In the time of the prophet Jeremiah, the children of Israel had fallen once again into idol worship, and God had spoken through Jeremiah to tell of the captivity and destruction that would come from a result of the king's actions. I preached Sunday before last about how that God spelled out to Jeremiah the judgment that was to come, but also gave a glimmer of hope, that if the king obeyed the Word of God, then the judgment would be stayed and God would restore Jerusalem. Those that were here two weeks ago will hopefully remember how that the king turned away from the Word of God and thus chose judgment. I preached about how that we choose judgment by not obeying God's commandments, and that we choose, not God. The king showed his choice by tossing the scroll of the Word of God into the fireplace of his winter house, so God commanded Jeremiah to rewrite the scroll, but this time add more judgments and prophecies that would come because of the rejection of God's Word. Let me just take a minute to say that we must not take the Word of God lightly. Too many people read or hear the Word of God and just shrug their shoulders and turn and walk away. The king of Israel just casually brushed the Word of God aside and therefore reaped the judgments rather than the benefits. I want to reap the benefits of God's Word, not the judgments. Our attitude should be "I don't care how hard you preach it preacher, if it's in the Word of God, I will live it! Tell me the truth, so I can choose life." The most important part of my job is to not deliver to you a half-truth. Jesus said ye shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free. People who only know half of the truth are only half-delivered. A person that is half-delivered is still half-bound, but Jesus didn't come to half-deliver a person, he came to completely set them free! That's why I try to be so diligent to study and to try to give thorough answers, that's why sometimes we take a break from shouting to teach a while. That's why you need to be in church as much as you can and listen to a pastor that teaches the whole truth, and not just what you want to hear. I don't want to be half-free and half-bound, I want to be completely free, so preacher preach me the whole truth. I don't want to be sort of happy, I want the genuine joy of the Lord, so preacher preach me the whole truth! I don't want to HALF- make heaven, I want to completely make heaven. Don't you?! Preacher preach me the whole truth. We should have a church that does not care how hard or close to home the preacher preaches as long as he is preaching the word, because there is nothing scarier than a half-way, lukewarm Christian. You know what produces lukewarm Christians? Half-truth preaching. Preachers that are scared to tell you the truth because of money, or friendship, or whatever. If it's in the word, I've got to deliver the message. Don't get "offended" at the word, get "bended" by the word, and get your life in shape! I'm talking about preaching all of the words of Christ. Like you still have to believe in Christ and the cross and the power to save. We're not a world full of different religions all serving Gods that go by different names but it don't matter. NO NO NO!!!! There is only one God who is alive and created all things and died for us to fulfill His own requirements for purchasing our salvation, and His name is JESUS. Not Buddah, not Muhammed, not Krishna, not Allah, not Donald Trump, Bill Gates, or Donald Duck. The only name that will save you is Jesus Christ, and He is the ONE, True living God! I'm talking about not preaching half-truths like there's three gods, or maybe two or maybe mary, or well it's just a mystery! My God goes by many titles but now only one name, and His Name is Jesus! That's why it still takes repentance to be saved, you don't repent to me or some other man of the cloth, because the cloth of my life was once stained by sin. Why don't you confess your sins to the sinless one, Christ Jesus, your high priest, the only advocate you'll ever need! The Song is right: He's more than enough! {Adlib? Whatever you need him to be... Whatever's going on in your life...} That's why He's worthy to be praised and worshipped with everything with in us. That's why we don't just politely clap to our God and say an occasional Amen. God is worthy of all of the glory, and that's why I dance. That's why I sing, that's why we make a joyful noise on the instruments. That's why we sing unto Him a new song! That's why we raise our hands in surrender, and that's why we weep in His presence! He's the God of glory and He's worthy to be praised! Why cheer for a football team, car race, political leader or a shopping sale and then come to church and just sit quietly when the name of the one who loved you enough to buy you is mentioned! Show me a half-dead church and I'll show you a church of half-truths, but I'm glad I know whom I serve! I'm talking about how that the only scriptural way to be baptized is to go completely under the water in Jesus' name! The titles won't save you, but the name will! I'm talking about how it still takes being filled with the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues as the Spirit gives the utterance to be saved, and then allowing that Spirit to change your life day by day as you study the Word of God! If this teaching goes against what you've been taught, then you've been taught half-truths, and you've only half-lived! Why don't you obey the Whole Word of God today and get victory! I'm talking about how that it still takes a clean lifestyle and outward and inward holiness to be saved. I'm talking about how that it really does matter how you walk, talk, dress, act, go, live, and think! Sin is still sin, the Ten Commandments are still in effect and God is still taking worthless no good sinners and making them into mighty spiritual dynamos for His cause! You don't have to leave bound, you can be free today, because you're in a church where a man of God is willing to preach you the whole truth!

That has nothing to do with my message, but it the truth anyhow... the whole truth!

Everything that Jeremiah prophesied came true. Jerusalem was completely destroyed along with the temple and burned to the ground. The king of Israel lost his life. The children of Israel were carried into captivity by Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian King and everything God said came true to a T. That's why you better pay attention to God's Word, because everything is going to happen just like it said. There is a God and He is coming back and He will only take those who have been sealed with His spirit and washed in His blood by being baptized in His name. This world will pass away and there is a literal heaven and a literal hell, it's going to happen just like He said, so you'd better listen to the Word of God!

Jeremiah added a promise to the end of the judgment of captivity. He said that Israel would be in captivity for only 70 years and then, they would return home to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem. When they did, they were to rebuild the walls and then IMMEDIATELY rebuild the temple so that they could worship the God who had freed them! So they wouldn't forget, the prophecy was written down and carried into Babylon with them and it has lasted until this day in the form of chapters 25-29 of the book of Jeremiah. If God allowed us to have it today, then obviously there are lessons that He wants to teach us from it! But can you imagine being a young Jew in that time period? Your daddy has told you that after the seventieth year of captivity you are going to be able to go home to the place where your father and mother grew up and build a home and live and raise your family. I'll bet that prophecy was a popular one, because nobody likes being captives. Can you imagine the countdown? Only twenty years to go... I've got to stay in shape! In just ten years we are going home, God said...! Then something remarkable happened. Babylon got taken over by the Medes and the Persians, and the Persian king told the Jews that "you can return home!"

But one thing was really neat. God had told them that in the 70th year they were to rebuild the temple. From the time the first king (Jehoiakim) who had rejected God's Word and tossed it into the fire had been taken captive until the time that they were able to return to Jerusalem was exactly 70 years! (B.C. 606 - B.C. 536) The Jews started building the walls under the direction of a man named Nehemiah and also started laying the foundation of the temple of God just as God had constructed. When the enemies in the land saw the foundation of the temple of God being built, they began to cause all kinds of legal trouble with the Persian king, and then in B.C. 522 they were commanded by the Persian King Darius to stop the building of the temple so the Jews became frightened and quit. They all went to building themselves nice structures to live in while the house of God laid unfinished, the foundation partially complete. Two years later, God spoke to the prophet Haggai, and told him to prophesy to the people that it did not matter what everybody else said, even the Persian King, that it was time to obey the Word of God and build the temple of God.

Let me stop right here and ruin a good sermon. History is only interesting when we can see how it applies to us. I ain't preaching about a physical building program this morning. When you receive the Holy Spirit, the scripture teaches us that our bodies become the TEMPLE of the Holy Spirit. You're physical body becomes the place where God dwells. That's why there is no veil here today and ark of the covenant inside of this church. God doesn't want to dwell here (church), God wants to dwell here (our heart)! The Holy Ghost is not an added gift that is optional. It is a gift in that it is freely given to those who will allow God to take control of their lives. When you are sealed with His Spirit, then you become the temple of God! Just because you are filled with the Spirit doesn't mean that you've arrived. In fact, you begin to undertake a building project in your life. When you are born again, you don't go from infancy to mature adulthood in the split second you receive His Spirit, you have to grow. You don't build a temple by working on the trim, first, you gotta get the foundation right or all the cosmetic changes won't last! When you come to God, you begin a building project of the temple of God, your life, your body. Like the Jews, God brought you out of your captivity of sin not to do your own thing, but to build His house! That is the message of Haggai. Build the house of God. We all have to work, and we all have families and friends and lifes, but building our personal wants is not the reason that God brought us out of captivity. Build a house for Him. Your body should be changing to be a temple fit for the King of Glory! The Jews had stopped building the house of God and were distracted with other things. yes we have to live our lives and provide for our family, but building the temple of God is the most important thing in our lives! What do you spend the most time doing, studying God's Word, praying, fasting, hanging out with God's people? Are you building your life into the temple of God? or do you spend more time working, or making money, or doing worldly pursuits? As God of glory looks at us today, which building project are you spending the most time own, your personal life, or God's temple!

Notice that the enemy didn't wait until the temple was completed to start harassing the Jews, but immediately started trying to distract them from building while they were getting the foundation correct! That's why I don't preach half-truths, because you've got to have a solid foundation! Remember what Jesus said about having a correct foundation? {Adlib???} When a person tries to start getting their life right, the devil always sends distractions. Work, family, pleasure, it all starts interfering with church. The Devil doesn't want you to get your foundation right, because then something can be built for God that will last! I'm talking to some people this morning that are stuck in spiritual cycles that you seemingly can't get out of. You always reach a certain place spiritually, and then you miss so much church and prayer because of your life, that you fall back down, you can't establish a foundation and stay there spiritually! You need to stop allowing the cares of life, job, family, and pleasures to weigh your spiritual life down. We must build a firm foundation or we won't make it! We're building the temple of God, it's what God saved us for!

Notice that God sent the people a man of God named Haggai to get them out of their spiritual rut. You need a man of God in your life. I need a man of God in my life. Anybody that thinks that they can make it to heaven without having a pastor is foolish and naive. You can't make it to heaven without submitting to God-given authority in your life. Show me somebody that can't be faithful to church every time the doors are opened and I'll show you someone with an unfinished foundation and someone who is spiritually immature. You've got to have a preacher and a church in your life to grow spiritually. God doesn't change and the message of Haggai is still the whole truth! Don't believe some half-truth that you can miss church all of the time and still spiritually grow. Television is no substitute, Radio is no substitute, Study of the word of God is no substitute, you need a preacher to remind you of what the word of God says about your life to grow! Nothing's more depressing than an unfinished building, and nothing turns people off of religion than a bunch of unfinished temples walking around saying that they've got the answers. Lay your foundation the right way, don't settle for half-truths and half-faithfulness, you need God, the man of God, and the Word of God to be saved! Still not convinced? What did Paul say:

A sign of truly believing is submitting yourself to the preaching of a man of God! And through it, God saves those that believe! Just because you believed doesn't mean that you are automatically saved, and just because you spoke in tongues for hours doesn't mean that you are automatically going to make it. You just got delivered from your captivity from sin and were given power to overcome sin. But God delivered you from captivity for the same reason that He delivered the Jews from captivity, to build a temple where He can live!

God spoke His message clear through Haggai. The Lord said that the people were saying it couldn't be the time to build the temple, look at all the opposition. But God was reminding them that it didn't matter what the world said that it only mattered what God said, and He had brought them out of 70 years of captivity to build a temple. 70 years, 7 the number of God complete and perfect timing. Most people don't realize the lesson that God is teaching us by holding the people captive for 70 years and then setting them free to rebuild the temple, so allow me to give you a crash course on the lesson behind the number seven in the Bible:

God could have created the world and everything in it in 2 seconds but He chose to take seven days to create it for that was His perfect timing. After Noah built the Ark, God told him 7 days before it began to rain when it would happen. It was the perfect timing of God's plan for Noah. After he sent out the dove from the ark and it didn't return, Noah still waited another 7 days before getting off. Noah understood the concept of Waiting on God. We could all learn from his example. I don't have time to preach every seven of the Bible but let me mention some of them so you learn the lesson well. When Jacob died, the family mourned him for seven days. Job's friends silently mourned for seven days. Moses caused the Nile to turn to blood for Seven days. Joshua marched the Children of Israel around Jericho seven days and on the seventh day they went around seven times before God gave the victory. The Passover lasted for seven days. Samuel told Saul to wait for the Lord's command for Seven days. The Feast of the Tabernacles lasted for Seven days. A priest was consecrated for seven days before ministering and if an Israelite became defiled, they were defiled for seven days. When David wept and sought God's direction for his child born out of adultery, He fasted seven days and the child died on the seventh day. The firstborn of sheep and goats that were to be offered to God had to remain with their mothers for seven days before being offered. Paul twice stayed at a place for seven days waiting on the timing of God. 7,7,7,7,7....

Daniel had a vision of seventy prophetic weeks fortelling of the coming of the Messiah the first and the second time. See the timing of God. The period between the Passover and the Feast of Pentecost was 7 weeks (49 days). The Day of Atonement where the High Priest went into the Holiest Place in the Presence of God was in the seventh month. 7,7,7, the number that represents God's perfect timing.

Jacob loved Racheal and worked for 7 years to get her, was tricked got her ugly sister Leah instead, and worked another 7 years to get Racheal. When Joseph was in Egypt, Egypt had 7 years of abundance, followed by 7 years of famine. When God decided to teach Nebuchadnezzar a lesson in humility, He made him crazy in the head for seven years. Every year of Jubilee, was a time where the land rested and the slaves were set free, and it was held every fiftieth year, why? Because between each Jubilee year were 7 "weeks" consisting of 7 years which made 49 years. Still with me? Let's keep going through the sevenths because their is a beautiful truth behind all of this.

Back to Noah. Noah took two of every animal into the ark right? No, he took two of every animal that would be considered unclean such as pigs, lizards, etc... But of the animals that could be offered unto the Lord, he took 7 of each kind! When Abraham and Abimelech got into a fight over water at a well, Abraham made it right by giving him 7 sheep. Five distinct times we find in scripture where God demanded a special kind of sacrifice and each time, God required that Seven lambs be offered. When a priest offered a sin offering, he sprinkled the blood seven times before the veil. When a leper was cleansed, the sacrifice's blood that was offered was sprinkled upon his head seven times. When the High Priest went behind the veil on the Day of Atonement he also sprinkled the blood seven times upon the mercy seat which symbolized the throne of heaven. During a trespass offering the priest also had to sprinkle oil seven times upon the sinner. When Elisha's servant went to look for rain in the middle of the drought, it was on the seventh time that he finally saw a cloud. When the general Naman was commanded by the man of God to go dip himself in the river Jordan, he was healed on the seventh dip. When Ezekiel saw a vision of the future temple in Israel, it had seven steps. Before throwing the Hebrew children into the fire for not bowing to his idol, Nebuchadnezzar had the furnace turned up seven times hotter. God told the people of Israel in Leviticus that if they did not listen to Him and stop serving Idols that He would give them 7 times the judgment for their sins. In Bible times Silver had to be purified 7 times before being used for God. David wrote in the 119th Psalm that he took time out to praise God 7 times a day! Still with me? Let's finish . . .

The Wonderful book of Esther is full of 7's. The King Ahaserus had 7 chamberlains as well as 7 princes in his court as well as 7 counsellors. When Esther began to prepare to meet the King, she was given 6 maids, No just kidding and checking to see if you are still with me, she was given 7 maids to help her prepare for marriage to the king.

The book of Revelation is also full of 7's and if I get started on Revelation we'll still be here so I'll simply list them. 7 churches of Asia, 7 Seals, 7 Thunders, 7 heads, 7 crowns, 7 kings, 7stars, 7 spirits, 7 eyes, 7 golden lampstands, 7 angels with 7 trumpets, 7 angels holding 7 vials holding 7 plagues, 7 horns.

And finally when Peter asked Jesus how many times that he should forgive a brother, Jesus answered 70 times 7. That didn't mean to stop forgiving on the 491st time, but to forgive until God's perfect timing was accomplished and everything was made right! And I left tons of sevens out -- that's nowhere near every seven in the Bible and it's not just a coincidence. The number 7 always represents the perfect timing of God.

Our point was that God kept Israel captive for 70 years and then set them free in His perfect timing to build the temple. Most of you weren't raised in the truth. Some of you did not discover the truth of Jesus' name baptism and infilling of the Holy Spirit until you were well into your adult years. Some of you were not even exposed to the truth for the early years of your life. But you couldn't control that, God did. And now He's saved you and you've been born again. Just like the Jews you were held captive in sin until the perfect timing of God was accomplished in your life. You know what that tells me? God has set you free from sin at this point in your life because it was His will for you to be here, Castroville is your city of Jerusalem. And God has a plan for you and a reason why He's freed you from that captivity . . . To build a temple with your body and life for Him to work through and minister in. It's never too late to do something for God. It's never too late to change. If God let you stay captive to sin for years and years before giving you an opportunity to hear the truth, then realize that you are in God's perfect timing and now your purpose in life is to build your foundation. Don't let the enemy distract you from building your foundation. Keep being faithful to God. Let your world go crazy. That's not a sign that it's not time to build your temple, it doesn't matter what the world that you have to live in is telling you, it matters what God's Word said, and He's saying build a temple for me today! {Adlib}

If you are here and you have never found out what it's like to have a spiritual purpose in your life. If you feel like life's empty, it's because you have not filled it with the purpose that you were made. Jesus wants to fill the void. The Bible says that Today is the day of salvation. Hebrews 3:15 says to not harden your hearts toward the Lord but hear his voice To day! Today you have heard the call to come out of captivity. God wants to inhabit your body and make it a temple of praise and worship to him. Stop building your temple of fleshly desire because all such temples are built on faulty foundations. Money will let you down, people will let you down, but Jesus will NEVER let you down. Answer the call today. Don't settle for a half-truth and a half-built temple. {Adlib}

The prophecies of the Jews returning to Israel after 70 years.