Christ Presbyterian Church is a local congregation of the Presbyterian Church in America. Visit us for morning or evening worship in Mobile, Alabama or on the web at cpcmobile.com. We turn back to the book of Habakkuk as we have our second message from Habakkuk, looking at the minor prophets. This morning we're looking at the second chapter, and I'm going to read the first five verses, and then I'm going to skip over, just in regard to time, and read verses 18 through 20. So I'm going to skip some of those verses. Remember as we read Habakkuk that we're talking about this conversation between God and Habakkuk. As we begin here, we see Habakkuk concluding his talk to God, what he says to God, and then God's response is the rest of the chapter and some reflections that are probably also a part of God's response. So listen to God's holy word. I will take my stand at my watch post and station myself on the tower and look out to see what he will say to me and what I will answer concerning my complaint. Write the vision. Make it plain on tablets, so he may run who reads it. For still the vision awaits its appointed time. It hastens to the end. It will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it. It will surely come. It will not delay. Behold, his soul is puffed up. It is not upright within him. But the righteous shall live by his faith. Moreover, wine is a traitor, an arrogant man who is never at rest. His greed is as wide a shield. Like death, he has never enough. He gathers for himself all nations and collects as his own all peoples. Then skipping over to 18. What prophet is an idol when its maker has shaped it? A metal image, a teacher of lies. For its maker trusts in his own creation when he makes speechless idols. Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, awake to a silent stone, arise. Can this teach? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver and there is no breath at all in it. But the Lord is in his holy temple. Let all the earth keep silence before him. Thus ends the reading of God's Word for this morning. Let us look to Him in prayer. Heavenly Father, we give You praise for Your Word. As we reflect, O Lord, upon this portion, in particular that fourth verse, we ask, Lord, that You would give us understanding of faith and what it means to have faith. We ask Your blessing upon our reflection upon Your Word, for we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. It's one of the most powerful statements in all of the Bible. Not only are Habakkuk's words quoted by Paul in Romans and in Galatians, and also by the writer of Hebrews in that book, but they are the words that were so powerful during the Reformation some 500 years ago, that they changed the whole world. The just shall live by his faith. Martin Luther didn't understand those words initially when he read them. He was a devout, a religious monk who was petrified in fear of God. But when he came to understand those words, it changed his whole life and it changed the whole world. It changed Europe. It changed America, even though that was many years later, as those who came to believe that the just shall live by faith carried that message across the sea and came to America to establish religious freedom. And through the modern missionary movement, it continued to change the whole of the world. But sadly, these words are not well understood today. Faith is a word that is used a lot but without great understanding of its meaning. Indeed, sometimes the word is used in such a way as to draw people away from biblical faith. And living by faith seems to many people to be a contradiction in terms. They have the idea that living deals with doing and with works, while faith, many people think, is opposed to works, and thus living and faith are two opposites, they think. This morning, I want to ask the first question. What does God mean in this portion by faith? What is biblical faith, a definition? Next week I want to return and ask the second question, what does it mean to live by faith? But we began by looking at the definition. What is faith? Faith is believing a person and his word. And it is tested as to its genuineness when it is set against sight, experience, reason, and attitude of mind. Let's look at the definition and then at the tests. First of all, faith is believing a person to be speaking the truth. Imagine the scene last Monday as the employees were gathering to leave work. Because it was going to be so cold the next morning, John announced to everyone that the boss had said that you don't have to come to work tomorrow and you're gonna be paid for work as well. A second employee said, I didn't hear it from the boss, so I'm coming tomorrow. Well, a third employee said, I believe John, I'll see you on Wednesday. Now it's that third employee that is expressing the reality of faith in John and in his word, what he said. The second one did not express, he had doubts, he had questions, he didn't trust him and what he said. Now you can have faith that is rightly placed and faith that is wrongly placed, I don't know which was true in this situation, it's a made up story, but you could have it that they would come on Tuesday or he would come back on Wednesday, the employee that believed John and would not have a job anymore. You can have faith that's misplaced, and you can have faith in the words that is right. But Habakkuk demonstrates his faith in the word of the Lord. He affirms that what God said in the past was true. Looking back to the first chapter, verse 12, we read, Are you not from everlasting? These are the words of Habakkuk. O Lord, my God, my Holy One, we shall not die. Habakkuk there remembers the promise of God. The promise of God that was given to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and was passed on to the people. That nation would not die for through that nation the Messiah would come. And he knew and he held on to that promise. But Habakkuk also believed the word that came to him, God had spoken to him and had told him that judgment was coming upon that nation and the nation and Jerusalem would be destroyed. Habakkuk goes on to affirm that he believes that word as well in the second part of that twelfth verse. O Lord, you have ordained them, that is the Chaldeans, as a judgment, and you, O Rock, have established them for reproof. God promised to preserve them, but he didn't promise not to bring them down as a city. to destroy that city, indeed to destroy that temple. And now he was saying indeed in promising that he would do that very thing. Habakkuk, you see, believed both. He believed in God's promise in the past and he believed in God's promise as it was given to him at that moment in time. In other words, Habakkuk believes in the word of God because he believes in God. He proved his faith in God's word by committing his life to these things. This morning I want to look at that faith. And I want you to ask the question as we do, is your faith solidly based upon biblical faith? Does it have a solid foundation? Is it firmly placed upon the truthfulness of God in his word? Test your faith as we contrast faith with trusting in sight, experience, reason, and attitude of mind. Biblical faith, first of all, as we test it, believes God when sight says God is wrong. Faith and sight do not always oppose one another. In Psalm 139 verse 14, I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works. My soul knows it very well. How did David know that? How did he know that wonderful were the works of God in particular? Wonderful was the way that he made man. Well, he knew it because of general revelation. He knew it because he could see what man could do. He could know the thoughts of man. He could know that man had sovereignty over this world. He could see how man's body could move in miraculous ways, in beautiful ways at times. He knew that wonderful were the ways that God has made man. But he also knew it by revelation. God had spoken in Genesis chapters one and two speak of man created in the image of God. He knew it by revelation. He knew it by that which he saw as well with his eyes. The two fit perfectly together. But you see, there are other times when they don't fit perfectly together. That's why Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5 verse 7, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Second Kings chapter 19, we read of Sennacherib, the king of Assyria, and his army that was coming to besiege Jerusalem. There is over 185,000 that are gathered to besiege this small town by modern standards. In the midst of that situation, with them just waiting for the morning dawn to attack, God speaks. And in verse 32 we read these words, thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria, he shall not come into this city or shoot an arrow there or come before it with a shield or cast up a siege mound against it. He won't even try to fight to overtake it. Now, you see, the people of that time had to look and say, now wait a minute, my eyes sees, there's 185,000, they're here to destroy Jerusalem. And the Word of God comes and says they're not going to even attack, they're not going to lay a siege against it. What do you believe? What would you believe in that situation? But of course, as the story unfolds, we know that the angel of the Lord came and struck 185,000 of those Assyrians and killed them that night. And so when Sennacherib rose, he looked around and the few that he had left, he took off with his tail between his legs and went back home, never to rise as a great power again. You see, the word of God was that which was right and the sight was wrong. Faith believes the person against one's own eyes. Secondly, biblical faith believes God when experience says God is wrong. Sight and experience are closely linked together, but experience takes into account what we have seen in the past. C.S. Lewis in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe tells the story of four children who discover the land of Narnia. They first discover the land of Narnia in the wardrobe. And it's Lucy, the youngest of the four children, who first goes into that wardrobe and through the wardrobe and back to discover the land of Narnia. She comes back with her stories about the land she found there. And the other three children think that she is just pretending. They don't believe her, even though she insists upon it being that which is true. The second time, it happens that they're playing hide and seek again, and Lucy runs into the wardrobe, but behind her runs Edmund, the second youngest, and they both go into the wardrobe and into the land of Narnia. When they come back, Lucy is excited because now she has a witness to tell of the reality of the truth of this. But Edmund decides not to back up his sister, but to say, it's all pretend. And now the two oldest children are very concerned. Not only is she lying, but now they're concerned about her mental state. And so they decide to go to the professor with whom they are living, and they tell him the whole story. And the professor, after he listens to the whole story, asks the question, how do you know that your sister's story is not true? I'm shocked by that question. But they come back with a stumbling answer and says, well, Edmund said that they have only been pretending. And the professor comes back with another question. And which one, tell me, is the one that is more truthful, Lucy or Edmund? And they say, well, Lucy's always told the truth up until now. And Edmund's given to lies all the time. You see, the whole point of it is that he is teaching them that, look, your experience says that the back of wardrobes don't contain countries, nations, new lands, and worlds. But that doesn't mean it isn't true. You can't trust your experience. God says many things to us that our experience causes us to struggle to believe. Think about the doctrine of the Trinity. God eternally exists as three persons, yet is one God. I have never had an experience that would confirm that. I have never had anything in this world that seems to fit the category. Three persons, yet one God? How does that fit together? I receive it by faith, because God said it is true. The same is true in relationship to many doctrines. Think of the doctrine that we are new in Christ. 2 Corinthians 5, 17 says, if anyone is in Christ, he's a new creation. The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come. And what happens? As you go out as one who is born again by the Spirit of God, you believe the gospel. And you say, the Bible says that I'm a new creation, but I've got the old habits, the old bad language, the old thoughts that are coming into my head. Am I new or am I not? My experience says, I'm the same. And the word says, I'm new. Which do I believe? That's not just the power of believing. That's, you see, believing the truth of the word. As we read deeper, of course, we know that while we are new in Christ, we have a struggle in this world. But that newness is the genuineness of who we are. Do we believe the Word of God or our experience? Thirdly, biblical faith believes God when our reason says God is wrong. Reason is a gift of God, as is sight and experience, but human reason is not to be trusted. Reason is highly honored. We see that in the Christian faith in relationship to that which is said about Jesus Christ. John 1 verse 1, in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God. But that which we've memorized, many of us, that word, word, is in reality a word that is filled with more meaning than that and can be properly translated as reason or logic. So that Jesus is described in that deeper way of being logic or reason of God. The Christian faith is reasonable. Hebrews 11 verses 17 through 19. By faith, Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promise was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, through Isaac shall your offspring be named. He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back. As Abraham went up that mountain, as he tied his son to make a sacrifice, as he reached the knife to take the life of his son, it was reasonable for him to believe that if he did this, God would raise Isaac back because God had already said it was through Isaac that the blessing would come. It was reasonable. But it was reasonable only upon the basis and foundation of the revelation of God. Apart from that revelation of God, it was not reasonable. And so if he only moved from sight and experience and his own reason, he would have not come to that conclusion. You see, reason is that which we cannot trust. The problem with human reason is twofold. First problem we have is we are limited in our knowledge. If someone gave you five pieces of a puzzle, and you'd never seen the puzzle before, but they asked you what the picture was of that 100-piece puzzle that you had five pieces of, you'd say, well, I can't do that. I need more pieces to know what it's about. I can see there's some color in it, but I can tell you very little about it until you give me more pieces. I want the other 95 pieces. Do you think that you know more than five percent of God's truth? You see, you can't move from your reason because you don't have all the facts, you don't have all the knowledge. The second problem with moving from our reason is the reality that even if we had all the knowledge, we wouldn't put it together in the right way because we are twisted by Sin. And so our reason is warped. It doesn't put things together in the right way. Last night I was reading an article. It was an article about DNA. And I'm not a scientist, I don't know all about that. But they found recently that they've discovered that DNA, of course, has a message to tell cells what to do and is very vital. And then they also have this junk DNA they talk about that has messages that are just kind of meaningless, so they thought. But now they have discovered that the so-called junk DNA actually is another layer of information that goes along with it. And in the discovery paper, as they were talking about that, it was made the point that these two things, this DNA and the information, the information and the secret information, the two together, evolved together. evolved together. Oh, yeah. Where's the other option that God created? Which one makes sense? I think it's absolute nonsense when you know the complexity of human life to think that it evolved. But that's what people hold on to. Why? It started by sin. God's Word is that which we are to trust because it's always reliable and always true. Sometimes God's Word and our reason agree, but sometimes they are in conflict with each other. One of my favorite Andy Griffith program's reruns is the one about Mr. Beebe. Opie, in the beginning of that story, tells Pa that he's playing with Blackie, that Blackie just came in to eat breakfast and he tied up Blackie out at the door. He's playing pretend, his horse Blackie is out there. That's the way it introduces the beginning of the program. But then after that, it seems that Opie comes with a hatchet and says that Mr. Beevy gave him the hatchet. When he asks who Mr. Beavey is, well, Mr. Beavey has a silver hat, and he walks around in the trees, and he has 10 extra hands that hang from his belt. Everybody's convinced that it's pretend. So they send him to take the hatchet back, but he comes back, having taken the hatchet, he brings a quarter. Again, where'd that quarter come from, from a pretend friend? And so, Andy has to discipline his son for lying. Up in his bedroom, it's just about time to meet the whip. And he talks to his son and he says, I'll forget the whole thing. All you have to do is say, Mr. Beavy is pretend. And Opie starts out, Mr. Beavy, Mr. Beavy is real. Don't you believe me, Paul? And Andy looks into his eyes, and he says, I believe you. And he goes down to talk to Barney and Aunt Bea, who say, you mean you believe in Mr. Beebe? And Andy says, no, but I believe in my son. And at the end, he goes out and was walking in the woods trying to figure the whole thing out. And he says, Mr. Beavy, Mr. Beavy. And he gets an answer. And a lineman climbs down from the tree, and his hands are his tools, and he's wearing a silver hat. And it was true. You see, he was called to believe what he couldn't reason out. Biblical faith always puts God's word over human reason. Fourthly, biblical faith believes God when our attitude of mind says God is wrong. One of the greatest misuses of the term faith in our culture, particularly in the religious culture today, is to confuse faith with an attitude of mind. If you have a positive attitude, you have great faith. And if you have a negative attitude, you lack faith. One is discouraged and you're going to hear the retort, have faith. And that can apply to several circumstances, you know. If they've been planning a picnic and the forecast says 100% chance of rain, they are to have faith. And if they have faith and they hold onto that faith, it's going to be sunny. Their business is just about to go under, and they are told, have faith, and if you have enough faith, your business will be good. If the doctor has just told them that a loved one is not going to recover, but is going to die, there's someone who's going to say, have faith, and if you have enough faith, they will be made well. What's wrong with this kind of faith? In all of these cases, God is confused with human desire. That's the basis and foundation. There's the assumption that what I want is what God wants and thus is his word to me. And that simply is not true. God's word, the Bible, is filled with wonderful promises that we need to believe. But it's also filled with conditions in relationship to some of those promises. It's filled with threats. It's filled with promises that are negative promises as well. Faith is to believe in God's word in regard to all of these things. Habakkuk's contemporary, Jeremiah, received the same message of judgment coming by the hand of the Chaldeans that Habakkuk received. And the prophet Jeremiah, as he was instructed to do, went forth and told the people of the judgment that was coming by the hands of the Chaldeans. And what do you think the people said? Do you think they raised up their hands and said, what a man of great faith? They said, traitor. In Jeremiah chapter 26, Jeremiah speaks the word that he is commanded to speak. And in verses eight and nine, we read these words of the response of the people. They say, you shall die. Why have you prophesied in the name of the Lord saying this house shall be like Sheol and this city shall be desolate without inhabitants? See, they did the same thing. They confused their desires with the word of God. They didn't want their temple to be destroyed and so they didn't think that God would do that. That's not biblical faith. Today, rather than calling such a man a traitor, he likely would be called one who lacked faith in God. Don't allow that message, that lie, to be received by you. Faith in God is not the same thing as believing everything will work out well. Positive thinking is powerful. I have no doubt that if you believe you can succeed, you're ten times more likely to succeed than if you believe you're going to fail. It's powerful. It's not the same thing as faith. Biblical faith is believing the Word of God and trusting in the Word of God and the Word of God alone. Sometimes that means believing the promises of blessing. that Jesus really did die for my sins and that by trusting him alone I am saved eternally. That's faith. But sometimes it's also believing the negative, to believe that the one who does not trust Jesus Christ is condemned eternally because they have not believed. That also is received by that same faith. A few years ago, your session and mission committee discussed the faith promise. You've got it as a bulletin insert this morning. We believe in missions giving. We believe in the tithe and we believe in offerings. And we believe in spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, the great commission to the ends of the earth, and we can only do that as a people of God give. We want to encourage people to give. But we also know that faith promise is used by some people to mean something very different than that. For some people, the word faith promise means that you get a number, maybe through prayer, maybe through some way, you get a number, a number of dollars. And that number of dollars is the number that you'd write on this slip, and that's the amount that God will bring in additional unexpected income to you, which you in turn give to missions. For some people, that's what faith promise is. That's not a biblical definition of faith. That's something totally different. Faith is believing God in his word, and you show me where in the Bible it tells you how much income, additional income, you're going to get in order to give to missions. You don't find it any place in the Bible. Yeah, you do find promises that encourage you to give in the Bible. That's why on the back, and I'm gonna read the first two paragraphs and leave the rest of you to read the rest of it, but first two paragraphs says, all of our material blessings belong to God. The Bible tells us that. We express this belief by giving the tithe to God. That's the meaning of our tithe. Mission faith promise is a sacrificial gift above the tithe that expresses our gratitude to God and our desire for the kingdom to grow as the gospel is proclaimed through missions. A faith promise pledge is not built upon our faith, but built upon the promise of God to care for his children as we seek his kingdom. It's based upon the Word of God. See, that principle is to come into all of our lives. It's very significant that we understand that biblical view of faith. Do you feel discouraged and downhearted? So were Jeremiah and Habakkuk. That didn't mean they weren't men of great faith. You may have negative feelings Negative attitude of mind. But that doesn't mean you're not believing God. You know, you open the newspaper and you read of one particular action or another action of our government and you become very depressed about it and you try to make right that, but it brings you downhearted. That doesn't mean you've lost your faith. Because it doesn't say that America is going to exist as a nation forever and ever and always be blessed. It doesn't say that in the Bible. So being downhearted and doing something about it is good. Ultimately, of course, we believe that in the end, God wins. For Christians, we go to be with Him, so ultimately there is a positiveness, but there's many negative feelings that are right in the midst of our lives. On the other hand, do you feel encouraged and positive about the future? So did those who were determined to kill Jeremiah. They were very positive, but they didn't do so because of faith. Many positive people reject the Word of God. Faith is believing God's Word which takes us through all of the emotions of life. What is biblical faith? Faith is believing God and His revealed Word, the Bible. It makes that the foundation for our life. Even when our sight says one thing or our experience or our reason disagree, it's believing the Word. And faith is not a positive attitude toward life, but a trust in God's revealed Word in the Bible. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we're so thankful for your Word. There's no reason that you needed to reveal anything to us. It was out of your mercy and your grace that you've spoken. And we ask, O Lord, that our faith might be placed solidly upon your revealed Word, and it might be established firmly upon your Word, and take us through all of the trials and the difficulties and the struggles of life as we trust not in sight, not in our experience, not in our reason, not in our emotional attitude or attitude of mind, but in your word. Fix within us and grow within us biblical faith, for we ask it in Jesus' name.