Haggai 1

A Call to Build the House of the Lord

In the second year of King Darius,^a on the first day of the sixth month, the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai^b to Zerubbabel^c son of Shealtiel, governor^d of Judah, and to Joshua^e son of Jozadak,^f the high priest:^g

This is what the Lord Almighty^h says: “These peopleⁱ say, ‘The time has not yet come to rebuild the Lord’s house.^j’ ”

Then the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai:^k “Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses,^l while this house remains a ruin?^m”

Now this is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thoughtⁿ to your ways. You have planted much, but have harvested little.^o You eat, but never have enough.^p You drink, but never have your fill.^q You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages,^r only to put them in a purse with holes in it.”

This is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thought^s to your ways. Go up into the mountains and bring down timber^t and build the house, so that I may take pleasure^u in it and be honored,^v” says the Lord. “You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little.^w What you brought home, I blew^x away. Why?” declares the Lord Almighty. “Because of my house, which remains a ruin,^y while each of you is busy with his own house. Therefore, because of you the heavens have withheld^z their dew^a and the earth its crops.^b I called for a drought^c on the fields and the mountains,^d on the grain, the new wine,^e the olive oil^f and everything else the ground produces, on people and livestock, and on all the labor of your hands.^g”

Then Zerubbabel^h son of Shealtiel, Joshua son of Jozadak, the high priest, and the whole remnantⁱ of the people obeyed^j the voice of the Lord their God and the message of the prophet Haggai, because the Lord their God had sent him. And the people feared^k the Lord.

Then Haggai,^l the Lord’s messenger,^m gave this message of the Lord to the people: “I am withⁿ you,” declares the Lord. So the Lord stirred up^o the spirit of Zerubbabel^p son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua son of Jozadak,^q the high priest, and the spirit of the whole remnant^r of the people. They came and began to work on the house of the Lord Almighty, their God, on the twenty-fourth day of the sixth month.^s

The Promised Glory of the New House

In the second year of King Darius,^a