The Green Light: This chapter draws to a triumphant close the accomplishment of the first mission given by God through the Persian king Cyrus in 1:1–4. Stage one was realized by chapter 3. Now stage two is brought to a satisfying finale in the completion of the temple-building project. The temple represented the heart of Israel’s spiritual life as the sign of God’s presence with the people, the focus of their worship and the source of divine blessing. Now, in principle, the postexilic community stood on a par with the preexilic one. The dynamic role of the temple in the OT may be measured by its multiplicity of metaphorical uses in the NT. There it is related to Christ (John 2:21), the church at large (Eph. 2:21–22), the local church (1 Cor. 3:16), and the individual Christian (1 Cor. 6:19…