Thurs.’s Devo - Being Fruitful

Read: Haggai 1:1-2:23; Revelation 11:1-19; Psalm 139:1-24; Proverbs 30:15-16
Thurs.’s Devo - Being Fruitful 12-20-18
Read: Haggai 1:1-2:23; Revelation 11:1-19; Psalm 139:1-24; Proverbs 30:15-16
God sent Haggai with a word for Zerubbabel and Joshua about what time they were living in. Zerubbabel was a Jew but his name means “seed of Babylon”. Joshua (“God saves”) was the High Priest. They had been telling the people that it wasn’t time yet to build the Lord’s house and God sent Haggai to tell them that it was now time to go to Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple. God reminded them that they had left Him to satisfy their own selves and build their own houses. He had not blessed their efforts to be prosperous and comfortable. Instead of their labor bringing fruit, it had been in vain. They worked hard to have nothing. God encouraged them that he was with them to prosper them in what he had for them to do and that was to return to Jerusalem and build his house. He explained to them that staying in Babylon was making them less godly and their influence was not making the Babylonians more righteous. God wanted them to remember how unfruitful they were in Babylon because when they moved home, they would be very fruitful. He reminded Zerubbabel that he had chosen him for this task and he would be with him and bless him. It would not be his might that accomplished this, but God’s spirit in him.
In Revelation, we read that during the Tribulation, the temple of Jerusalem will be given back to the Jews for a time. Then the ungodly Gentiles will take it over. God will raise up two extraordinary witnesses just like Zerubbabel and Joshua who will be his witnesses and do miraculous things like Moses and Elijah did. They will be martyred and their bodies left unburied to be gawked at and their death celebrated. After 3 and a half days, they will come back to life and rapture to the heavens while the world looks on.
I listened to about 6 different Youtube videos on what different end time scholars believed the two witnesses to be. All of Revelation is symbolic so they have to symbolize something. I believe they symbolize the spirit of Enoch and Elijah, the two angels that met Abraham on their way to destroy Sodom, the two angels on the ark of the covenant, the two angels that came to tell Mary that she would bear the Messiah in her womb, and Gabriel and Michael. The Bible is layered so one thing stands for many things. We will understand more and more as we get closer to the day.
Then God will immediately send an earthquake and 7,000 will be killed in the earthquake. The survivors will have the fear of God fall on them. This is the second woe.
The seventh trumpet sounds and we see what is going on in heaven. The 24 elders fall on their faces worshipping God giving thanks for God’s victory over the enemies of the earth. They are thankful that now God is taking over the earth. Then God’s temple in heaven was opened and the glory of his tabernacle is seen.
Lord give us clarity as to what we are to be doing today. Help us to be fruitful in the work of our hands.