After Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:24), mankind no longer experienced being in the presence of the LORD as they had before. It says in Genesis 3:8 that Adam and Eve heard God walking in the garden in the cool of the day and, “the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.” It wasn’t until hundreds of years later that Jacob stumbled upon a certain place on his way to Haran that access into God’s presence was restored. It states in Genesis 28:11 that after he arrived, Jacob took one of the stones of the place, put it under his head, and fell asleep. Genesis 28:12-17 goes on to say:

And he dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it! And behold, the Lord stood above it and said, “I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac. The land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring. Your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land. For I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it.” And he was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”

Jacob believed that he had discovered an opening, a gate or door into the house of God. Jacob’s discovery created in him a desire to commune with God and to serve him (note on Genesis 28:10-22). In the morning, Jacob took the stone that he had put under his head, “and set it up for a pillar and poured oil on it,” a sign that it was consecrated to God, and Jacob promised that if God returned him to his father’s house in peace, “then the LORD shall be my God, and this stone, which I have set up for a pillar, shall be God’s house” (Genesis 28:18-22).

King David seemed to be the first person to realize that Jacob’s promise was never carried out. First Chronicles 17:1-6 states, “Now when David lived in his house, David said to Nathan the prophet, ‘Behold, I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of the covenant of the LORD is under a tent.’ But the same night the word of the LORD came to Nathan, ‘Go and tell my servant David, “Thus says the LORD: it is not you who will build me a house to dwell in. For I have not lived in a house since the day I brought up Israel to this day, but I have gone from tent to tent and from dwelling to dwelling. In all places where I have moved with all Israel, did I speak a word with any of the judges of Israel, whom a commanded to shepherd my people, saying, ‘Why have you not built me a house of cedar?’”’” “God did not allow David to build the temple because he was a man of war (1 Chronicles 22:8; 28:3), but he was permitted to accumulate a large part of the materials needed for its construction (1 Chronicles 22:2-4, 14-16) to facilitate its completion by his son Solomon. Solomon was approved by God because he would be ‘a man of rest’ (1 Chronicles 22:9)” (note on 1 Chronicles 17:4). After all the work that Solomon did for the house of God was finished, the ark of the covenant was brought into the temple (2 Chronicles 5:7) and, “the house of the LORD, was filled with a cloud, so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the LORD filled the house of God” (2 Chronicles 5:13-14).

The house of God was a permanent structure in Jerusalem until the people of Judah were taken into captivity by King Nebuchadnezzar. The destruction of God’s house was the result of the people of Judah’s unfaithfulness. It says in 2 Chronicles 36:14-19:

All the officers of the priests and the people likewise were exceedingly unfaithful, following all the abominations of the nations. And they polluted the house of the Lord that he had made holy in Jerusalem.

The Lord, the God of their fathers, sent persistently to them by his messengers, because he had compassion on his people and on his dwelling place. But they kept mocking the messengers of God, despising his words and scoffing at his prophets, until the wrath of the Lord rose against his people, until there was no remedy.

Therefore he brought up against them the king of the Chaldeans, who killed their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary and had no compassion on young man or virgin, old man or aged. He gave them all into his hand. And all the vessels of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of the Lord, and the treasures of the king and of his princes, all these he brought to Babylon. And they burned the house of God and broke down the wall of Jerusalem and burned all its palaces with fire and destroyed all its precious vessels.

God said that messengers had been sent persistently to the people of Judah to warn them, “because he had compassion on his people and on his dwelling place. But they kept mocking the messengers of God, despising his words and scoffing at his prophets” (2 Chronicles 36:15). The destruction of the house of God was intended to prepare the people for the coming of God’s Messiah. The prophet Jeremiah proclaimed, “Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called: ‘The LORD is our righteousness’” (Jeremiah 23:5-6).

Jeremiah prophesied that there would be seventy years of captivity (Jeremiah 25:11). God said, “Then after seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, declares the LORD, making the land an everlasting waste” (Jeremiah 25:12). God went on to say that the clans of Israel would once again be his people and he would turn their mourning into joy (Jeremiah 31:1). Jeremiah proclaimed:

Thus says the Lord:
“The people who survived the sword
    found grace in the wilderness;
when Israel sought for rest,
    the Lord appeared to him from far away.
I have loved you with an everlasting love;
    therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.
Again I will build you, and you shall be built,
    O virgin Israel!
Again you shall adorn yourself with tambourines
    and shall go forth in the dance of the merrymakers…

Then shall the young women rejoice in the dance,
    and the young men and the old shall be merry.
I will turn their mourning into joy;
    I will comfort them, and give them gladness for sorrow.
I will feast the soul of the priests with abundance,
    and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness,
declares the Lord.” (Jeremiah 31:2-4, 13-14)

God said that he loved his people with an everlasting love. The Hebrew word that is translated everlasting, ʿolam (o-lawmˊ) is properly translated as “concealed, i.e. the vanishing point; (generally) time out of mind (past or future), i.e. (practical) eternity” (H5769). In other words, there is no end to God’s love, God’s love is always present.

The book of 2 Chronicles ends with a proclamation by Cyrus king of Persia stating that God had charged him to build him a house at Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 36:23). The book of Ezra picks up where 2 Chronicles leaves off and begins with a restatement of Cyrus’ proclamation. Ezra 1:2-4 states:

“Thus says Cyrus king of Persia: The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever is among you of all his people, may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and rebuild the house of the Lord, the God of Israel—he is the God who is in Jerusalem. And let each survivor, in whatever place he sojourns, be assisted by the men of his place with silver and gold, with goods and with beasts, besides freewill offerings for the house of God that is in Jerusalem.”

Cyrus indicated that the people were free to go back to Judah and rebuild the house of God. It says in Ezra 2:64 that “the whole assembly together was 42,300.” “While there may have been many groups of exiles that returned to Jerusalem from Babylon, Scripture speaks only of three The first group returned in 536 BC under the leadership of Zerubbabel, the second in 457 BC under Ezra, and the third in 444 BC under Nehemiah…Despite the fact that all those who desired to return to Jerusalem were free to do so, a great number of Jews chose to remain in Babylon” (Introduction to Ezra).

“Haggai is the first of the prophets who spoke to the exiles after they had returned to Palestine…Haggai ministered in 520 BC between the months of August and December. He delivered four messages during that time…From the comments in verse three of chapter 2, it seems likely that Haggai was born before Solomon’s Temple was destroyed in 586 BC” (Introduction to Haggai). Haggai 2:3-9 states:

‘”Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory? How do you see it now? Is it not as nothing in your eyes? Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, declares the Lord. Be strong, O Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest. Be strong, all you people of the land, declares the Lord. Work, for I am with you, declares the Lord of hosts, according to the covenant that I made with you when you came out of Egypt. My Spirit remains in your midst. Fear not. For thus says the Lord of hosts: Yet once more, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land. And I will shake all nations, so that the treasures of all nations shall come in, and I will fill this house with glory, says the Lord of hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, declares the Lord of hosts. The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former, says the Lord of hosts. And in this place I will give peace, declares the Lord of hosts.’”

God said the latter glory of his house would be greater than the former. Jesus expounded on this truth when he told the Pharisees who accused his disciples of breaking the Sabbath, “I tell you, something greater than the temple is here. And if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath” (Matthew 12:6-8).

Jesus’ explanation of the purpose of the temple and why he was greater than the temple had to do with Jacob’s intention when he vowed to make the stone that he had set up as a pillar the house of God (Genesis 28:22). Jacob wanted to have a place where he could commune with God. Because of Adam and Eve’s sin in the Garden of Eden, communion with God wasn’t possible until Jesus died on the cross to pay the penalty for sin. The writer of Hebrews tells us that gifts and sacrifices were offered in the temple that could not perfect the conscience of the worshipper, “but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body, imposed until the time of reformation. But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once and for all into the holy places, not be means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption…Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith” (Hebrews 9:9-12; 10:19-22).

On one occasion, Jesus entered the temple and expressed his disdain for what was going on there. It says in John 2:15 that Jesus made a whip of cords and drove out those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money changes sitting there. John tells us:

And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”

So the Jews said to him, “What sign do you show us for doing these things?” Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking about the temple of his body. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken. (John 2:16-22)

Jesus’ resurrection from the dead showed that God had accepted his sacrifice for sin on our behalf and that communion with him was possible again. Paul talked about the significance of Jesus’ resurrection in his first letter to the Corinthians. Summarizing his previous statements on the topic, Paul declared, “I tell you this brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable…For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality” (1 Corinthians 15:50-53).

Jacob experienced a moment of immortality when he wrestled with God in order to get his blessing (Genesis 32:22-27). During this encounter, God told Jacob, “You name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed” (Genesis 32:28). Afterward, Jacob realized the significance of what had just happened to him, and said, “I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been spared” (Genesis 32:30, NLT). Jacob knew that because of his sin, it was impossible for him to be in God’s presence and still be alive. The fact that he was still alive meant that Jacob’s sins had been forgiven. Jacob received God’s forgiveness by faith, the same way that Abraham and Isaac did, and the same way that all of us do. Jacob drew near to God with a true heart in full assurance of faith; he entered into God’s presence and received the gift of eternal life. It’s possible at this point that Jacob understood that he didn’t need to build a physical structure in order for him to commune with God. In answer to the question, when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus told the Pharisees, “The kingdom of God is not coming in ways that can be observed…the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21, KJV).