For the first time in my lifetime, my favourite team made it to the championship game. I was excited, because my team was playing against the defending champion. But I was also nervous, why did we have to play against the best team? The coach changed my perspective. He said our team was fortunate to play against the favourite for the championship, because ″to be the best you've got to beat the best.″ Okay then. Let's go!

Haggai's penultimate paragraph contains two important things you've heard before and one thing you haven't. Here's what you've heard before: ″Tell Zerubbabel governor of Judah that I am going to shake the heavens and the earth″ (Haggai 2:21). This is the fourth time God mentions that Zerubbabel is governor of Judah. Each time may have pained God to say it, and Judah to hear it (1:1, 14; 2:2, 21). Before the exile, Judah had been an independent nation ruled by God through kings. Now it had a governor appointed by the Persian king. Judah was reduced to a tiny, backwater province in someone else's empire. Persian soldiers were stationed nearby, ready to attack at the first sign of trouble. How discouraging!

But God tells Zerubbabel not to despair. As He promised earlier, so He said again that He is ″going to shake the heavens and the earth″ (v. 21; see v. 6). Don't trust what you see, and definitely don't trust how you feel. God is in charge, and He's gunning for Persia.

How is God going to judge Persia? That's the new information in today's Scriptural reading. God promises to ″overturn″ and ″shatter″ enemy forces. He says, ″I will overthrow chariots and their drivers; horses and their riders will fall″ (v. 22). This was a bold claim. Persia had conquered the world by its unmatched innovations in cavalry and chariots. No army could defeat the Persian warriors on horseback.

Until God. He wanted the world to know that He's better than their very best, so He said, ″Great! I'm toppling horses!″ And He did. Persia was defeated by the Greeks, who were defeated by the Romans, who were defeated by barbarians, who then settled into various countries of Europe. Empires have come and gone, and look who's still here–the children of Israel!

God is mightier than your miry situation. He is stronger than its strongest, most distressing part. Ask Him to defeat your problem at its most powerful point, because that's how He demonstrates His glorious strength. He may do so now, or He may not. But He will definitely do so when Jesus comes again. At that time, everything that is stuck will become unstuck, including yours.