Living by Faith
Habakkuk
Main Idea: As we experience the burdens of life, we are to wait on the Lord with a patient faith.
I. The Language of Lament (1:1-17)
The ‘oracle’ (lit. ‘burden’) felt and seen by Habakkuk drives him to ‘complain’ to God in a prayer of lament. As he cries out to the Lord “how long” and “why” he feels that God is silent (1:2a), distant (1:2b), and indifferent (1:3) while “justice is perverted” in Judah (1:4). The prophet is wrestling with why the wicked are going unpunished in his midst.
God answers Habakkuk (1:5-11) in an unexpected way that will cause “wonder” and “astonishment.” The Lord will raise up the Chaldeans (Babylonians) to bring his righteous judgements to bear on Judah (cf. Jer. 5:14-17; 25:9). He emphasizes the pride, viciousness, violence, and quickness in which Babylon will bring this about.
This raises a second complaint & lament from Habakkuk (1:12-17), as the prophet wrestles with what he knows to be theologically true about God (1:12-13a) while expressing the disorientation he experiences with this response. He affirms God’s character, while questioning his actions. How could the Lord use such a wicked nation like Babylon to punish a less wicked nation like Judah?
To cry is human, but to lament is Christian… Belief in God’s mercy, redemption, and sovereignty create lament. Without hope in God’s deliverance and the conviction that he is all-powerful, there would be no reason to lament when pain invaded our lives… Lament is rooted in what we believe. It is a prayer loaded with theology. Christians affirm that the world is broken, God is powerful, and he will be faithful. Lament stands in the gap between pain and promise... To learn how to lament, we must resolve to talk to God and to keep praying.
~ Mark Vroegop, Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy: Discovering the Grace of Lament
II. The Life of Faith (2:1-20)
Chapter 2 reveals that the life of faith is marked by two realities:
1. Patience (2:1-3)
After his complaint has been lodged to the Lord, Habakkuk takes up his ‘stand’ at the “watchtower,” waiting for a response from God. The Lord instructs him to “write down” this vision, which will come in its “appointed time.” “If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay” (2:3b; cf 2 Pet. 3:8-9).
You cannot judge God by your calendar. God may appear to be slow, but he never forgets his promises. He may seem to be working slowly or even to be forgetting his promises, but when his promises come true (and they will come true), they always burst the banks of what you imagined… God’s grace virtually never operates on our time frame, on a schedule we consider reasonable. He does not follow our agendas or schedules. God seems to forget his promises, but he comes through in ways we can’t imagine before it happens.
~ Tim Keller, Hidden Christmas
2. Humility (2:4-5)
The pride of Babylon (2:4a, 5) is set against the humility of the righteous who live by faith (2:4b; cf. Rom. 1:17, Gal. 3:11, Heb. 10:27-28). The Lord here is inviting Habakkuk to “lay down the melancholy burden of assumed omniscience” (Tim Keller), and instead embrace the mystery of dependent faith.
Habakkuk does not know why God is doing what he is doing with the Babylonians. He only knows that God is doing it… The mystery of faith is borne in prayer and suffering. It is embraced in both, because God may take his follower to extraordinary depths of pain and confusion. The whys and hows of human experience in God's world are often never answered. And sometimes, Habakkuk teaches, when God does answer, it raises even more questions. But this little poem teaches how humans are deeply formed, from the inside out, in the mystery of faith. Our questions call out for response. But finally, the word that God offers is extraordinarily a word of rest and peace, even if it means our suffering and a "day of distress." Habakkuk calls its readers to abandon themselves to divine providence. God is not safe, but he is good. He is the King.
~ Heath Thomas & Craig Bartholomew, The Minor Prophets
III. Longing for the Day (3:1-19)
After the Lord’s response to the prophet’s lament, Habakkuk responds with a prayer-psalm (cf. Ps. 7). Throughout this prayer, the prophet is recalling the mighty visitations of the Lord to his people in dire circumstances, where “in wrath he remembered mercy” (3:2). His remembrance of past grace gives birth to future hope.
