What Are You Building?

6 · The pastor narrates the moment of prophetic intervention—the people began to rebuild but grew discouraged and stopped, so God sent Haggai and Zechariah to stir them up

And God, well, God sees them. And what happens is the. The people begin to build. At the beginning of the Book of Ezra, they begin to build, but quickly grow discouraged, quickly grow disillusioned, quickly melt in the face of threats around them. And so God sends two prophets, Haggai and Zechariah. You can read the backstory to this in Ezra 1 to 4. These two prophets are sent to stir up the people, to. To. To bring a word of renewal to the people.

7 · The pastor explicitly applies the ancient prophetic word to the present congregation, asserting that God's word of renewal through Haggai and Zechariah is the same word God wants to speak to Cross of Grace today

And I believe that's the same word that God wants to bring to us today. Today.

8 · The pastor transitions from introduction and context to the scripture reading, reminding the congregation that what follows is not merely ancient text but the living word of God

So let's read Haggai chapter one, verse one, and remember, this is God's word.

9 · The pastor reads the entire passage of Haggai 1:1-11 without interruption, allowing the congregation to hear the full prophetic word in its original form before any exposition or application begins

In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the Prophet, to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, the governor of Judea, and to Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest. Thus says the Lord of Hosts, these people say the time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord, and the Word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet. Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses while the this house lies in ruins? Now therefore, says the LORD of hosts, consider your ways. You have sown much, and you harvested little. You eat, but you never have enough. You drink, but you never have fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns wages does so to put them into a bag with holes. Thus says the Lord of Hosts, consider your ways. Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified, says the Lord. You look for much, and behold, it came to little. And when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why? Declares the Lord of Hosts, because of my house that lies in ruins while each of you busies himself with his own house. Therefore the heavens above you have withheld the dew and the earth has withheld its produce. And I have called for a drought on the land and on the hills, and on the grain and the new wine and the oil, on what the ground brings forth, on man and beast and on all their labors. This is God's word.

10 · The pastor prays briefly, asking God to bless both the preaching and the hearing of the word, acknowledging dependence on God's work in both speaker and listeners

And Lord, I pray for your blessing over the preaching and the hearing of your word. In Jesus name, amen.

11 · The pastor introduces the central anthropological claim that will govern the sermon's logic—human beings are fundamentally builders

Human beings are hardwired to build things. From the very beginning of our lives, human beings want to build. Whether it's building cars as a boy perhaps, or a dollhouse as a girl. Right? Whatever your equivalent is, human beings are hardwired to build.

12 · The pastor uses contemporary cultural data about toys and video games to illustrate the universal human impulse to build

I. I looked up this week what's arguably the number one toy of all time and the number one video game of all time. Measured by how many people have interacted with them and by their longevity and by their popularity, all these factors, they kind of converge. The biggest toy of all time, the biggest video game of all time, both converge. They're both about building. Now, I bet you can guess what the most popular toy is of all time with that clue. Who could tell me? The Legos. Right? Legos. I read a statistic that somewhere like 400 million people have Legos in the world. That's a lot of little bricks floating around, and it's been that way for decades. And recently, the most popular video game in the world related to building is. Somebody, I need a Gen Z here to shout it. Minecraft. Minecraft. Somebody did say Treacherous. That is a retro thing, but it still proves the point. Because even like before Minecraft, you had Treacherous, which is what? Little building, little blocks. Minecraft. There's somewhere in the range of 200 million people a month play Minecraft. There's a lot of people.

13 · The pastor brings in philosophical authority to deepen the anthropological claim, moving from empirical observation to philosophical category

And. And you might go wonder, why is it. Why do we gravitate as human beings to building? Well, There's a famous 20th century philosopher who talks kind of in a cute, joking way, talks about how human beings are not really homo sapiens, meaning thinkers, they're homo Fabers, meaning builders. That human beings are hardwired not just to think, but to build things.

14 · The pastor extends the building metaphor from childhood toys to adult life, listing concrete examples from the congregation's own experience—businesses, careers, hobbies, fantasy football—to show that building continues across the lifespan

And as we grow up, we continue to build things. Maybe your ambition is to build a business or to build a career, Even our hobbies, right? If you crochet or if you do woodworking or if you built a fantasy team, a fantasy football team, only to let that go up in flames at the end of the season and you're preparing yourself for the punishment we Build things, don't we?

15 · The pastor articulates the sermon's driving question—not whether we are building (that's assumed) but what we are building and whether it's the right thing

Human beings are hardwired. We cannot escape it. And so this passage is going to give us one key question we're going to explore today. What are you building? I'm not going to argue that you're building something. You know that you're building something. And it may be you probably are building something in your hobby, you're probably building something in your career, maybe your relationships, you're building. The question is, what are you building? And even more importantly, is it the right thing? Is what you're building with your life the right thing to give your time and attention to?

16 · The pastor identifies the repeated phrase 'consider your ways' as the structural and rhetorical key to the passage

Now, this passage is set up in a sense to make us pause and think about what we're building. If you notice twice in this section there was a the phrase consider your ways. This passage functions for the people of God like a stop sign. Most of the time we're just zooming around in life, aren't we? We're just doing stuff. We're going here, going there, going to eat, going to get groceries, going to do this, pick up a prescription, all that. We're zooming around. But this passage, Haggai 1 says stop, consider your ways. Or maybe you want to imagine in your Bible a giant red stop and think sign over this passage because the Lord wants to ask us, what are we building and is it the right thing?

17 · The pastor provides the sermon's structural outline, signaling three major movements that will progressively reorient the congregation's understanding of what house they should be building

Now, three sections to help us set our priorities for building in the new year. The first section is my house. My house. Second section, God's house. Third section, our house.

18 · The pastor sets the scene for the first major section by immersing the congregation in the historical moment—returning exiles surveying a devastated landscape

So, first section, my house. My house. Look at verse one and we get this context. In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai. And it comes to the governor, it comes to the high priest, it comes to the people. And, and imagine receiving this word. So you've come back into this, this, this derelict land. It's a wasteland. It looks like one of those post apocalyptic movies or shows. Everything is broken down.

19 · The pastor exposes the people's rationalization—they claim the time hasn't come to rebuild, but the real issue is discouragement, laziness, or disillusionment

And remember this people, these people had maybe there's a few bricks, somebody had tried to build a little bit here, little bit there, a little bit there. But. But they quickly abandon it when they faced opposition. And so verse two, thus says the Lord of hosts, these people say the time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord. So when it comes to the priorities of, of building for the Lord, some combination of discouragement or laziness or disillusionment had taken hold of this land. They are just walking by these piles of rubble going, okay, yeah, not just. That's. I'll deal with that later. Right?

20 · The pastor exposes God's rhetorical trap—the people claim they lack time and resources to build the temple, but they've already built comfortable homes with extra amenities ('paneled houses')

And look at what God does. They think, well, the time isn't. Isn't come to build. We don't have time to build. We don't have resources to build. We don't have the ability to build. But God exposes them in verse three. Look at verse three. Then the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet. Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses while this house lies in ruins? Do you see what the Lord's doing? He's saying, you. You're saying you can't build. You don't have anything to build with. You don't have time, you don't have the ability, but you've got your houses that you've built. And listen, when it refers to wood paneling, I don't want anybody here who has like an El Paso house from the 50s that has wood paneling to feel attacked. Okay? You're. You're safe. That's not. You don't have to go rip out your wood paneling necessarily. Essentially, what this refers to is God's people had rebuilt their homes. They had a roof over their head, but the paneling, really. The Lord is saying, but you also have a little extra, right? You. You had a little extra to make your home more comfortable. You had it to make it a little bit nicer for yourself.

21 · The pastor articulates the passage's central indictment—the people are building, but they're building the wrong thing

And so it's. It's not that you're not building at all. The problem is you're building the wrong thing. And you don't see the disconnect until the Lord ask, is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your houses while this house lies in ruins?

22 · The pastor reveals a detail easily missed in the text—Haggai delivers this word on the first day of the sixth month, a day meant for temple worship

Now, notice how poignant this would be. You may not have caught this, but it says it was the. In the sixth month, on the first day of the month, the Lord sends the prophet Haggai on the day that God's people should have been gathering for worship at the temple, but instead they sat in their homes. And he asks them, is this right? Is it right that there's no place to even worship together? But meanwhile, you're adding a second bedroom or something like that. The equivalent of it. Your. Your increasing your comforts.

23 · The pastor reads verse six and lets the catalog of futility accumulate—planting without harvest, eating without satisfaction, earning without gain

Now, verse five says, now therefore, says the Lord of hosts, consider your ways. Stop and think. And he gives them something to stop and think about. Look at verse six. You've sown much and harvested little. You eat, but you never have enough. You drink, but you Never have your fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns wages does so to put them into a bag with holes.

24 · The pastor unpacks the covenantal logic behind the economic futility—the land's condition was meant to function as a spiritual thermometer for Israel's covenant faithfulness

Now, we may not immediately get what the Lord is saying here, so let me give some context. I think there's two things in the background of what the Lord is saying. The first thing in the background is that the. The state of the land of Israel was meant to be. Was meant to function in a sense, like a spiritual thermometer for the people of God. And so what you see is that when God's people were leaning into the Lord, when they were spiritually healthy, the land flourished because they were God's people under God's place, under God's rule, and the land flourished. But when they were unhealthy, often what we see is drought and, and famine and these other things, these signs of spiritual unhealth. And so in the. In the book of Deuteronomy, there's these blessings and curses. And so God basically says, as you follow me in my ways, the land will be as blessed as it should be. Follow me and you will be blessed in every sense. But if you turn away, basically Lord is saying, if you will live in my kingdom as you're meant to, the land will be blessed. But if you turn away, the land will be cursed. And it notice this, it will return to the curse that all humanity is under.

25 · The pastor drives home the irony—the land was functioning exactly as designed (a flashing warning sign of spiritual unhealth), but the people were oblivious to its covenantal meaning

So, so follow me and there will be blessing, or turn your own way and find yourself cursed like the rest of humanity. And so here is the irony. God's people kept having difficult, uneconomic times. They would plant crops, and it seem like the crops should result in a bigger harvest, but the harvest wasn't quite there year over year, and nobody was going, wait a second, I remember something from Deuteronomy about this. Maybe we're not spiritually healthy. The land was almost like one of those big flashing neon signs that's going, stop, you're not healthy. You know, like, go back to zero. Like, this is not good. That's what's going on. But they're not seeing it.

26 · The pastor moves beyond the covenantal explanation to a broader theological principle—God is using the economic futility to illustrate a universal truth about all self-centered building projects

Second, though, one of the reasons God allows the people of God, his people, to experience this, this almost the dust and air of the world around them. They try to build this thing and it evaporates. They try to build this thing, it turns to dust. They try to put wages into a bag. It's like it has holes, is that God is also illustrating that all building done unto ourselves ultimately ends up in the same place. It ultimately ends in dust and air.

27 · The pastor uses Ecclesiastes as a biblical illustration of the same principle—the Preacher tested every human building project and found them all to be vanity, dust and air

And for example, the. The book of Ecclesiastes, you have the wise prophet who goes to thing after thing after thing, and he says, okay, if you try to build a. A bunch of material wealth, it's just gonna evaporate after you die or maybe before. If you try to build this, it's gonna evaporate. If you try to build this, it's gonna be dust and air. And he goes thing after thing after thing to what all humanity is trying to build. And he. He surveys them all and says, it's all vanity. It's all dust and air.

28 · The pastor traces the futility back to Genesis—the garden was the original place of blessing where humanity lived with God, but when they chose to build their own kingdom, the land was cursed with thorns and thistles

And so the. The Lord is also helping his people. See, I'm just shortening the half life, as it were, of the land to help you see that what you're giving yourself to isn't ultimately going to be satisfying or ultimately last. Now, this all comes back to the first garden. The first garden is the backdrop to all of this. So you remember, God creates a land of blessing, a land where Adam and Eve are meant to live in God's place, under God's rule, in relationship with God, and live in his kingdom of blessing, as it were. But humanity, Adam and Eve, they choose to seek to build their own kingdom. And what happens to the land, does anybody remember, is cursed? There's thorns and thistles, meaning the life apart from God always results in thorns and thistles and dust and cancerous growths. And that's the picture. Blessing and flourishing with the Lord apart from God, no blessing, no flourishing.

29 · The pastor extends the Genesis narrative to Babel, showing that even after the curse, humanity persisted in trying to build their own kingdoms apart from God

And yet what does humanity do? They quickly rally and are like, you know what we're going to do? We don't need the Lord. We're going to build a tower so high it can get up into the heavens by ourselves, right? The Tower of Babel. And of course, God frustrates that and says, you can't do that. That's not going to work. And yet human beings continue to build little towers of Babel in each of our lives.

30 · The pastor provides a taxonomy of building types to help the congregation identify what they are actually building with their lives

So here's the question I want you to ask. What are you building with your life? All of us are builders, but the question is, what are we building? Some of us are statue builders. I'm going to give you some categories here. Some of us are statue builders. Meaning you want to achieve great things and notoriety and have lots of degrees on the wall. You want a high follower count. You want a high position. You want to build a statue. And lo and behold, the statue looks a lot like you, right? You're like, look at this. I mean, this is great. This guy is awesome. Some of us are Statue builders, some of us are monument builders, meaning we have a cause or a passion or an art, a thing that we want to see build and has nothing to do with God, but it's our cause and our thing, and we just want to have our name on a platform, plaque below it and be associated with it. The monument builders, some of us are castle builders. We just want safety and security. We want high walls, we want deep moats, lots of crocodiles. Everybody stay out, right? I see you want security in your finances, you want security in your health, you want security in your relationships. That's what you're building. Some of us are American dream home builders, right? We want the American dream. We want the perfect life that meets our expectations. We want the house we want, the kinds of friends we want. We want our parents and our family to be maybe. Maybe close enough that we can visit, but not so close they can't drop by, right? We don't want unannounced visits. But define, you know, we want the perfect setting, perfect yard, perfect home. And some of us are just tired of building, and we don't think we're building at all. But I would say these are the just good enough builders, meaning you've been burned by life. You don't want to be burned again. You don't want to be disappointed again. So you just want a good enough house, good enough relationships, good enough money in the bank, the game on tv, right? Some stuff in the fridge. That's all you really want. But. But you're. That's what you're fighting for. You're fighting for that.

31 · The pastor makes the application personal by sharing his own struggle and then offering a diagnostic test—you can identify what you're building by what you defend when it's threatened

The question, friend, for you is, what are you building? I think it's so important for us to recognize. I had to do some work on my own heart this week to realize, man, there are some things that in my own life, I'm building. And here's the thing. You can always tell those other things other than the Lord you're building, because once people start walking by with matches, like, if you're building something, a part of your life, and you see a guy walking by with metaphorical matches, like, wait a minute, what are you doing over there? Right? There's this project. I really want to accomplish this project. And then here comes a thing that might derail it. I'm like, nope, get out of here, right? Whenever those things threaten, we jump into high gear and we're, like, standing in front of the building saying, nope, I built this. What is it for you? What do you run out into the front yard and fight for, what are you building?

32 · The pastor clarifies that God is not opposed to building per se—the issue is building the right thing

And again, notice this. The problem is not that you are building. The Lord is saying, stop building. The Lord is saying, are you building the right thing? And this is God's kindness to us. Because apart from the Lord, the things we build will be dust and air.

33 · The pastor signals the major structural shift from diagnosis (my house) to prescription (God's house), moving from what the people were wrongly building to what God calls them to build

Anyway, that's the first section. My house. Second section. God's house.

34 · The pastor reads God's command to build the house and highlights the purpose clauses—'that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified

God's house, verse seven. Thus says the Lord of hosts, consider your ways. Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified, says the Lord.

35 · The pastor surfaces the interpretive question—why would God prioritize the temple over infrastructure, defense, or governance? He acknowledges the counterintuitive nature of the command to set up the central question of this section: what makes the house so important?

Now, to understand the call of God, you have to understand the house. Because at first it may seem counterintuitive. Why would the Lord say, hey, out of all of the national building project priorities, first thing, priority number one, the temple, right? If we went, we're in a situation where we had to rebuild everything in a country or a city. That's probably not the first thing we're doing. Probably starting with like, I don't know, the. The city government building or the. The plumbing or the roads or, you know, one of a number of other things, the defenses. And the Lord says, no, no, no, no, leave that for later. Start with the house. So what is this house?

36 · The pastor elevates the stakes—understanding the house is not just exegetically important for this passage, but theologically essential for the entire prophetic corpus and Israel's history

Well, if you understand the house, if you understand the temple, I believe you'll understand the whole book of Zechariah and the whole book of Haggai and the whole period of Israel's history. It all comes back to this house.

37 · The pastor establishes the theological foundation for the temple's importance by quoting 1 Kings 6—the temple is precious not as a symbol or appeasement but because God promises to dwell there among his people

And notice this. The. The house is not important just because it's a national symbol or because, okay, we gotta. We gotta pacify God before we go on to other building priorities. No, the preciousness of the house comes down to First Kings, chapter 6. And the reason that the house is precious in the first place. First Kings 6 says this concerning this house that you are building, I will dwell on among the children of Israel and will not forsake my people, Israel. The house is precious because it is in this temple where God dwells with man.

38 · The pastor contrasts Israel's God with the gods of the ancient Near East—pagan gods lived apart from their people, but Yahweh chose to dwell among Israel

It is the. Now notice how radical this is for Israel. In the nation surrounding Israel, the gods of the ancient world, lowercase giant, lived not with their people. They lived somewhere else. They lived. If you're Greek, they lived up on Mount Olympus. If you're other religions, they lived somewhere up in the clouds, somewhere away, somewhere far away. They might visit, but they don't live there. Look, only the God of Israel dwelt among his people. Only the God of Israel says, build a house and I will Live with you right there. Like this has been God's purpose from the beginning.

39 · The pastor traces the theme of God dwelling with his people back to the tabernacle and the Exodus, showing that God's purpose from the beginning was to dwell with Israel—this is why he brought them out of Egypt in the first place

In Exodus 25, it's when they're building the tabernacle, God says, let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell in their midst. And notice why he even brings this people up out of Egypt in the first place. In Exodus 29, he says, I will dwell among the people of Israel and be their God, and they shall know that I am the Lord, their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt, that I may dwell among them.

40 · The pastor pauses to let the accumulated theological weight land—the temple's preciousness is not symbolic or aesthetic but relational

Oh, friends, do you see why the temple is precious? It's not just that it's a nice building. It's not just that it's symbolic. It is the place where God dwells with his people.

41 · The pastor returns to the garden to trace the supreme irony—Adam and Eve had everything they could want (comfort, security, glory, meaning) in God's presence, but they abandoned it to build their own kingdom

And here's the irony, okay? The irony goes all the way back to the first garden, because here's what happens to Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve live in this. If you could say it this way, temple of the Garden of Eden, right? If a temple is where God and man dwell together, that's the garden, the Garden of Eden. And in this temple, in this place, Adam and Eve, they have comfort, they have security, they have glory, they have meaning. They have all of the things they could want centered in God dwelling with them. They have a relationship with the God of the universe who made them and loves them. And. And the irony is that human beings went, but what if we built our own kingdom? What if we look for comfort over there? What if we decided to write the rules for ourselves over there? What if we could do better out there, away from God?

42 · The pastor traces God's grace narrative—after the garden rebellion and Babel, God could have justly ended the story, but instead he calls Israel

And it should have been the end of the story, right? It should have been the end of the story. The God who made them, they turn away. God could have just said, that's it, I'm done. Or certainly after the Tower of Babel, right? We'll see what they do. But they. Well, they're just going to build a giant idol to themselves where they shout their own glory and are full of sinful ambition. The Lord could have ended it there, but instead, in his grace, do you see what God does? He calls this people.

43 · The pastor connects all the threads—Israel was called out of Egypt so God could dwell with them, recreating the garden relationship

And he calls this people, Exodus 20:9 says, out of the land of Egypt, that I might dwell among them. God in Israel, among his people, is, in a sense, recreating the garden again. The. The promised land was meant to be a shadow of the garden. And so. So do you see why the Lord is saying, why aren't you rebuilding this temple? We. Why aren't you rebuilding the place where I dwell with you? Look, they Are looking to their own houses because they think, well, I need comfort, I need safety. I need a safe place. I need home. And the Lord is saying, do you see that all of that is in me? In me dwelling with you, you have safety. In me dwelling with you, you have comfort. In me dwelling with you, you have wholeness. See, they. They thought they were building their house. The Lord is saying, build my house. Not out of some strange human sinful jealousy, but rather saying, my people, this is the house for you and I to dwell together.

44 · The pastor uses the parable of the bitter carpenter to illustrate God's intentions—the people think God is demanding something for himself, but he's actually inviting them to build the very thing that will be theirs

Think of it this way. There was a. An old parable about a rich man who had a faithful carpenter that worked for him for many years. And the rich man commissioned the carpenter as his last act of employment to build what he called the finest house the carpenter had ever built. The finest materials, spare no expense. This is to be the crowning achievement of your work. And then you can happily retire. But the carpenter had grown old and bitter working for this man decided, oh, he wants me to build one last thing. Fine. So he did not select the finest materials. He cut every corner he possibly could in the building of the house just to fulfill the obligations so that he could leave and retire only for the owner on the last day, well, to be handed the keys from the carpenter. The carpenter hands the keys to the owner. And the owner, with a giant smile, hands the keys back to the carpenter and says, what? You have built this finest work you have done. I intended it all along to be for you. Now go and enjoy the house, right? And the carpenter's going, oh, man. Didn't realize I was building my house. That's what's happening here, right? With the people of God. They're building these little houses when the lord is saying, no, my house is your house. My house is the place I dwell with you. My house is the thing you're looking for in your little paneled homes. Why are you building that? Come. Come back. Let. Let this be the garden again. Let this be the promised land again. Where God's people dwell under God's rule, under God's blessing.

45 · The pastor synthesizes the temple's significance into three categories—relationship, mission, and legacy—that will structure the remainder of this section

Oh, friends, do you see why the temple is precious now? Why it's such a big deal? The temple means so many things, but think of it in three ways. The temple means relationship and mission and legacy. Okay?

46 · The pastor unpacks the first category—relationship

The temple means relationship. Meaning it's a place where God's people could go to encounter God in a unique way. Now, listen. God is present everywhere. He's upholding all the atoms in the universe. But God speaks of his special presence, dwelling with his people. In particular places and ways. And this is a particular way for God to dwell with his people. And he's saying, don't you want that? Build that, build that. That I might encounter you, you might encounter me.

47 · The pastor unpacks the second category—mission

It means relationship, and then it also means mission. There's this beautiful passage in Isaiah where God pictures the nation as a. What he calls a light to the other nations. So if you've ever seen where sometimes in the city they'll. A business will be opening and they'll rent those big spotlights that'll just shoot up into the sky, you know, I'm talking about. And all of a sudden you can see it and you're like, wait, what is that? It's got to be amazing. And then you like, drive over and it's like a, I don't know, Cheddar's or a Carl's Jr. You're like, Ah, it got me, right? But, but it's, it's meant to draw you, right? To, to say, come and see, friends. That's what the people of God were meant to be. That is the, the nation of Israel and the center of the nation. The temple was meant to be this beacon of light stretching up that the nations might go, what is, is that? Who is that? It was meant to be a place of mission.

48 · The pastor unpacks the third category—legacy

and it was meant to be a place of legacy. Look, one of the reasons that these people were probably building homes is they were thinking, well, I got to build something so that my kids can inherit it or my grandkids can inherit it. I got to get this land set up for. For my legacy. Because the ancient world was all about legacy, all about legacy. What's next? What's after me? What's after me? And the Lord is basically saying, you're thinking too small. You're only thinking one generation ahead. I am thinking a hundred generations ahead. And so he says, come build the house.

49 · The pastor pivots from ancient Israel to contemporary application, asking whether the congregation will join the building project God calls them to

So the question for us today is, are we going to join the work to build God's house?

50 · The pastor signals the major structural shift to the final section and surfaces the hermeneutical question—how does the command to build the temple apply to contemporary Christians who are not rebuilding a physical temple in Jerusalem? This transition acknowledges the interpretive gap and prepares to bridge it

Now, the third section is incredibly important, our house. Because I think we got to ask, how do we do that? What does that mean for us if. If we are not in 6th century Israel rebuilding a literal temple, what does it mean to build the house of God?

51 · The pastor warns against a common misapplication—using 'build the house' as a fundraising proof-text for building projects

Now this is where I think we gotta be theologically careful because it's super easy. I've heard some bad teaching on like, oh, well, just the house is, you know, listen, man, I've heard pastors and nonprofits use this whenever they need to do fundraising. It's like, you know, what the house is. The house is the new gym down this, you know, like for the church. The house is the new nonprofit center we're building. No, no, that's. That, that could be part of what the Lord's talking about. But that's not the center of. That's not what theologically the house is today.

52 · The pastor provides the interpretive key—in the New Covenant, the house is both Jesus and his people (the church), which are inseparable

So what is it? Well, the house is two things. It is Jesus and his people, which are really the same thing.

53 · The pastor establishes the Christological fulfillment—Jesus himself is the temple, the very presence of God dwelling with his people

So, so first, the house is Jesus. Jesus says that he is the temple. And think about this, what we just celebrated at Christmas. Jesus is the very presence of God coming to walk among his people, right? That is the temple. The temple not in a building, but in a person. And then when Jesus arrives, you see a beautiful truth about the temple. The temple was actually never a building and it was always a person. It was always pre figuring and pointing ahead to the person of Jesus Christ.

54 · The pastor unpacks the gospel logic in temple language—Jesus bore exile from God's presence (what we deserved) so that through his resurrection we could be brought into him ('in Christ')

But notice what the temple Jesus does. Jesus says, I'm going to destroy this temple and rebuild it in three days. What does he, what does he do? Well, he goes to the cross and he think about in temple language. He casts himself away from the presence of God, bearing the wages of our sin, bearing the exile we deserved. He bore that so that he might be resurrected and we might then be invited to be part of him, to be in Christ, to be part of who he is. In a sense, Jesus was cast away from the temple that the temple doors might fling open to all who will call on his name.

55 · The pastor issues a stark warning and gospel invitation—without Jesus, all human building projects end in dust, air, and ultimately curse

And friend, let me just say this. Whatever you're building with your life, if you don't have this, everything else is dust and air. Without Jesus, anything you build in life will ultimately not only be satisfying, unsatisfying, it will end in tragedy. Because the end of every building project will end with a curse. And either, here's the reality. Either you will go in exile to bear that curse, or you will claim Jesus who bore the curse for you.

56 · The pastor follows the warning with the gospel invitation—the doors are wide open to anyone who will call on Jesus

But the good news is this. The doors of this temple of Jesus Christ are open to anyone who will call on him. Anyone. No matter who you are, no matter where you've been, no matter what you've done, you can enter in to the place where God dwells with his people through Jesus Christ. Oh, isn't that good news? So believe, friend, today, if you're on the fence, believe in him today.

57 · The pastor moves from Jesus as temple to the church as temple, quoting 1 Peter 2

The second thing then is not just Jesus, but his people. So Jesus is, is pictured as well as we'll see the. Not just a building that we keep at arms length, but a building we are brought into first Peter, chapter two says this. You come to him, Jesus, a living stone rejected by men, but in the sight of God, chosen and precious, you yourselves, like living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Do you see this and think about this. Peter is saying this to a bunch of Gentiles in the churches. He's writing, these people don't have the right ethnicity. They're not from the right country in the world. They probably didn't grow up speaking the right language. But he's saying, no, no, no. The way you become part of this is through Jesus Christ. He's like the cornerstone. And all of us, like living stones are being laid one on the other that we might be brought into this work.

58 · The pastor synthesizes the application—the contemporary building project is Jesus and his church

Oh, friends, do you see? You might think, okay, well, it's as simple. What is the building project today? It's as simple as Jesus and his church. Friends, that's the building project. God is calling us today to today. Will you. Will you build a relationship with Jesus and his church? Will you build what Jesus is building today?

59 · The pastor unpacks how the local church fulfills what the temple was—a relational place where God meets his people in a unique way

And here's the reality. The local church is all the things the temple was in part, now in much more wholeness. The church is a relational place with God. We, where we gather God uniquely meets us in a way that does not happen when we are by ourselves. That's what the Bible says. Friends, have you ever had an encounter where you're with other believers or were led in singing and you think, man, it's like the Lord is right there. That is designed by God. Now, it's not like you can't encounter God in your car or on a mountaintop that the Lord will meet you there. But there is something unique and precious about the gathering of the saints of God. So everything we invest here, man, we. We receive back. It's like we. We invest in serving one another and then the Lord serves us through them and meets us.

60 · The pastor unpacks the missional dimension—where Israel was one beacon in one place, the New Testament church is many lampstands sent into every neighborhood and nation

But the church is also a place of mission. Here's what I love about the church. Where Israel was one geographic place where a beam shot into the air, drawing the nations in the New Testament. Here's what happens. The New Testament pictures local churches like lampstands sent out into a dark world. In Revelation, Jesus walks among these lampstands, strengthening and encouraging. So it's like this one giant beam of light has been split into beams of light traveling into every neighborhood and every nation.

61 · The pastor narrates the missional trajectory from Jerusalem to the present—the people of God have carried the light across continents all the way to El Paso

And friends, do you not see what Jesus has done since the time of Jerusalem, since the time of Peter that the people of God have not stayed centered just in the ancient Near East. They have gone across countries and continents all the way to where we are now. And the light of God continues to spread out into the nations. And the Lord's purpose is that every tongue and every tribe and every nation will have a beam of Jesus light shining out from it. Amen. That is the purpose of God.

62 · The pastor reframes seemingly small acts of church participation (handing out donuts, showing up to home group) as participation in Jesus' global building project

And so, friends, when we participate in the building of the local church, it's not just, well, I just, you know, I handed out a donut, or I encouraged somebody, or I showed up to home group when I didn't want to, and I was running late, and I thought maybe I shouldn't go, but I did anyway. Look, friends, it's not just, oh, I just did that. That's not a big deal. No, friends, you are laying, in a sense, a brick, one more brick in the building project of Jesus Christ to reach the world.

63 · The pastor unpacks the legacy dimension by making it personal—he's pastored this church long enough to bury saints and see their empty chairs

And the church is also last. I would just say legacy. Like, I've been a pastor at this church long enough to welcome saints that have sat in these chairs into the presence of God as they passed on to glory. And I can see where they sat in this room. And I think one of the things the church does is we want to leave something that lasts, don't we? We want to leave something that lasts. And so many people are like, man, I got to leave. I got to leave. You know, I hope I build a company that lasts after me. I hope I believe, you know, leave a family tradition that lasts after me. I hope I leave this thing that lasts after me. Friends, in the end, Ecclesiastes says, all of it will eventually be dust and air, except for one thing. The people of God.

64 · The pastor extends the legacy theme—when saints die, others fill their seats and benefit from what the first generation built

And though these saints have passed on the glory, their seats are filled by others that benefit from what the first saints built. Friends, do you see how precious the church is? Do you see why the Lord calls us to this? We're building something where. We're building a place of relationship, a place of mission, a place of. Of legacy.

65 · The pastor addresses the sense of smallness and insignificance believers feel when they contribute to the church—the bricks feel like Legos

And I think in the end, friends, what we are called to do is in the midst of, okay, one more brick, one more conversation, one more encouragement. I'm. I'm donating an hour. When I wish I had more, I'm donating a hundred bucks. When I wish I had more, I'm just. My bricks are so small. They're like. They feel like Legos going into the house of God. They're not making a difference. But, friends, the Lord says that when you build his house, he is the master builder. And he will cause it to flourish as it has for thousands of years.

66 · The pastor uses the parable of three bricklayers to illustrate the difference vision makes—the first two see only bricks or walls, but the third sees a cathedral

So let me. Let me end with this encouragement. There was a. There's another parable I love where a. A reporter found a group of bricklayers in Europe building something. And he talked to the first bricklayer and he asked the bricklayer, what are you building? And the first bricklayer said, I'm just laying bricks. The guy's like, okay. Talks to the second, second person, what are you building? And he goes, ah, trying to finish this wall. Okay? And he goes to the third bricklayer. And the third bricklayer was by far the happiest bricklayer. He was joyful, whistling, singing a tune. So the reporter asked him, if are you building something different than they are? What are you building? And he. And this third bricklayer smiles at the reporter with a big grin on his face and says, I'm building a cathedral. Do you see the difference?

67 · The pastor applies the parable—many believers feel like they're 'just laying bricks,' but God is inviting them to stop and see what he's building

So many times, saints, we are going, I'm just laying bricks. I'm just showing up. I'm just doing this. I'm just, okay, yeah. And I'm trying to. I'm trying to staff that one kid's classroom like. But the Lord with this stop sign, you know what he's doing? He's saying, stop and consider. Not just as a rebuke, but as an invitation. Friends, stop and consider what the Lord is building in the world around us.

68 · The pastor reads Revelation 21 as the ultimate vision toward which all building projects are moving—the New Jerusalem, where God dwells with his people forever

And I want to give you a vision as we end. Because here, all of our bricks, the Lord takes them in the end and he builds this. In Revelation 21. Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven. And the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the Holy City, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. Amen.

69 · The pastor synthesizes the entire sermon into one simple claim and invitation—the New Jerusalem is what the Lord is building, and we are invited to join him

Oh, friends, this is what the Lord is building today. Let's join him.

70 · The pastor closes in prayer, summarizing the sermon's argument in doxological form—thanking God for grace, for Jesus as cornerstone, for stopping us to ask what we're building, and asking that we would see the glorious thing God is building and join him joyfully until Christ returns

Would you stand? And let's. Let's pray. Oh, Heavenly Father, we thank you. We thank you, God, that it is all of grace, That people who were once far from God are invited near. It is all of grace that you take people who have turned away from you and you beckon them in that they might be with you and you might dwell with them. Oh, Lord, we thank you for Jesus Christ, the. The mighty cornerstone, the master builder who through his death and resurrection. Throw threw open the doors that we might join you in the holy temple of your presence. Oh, heavenly Father, you, you in grace gifting today, Lord, have stopped us and have said, son or daughter, what are you building? And you've asked us whether it's the right thing. So Lord, I pray that we would look up like that last bricklayer and we would see what you are building. We would see the glorious thing awaiting us at the end of time, Lord. That is relationship. That is mission. That is legacy. May we on the cornerstone joyfully build until you return. Amen.