The challenge to rebuild

¹The LORD ’s word came through Haggai the prophet in the second year of King Darius, in the sixth month on the first day of the month, to Judah’s governor Zerubbabel, Shealtiel’s son, and to the high priest Joshua, Jehozadak’s son:

²This is what the LORD of heavenly forces says:

These people say, “The time hasn’t come,

³Then the LORD ’s word came through Haggai the prophet:

⁵So now, this is what the LORD of heavenly forces says:

Take your ways to heart.

⁶You have sown much, but it has brought little.

You eat, but there’s not enough to satisfy.

You drink, but not enough to get drunk.

There is clothing, but not enough to keep warm.

Anyone earning wages puts those wages into a bag with holes.

⁷This is what the LORD of heavenly forces says:

Take your ways to heart.

⁸Go up to the highlands and bring back wood.

Rebuild the temple so that I may enjoy it

⁹You expect a surplus, but look how it shrinks.

You bring it home, and I blow it away, says the LORD of heavenly forces,

But all of you hurry to your own houses.

¹⁰Therefore, the skies above you have withheld the dew,

¹¹I have called for drought on the earth,

¹²Zerubbabel, Shealtiel’s son, and the high priest Joshua, Jehozadak’s son, along with all who remained among the people, listened to the voice of the LORD God and to the words of Haggai the prophet because the LORD their God sent him. Then the people feared the LORD .

¹³Then Haggai, the LORD ’s messenger, gave the LORD ’s message to the people:

I am with you, says the LORD .

¹⁴The LORD moved the spirit of Judah’s governor Zerubbabel, Shealtiel’s son, and the spirit of the high priest Joshua, Jehozadak’s son, and the spirit of all the rest of the people. Then they came and did work on the house of the LORD of heavenly forces, their God,

¹⁵on the twenty-fourth day of the sixth month in the second year of Darius the king.