service to others

  The setting for the beginning of the short book by the prophet Haggai is given rather succinctly in the final verses of the book of Chronicles. The story begins 66 years before Haggai: “The priests and the people of Israel were exceedingly unfaithful, following the abominations of the nations around them; and they polluted the house of the Lord that God had consecrated in Jerusalem. “The Lord, the God of their ancestors, sent word persistently to them by messengers, because God had compassion on the people and on God’s dwelling place; but they kept mocking the messengers of God, despising their words, and scoffing at the prophets, until the wrath of the Lord against the people became so great that there was no remedy. “Therefore God brought up against them the King of the Chaldeans, who killed their youths with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion on young man or young woman, the aged or the feeble; God gave them all into his hand. “All the vessels of the house of God, large and small, and the treasures of the house of the Lord, and the treasures of the king and of his officials, all these he brought away to Babylon. They burned the house of the God, broke down the wall of Jerusalem, burned all its palaces with fire, and destroyed all its precious vessels. He took into exile in Babylon those who had escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and to his sons. And the land lay desolate.” End of quote […]