Locking Up Believers

Once I had a friend (who was actually a pastor – not just employed as one) who led a congregation I was related to. He said more than once of several people who were in his congregation who got saved and filled by the Spirit of the Lord that he wished he could lock them up for a couple of years so they would not scare the sheep so much. In a great contrast, I would like to lock up anyone who starts out on fire and filled with faith and hope and love, but then cools off. I would like to lock them into great discomfort until they are again desperate for truth and life and willing to sacrifice comfort and safety and the approval of others to have and share such valuable treasures.

“The Lord of Hosts says this: These people say: The time has not come for the house of the Lord to be rebuilt.”

The word of the Lord came through Haggai the prophet: “Is it a time for you yourselves to live in your paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?” Now, the Lord of Hosts says this: “Think carefully about your ways:

You have planted much
but harvested little.
You eat
but never have enough to be satisfied.
You drink
but never have enough to become drunk.
You put on clothes
but never have enough to get warm.
The wage earner puts his wages
into a bag with a hole in it.”

The Lord of Hosts says this: “Think carefully about your ways. Go up into the hills, bring down lumber, and build the house. Then I will be pleased with it and be glorified,” says the Lord. “You expected much, but then it amounted to little. When you brought the harvest to your house, I ruined it. Why?” This is the declaration of the Lord of Hosts. “Because My house still lies in ruins, while each of you is busy with his own house.

So on your account,
the skies have withheld the dew
and the land its crops.
I have summoned a drought
on the fields and the hills,
on the grain, new wine, olive oil,
and whatever the ground yields,
on the people and animals,
and on all that your hands produce.”

Then Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, the high priest Joshua son of Jehozadak, and the entire remnant of the people obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the words of the prophet Haggai, because the Lord their God had sent him. So the people feared the Lord.

Haggai, the Lord’s messenger, delivered the Lord’s message to the people, “I am with you”—the Lord’s declaration.

The Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, the spirit of the high priest Joshua son of Jehozadak, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people. They began work on the house of Yahweh of Hosts, their God, on the twenty-fourth day of the sixth month, in the second year of King Darius.
(Haggai 1:2-15 HCSB ©®)

— So the people feared the Lord –