The books of Zephaniah, Haggai, and Zechariah were all in the same time frame as the exile of the people of Israel was coming to an end. The people had been in exile some 70 years as prophesied. The temple of God in Jerusalem had been torn down some seventy years earlier as King Nebucannezer had taken over the city. The King of Babylon had taken captive the brightest and best that Israel had to offer, and left the more uneducated, poor, common people to take care of the land. They had only to pay taxes to Babylon, but as the Temple had been torn down, and the priests had been taken into exile, they no longer had to sacrifice to God.
In these books we see not one but three different prophets had come forward from God to tell the people to rebuild the temple as the Israeli people were coming hame from exile soon. The new ruler in Babylon had given the go ahead for the rebuilding project. Haggi, was the man tasked by King Darius and God finishing the rebuilding of the Temple. Haggi was the forth prophet of God to come forward to rebuild God's temple. He and all the others met great resistance in their efforts to rebuild, from of all people the Israeli people themselves. They came after Nehemiah who rebuilt the walls and made Jerusalem safe again, even though he faced internal and external forces that tried to stop him.
They had gone through almost two generations in exile, and a very few people were still alive that remembered the Temple of God, or the sacrifices. The people could only see how rebuilding the Temple would make them have to start giving ten percent to God again, they seemed to forget the fact they would be free from the taxes of Babylon. The people of Israel were much like the people in the United States today. We have driven God out of our society and embraced things such as homosexuality, and abortion, and God has said in His word that Homosexuality and murder through abortion, are abominations in His sight. We as a nation, would have to give up these things to be able to turn back to God. The people only see what they must give up, rather than what they would gain by returning to the Lord.
In the song 'Basics of Life' there is a couple of verses that reflect this problem "We've let the darkness invade us to long, We've gotta turn the tide, there's no room for compromise."This very well explains where we are as a country. We as a nation have let the original intentions of our founding fathers go to the wayside, while embracing the evil that is presented to us. In many cases the change has been gradual in others much quicker. In both cases, The devil has used deception and delayed circumstances to get the new behavior accepted. Satan told Eve that if she ate the forbidden fruit that 'this day she would not surely die', she didn't think that a day to the Lord is as a thousand years, and from the point she ate of the fruit, she lived less than 1000 years. So God's statement that she would die that day was true, It was just one day to God not Eve. We continue to ignore the warnings of God at our own peril. If he takes His hand of protection off this nation, we will be in great trouble.
There is no room for compromise, the song says, and is true. We have gone so far that we think we can't get back, but with God leading the way, we can find our way back into His graces. We need to repent and turn around now, before we go further away. If we don't repent soon it may be too late for us.
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