How Does It Look to You Now?

I’m discovering my role on the team. I work with some amazing people here, on my team and in the agency in general. They continually amaze me with their knowledge and experience and the passion with which they do their jobs. Even in this strange times we find ourselves in these days. Which means that I see them on Zoom, little squares of people as we gather for meetings large and small. I’m old enough that the first images that comes to mind when I think of our Zoom communication is the intro to the Brady Bunch. You remember that sitcom - “It’s a story, or a lovely lady ...” You’re singing it now, aren’t you? Well, some of you. But they were in those boxes looking down and around at each other. That’s the first Zoom meeting, it seems to me. 

Where was I? Oh, yes, my role in the incredible team. I’m the writer. I know, I thought I was going to be the preacher, but no. There aren’t enough opportunities to preach. But write. It is all I do it seems. Except for Zoom meetings. Which makes it odd, I guess, that on the weekend, I write. Still. I love it. I love words, and putting them together and making sense out of a world that doesn’t really make much sense any more. Or attempting to make sense. So, I write, a lot. I write preaching notes and worship ideas for every series that we produce. I write articles about worship and preaching. I write responses to questions that come in. I write reports, and proposals. I just write a lot. 

Don’t get me wrong, the others write too. And do it well. I’m just often tasked with putting our conversations into written words, or coming up with descriptions of the podcasts that we record, or putting into words emotions that arise among us and threaten to choke us up. I do that. And I love it. 

Which is why I was honored to be asked this spring if I would write a week’s worth of devotions for the Upper Room Disciplines. This is different from the monthly Upper Room Devotional. This is whole year’s worth of devotions published in one book together. I’m writing the week that includes All Saints Day (Nov.1) in 2022. It’ll come out in fall of 2021, so watch for it. :)

But I thought I’d test out my devotionals here in this space. The problem is they have to be very short, 325 words.  Considering my last post here was a little over 5 times that amount, it seems really short. That’s why the long introduction. I’m given four texts and because I have All Saints Day in my week, I get four more. And I’m supposed to use them all over the week. So, for the next few weeks you get to read my musings on these texts and figure out (and maybe help me figure out) which 325 words I can use for the devotional.

And I thought I’d start with the hardest one. At least from the first reading a while ago. (I admit, I set this aside for a while, but the deadline is now closer, so I need to get working on this, along with the other things I have to write!) I love the Hebrew Bible stories, but there are parts that I don’t pay a lot of attention to. And this is one of those. Take a look.

Haggai 2:1-9 In the second year of King Darius, in the seventh month, on the twenty-first day of the month, the word of the LORD came by the prophet Haggai, saying: 2 Speak 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, 3 Who 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? 4 Yet 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, 5 according to the promise that I made you when you came out of Egypt. My spirit abides among you; do not fear. 6 For 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; 7 and I will shake all the nations, so that the treasure of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with splendor, says the LORD of hosts. 8 The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, says the LORD of hosts. 9 The latter splendor of this house shall be greater than the former, says the LORD of hosts; and in this place I will give prosperity, says the LORD of hosts.

Huh. Not necessarily Huh? But certainly just huh. What do we do with that? This is very specific, look at all those names and dates. It’s like a bad history class. Names of people we don’t know from Adam. Or Archduke Ferdinand. Or Chaing Kai-Shek. It just seems like a mess, right? A right zerubbabel, you might say. And a date that seems somewhat arbitrary. July 21st. Seventh month, twenty-first day. Except it wasn’t July. July hadn’t been invented yet.  Actually, it was called Tishrei, and it was a very important month. Rosh Hashana happens in Tishrei, as does Yom Kippur, and Sukkot (or the Feast of Tabernacles) and Hoshana Rabbah which is the seventh day of the Feast of Sukkot and a special synagogue service marked by processions and the sounding of the shofar and it happened on the twenty-first day of the seventh month. 

Did you get all that? It was a loud day, a party day. It was a celebration of what God has done for God’s people, and marked my movement and music and food and joy. On that day the Lord spoke to Haggai. That day. Haggai probably said “What?” and held his hand behind his ear. “Was that the shofar or was that God?” 

But somehow God got through the noise of that celebratory worship. And what was the message? It was all about God’s house. The temple and how it was rebuilt, or not rebuilt. It didn’t have the style it used to have, didn’t have the glory. And even on this loud day of celebration there was a ho hum quality to their worship. It ain’t what it used to be. “How does it look to you now?” Is God trying to shame them? King Zerubbabel? Prophet Haggai? Everyone? You’ve given me a shack, God says, a dump, an eyesore!

No, it doesn’t seem that way. I wonder, in fact, if God is actually hinting about something beyond the building anyway. Yeah the second temple wasn’t as grand as the first. But God says, don’t worry about it. I’m with you. I’m always with you. And guess what? Things are going to get shaky. Stuff is going to happen. You’re going to be afraid. You’re going to wonder what’s up. You’re going to feel ... shaky. And then you’re going to figure out what really matters. What the treasure really is. And it’s mine. 

Wait. God’s going to threaten us? For a ransom? No, I don’t think so. Shaking happens. Is happening. And pat of what gets shaken is our priorities. But as always, we have a choice. We can choose to go after God’s treasure, the stuff that really matters. Like loving God and neighbor, like self-sacrifice and service, like building up and making better, like equality and justice, and peace. Or we can choose the shaky stuff. The temporary stuff. The stuff like the second rate temple building that doesn’t really satisfy anyone. We can cling to our lifestyle and our rights and our so-called freedom. And still miss out on the splendor of God. The splendor God promises to fill our spaces with.

There are those to value buildings and festivals and the right to ignore science and safety. And while they are doing it, blowing their own horns and making all the ruckus. There are those who value a way of life that over-values some while devaluing others, they shout about their right to hate. And it is during the noise of this protestation that God says “how does it look to you now?”  

No so great. I vote for the glory of God. Fill our spaces with your presence, as we care for the most vulnerable among us. Shake us up until we begin to see what we are doing to one another, to those who are different, and finally begin to see the treasure that they are. The treasure that we all are. Only then, will God’s splendor return. The latter splendor, the splendor of peace, the splendor of justice, the splendor of equality will be greater than the former. Because we choose love.

Shalom, 

Derek