Monday, November 17, 2014

Checking Priorities


"You have sown much and bring in little; you eat, but do not have enough; you drink, but you are not filled with drink; you clothe yourselves, but no one is warm; and he who earns wages, earns wages to put into a bag with holes."
Haggai 1:6

Haggai was a prophet to the remnant of Jews who came out of the Babylonian captivity and returned to the land to rebuild the temple.  The job was difficult and soon the people turned from the restoration of the temple to building their own homes and establishing their own lives.  Returning to Israel was not easy, in fact it was very dangerous.  The remnant returned with a vision and great faith. In time,  that vision became blurry and their priorities changed, so God raised up Haggai and Zechariah to call them back.

Haggai called the people to recognize that they were working hard but getting nowhere, they were putting in effort yet accomplishing little.  The reason was that they had left the priorities of God and replaced them with their own.  Because they were going their own direction and not the Lord's, it was as if they were on a stationary bike, working hard and sweating... but getting nowhere.

It is so necessary for us to check and recheck our priorities to make sure that we have set God and His purposes first.  Distractions abound so it's easy to get off track and lose direction. Proverbs 3:6 gives us the simple solution, "in all your ways acknowledge Him," when we purposely seek to keep God first it keeps you in the right direction and saves from a lot of wasted effort. 

No comments:

Post a Comment