Habakkuk
Read Hab 1:1-5
Why was Habakkuk afraid?
He needed a word from God because of his burden
He needed faith to cling to at this time when the nation was in terrible violence
Like Habakkuk, we question His ways and His timings
Why are you doing something Lord?
When will you move your hand and deliver us?
Yet His ways are above our ways
God’s wisdom is far greater than our wisdom
Abraham and Sarah had to wait for the promise, but they too got impatient
Moses asked, how long shall I have these people murmuring people?
How much longer must we be in this wilderness?
We can protest and ask ‘how long’
But God’s timing is always perfect
Even in Rev 6 we see the redeemed in heaven ask ‘How long O Lord until you avenge our blood’
We are an impatient lot aren’t we?
But God’s ways and timing are a mystery to us
If we knew how and when God would move then he would cease to the mysterious God that He is
We would get bored; instead we look and wait in anticipation wondering how He will do it this time
How will He deal with this situation?
That’s the excitement of knowing Him!
We cannot comprehend His grace
Here the prophet is calling out for answers but gets none
He wanted God to deal with the problem there and then
What would happen if God didn’t delay and dished out the justice on the world?
2 Pet tells how God in the days of Noah waited while Noah built the ark
He could have saved Noah and destroyed the people long before he did
But His grace gave them every opportunity to repent and turn from their ways
And how in the time of Abraham and Lot, God would have held back judgement from Sodom and Gomorrah if the people had repented
2 Peter 2:9 ... the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the Day of Judgment
Waiting for God, is not always easy
For ourselves and for others it means we have to trust Him and have confidence in Him
Why didn’t the people listen to the prophets?
And even today, people don’t want to read passages about judgement and sin
Perhaps they were uncomfortable and are uncomfortable with the message of sin
For many, they’ve hardened their hearts
They insisted on ‘feel good’ messages instead of the truths of the Word
They were convinced that they were not under judgement
They saw the sin of everyone else but not their own
How many point the finger at another when a message is spoken?
It’s for so and so... not me
So and so needed to be here to hear this today.....
The book of Habakkuk was for them there and then, but not us today we hear
We have to accept all scripture
The life and message of the prophets are to listen to the voice of God and follow Him
Chap 1:1 tells us, the burden Habakkuk saw
God delays to answer at times to test our faith
Habakkuk speaks against the people
It is heavy and burdensome
The message of God isn’t always easy to bear
Why does God lay a heavy burden on him or at times on us?
We don’t think it fits in with the nature of God when Jesus said that we should take our burdens to Him
But Habakkuk’s name means to cling to God
He calls out to God
The message wasn’t to be watered down
He was doing his duties in the temple when the vision came
The vision was what God was going to do
He was to write it down
God will fulfil it in His time
A time of Judgement, yet grace holds it back at this moment
The judgement is certain, the timing is unknown
There was a disregard for holiness
He was troubled that the culture he lived in was preoccupied with violence
They became de-sensitised to it
A generation like those that preceded the flood
Restless for things and wanting new things, material things
Why does God put up with this?
One word, Grace
Habakkuk is crying out for deliverance, why?
Because this prophet cared for the people and he loved the presence of God
So why was God silent?
Why give Habakkuk this burden?
He gives the righteous a burden so they have a heart for the sinner and have compassion on them
God was breaking this man’s heart so he would pray for the people
He lived in a lawless society
There was social strife
More laws and legislation were introduced, but it didn’t help
Things just got worse
Judah with all their political correctness
Lawsuits and justice were being denied
"Lord, how long will I cry to You of these things that are taking place, and You don't answer, You don't hear, You don't respond? God, there's such a horrible deterioration in the land. There is such moral corruption. There's such an overwhelming tide of evil, and the whole nation is just going down so rapidly. God, You don't seem to be doing anything about it. We pray; we cry unto You, but it seems like evil is prevailing, and that the evil persons are prevailing. As the result, righteous judgment no longer profits."
The effect of the moral decline of the nation is reflected in the judicial system
The law is slack and judgment does not go out
I think of things that are going on in our own nation
How many times do we hear that the justice system is wrong here?
Illustrations: The case about Jamie Bulger’s killers being set free and now it comes back to light that the one should never have been released
We don’t know how long it will be until the other one does something too
We see people being put into prison for trivial things in comparison to others and things don’t seem fair
Our friend got 3 years for making indecent texts to a girl of 15 and yet some who have done far worse get a shorter sentence
Or those who get away with their crime because of a technicality in the law
Lee Hughes was sentenced to 6 years for drunk driving and leaving the scene of an accident which killed a man in another car
Yet the illegal immigrant who mowed down a 17 year old girl and carried her body a quarter of a mile down the road and left the scene, when he was found only got 6 months because he had served a year while waiting for trial
Like Habakkuk’s day, the justice system was failing the nation, so what did they do?
They made more laws! Sound familiar?
There was a growing population of foreigners who bought with them their gods, corruption and violence
The righteous were being encircled by the wicked
No one dared to stand against the injustice
The same here; we are not getting justice and if we speak out against the injustice we are being racist, prejudiced or politically incorrect
His nation was heading for moral disaster just like others
God had to open his eyes to bring him to a place of prayer
May the Lord lay a burden on us about the state of our nation
I pray we will have our eyes open to see the moral decline and violence we have around us
I pray God will so burden us that we will be on our knees in prayer
We cannot change things by politically signing petitions or by extreme activism
But by praying for the nation
Now we see God’s reply to Habakkuk from v 5
We are at the place when we ask, ‘why have you laid this heavy burden on my life?’
‘Where are you when I need you?’
These are common prayers of the righteous
Job also pleaded with God for answers
But God asked Job questions instead
It was time to show Job who was in control of the universe
And now it was time to show Habakkuk
He cried out faithfully to the people to repent
They weren’t those who didn’t know God, but those who claimed to know Him
He was rejected for his message
The violence was in families, the work place and even in the temple over the law
The courts were powerless to protect the innocent
The government created more laws to curb crime, but it didn’t work because it was the heart of man that needed dealing with not the law
It is the first demonstration of God answering in v5
But what was the answer?
Not what anyone would want to hear really
I’m going to send the most awful people to you
What? How will that help?
God was working, but Habakkuk didn’t see it
God may be working here in our land or in our life and we can’t see it
It may be we are looking at the wrong thing
God said, ‘You won’t believe it if I show you’
Habakkuk wasn’t prepared for the answer
What would we say if God said, I’m answering, I’m sending a violent people to you who are terrible.....?
It was to the people, the whole land
Don’t pray about what concerns you and your own little world, but what concerns God!
Let Him stretch your vision
God had heard him
But the answer would come disguised
Take a good look
He wanted to awaken them to a legitimate fear so they would repent
Are we to preach a message like this today?
Jesus is our only hope of salvation
Only God can raise a spiritually dead nation and people
We must call sin what it is
Identify it and then identify grace
God was working in the gentiles yet the Jews still rejected the message
God was preparing in that day for Judah’s judgement
When you turn and allow another nation to rule, the Lord will allow them to destroy you
A nation who respects none, they will take everything you have
When Habakkuk prayed for justice, God sent the most violent people to them
They came looking for violence
A people who made up their plans to take the land
They would rape, pillage etc
Their culture was unbearable
It may be that God is allowing Islam, who also, are a people wanting to rule and take possession to penetrate our nation to bring us to our knees
Does our theology hold this?
They were unstoppable and swift
Woe to us the people said
We need to say the same thing today
Judah disregarded the warning
They thought God would get them out of another situation
But He didn’t
You may say, I just want a cosy life so who cares?
Why should God’s people do anything?
We live in peace don’t we?
Judah was morally weak and so vulnerable but she did not know it, or accept it
I believe the UK is like this
We have troops, wealth ..........but these will not save us
God laughs at those that think that they can do it alone
We have to take a warning from these ourselves
God will destroy them though
God won’t allow other gods to have their way
But He didn’t
Is your heart broken enough for this nation?
For these people?
Why not?
He can turn a nation back to Himself
Lord, pour out Your grace
We, like Habakkuk must tell it as it is
"Write the vision; make it plain so that when people read it, they will run to share it with others."
For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie Hab 2:3
Now it's going happen; it's going happen in its appointed time
..and though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry Hab 2:3
The church has been waiting for Jesus to come for almost two thousand years of man's time
But it will come
If you have waited for an answer, it will come
Now the prophet is encouraging us to the faithfulness of God's Word and God's promise
Hab 2:3 "For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry."
Throughout the New Testament we are encouraged towards patience as we wait for the coming again of Jesus Christ
Peter tells us that in the last days scoffers would come and they would say, "Where is the promise of His coming? You say Jesus is coming again?
They've been saying that for years
2 Peter 3:9 says, "But God is not slack concerning His promises, as some men count slackness, but He's faithful to us
Then he tells us the reason why he has tarried,
"For God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance" 2 Peter 3:9
Therefore, realize that the delay of the Lord, is the salvation of the lost
It's for those who've not yet received, because God is so patient
James said, "Have patience brothers till the coming of the Lord, establish your souls, for the Husbandman is waiting for the complete fruit of harvest" James 5:7-8
So we are encouraged to wait for it's going to happen; surely it will come
The mistake of Babylon was that they were going to claim victory due to their own gods, though God was using them and allowed them to be His instrument to bring judgment against His people, they in turn were going to mistake it as a victory of their gods, and going to worship their gods
Let us trust in nothing but the lord to save our nation and the people
Then Habakkuk prays in chapter 3
This is a condensed version:
In essence, the prophet is saying, "God, I cried to You and told You my complaint that You weren't doing anything. And You told me You were doing something, and I don't understand what You're doing, but Lord, just keep doing it. I'm fearful for what I heard, but Lord, keep doing it. Keep working, Lord. Keep alive Your work, but don't forget to be merciful in the midst of the years, and in Your wrath remember mercy
Now he's going into a glorious prophetic description of the coming again of Jesus Christ
As He comes, He'll be coming from the area of south and east, from Jerusalem to the Mount of Olives
"As lightning shines out of the east to the west so shall the coming of the Son of man be."
Isaiah said, "Who is this with His robes dyed red and from Bozrah with the robes that are dipped in blood" Isaiah 63:1
The brightness was as the light; His glory first of all covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise Hab 3:3
His brightness was as the light; and he had horns coming out of his hands Hab 3:4
Or rays coming out of His hands
Have you ever seen when the sun sits beyond the clouds?
The rays coming out, are the brightness of the light
Out of His hands come these rays, rays of glory
And then there was the hiding of his power because before him went the pestilence Hab 3:4-5
That is, the Great Tribulation that will precede His coming
..and the burning coals went forth at his feet. He stood, and measured the earth: he beheld, and drove asunder the nations; and the everlasting mountains were scattered, and the perpetual hills did bow: his ways are everlasting Hab 3:4-6
Read in the book of Revelation of the great catastrophic judgment and the changes that are coming upon the earth during the Great Tribulation period prior to the return of Jesus Christ
For every mountain and every island will flee
The ocean beds will be changed
Tremendous disastrous changes are going to take place upon the surface of the earth prior to the return of the Lord and the great judgment of God
And we are seeing this unfold today
The sea beds and tectonic plates are moving
You did march through the land in indignation, you did thresh the heathen in anger Hab 3:12
Indignation is a word in the Old Testament that is commonly used for the period of the Great Tribulation of the New Testament
Who did He thresh? Was it the church, His children, His people? No. That's inconsistent with God
The great judgment is directed against the heathen, not against God's people
You went forth for the salvation of your people, even for the salvation with your anointed
We see indignation and His wrath upon the heathen. But for His people, salvation; that is, deliverance
The great day of the wrath of the Almighty God as He, with indignation, smites the heathen, and as described here by Habakkuk, but then in the middle of all of this, the great desolation that will take place as the result of God's judgment coming upon the earth
Then the prophet declares, because he is a man of faith, a famous verse:
Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there be no herd in the stalls Hab 3:17
Now the prophet has been talking about this great day of indignation and judgment. And although the fig tree shall not blossom, no fruit in the vines, no olives in the olive trees, no grain fields, no flocks, no herds.
Yet, in spite of all of this he says,
I will rejoice in the LORD Hab 3:18
The word rejoice in the Hebrew is literally "leap for joy."
I will joy in the God of my salvation Hab 3:18
The LORD God is my strength Hab 3:19
What a glorious declaration to be able to make, "God is my strength."
I feel sorry for those people who are trusting in their own strength, in their own abilities
Always, our strength is limited and has its point of limitations
When you've exhausted your strength to its fullest extent. Then what?
Then say, the Lord is my strength, there's no end
How glorious. The Lord God is my strength!
..and he will make my feet like hinds' feet, like the deer's feet, like the goats and make me walk upon the high places Hab 3:19
Then he addresses this psalm to the chief singer on my stringed instrument Hab 3:19
So it was set out in Hebrew poem form, and was to be sung with a cry using the stringed instruments as a background
Habakkuk is one of the most glorious declarations of the coming again of the Lord that we find in the Old Testament
What a sight for this prophet to see, no wonder he was burdened
Of course, in the New Testament it is unfolded in a greater measure
Lord may we be burdened for this nation, for these people, but Lord thou you tarry, we will wait for your grace will bring in those you are calling and you will then return to rule in power and might. Amen
