The Lord invites His followers to joyfully trust Him in the face of difficulty and loss while waiting for their ultimate rescue...

This week, we have been looking at a letter that is recorded for us in the Old Testament of the Bible called the book of Habakkuk. So far this week, we have seen the prophet ask two timeless questions, which are "How Long?" and "How come?". We talked about the reality that these are the same questions that people ask God today? How often do we question God as to why He would allow wrongdoing and injustice to go unpunished? How often do we question God as to why He would allow evil empires to expand? How often do we question God as to why He would allow arrogant leaders and nations to exploit and dehumanize other nations that are not nearly as evil?

We then looked on as the Lord answered the prophet's question by explaining that  the root of the problem, the root of all selfishness and rebellion against the Lord, is pride. The root of the rebellion of the Jewish people, and the Babylonian Empire, is a selfish and self-centered prideful love that places one in opposition to the Lord and that acts out of that selfish love and pride to do wrongdoing and injustice against the Lord and others. And that selfish love and pride reveals the reality that they are not living in a right relationship with the Lord.

However, the person who is living in right relationship with the Lord will live a life that places their confident trust in the Lord and will live their day to day life in a way that trusts in the Lord.   In the Lord’s answer to Habakkuk’s questions “How long?” and “How come?”, we saw the Lord basically say to the prophet “You need to trust Me. You need to look at the end of history and the end of My story. You need to see where I am; I am still in charge and in control, regardless of your circumstances. So trust Me, shut up and realize who I Am and where I am.” We see Habakkuk’s response to the Lord in Habakkuk 3:1-15:

A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet, according to Shigionoth. ² LORD, I have heard the report about You and I fear. O LORD, revive Your work in the midst of the years, In the midst of the years make it known; In wrath remember mercy. ³ God comes from Teman, And the Holy One from Mount Paran. Selah. His splendor covers the heavens, And the earth is full of His praise. ⁴ His radiance is like the sunlight; He has rays flashing from His hand, And there is the hiding of His power. ⁵ Before Him goes pestilence, And plague comes after Him. ⁶ He stood and surveyed the earth; He looked and startled the nations. Yes, the perpetual mountains were shattered, The ancient hills collapsed. His ways are everlasting. ⁷ I saw the tents of Cushan under distress, The tent curtains of the land of Midian were trembling. ⁸ Did the LORD rage against the rivers, Or was Your anger against the rivers, Or was Your wrath against the sea, That You rode on Your horses, On Your chariots of salvation? ⁹ Your bow was made bare, The rods of chastisement were sworn. Selah. You cleaved the earth with rivers. ¹⁰ The mountains saw You and quaked; The downpour of waters swept by. The deep uttered forth its voice, It lifted high its hands. ¹¹ Sun and moon stood in their places; They went away at the light of Your arrows, At the radiance of Your gleaming spear. ¹² In indignation You marched through the earth; In anger You trampled the nations. ¹³ You went forth for the salvation of Your people, For the salvation of Your anointed. You struck the head of the house of the evil To lay him open from thigh to neck. Selah. ¹⁴ You pierced with his own spears The head of his throngs. They stormed in to scatter us; Their exultation was like those Who devour the oppressed in secret. ¹⁵ You trampled on the sea with Your horses, On the surge of many waters.

Here we see Habakkuk pray for the salvation and rescue of God’s people in the midst of God’s right and just response to wrongdoing and injustice. Habakkuk prayed that the Lord, in His wrath remember mercy. As the Lord exercised His wrath, which is His right and just response to wrongdoing and injustice, Habakkuk prayerfully requested that the Lord extend mercy to those who trust in Him in the midst of His justice and judgment.

And in his prayer, we see Habakkuk paint a picture from a collage of God's activity in the past and the future expectation of God's activity in the future. Habakkuk combined elements of the song of Moses, which is recorded for us in Deuteronomy 32, the song of Deborah, which is recorded in Judges 5, and the song of David, which is recorded in 2 Samuel 23, to paint a picture of anticipating God's activity in the future.

Faced with the Lord’s impending justice and judgment of the Jewish people, Habakkuk prayerfully looked forward to a day in the future when the glory of the Lord would fully appear upon His future judgment upon humanity at the end of God's story here on earth. After prayerfully remembering the Lord’s activity in the past and praying for mercy in the midst of the Lord’s justice and judgment in the near future, we see Habakkuk reveal his personal response to the Lord’s answer of his questions in verse 16:

I heard and my inward parts trembled, At the sound my lips quivered. Decay enters my bones, And in my place I tremble. Because I must wait quietly for the day of distress, For the people to arise who will invade us.

Habakkuk responded to the Lord’s answer to his questions with stunned awe. The Lord’s answer turned Habakkuk’s insides upside down in anguish.  The Lord’s answer brought a pain deep into his bones. The Lord’s answer drove Habakkuk to a place of prayer where his lips quivered in fear. You see, there was no escape for Habakkuk; Habakkuk was left to wait and rest in the reality that the day would come when the Babylonian Empire would come and conquer the Jewish people and lead them to captivity.

Habakkuk was left to wait and rest in the reality that incredible personal and national loss was coming his way and there was nothing that he could do to escape it. There is no direct evidence from this letter that Habakkuk lived past the destruction of Jerusalem. Now imagine yourself as Habakkuk. Place yourselves in his shoes. If you were Habakkuk, what would you say next to God? We see what Habakkuk said next in verse 17-19:

 Though the fig tree should not blossom And there be no fruit on the vines, Though the yield of the olive should fail And the fields produce no food, Though the flock should be cut off from the fold And there be no cattle in the stalls, ¹⁸ Yet I will exult in the LORD, I will rejoice in the God of my salvation. ¹⁹ The Lord GOD is my strength, And He has made my feet like hinds' feet, And makes me walk on my high places.

Now is that how we would have responded to the Lord? Would we have responded to the reality that we were about to suffer potential immeasurable loss by exulting, or make much of the Lord?  Would we have responded to the reality that we were about to suffer potential immeasurable loss by rejoicing in the Lord as your rescuer? Would we have responded to the reality that we were about to suffer potential immeasurable loss by proclaiming that the Lord is your strength? Would we have responded to the reality that we were about to suffer potential immeasurable loss by proclaiming our joyful trust in the Lord, who makes us walk on high places?

Is this our natural response when we face times of difficulty or loss? Is this our natural response when the Lord does not answer our questions “How long?” and “How come?” in the way we want Him to? You see, it is here, when God speaks, that we discover a timeless truth about the nature and character of God and God’s activity in history. And that timeless truth is this: The Lord invites His followers to joyfully trust Him in the face of difficulty and loss while waiting for their ultimate rescue. Just as it was for Habakkuk, just as it has been throughout history, The Lord invites His followers to joyfully trust Him in the face of difficulty and loss while waiting for their ultimate rescue.

You see, the point of the book of Habakkuk is that the Lord is large and in charge of all of the creation. The point of the book of Habakkuk is that the Lord will exercise His right and just justice against the wrongdoing and injustice of others. The point of the book of Habakkuk is that the root of the problem of sin and rebellion against the Lord is a selfish love and pride that places one in opposition to the Lord and acts out of that selfish love and pride to do wrongdoing and injustice against the Lord and others. The point of the book of Habakkuk is that the person who is living in right relationship with the Lord will place their confident trust in the Lord and will live their day to day life in a way that trusts in the Lord regardless of circumstances. 

The point of the book of Habakkuk is that the person who is living in right relationship with the Lord will trust in the Lord even in the face of the difficulty and loss that may come their way as a result of living in a culture that experiences the Lord’s justice and judgment. The point of the book of Habakkuk is that the person who is living in right relationship with the Lord will trust in the Lord even in the face of the difficulty and loss because they trust in the reality of their ultimate rescue by the Lord.

You see, Habakkuk experienced the difficulty and loss with the rest of the Jewish people at the hands of the Babylonian Empire, even though he trusted and followed the Lord. Yet Habakkuk was able to joyfully entrust himself to the Lord in the face of difficulty and loss because Habakkuk recognized that the Lord is the ultimate end of history. Habakkuk was able to joyfully entrust himself to the Lord in the face of difficulty and loss because Habakkuk recognized that the Lord is large and in charge of all history.

Habakkuk was able to joyfully entrust himself to the Lord in the face of difficulty and loss because Habakkuk was able to look at the end of history and the end of the Lord’s story and see that the Lord was still in charge and in control, regardless of his circumstances. And as a result, Habakkuk was able to joyfully entrust himself to the Lord in the face of difficulty and loss because Habakkuk was waiting for the day of his ultimate rescue from the Lord.

So here is a question to consider: Are you wrestling with the questions of “How long?” and “How come?” in the face of difficulty and loss?  How will you wrestle with the questions of “How long?” and “How come?” when difficulty and loss come? And how will you respond to the Lord’s answer to these questions?

Will you respond by joyfully trusting in the Lord as a result of recognizing that the Lord is the ultimate end of history? Will you respond by joyfully trusting in the Lord as a result of recognizing that the Lord is large and in charge of all history? Will you respond by joyfully trusting in the Lord as a result of waiting for our ultimate rescue from the Lord? 

Because, as we have discovered this morning, the Lord invites His followers to joyfully trust Him in the face of difficulty and loss while waiting for their ultimate rescue...