Haggai #3: How to Catch Perfection

Haggai 2:1-9

2:10 On the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Haggai:

2:11 "This is what the Lord Almighty says: 'Ask the priests what the law says:
2:12 If a person carries consecrated meat in the fold of his garment, and that fold touches some bread or stew, some wine, oil or other food, does it become consecrated?' " The priests answered, "No."
2:13 Then Haggai said, "If a person defiled by contact with a dead body touches one of these things, does it become defiled?" "Yes," the priests replied, "it becomes defiled."
2:14 Then Haggai said, " 'So it is with this people and this nation in my sight,' declares the Lord . 'Whatever they do and whatever they offer there is defiled.
2:15 " 'Now give careful thought to this from this day on -consider how things were before one stone was laid on another in the Lord 's temple.

2:16 When anyone came to a heap of twenty measures, there were only ten. When anyone went to a wine vat to draw fifty measures, there were only twenty.
2:17 I struck all the work of your hands with blight, mildew and hail, yet you did not turn to me,' declares the Lord .
2:18 'From this day on, from this twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, give careful thought to the day when the foundation of the Lord 's temple was laid. Give careful thought:
2:19 Is there yet any seed left in the barn? Until now, the vine and the fig tree, the pomegranate and the olive tree have not borne fruit. " 'From this day on I will bless you.' "