Write the Vision
Habakkuk 1-2
July 23, 2017
This summer we are doing a series of quick hits through the minor prophets of the Old Testament. We have already covered Nahum. This week and next, we will be looking at Habakkuk. For most people, Habakkuk is the name of the book of the Bible that illustrates how inaccessible is the Old Testament. What is a Habakkuk? Who would name their kid something that sounds like Habakkuk?
Well, here’s the deal: Habakkuk is a book of the Bible and, in fact, it deals with some of the most practical questions with which believers often struggle. There are two questions in the first two chapters of Habakkuk that we are going to cover today. Instead of reading it all up front, I am going to read each question, reflect on it, then read God’s response, and reflect on that.
The First Question
So, we begin with Habakkuk’s first question. Habakkuk was a slightly later contemporary of Nahum, whom we just finished last week. We do not know much about him. What we do know is that he would fit well into today’s world. His opening question is, “Lord, why do you allow such sinful behavior among your people?”
O Lord, how long shall I cry for help,
and you will not listen?
Or cry to you “Violence!”
and you will not save?
3Why do you make me see wrong-doing
and look at trouble?
Destruction and violence are before me;
strife and contention arise.
4So the law becomes slack
and justice never prevails.
The wicked surround the righteous—
therefore judgment comes forth perverted.
Habakkuk looked around and saw that God’s people did not look anything like what they were supposed to look like under the covenant. He prayed to God for help – and had apparently been praying to God for help for a long time.
Habakkuk was frustrated with the people of the church. Huh. How about that? The more things change, the more they stay the same. I so completely resonate with Habakkuk’s complaints.
“How long do I have to complain before you do something, God?” I have lamented the direction and state of our denomination for more than twenty years; the first ten during which I was extremely active in trying to persuade people to pursue renewal and reform. The more I watch our denomination’s news, the more I am convinced that they – and by association, we – are pursuing a direction that will lead to the demise of the institution. Just so you do not think I am alone in this perception, it is worth noting that the Presbyterian Church had a high of 4.5 million members in 1965; and now, we are below 2 million. Why?
The long and the short of it is we are doing the same things Habakkuk was lamenting: we are taking God for granted. We assume that because God has blessed us in the past, God will continue blessing us in the future regardless of how we act. Instead of repenting and seeking to conform ourselves to God’s word, our denominational leaders have three separate task forces trying to envision how we might do institutional ministry better. I am not saying that they are bad people; I am saying they are misguided because they are operating under the impression that God is waiting to turn things around for us if only we can guess the right administrative formula. I also am saying that they have allowed and encouraged error to be taught in order to be more appealing to the world rather than cleaving onto what God has revealed in Scripture.
Those in decision-making positions are committed to presenting a gospel drawn from the parts of Scripture that support their own agenda. They are more concerned with their perception of justice than they are with what God declares and commands in his covenant. They believe they know better than God about how things are and how God should fix them. They encourage people who openly say, “I will not abide by the promises I have made,” and work to silence those who would proclaim the cross and empty tomb. We have situations in our denomination where there are clergy who specifically deny that Jesus is Christ, that his death on the cross was atoning for our sins, and that he is the way, the truth, and the life. Instead, the denomination’s actions demonstrate that they value property more than the gospel. They value political power more than mission. They are more concerned with looking right in the eyes of the world than in being pleasing in God’s sight. They presume God’s blessing in the future regardless of how we act because they do not accept that the institution is dying for its unfaithfulness.
Friends, this is why I am so adamant about our investing in Bible study, prayer, and worship. I go verse-by-verse and chapter-by-chapter in our sermons in order that we might not just pick and choose the parts we like. This is not a comfortable sermon to preach today. But we need to hear it. But I also need to exhort you to do the spiritual work at home, too. There is no substitute for spending time with God by reading Scripture, by talking and listening to God in prayer, and by praising him wherever you are. When we stop thanking God for who God is, we start drifting and taking God for granted.
Habakkuk did not think that God should continue to bless that which does not take God seriously. I do not think that it is right, either. Habakkuk lamented that things were just going along and that God was not fixing things where they were obviously wrong. Yes, brother, preach it! Hold God accountable.
The First Answer
But then, God answered.
Look at the nations, and see!
Be astonished! Be astounded!
For a work is being done in your days
that you would not believe if you were told.
6For I am rousing the Chaldeans,
that fierce and impetuous nation,
who march through the breadth of the earth
to seize dwellings not their own.
7Dread and fearsome are they;
their justice and dignity proceed from themselves.
8Their horses are swifter than leopards,
more menacing than wolves at dusk;
their horses charge.
Their horsemen come from far away;
they fly like an eagle swift to devour.
9They all come for violence,
with faces pressing forward;
they gather captives like sand.
10At kings they scoff,
and of rulers they make sport.
They laugh at every fortress,
and heap up earth to take it.
11Then they sweep by like the wind;
they transgress and become guilty;
their own might is their god!
Do you understand God’s answer? God told Habakkuk, “Yes, I agree. The people are sinful. And watch what is going to happen now: I am going to raise up the Chaldeans (the Babylonian empire) to invade, destroy, capture, kill, destroy, mock, and trample because they are mighty.”
Take note of what God was saying. God says, “Look. See what I am doing; see what I have done.” World events do not just happen. God was claiming responsibility for the rise of the Chaldeans before it happened. God told Habakkuk ahead of time so that he would look with eyes to see God’s hand at work in the midst of world events. Habakkuk was to look with the expectation of seeing God moving among the nations.
There is a spiritual dimension to what takes place in the world. We are foolish if we fail to be in prayer to God for discernment to identify and respond spiritually to what is happening. God was telling Habakkuk to look and see because “you would not believe if you were told.”
We need to know this when we get comfortable as Americans. We need to know this when we get comfortable as Christians. God does not defer to anyone. God does not bless America because we are Americans. God does not bless America because we sing “God Bless America.” We are subject to God and not the other way around. God does not serve at the pleasure of any nation or any individual. God is not a lever to be exercised to get what we want against someone else.
Habakkuk’s complaint and question did not spur God to action. Habakkuk’s complaint and question led to God revealing what he was doing. God was explaining his exercise of sovereign authority.
When Kaley and Brooke (our oldest daughters) were young, they argued, bickered and fought like any siblings. They constantly complained to us about each other. We could hear them downstairs as they were upstairs in their room yelling at one another. Inevitably, one would come out of the room, stomp down the stairs, find us wherever we are, and say, “You have to do something. She’s being unreasonable.” Depending on what kind of mood I was in, I would respondin one of three ways:
- “Tell me all about it,” I would say; and they would not realize it was a trap. Because I would let them go on and on and on about how bad was the other one. Then, I would ask, “And what will she say about you when I ask her?” Or,
- “What would you like me to do?” I would ask; and they would not realize it was a trap. Because I would let them go on and on and on about the judgment they wanted imposed on the other until I would say, “Just so you know, whatever punishment I give to her I also am going to give to you.” Or,
- “Do you really want me to come up there and get involved?” I would ask, “because neither of you is going to like my solution. So, do you want me to come up or do you want to work this out for yourselves?” I do not ever remember being invited up after I posed this option – they usually would mumble back, “We’ll work it out.”
Friends, we need to realize that God is God; God’s authority is certain. We have to stop taking God for granted.God’s judgment is real, true, and serious because God’s holiness is real, true, and serious. Grace does not mean God has no expectations of us. We do not earn our salvation but we work out the salvation we have been given by grace through faith with fear and trembling because it is God at work in us, enabling us to will and work for his good pleasure.We cannot think that because God has not raised up judgment against us in our recent memory, that God cannot or will not in the near future. We cannot be comfortable in our own sinful ways – accepting God’s blessings without worship, service, or outreach – and think that God will let it continue unchecked perpetually.
Further, we need to know that God is not limited in his options. God is not passive. God is not ambiguous or soft. God’s holiness is certain and anything that does not measure up will not persist. God reminds Habakkuk that he is sovereign over all creation, including all nations. God’s Upper Story is being played out through the Lower Story; it is not bound by it. God is not required to give us what we want so that we can have “our best life.” God is calling us to the covenant relationship in which he is God. Failure to live into that relationship leads to bad consequences. He was raising up the Chaldeans to do terrible, horrible things in judgment against Israel’s persistent refusal to repent and return to God.
Habakkuk’s second question
As we read further into Habakkuk, we can see that Habakkuk was jolted by God’s answer. Wait, what? God was going to raise up another nation to attack Judah as judgment for their sinfulness. To Habakkuk’s credit, he did not double back or put it into reverse, “Um, God, I just wanted you to clean up the church; I don’t know if all that is necessary.” What he did say was something akin to, “Lord, are you kidding me? How can you consider usingthose people – even worse than we are– to discipline us?” In other words, how can a good and holy God use terrible sinners to judge his covenant children?
Are you not from of old,
O Lord my God, my Holy One?
You shall not die.
O Lord, you have marked them for judgment;
and you, O Rock, have established them for punishment.
13Your eyes are too pure to behold evil,
and you cannot look on wrongdoing;
why do you look on the treacherous,
and are silent when the wicked swallow
those more righteous than they?
14You have made people like the fish of the sea,
like crawling things that have no ruler.
Hab. 1:15 The enemy brings all of them up with a hook;
he drags them out with his net,
he gathers them in his seine;
so he rejoices and exults.
16Therefore he sacrifices to his net
and makes offerings to his seine;
for by them his portion is lavish,
and his food is rich.
17Is he then to keep on emptying his net,
and destroying nations without mercy?
Hab. 2:1 I will stand at my watchpost,
and station myself on the rampart;
I will keep watch to see what he will say to me,
and what he will answer concerning my complaint.
I like the last couple of verses because Habakkuk is bold. “Lord, I am going to stand here and watch to see what it is you think you are doing. I am going to wait here for you to explain how what you are proposing is OK.”
Friends, we have all been there or – at least – have heard others with the same kind of posture towards God. This is the “how can a good and loving God allow ______.” You can fill in the blank with cancer (or other illness); wildfire (or other natural disaster that kills); or war (or any other human violence that murders, destroys, or damages). It is the posture of judging God’s job performance.
Here’s the thing, though. Habakkuk was not wrong in his recital of God’s character traits: 1) you are from old – you are eternal; 2) you have marked the Chaldeans for judgment and punishment for the very things you have raised them up to do; and 3) it does not seem consistent for you to be silent when “the wicked swallow those more righteous than they.” In fact, the question Habakkuk posed was exactly the question we ask when we compare our righteousness to others, “Why?” God, I come to worship every Sunday; why did I get cancer and some other sinner did not? God, I volunteer in mission; why did I get laid off from my job when that other guy did not? God, we are preaching the gospel and studying your word; why are we not growing and other churches that are preaching error are growing? Why?
As I mentioned, God is not subject to our judgment. That may be difficult for some of you to hear – and I certainly struggle with it when I feel like God is not being “fair” to me – but it remains true. God says it in Scripture over and over again, most clearly in Isaiah 55:
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD.
9For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
We can ask all we want, but we may never fully understand why. God does not promise us explanations or justifications. We can still ask; the question is whether we will trust God if we do not get the answer we want – or any answer at all? But, here, God did answer Habakkuk.
God’s Second Answer
Then the Lord answered me and said:
Write the vision;
make it plain on tablets,
so that a runner may read it.
3For there is still a vision for the appointed time;
it speaks of the end, and does not lie.
If it seems to tarry, wait for it;
it will surely come, it will not delay.
4Look at the proud!
Their spirit is not right in them,
but the righteous live by their faith.
5Moreover, wealth is treacherous;
the arrogant do not endure.
They open their throats wide as Sheol;
like Death they never have enough.
They gather all nations for themselves,
and collect all peoples as their own.
Hab. 2:6 Shall not everyone taunt such people and, with mocking riddles, say about them,
“Alas for you who heap up what is not your own!”
How long will you load yourselves with goods taken in pledge?
7Will not your own creditors suddenly rise,
and those who make you tremble wake up?
Then you will be booty for them.
8Because you have plundered many nations,
all that survive of the peoples shall plunder you—
because of human bloodshed, and violence to the earth,
to cities and all who live in them.
Hab. 2:9 “Alas for you who get evil gain for your houses,
setting your nest on high
to be safe from the reach of harm!”
10You have devised shame for your house
by cutting off many peoples;
you have forfeited your life.
11The very stones will cry out from the wall,