The first thing we should do when things go against us is to ask ourselves, "Is the Lord poking my pockets full of holes?" Which is to say, is the Lord bringing difficulty on me because I have not been faithful to him, or because he is trying to tell me something? God does not always bring difficulty because we have been unfaithful (witness Job's life); however, he sometimes does, which is why we need to rule that out first thing.
Second, the people had holes in their pockets because they were building their own stuff while the Lord's house lay in ruins. They were neglecting God's dwelling place among his people. God does not dwell in church buildings now, as he did among his people then (some deep theology here that I don't have time to go into. How can God "dwell" in the temple and yet be everywhere?). Where does God dwell? He dwells in the hearts and lives of believers, so in the same way the exiles should have been rebuilding the temple first, we should be, as the group Watermark put it, asking the Lord to "come and make my heart your home."
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