going to hold open the door, save you a seat, and we’ll always be here as long as God allows us to be.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yep. Absolutely. And there’s always room for one more. So tell your friends about Through the Bible or just have them go to ttb.org or you can give them those Bible bus passes. That’s a great way to share the ministry of Through the Bible. Greg, we’re out of time. Why don’t you pray for us?
SPEAKER 04 :
Father, we rejoice that your word continues to impact people’s lives. We love to get these glimpses of what you’re doing in individual lives and families and churches. And we just pray that your word would continue to bless more and more people all across this earth. In Jesus’ name, amen.
SPEAKER 02 :
Let’s dive into Haggai chapter 2 on Through the Bible with Dr. J. Vernon McGee.
SPEAKER 01 :
Now, friends, we come today to the 10th verse. of the second chapter of Haggai. And if you found your place there, well, we’ll get underway. Now, this is the fourth message that he’s given. We come now to what we label the fourth message. And it’s an appeal to the law. And we have here the explanation of the principle. And that’s from verse 10 through 19, by the way. Now, this is a great passage of Scripture we’re coming to. Let me read. In the four and twentieth day of the ninth month in a second year. Now, the last one was given in the seventh month, the twentieth day, and that was on a feast day, 520. Now, this actually is on December the 24th, 520. And this is the message now that we have. And it’s geared in to secular history, not sacred history. It’s geared in to a Gentile ruler and not one of the kings of Israel or Judah because there’s none on the throne at this time. And therefore… The times of the Gentiles definitely has come. Now, let me read all the verse. Verse 10. In the four and twentieth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, came the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Ask now the priest concerning the law, saying, If one bear holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, And with his skirt do touch bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any food. Shall it be holy? And the priest answered and said, No. Then said Haggai, If one that is unclean by dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean? And the priest answered and said, It shall be unclean. Now, the matter that is before us is this, that on the 24th of December, In the year 520 BC, Haggai went to the priests and he asked two questions. And putting it very simply, it was this. If that which is holy touches that which is unholy, will it make the unholy holy? The answer is no. The other part of the question is, if that which is unclean touched that which is clean or holy, Will the unclean make the holy and the clean unclean and unholy? And the answer is yes. That’s what it’ll do. Now, that’s the two questions that are before us. Now, let’s get the background for this. Because, very frankly, this is the very important thing. There are many, actually, phases and facets of the everyday, workaday world in Israel, which was not covered in detail by the Mosaic Law. In other words, there were certain involved situations and there were certain knotty and thorny problems that arose in their daily life and it became more complex because there was nothing specific given in the law that would adequately cover it. And the question is, how did Israel function under the law when there was no specific law to govern a given situation? And the answer is given in the word of God. Even before Moses’ death, there was a case in point. And I won’t turn to it today, but you’ll find it back in the 27th chapter of the book of Numbers. And it concerns Zelophehad’s daughters. Now, you see, the Mosaic law had said that when a man die, his son shall inherit. Well, it said nothing about the daughters. And you can see that they needed a woman’s lip movement there. And Zelophehad, he didn’t have any sons, but he had a house full of girls. He had a regular girl’s dormitory. And when he died, there was nothing in the Mosaic Law. So Zelophehad’s daughters, and they started this women’s lib movement. They went over to Moses. They said, look here, what about it? The law says that sons are the inheritance. And our father didn’t have any son. We’re all a bunch of gals. What about it? Moses said, I’ll have to consult the Lord on this. Well, you can see that Moses wasn’t too enthusiastic about the women’s lib movement. He’s a real male chauvinist, I guess. And so he went and consulted the Lord. It’s quite interesting. The Lord was on the side of the girls. You can see he went in for equal rights for women. And he said, well, certainly. It was generic when I gave it to you and I said, The sons, I meant either sons or daughters, and therefore the daughters of Zelophehad, they speak rightly. And there was now a provision that the girls would inherit. And they did. That was taken care of. Now, God made adequate provision for just dealings under the law. And the way it was to be done was this. And I’ll have to go to the Mosaic Law because it provided for this kind of a situation that we find Haggai engaged in. He’s to go to the priests and ask them for a law because there’s nothing in the Mosaic Law about it, yet it dealt with certain situations on these two questions. And so over in the 17th chapter of the book of Deuteronomy, verse 8, and I want to read verses 8 and 9. Now listen to this very carefully. If there arise a matter too hard for thee in judgment, between blood and blood, between plea and plea, and between stroke and stroke, being matters of controversy within thy gates, Then shalt thou arise, get thee up into the place which the Lord thy God shall choose, and thou shalt come unto the priests, the Levites, and unto the judge that shall be in those days, and inquire, and they shall show thee the sentence of judgment. And this was the procedure. Now notice verse 10. Thou shalt do according to the sentence. I’ll go up and ask the priest, here’s something arisen. It’s not specifically dealt with in the Mosaic law. What are we to do? Well, thou shall do according to the sentence. Now, whatever the priests decide, they’re the Supreme Court, they’ll let you know. “…which they of that place which the Lord shall choose shall show thee, and thou shall observe to do according to all that they inform thee.” And verse 11, “…according to the sentence of the law, which they shall teach thee, and according to the judgment, which they shall tell thee, thou shall do, thou shall not decline from the sentence, which they shall show thee to the right hand, nor to the left.” Now, the thought here is, this becomes now the law from now on in specific cases that deal with the same issue, of course. Now, that would be God’s method. Now, actually, I think we have that method today. When I was a young fellow working in the bank, I thought I would be in the business world at that time. That’s before the Lord called me. And I took a course in commercial law. And I don’t remember much of what I learned, but one of the things that I recall was there’s a difference between what is known as statute law and common law. Now, statute law is law that’s passed by legislatures. It’s passed by Congress. And when a certain bill passes, that becomes statute law. It’s that which is passed and written down. And there’s sure a lot of statute laws that have been passed. My, I doubt what anybody would ever know all of those. Then there’s what is known as common law. In other words, here is a matter brought before a court. And the lawyer for each side, they look for cases that have been tried before because there’s nothing on the statute books that covers this specific case. So they say in the case of John Doe versus Mary Roe, why it was decided years ago, but judge know it all in Washington. that it was to be done this way. And therefore, they used what is known then as common law, that is, decisions that had been handed down by court. so that we actually have two kinds of law today in that sense, statute law and the common law. Now, Israel had the same thing. Every specific thing was not covered in the Mosaic law. Great principles were put down, of course. In other words, the priests were to know the Old Testament. Then they would go up when something arose not covered specifically and get a decision from them. Now, I suppose that in the course of their history, that many occasions must have arisen when recourse was made to this part of the law. And many years elapsed, though, before we are given a scriptural example. In other words, you have to come here to the post-captivity period. And they’d already been 70 years in Babylon. And a small remnant was returned. They were discouraged. And God raised up three prophets to encourage the people. These men were altogether different, as we’re going to see. But Haggai was very practical. So God sent him to the priests. Now he says, I want you to go up and ask concerning two questions that are not specifically covered. And the background of this is just simply this. You see, when they first returned, there was this enthusiasm to build. But after 15 years and the debris of Jerusalem and the enemies outside, why, they just did nothing about building the temple. And they consoled themselves because they had lost their esprit de corps. And they were sinking in complacency. And they were saying, it’s not time to build. And Haggai spoke into this situation. and encouraged them, and they began to build. And then, lo and behold, some of the old-timers who’d seen the first temple, well, they began to weep because they said, this little temple’s not worth anything. And so for three months, though, they worked, and now a mercenary spirit enters into them. They say, now you told us to go and work and build a temple and that God would bless us. Now, we’ve obeyed, but God is not blessed. And so it’s at this juncture that God sent Haggai to the priests with this twofold inquiry. It’s actually one question with two facets to it. Now, the first inquiry is this. Now, we’re taking them up specifically. If one bare holy flesh in the skirt of his garment And with his skirt do touch bread or pottage or wine or oil or any food, shall it be holy? The priest answered and said, no. In other words, what he’s saying here, holiness is not communicated by contact. Holiness is not transmitted to unholiness by contact. Cleanliness is not transferred to uncleanliness just by the application of one clean thing against an unclean thing. In other words, holiness is non-communicable. You can’t communicate it. A holy object does not convey virtue by a connection. A holy person will not convey virtue to another person. Now, let’s see the application of that, and I’ll have to drop down to verse 17. God says, I smote you with blight and with mildew and with hail in all the labors of your hands, yet ye turn not to me, saith the Lord. God says that you actually didn’t turn to God. They returned to the land, but they didn’t return to God. They went through the ritual. They brought sacrifices now and expected God to bless them. So religion, you see, is not a salve that you can rub on the outside. And friends, you can swim in holy water and it wouldn’t make you holy. You can go through a ritual and it’s not going to change you. You can be baptized in water and held under till you drown. But that’s not going to change you, friend. May I say to you that we put sometimes too much emphasis on that which is right. Now, don’t misunderstand me. I think baptism is very important, very important. But you’re not going to convey holiness with it. You’re not going to change a man’s heart by going through a ceremony. Now, let’s look here at the second inquiry, verse 13. Then said Haggai, if one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean? And the priest answered and said, it shall be unclean. Now, apparently, they didn’t have a specific word on this, and yet they should probably have known their law just a little bit better than this, because actually God had spoken on this. And I want to turn to, I think, a key passage back in Leviticus, the 22nd chapter, verses 4 through 6. Let me read this. What man soever of the seed of Aaron is a leper, or hath a running issue? He shall not eat of the holy things until he be clean. And whoso toucheth anything that is unclean by the dead, or a man whose seed goeth from him, or whosoever toucheth any creeping thing whereby he may be made unclean, or a man of whom he may take uncleanness, whatsoever uncleanness he hath, the soul which hath touched any such shall be unclean until even, and shall not eat of the holy things unless he wash his flesh with water.” Now, you see that there was apparently a law but it only went for a day. And it’s quite specific. They’ve now discovered that uncleanness is communicated, this second inquiry, that unholiness is transferable. Uncleanness is communicated to the clean. An evil heart cannot perform good deeds. A bitter fountain cannot give forth sweet waters. Grapes are not gathered from thorns. Figs do not come from thistles. There is a syllogism in philosophy. Many of you will recall it. You have a majored premise. Then you have a minored premise and then a conclusion. Now, the majored premise is this. Holiness is not communicated. The minored premise is unholiness is communicated. Now, what is the conclusion? When the holy and unholy come into contact, what happens? Both are unholy. The Lord Jesus says, Can the fig tree, my brethren, bear olive berries? As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. An act, a ritual, a ceremony will not change the heart. A good deed actually is touched and tinctured and tarnished when an evil heart performs. Now, this is the ceremonial law. But friends, it’s applicable to every phase of life. It’s like the law of gravitation. It’s universal. Now, listen to this in closing, and I’ll have to come back to this. In the physical realm, that is the material, you can go in the chemistry lab. And when I preached on this in church, always had two great big beakers. One of them filled with clear water. One of them filled with the dirtiest water that black ink could make it. And what happened? I would pour some of the clean water in the unclean water, and I’d say, how long would you have to pour here to make it clean? The answer’s clear. You never make it clear by just pouring clean water in on that dirty black stuff. But you put one drop of that black stuff in the clean, and it makes it unclean. So in the material realm. Now, in medical science, in therapeutics, How do you get measles? And how do you cure it? Do you take a well boy in and let him rub up against the boy that’s got measles? And will that cure him? No, but I’ll tell you what it’ll do. It’ll give the clean boy without measles, it’ll give him a good case of measles. That’s the way it’ll work out. Now, it works in the moral realm. Also, the material realm, the medical realm, and the moral realm. The liquor industry gives to charity. The racetrack has a day in which they give all the proceeds to charity. Hollywood produces biblical stories, and we’d applaud them. Well, you might. I’m not. May I say, my friend, that the liquor industry can’t cover up the awful thing they’re doing to human life by giving to charity. Why? Because when a clean thing and an unclean thing come together, the unclean always makes the clean unclean. That’s the reason. May I say, a lot of young people listen to this program. Young man, young woman, you can’t run with the wrong crowd and stay clean. No, you can’t. If you’re running with an unclean crowd one of these days, you’re going to find out it’s going to rub off on you. Now, next time, I’m going to bring it into the religious realm and see how this great principle works. Say, this man Haggai is really practical, isn’t he? Until next time, may God richly bless you, my beloved.
SPEAKER 02 :
We’ll pick up here next time. In the meantime, to be in touch, visit ttb.org or call 1-800-65-BIBLE. I’m Steve Schwartz, asking that God would bless you as you walk with Him in His Word.
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Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe. Sin had left the crimson stain, he washed it white as snow.
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Our story on the Bible Bus today is just one step in a five-year journey through the entire Word of God. Come along for the ride, and you’ll study both the Old Testament and New Testament, discovering God’s great redemption story. Is this your story too?
