Why Does God Sometimes Withhold His Blessings from Us?

We Must Put God First Before Worrying about Ourselves

In the short book of Haggai, the prophet has a message for the people and an application for us today. God, through Haggai, chastises his people. They live in nice homes, while God’s home—the temple—sits in shambles.

It isn’t that God wants us to build great monuments for him as much as he wants us to put him first. It’s an issue about our priorities.

God has attempted to get his people’s attention for years, but they miss it. “Consider your situation,” God says. Then he reels off a list of realities for them:

• Each year you plant much but harvest little.
• You eat but are never full.
• You drink but are still thirsty.
• You put on clothes but remain cold.
• You earn money, but it doesn’t last until your next paycheck.

“Contemplate this,” he says. God wants his people to put him first and think about their own needs second. When they do this, he will give them plenty.

Specifically, God wants them to rebuild his temple. Though we could assume this means he wants us to embark on a building project for our church—making it our number one priority—this misses the modern-day application.

Remember, Jesus came to fulfill the Old Testament, so the need for a physical temple ended because we became his temple (1 Corinthians 6:19-20 and 1 Peter 2:4-5).

It May Be About Our Priorities

Instead, we can receive this Old Testament prophecy as a call to put Jesus first. That’s an easy enough lesson for us.

However, it gets a bit dicey when we dig into this.

Based on the lesson from Haggai, we can assume that if things aren’t going our way and we aren’t receiving God’s blessings, it’s because we have our priorities out of whack, and we aren’t putting him first in all that we do.

Though sometimes this may be the case, other times we may struggle and suffer because God is using our circumstances to grow us into the person he wants us to become.

In this situation, we may very well have our priorities correct and, for a season, still not enjoy his blessing.

If we feel we aren’t receiving God’s blessings, it’s up to us to determine why. Do we need to reorder our priorities, or do we need to allow him to grow himself in us, preparing us for the future?

May we wisely discern the reason why.

[Read through the Bible with us this year. Today’s reading is Haggai 1-2, and today’s post is on Haggai 1:2-11.]

Learn more about all twelve of the Bible’s Minor Prophets in Peter’s book, Return to Me: 40 Prophetic Teachings about Unfaithfulness, Punishment, and Hope from the Minor Prophets

Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.

Read more in his books, blog, and weekly email updates.