Haggai 2:7 Commentary and Bible Study

Haggai speaks of ‘the desire of all nations’ coming. This is the only time this exact phrase is used in Scripture. Some people think that by ‘the desire of all nations’ Haggai is referring to riches and money, the things that people desire. They link this up with verse 8, ‘the silver and the gold is mine, saith the Lord’, but we have no doubt that ‘the desire of all nations’ is Christ. The argument against it being Christ, is that Christ is not yet known among all nations. It is only with his coming and with the spreading of the gospel, that there will be Christians, in all major nations of the world, who desire him. But that doesn't alter the meaning at all, because this is prophecy, and in the language of prophecy things are spoken of as though they had already happened. ‘I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations’ – it is a prophetic utterance itself – ‘shall come’, personally. And at that point ‘I will fill this house with glory.’ Of course, the house will be Christ and his church, not a symbolic building by that time. The KJV renders the verse as a reference to the Messiah. Experts say that is wrong and point out it should be the preciousness of all nations, and we scratch our heads and say, what is the difference? You cannot have what is precious, what is desirable, without Christ. The KJV fits much better. A time is coming when the Gentiles will be brought in. The builders of the temple are called to look for spiritual future blessings. ‘I will fill this house with glory, saith the LORD of hosts’, and in the wonderful language of prophecy, the type or the symbol is clothed with the fulness of the antitype or the reality, because of the identity between the two. God will fill this house with glory, but what he will actually fill with glory is the New Testament church, which until it came into existence was only imperfectly understood by these Old Testament saints.