"10 On the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came by Haggai the prophet, 11 “Thus says the Lord of hosts: Ask the priests about the law: 12 ‘If someone carries holy meat in the fold of his garment and touches with his fold bread or stew or wine or oil or any kind of food, does it become holy?’” The priests answered and said, “No.” 13 Then Haggai said, “If someone who is unclean by contact with a dead body touches any of these, does it become unclean?” The priests answered and said, “It does become unclean.” 14 Then Haggai answered and said, “So is it with this people, and with this nation before me, declares the Lord, and so with every work of their hands. And what they offer there is unclean. 15 Now then, consider from this day onward. Before stone was placed upon stone in the temple of the Lord, 16 how did you fare? When one came to a heap of twenty measures, there were but ten. When one came to the wine vat to draw fifty measures, there were but twenty. 17 I struck you and all the products of your toil with blight and with mildew and with hail, yet you did not turn to me, declares the Lord. 18 Consider from this day onward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month. Since the day that the foundation of the Lord's temple was laid, consider: 19 Is the seed yet in the barn? Indeed, the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, and the olive tree have yielded nothing. But from this day on I will bless you.”
Haggai 2:10-19
Haggai's message, as we have interpreted it, is true both in personal life and in national life. When we lose out spiritually, we may lose a great deal in a short time, but we rarely recover that ground as quickly as we lost it, nor is it ours to say when or how we may recover it. This is the point that John Bunyan makes so wonderfully in 'The Holy War', when Emmanuel was driven out of the city of Mansoul through the neglect and sin of its citizens. It was long e'er He was wooed back again. In the same way, in national life, the famine of the Word caused by the wilful neglect of the Scriptures and the distortion of its truths is taking a long time to recover from. This is why revival tarries; and it is simplistic and naive in the extreme to suppose that the merest gesture of repentance is all that is needed to put matters right, and woo back the grieved Spirit of God into our midst again. Not so: let us remember how the prophet Samuel laboured for a quarter of a century after the declension of the time of the Judges before Israel was revived and brought again to a position of spiritual prosperity. To begin with, after his anointing and commissioning as God's man, things got worse, not better. To change the metaphor, suppose a great ocean-going vessel, travelling at a speed of thirty knots, is given the signal 'Full speed astern'. What happens? The engines are put into reverse, but the ship still goes on in the same direction, because its original momentum keeps it going, it may be for some miles, before the reversed engines gradually slow down its motion. Only then, after long enough, will the effect of the 'full speed astern' begin to become evident. This is what Haggai is saying. God has given the 'full speed astern' signal; the people have obeyed; but they must be patient and give it time to have its effect.