I.　The central thought of Haggai's prophecy is that the building of the house of Jehovah is related to the welfare of God's people today and to the coming of the millennial kingdom with its Messiah in the age of restoration—1:2, 8; 2:6-9, 20-23; Matt. 19:28; Acts 3:20-21:

A.　In the Old Testament the house of Jehovah, or the temple, was first a type of Christ as the house of God individually and then a type of the church, the Body, the enlarged Christ, as God's house corporately—John 2:19-21; 1 Tim. 3:15.

B.　Because the house of Jehovah is a type of the church, Haggai's prophecy refers to us, the New Testament believers, since we are the reality of the type.

II.　We need to see the significance of the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house—Hag. 1:2; John 14:2:

A.　The church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, His household, enables God's life to be propagated; therefore, God's house is a place for the continuation and multiplication of His life—vv. 2-3; 1:12-13; 20:17.

B.　In the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, the invisible and mysterious Triune God has a visible and solid manifestation among men on earth—1 Tim. 3:15-16.

C.　The church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is the dwelling place of God—the place where God can have His satisfaction and rest; in this dwelling place God lives and moves to accomplish His will and satisfy the desire of His heart—Eph. 2:22; 1:5, 9, 11; Phil. 2:13.

D.　As the issue of Christ's being glorified by the Father with the divine glory, the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is a divine and human incorporation of the processed and consummated Triune God constituted with His redeemed, regenerated, and transformed elect—John 12:23; 13:31-32; 14:2.

E.　The church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is for the eternal and purposeful Triune God to carry out His eternal economy to consummate the New Jerusalem as His eternal goal for His eternal expression—Eph. 3:9-11; Rev. 21:2, 10-11.

F.　The church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, exists in the resurrection life of Christ; thus, the church is "resurrectionly"; that is, it is an organic entity absolutely in resurrection—John 11:25; 2:19; Acts 2:24.

G.　In the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, we enter into the corporate experience of God and experience the All-sufficient God, who is revealed in His house—Gen. 35:1, 3, 7, 11.

III.　The New Testament reveals the way that the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is built up—Hag. 1:8, 14:

A.　The house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is built up by the mingling of divinity with humanity—John 14:20; 15:4a; 1 John 4:15:

1.　The principle of God's building is that God builds Himself in Christ into us and builds us in Christ into Himself—Eph. 3:17a; John 14:20.

2.　The church is God's building, composed of God Himself as the divine material mingled with man as the human material—1 Kings 6:7, 15, 20-21; 1 Cor. 3:9, 11-12a:

a.　The two natures of Christ, divinity and humanity, are joined together and mingled together as one—Luke 1:35.

b.　In principle, the church is the same as Christ—the divine nature mingled with the human nature to become one entity—John 14:20.

B.　The building up of the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is by the believers' growth in life; the growth in life is the building—1 Cor. 3:6-9, 16-17; Eph. 2:21; 4:15-16:

1.　Since God's building is living, it is growing; the actual building up of the house of God is by our growth in life, and the more we grow in life, the more we are in the building—1 Pet. 2:5; Eph. 2:21.

2.　To grow in life is to grow into the Head, Christ, and to have Christ increase in us in all things until we attain to a full-grown man—4:15, 13.

3.　The Body builds itself up by growing; growth equals building—v. 16

C.　The building up of the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is the issue of Christ making His home in our hearts—3:17a:

1.　In order for the Lord's word in Matthew 16:18 concerning the building up of the church to be fulfilled, we must allow Christ to make His home in our hearts, possessing, occupying, and saturating our inner being; this is the way to build up the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house.

2.　The more Christ occupies our inner being, the more we will be able to be built up with others to become the corporate expression of the Triune God—Eph. 3:17-21.

D.　The building up of the church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is by the constant visitation to the redeemed elect of the Father and the Son with the Spirit who indwells the redeemed elect to be the mutual dwelling place of the consummated Triune God and His redeemed people—John 14:23; 15:4a:

1.　The Father and the Son come to visit us to do a building work in us, making an abode that will be a mutual dwelling place for the Triune God and for us—14:2, 23.

2.　This is the building up of the Father's house through the constant visitation of the Triune God.

E.　The church as the house of Jehovah, the Father's house, is built up through the practice of the scriptural way to meet and to serve—Eph. 4:11-16; 1 Cor. 14:24-26, 31; Hag. 1:8, 14:

1.　The scriptural way to meet and to serve is for the annulling of the clergy-laity system and the developing of the gifts, functions, and capacity of all the members of the organic Body of Christ—Matt. 20:25-28; Rom. 12:4-6.

2.　Through the practice of the scriptural way to meet and to serve, the Lord is recovering the priesthood of the gospel (15:16), the perfecting of the common members of the Body of Christ to make them living, active, functioning members of the Body (Eph. 4:12, 16; Heb. 10:24-25), and the church meetings in mutuality with prophesying for the building up of the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 14:4b, 24a, 26, 31).

IV.　"I will shake all the nations, and the Desire of all the nations will come"—Hag. 2:7a:

A.　This refers to Christ, who is the Desire of all the nations—Mal. 3:1b.

B.　The coming of Christ as the Desire of all the nations depends on the return of God's people from their captivity in Babylon and the recovery of the building of God's house—1 Tim. 3:15; 1 Pet. 2:5.

C.　Only the church built up as the house of God and the Body of Christ according to the Lord's desire can be the steppingstone into the age of the kingdom; thus, for the sake of His coming back, the Lord needs the church to be built up—Matt. 16:18-19, 27-28.

V.　"I will fill this house with glory…The latter glory of this house will be greater than the former"—Hag. 2:7b, 9a:

A.　The glory of God is in the building of God, the house of Jehovah—Exo. 40:34-35; 1 Kings 8:10-11; 2 Chron. 3:1; 5:1-2, 13-14; Eph. 3:21; Rev. 21:10-11.

B.　In a vision of God, Ezekiel saw the glory of Jehovah return to the house of Jehovah and f ill the house—Ezek. 43:1-5:

1.　The glory of Jehovah returned to the house because the building of the house was completed—vv. 2, 5.

2.　This indicates that in order for the God of glory to dwell in the church, the church must be built up to become the dwelling place of God—Eph. 2:21-22; 3:14-21.

C.　In the church life the first consideration that we should have is the Lord's glory; the decisions in the church life must be made primarily according to the Lord's glory—1 Cor. 10:31; Eph. 3:21; Phil. 4:20; 1 Pet. 4:11.

D.　In our experience of the church life, we need to advance so that we may experience the glory in God's dwelling place—John 17:22; Eph. 3:21.