Haggai 2:8 - The silver is mine, the gold is mine

2:8

Economic poverty was a major problem in Jerusalem at the time, recovering from their war ravished state. A problem uppermost in their minds would be how can we get the resources to build this temple? At the same time they would see other nations, the Medes in particular, who seemed to have all the wealth. God reminds them that wealth actually belongs to Him. Moreover, we read in Ezra 6 about how Darius the king made an order that gold and silver taken from the temple was to be returned, and regions were ordered to pay taxes to fund the rebuilding of the temple. The words of this verse were not just idle words. Now, I detest what is called the prosperity gospel, but we must not throw out the baby with the bath water. All wealth belongs to the Lord, and prosperity comes from Him. We have here and in Ezra 6 a concrete example of this working out in practice. We need to know that the Lord is God and there is no other. We also see here God’s temple being funded by the state! There is nothing intrinsically wrong with churches receiving funding from governments, as long as the church does not have to sacrifice Godly principles. We also see that there are times when governments make decisions that are favourable to the kingdom, there are times when they persecute God’s people. We read of both in the Bible. In either situation we need to be secure in the knowledge that Christ is Lord, all the time, and we must remain faithful to Him.