Strong Hands for a Reversed Economy

Let your hands be strong, because the economy of fear is being reversed

Those who hear in these days the words of the prophets who were present when the foundation of the house was laid are told twice: let your hands be strong. Before those days there was no hire for man nor hire for beast; neither was there any peace to him that went out or came in because of the affliction; for I set all men every one against his neighbour.

Now the LORD will not be as in the former days. The seed shall be prosperous, the vine give her fruit, the ground her increase, the heavens their dew. The remnant shall possess all these. As Judah and Israel had been a curse among the nations, so they will be saved and will be a blessing. Fear not. The material world of wages, travel, harvest, and reputation is inside the promise.

Corporate reversal is not a personal prosperity contract

Haggai's poor yields and this oracle share a period. Temple work, agriculture, pay, and neighbor peace were one discouragement. Strong hands answers that discouragement with courageous labor. It does not authorize overwork, unpaid toil, unsafe conditions, or shame toward exhausted and disabled people.

Prosperous seed does not guarantee wealth, perfect crops, high wages, or business success for a faithful individual. Becoming a blessing among nations is not ethnic superiority. The remnant inherits a changed relation to land and neighbor. That hope should be held as corporate and historical before anyone draws a bounded analogy for a private life.