I'm going to be reading from Habakkuk 2, 1 through 4, which is at the very heart of this book. I will stand watch and set myself on the rampart and watch to see what he will say to me and what I will answer when I am corrected. Then the Lord answered me and said, write the vision and make it plain on tablets that he may run who reads it. For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it will speak and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it, because it will surely come, it will not tarry. Behold the proud, his soul is not upright in him, but the just shall live by his faith. Amen. Father, we thank you for your word and I pray that I would give a faithful exposition of it. Each one of us would respond with gratefulness of heart as we think of all of your condescending ways with us, your love to us. We continue to worship in Jesus name. Amen. Well, not very much is known about Habakkuk. We do know what his name means. It means embrace. And since the last two letters of his name are actually a doubling of the same consonant, it's a Hebrew way of intensification of a word. Many scholars say that his name means full embrace, a full embrace. So even though Hosea did not understand a lot of what the Lord was doing, he was able to fully embrace God and have faith in the Lord and trust Him. And this idea of trust while waiting is not only at the heart of this book, we see it at the conclusion of this book as well. Now from the last verse of the book, we know that he was a musician. And we know that he was a prophet from the first verse of the book. We know that he lived toward the end of the kingdom of Judah and was probably a contemporary of Jeremiah, even though some people squeeze him just a little bit earlier. It is clear from this book that the Babylonians are prophesied to destroy Judah in the near future. And so I agree with those who date this book to the reign of the king Zedekiah, wicked king Zedekiah. He'd likely seen the last revival that had happened under King Josiah, but that was a pretty short-lived revival. In fact, the last 23 years of Judah's existence, from the time of Josiah's death till the time that Judah was destroyed, The nation had seen an astonishing slide into immorality. I've had people tell me that they are absolutely shocked at how quickly our nation has degenerated into evil. You know, when I was a teenager, that every state of the nation made homosexuality, for example, a crime. Today, it is celebrated, and if you speak against this and many other sexual perversions, you're the one that is in trouble. Well, there was a similar slide into darkness that happened in Israel in less than 23 years. It really was amazing. Not only was there homosexuality and other sexual perversions, but there was the murder of children that was very routine, much like we see in the abortion industry today. And the church itself was not exempt. They were almost as bad as the culture around them. The church is accused of having heretical doctrine, corrupt priests, bad prophets, and even the members of the churches were engaged in a lot of perversions in the nation, including the killing of their own babies. It was just a very, very bad time. There was a centralization of power in the state, state-sanctioned murder and usury and abuse of police powers and multiplication of bad laws. It's starting to sound a little bit similar to what's going on in America. The state treated good prophets like Jeremiah as if they were guilty of hate crimes and treason for the sins that they pointed out. Individuals were lawless, guilty of idolatry, Sabbath breaking, divorce, and fornication. Those were definitely not good times to live in. read through the list of sins that Jeremiah and Ezekiel said went on during the last 23 years of Judah's existence, it really is not much different than what we see all around us here in America. And so, it's not good enough to shake our heads at the sins that are described in the Bible in ancient Israel, ancient Judah. If we're to have the heart of Hezekiah, we also need to have the burden that Hezekiah was burdened on over the sins of that nation. And that's what we're going to begin our overview of this book at, verse one. Book of Habakkuk starts by saying, the burden which the prophet Habakkuk saw. When God revealed, that's the word saw, when God revealed to him the true state of affairs of Israel, of Judah, in the perspective of the Lord, it made Habakkuk feel a very heavy burden. Now that word, the burden, It's a synonym for the oracle, so some translations make it oracle. But there is this heaviness of spirit that accompanies the vision. And it is my prayer that the modern church would regain the burden and the weeping of the prophets of old. Habakkuk, by inspiration, reacts against the evils in Judah by crying out in puzzlement. And it's a puzzlement that most righteous people have felt when they are facing pervasive evil as well. Beginning to read at verse 2. Oh Lord, how long shall I cry and you will not hear? Even cry out to you violence and you will not save. Why do you show me iniquity and cause me to see trouble? For plundering and violence are before me. There is strife and contention arises. Has God made him begin to realize the magnitude of the sin of his nation? He was burdened and he wondered how God could stand it. He was saying, why are you putting this burden of sin upon me, revealing how bad things are? And you don't seem to be doing anything about it. Sin and evil just continues to go on in this nation. Continuing in verse 4. Habakkuk did not question God's goodness, justice, power, sovereignty, wrath, or any other attribute. He was a very orthodox believer, and he was a prophet who loved God's word. But his question is, how on earth can you put up with this evil? I can't stand the evil, and you are much more righteous than I am, Lord. How long is it that you're going to put up with this? As he says in verse 13, you're of purer eyes than to behold evil and cannot look on wickedness. Why then do you look on those who deal treacherously and hold your tongue when the wicked devours a person more righteous than he? And God's answer basically is, hey, don't interpret my patience as indifference. I am about to bring a judgment upon Judah that will be so devastating that you will have a hard time comprehending it. As he says in verse five, be utterly astounded. He goes on to say that he will use wicked Babylon as his rod of discipline against Judah. So he says, no, I am about to do something about what you're seeing, what you are burdened about. But that brings up an even further puzzle in Habakkuk's mind. I can imagine Habakkuk saying, what? You're going to bring wicked Babylon to discipline wicked Judah? That didn't make any sense to me. And the answer is yes, that's exactly what I'm going to do. In the third section, that's chapter one, verses 12 through 17, Habakkuk is just shocked that God would use Babylon to judge and discipline Judah when Babylon was so much more wicked than Judah was. Why not simply judge both nations rather than sparing Babylon and judging Judah? And down through history, God's people have, if they are honest, wondered the same thing from time to time. They may not have expressed it, but in their mind they wonder, how come some nations seem to be judged fairly quickly and other nations just seem to go on with impunity for long periods of time? Why is God so slow to judge? God's people have had those questions, and that is why God has placed these questions into the mind of the prophet so as to capture the feeling of the church. It's not that Habakkuk doubts God. He simply doesn't understand how all of this works. Now, if you look at the outline of the book in your handouts there, you will notice once again that it's written in the form of a chiasm, a chiasm that has been recognized by many scholars. And you can see we're going fairly quick. I've already been through the first A, B, and C sections. But if you look at the second C section, you'll see that it really is an extension of the first C. Habakkuk's second complaint. The first C complains Babylon is more wicked, much more wicked than Judah. And the second C documents that. It pronounces emotional woes against the horrible evils of Babylon. So it goes from chapter 2, verse 5 through verse 20. Now in that section, he condemns Babylon. Let me list out from verse 5, it condemns them for drunkenness, pride, greed, and unjust expansionism. In verse 6, he documents more evil and he says, how long? How long are you going to put up with the evils of Babylon? He goes on to document Babylon's greed, murder, covetousness, arrogance, genocide, slave labor, idolatry, and other evils. Habakkuk is filled with a holy anger at the evils of Babylon, and he says in verse 20, In contrast to all of these evils, but the Lord is in his holy temple. Let all the earth keep silence before him. The entire earth stands condemned before God's awesome courtroom. So the whole section is demonstrating the Babylon is indeed much more evil than Judah. And what makes all of this evil such a horrible burden for Habakkuk is that it stands in such bold, stark contrast to God's glorious goal for planet earth. It's expressed in verse 14. For the earth will be filled with the knowledge and the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Now that's a quote from Isaiah 11 verse 9, and it's just a shorthand way of referring to all of the millennial glories that Isaiah 11 had described. And he's saying, in light of those millennial glories that you are desiring for planet Earth, why is it that you are so slow? Why is it that you are allowing these evils to go on? He knows and is absolutely convinced that the millennial glories that Isaiah 11 pronounces will be fulfilled. He has no doubts about the fact. God desires this. God loves there to be a Christian world. It will happen. But that makes the evil of both Babylon and Judah all the more astonishing. How can God put up with it so patiently? And God's answer is given in the second B of the chiasm. That's chapter three, verses one through 15. And it's very interesting because God puts a prayer into Habakkuk's mouth. And the reason he puts a prayer there is God has ordained that his goals for earth will only be achieved through the prayers and the efforts of the saints. He is not going to bring the kingdom like a flash out of heaven, like premillennialists anticipate, any more than he conquered the land of Canaan like a flash out of heaven. No, it took a lot of prayer and hard work. Without prayer, nothing will happen. Now, this section is primarily dealing with God's heavenly angels taking out Babylon and taking out all future enemies, and so there is a connection between the prayer of Habakkuk and the armies of heaven. There always has been that connection. God has ordained that the angels of heaven fight only as the church prays. There's always been a connection there. We've preached on this before. This was true in the Old Testament. It continues to be true in the New Testament. And so it's a motivation for us to pray. I'm very encouraged by that section. Now, of course, unless God stirs up such prayers in the church, That's not going to happen. Even prayer comes by grace. It was God who gave this inspired prayer to Habakkuk, right? He stirs up prayer. But that leads to a further question. Why, Lord, then, if prayer is so essential to the advancement of righteousness, why do you not stir up prayer much more soon? Why do you not bring the revival that our hearts so desperately long for? How long, Lord? How long? Even on God's slowness to stir up revival, Habakkuk is puzzled. So verse 2 says, O Lord, I have heard your speech and was afraid. O Lord, revive your work in the midst of the years. In the midst of the years, make it known. In wrath, remember mercy. Now, this whole prayer is a very God-honoring prayer, and I believe it was answered very, very quickly. God sent the revival that Habakkuk prays for. God always answers the prayers that He instills in people's hearts. If we're praying in the Spirit, those prayers will be answered. So this prayer was answered by God sending revival through the very judgment that He's going to be talking about. It purified the remnant of God's people and it brought revival while they were in Babylon. So it's an answered prayer, but Let me just explain why this is such a God-honoring prayer. First, it expresses fear and reverence. He does not casually or flippantly approach God's throne. Habakkuk knows his place. He says, O Lord, I have heard your speech and was afraid. That first clause expresses godly fear. The second clause asks for revival in history. It doesn't just pray for a God-glorifying planet in eternity, obviously that's going to happen, but this is asking for more. It has the faith to ask for a God-glorifying culture in the midst of the years, that is, in history. This is God's goal, to cause Christ's kingdom to grow and to dominate the earth in history. And then finally, It is a prayer that does not deny God's total right to send His wrath upon the earth any time that He chooses to do so. Just like in the book of Nahum, Habakkuk says God is glorified through salvation. He is glorified through judgment. Either way, He is sovereign. But Habakkuk humbly asks, in wrath, remember mercy. In effect, he's saying, Lord, I recognize Your wrath needs to come upon the nation. But I'm also going to appeal to another attribute of yours, mercy on behalf of the remnant. In wrath, remember mercy. So what's he doing here? He is appealing to God's attributes and to the promises of Scripture when he prays. You know, in the New Testament it says our prayers will be answered if we meet certain conditions. One of the conditions is if we pray according to the will of God. When I was at first a Reformed believer, I kept thinking, well, how do you know whether you're praying according to God's decree of will? And I finally came through the Puritans to realize God never asks us to second guess what God's decree of will is. His Holy Spirit works within us and causes us to pray what? The Scriptures. This is the revealed will of God. And as we give God back his promises, we give back God his attributes, and we say, Lord, we're just asking what you desire. God says, ah, finally, your prayers are not man-centered. They are God-centered. I love to answer those kinds of prayers. So, it's a great prayer. If we're to have the kind of revival that Habakkuk prays for, the church needs to develop the kind of prayer that Habakkuk displays. And then comes this amazing poem in the remainder of his prayer. Verse 3 says, God came from Teman, the Holy One from Mount Perun. God's answer is not the answer that all mills and premills many times state that the only hope for planet Earth is the second coming. Yes, he comes in judgment and salvation, but it isn't a coming at the end of time. It's a coming in history and, interestingly, from the Earth. In this case, it was from Mount Paran. Actually, this is an allusion to Deuteronomy 33 verse 2, where God says, the Lord came from Sinai, he shone forth from Mount Paran. God has been coming and he will continue to come until his purposes for earth are accomplished. As you read through this poem, he progresses from illustrations, and they are just illustrations, of Sinai to the wilderness and to the conquest of Canaan. And I don't have time to get into it, but he uses a prophetic past tense, which shows the certainty of God's victories in the future. His prayer asks that just as he sent his angelic armies to conquer Egypt in the Exodus, to conquer other enemies in the wilderness, to conquer the Canaanites in the land of Canaan, He will conquer he's asking God to conquer Babylon with his armies as a symbol of the conquest That he will achieve in new covenant times. I know that's a mouthful a huge mouthful I don't have the time to unpack it, but he's just laying out lord in the past. You have dealt this way I am praying that you would continue to act consistently with your character and advance your kingdom That's basically what he's asking. So in this poem He alludes to God's redemption of His people, Israel out of Egypt, and in effect says He is going to achieve another exodus. He will not abandon His people. He will not abandon His purposes. Indeed, the discipline of His people is for the very purpose of sanctifying and purifying the Church and making it strong. And just as God miraculously brought about an exodus, and guarded and protected his people and gave them the law and conquered the land of Canaan, he will once again do what was prefigured typologically in those ancient actions. This is how the world is going to be eventually filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as deep as the waters cover the sea. How deep do the waters cover the sea? pretty deeply, miles deeply. Well, that's how deeply his kingdom is going to be manifested in earth. The knowledge of him will be manifested. The glory of him will be manifested in him. It's the goal of planet earth that he sets before our eyes. So no matter how much evil, no matter how powerful the enemies might be, the church must never forget the victory promised in history and that our prayers and efforts contribute to that victory. So the final A section, That's chapter 3, verses 16 through 19, forms a fitting conclusion to the whole book. It's not up to us to know the times and the seasons. So Bacchic resolves. Earlier, he had been impatient. He said, Lord, how long are you going to do this? At the end, he just resolves, OK, I'm going to be faithful to the Lord. I'm going to trust him no matter how long it takes. I don't care how long it takes. I'm going to be faithful in my spot in history. And this is precisely what Jesus told the apostles when they eagerly wanted the full kingdom glories right away. He said in Acts one, It is not for you to know times or seasons which the father has put in his own authority. But now here comes you need to get resources and do your responsibility, but you should receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you should be witnesses to me in Jerusalem. and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth. So it's not for us to know the when, it's for us to have the faith to live as he instructs us and to leave the results in his hands. And he promises when we do that, he'll give us the Holy Spirit. He'll empower us to supernaturally do our responsibilities. Now, of course, that's the heart of the book of Habakkuk as well. You come to the same conclusion in the book of Habakkuk, whether you go through the book linearly, like some people do, from the doubts of chapter one to the hope of chapter three, or whether you notice a chiasm like Dorsey and other scholars have noticed. The faith and patience called for at the end of the book are also the focus and the heart of the book. So I want you to turn back to chapter 2, verses 1 through 4, which we skipped over earlier. The first verse especially has been really misinterpreted by some people. Some people see Habakkuk as challenging God in these verses, as in, I'm going to sit here until you give me a satisfactory answer. You owe me an answer. That's the way they interpret this. I don't see it that way. Not at all. He has already said that he fears the Lord, and Habakkuk, even in this verse, knows he needs correction. Probably needs correction. So the last clause of verse one says, and what I will answer when, not if, but what I will answer when I am corrected. He's open to correction. He knows he probably needs correction. That shows humility. God dictates we stand corrected and when God calls upon us We have an obligation to answer and so the verse 1 really is a statement That he will humbly stand at attention to see what the Lord will say to him. It's not arrogance It is humility and in verses 2 through 5 God gives his answer Excuse me 2 through 4 He says, write the vision and make it plain on tablets that he may run who reads it. This book is not just about Habakkuk getting his questions answered. The book addresses the concerns to It's really the concerns of all of the elect in every age. We all face things that make us wonder why? Why me? Why now? How long? And sometimes those tough questions paralyze God's people. Well, according to this verse, God gave this little book to enable us to run even when we don't feel like running. Write the vision, make it plain on tablets that he may run who reads it. If you interpret the book of Habakkuk correctly, It's going to enable you to have faith, hope, and a determination to throw off apathy and cynicism and to serve God faithfully no matter what happens to your crops or your health or anything else. Sadly, too many interpretations of Habakkuk leave you depressed and thinking the only hope is to wait for God to rapture us out of this world. It's an escapism. It's completely contrary to the Bible's dominionism. Though the principles apply to every age, God is especially writing this book for the new covenant people of God. He says in verse 3, For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it, because it will surely come. It will not tarry. Now, he's not contradicting himself. Two different Hebrew words there on Terry. What he's saying is God won't be late by one second. He is not denying it's going to take a long time before this is fulfilled, but he says he will not be late by one second. He keeps his schedule. His appointed time is guaranteed for all events in history. Now, interestingly, both the Greek Septuagint translation of this, as well as the book of Hebrews, apply the it to a person, the Messiah. Thus, they are personifying the vision as being Christ. He is, after all, the Word of God. Well, the vision will be fulfilled, but it can only be fulfilled because of a he who is yet for an appointed time and he will speak and will not lie. And though he tarries, wait for him because he will surely come and he will not tarry. And of course, Christ did come. And in him, all the promises of scripture, in other words, the vision are yes and amen. He is the vision. He's the giver of the vision. Every jot and tittle of scripture is fulfilled in him So the book of Hebrews is not stretching the scripture by applying this to Jesus verse 4 Insists that proud people cannot connect with what he's just said They cannot connect with it because they don't have their heart right, but but he says the just shall live by his face faith This clause is quoted three times in the New Testament. Paul quotes the verse twice to teach justification by faith and Hebrews 1038 quotes it to prove that the Christian life that was already begun by faith must be continued by faith or the Lord will have no pleasure in us. The just are constantly called to live and walk by faith in Christ and in Christ alone. Now that being the case, It is no wonder to me that the faith of verse 4b is contrasted with the pride of verse 4a. A prideful man does what? He depends on himself. He trusts in himself. He boasts in himself. But a man of faith completely takes his eyes off of himself and his own inadequacies, because his own inadequacies are immaterial. His eyes are fixed upon Jesus, and he first looks to Jesus for Christ's imputed righteousness. We call that justification. He continues to live by faith, looking to Jesus for his imparted righteousness. We call that sanctification or dominion. And so the man of faith finds meaning and identity in Christ because his whole life is characterized by faith. As Charles Spurgeon said, the faith which saves is not one single act done and ended on a certain day. It is an act continued and persevered in throughout the entire life of man. See, this is one of the problems I had when I was a young man. I kept wondering, did I really believe? Was that a fake faith? I always doubted my salvation. And people ask me, well, do you believe right now? I said, yeah. Well, it doesn't matter whether you believed right back then. It's not an act. The faith that saves is a faith that continues to trust Christ throughout life. So that's what he's saying here. The faith which saves is not one single act done and ended on a certain day. It is an act continued and persevered in throughout the entire life of man. The just not only commences to live by his faith, but he continues to live by his faith. He does not begin in the spirit and end in the flesh, nor go so far by grace and the rest of the way by works of the law. Faith is essential all along, every day, and all the day, in all things. Our natural life begins by breathing, and it must be continued by breathing. What breath is to the body, that is faith to the soul. The just shall live by faith. Well, since this message is the heart of the book, the very center of the chiasm, it's no wonder that Habakkuk also ends the book by singing a song that we're going to be singing right after the worship service. And it's a song that indicates that no matter how tough life might be, We are going to be determined to trust God, rejoice in God, follow God, seek to please God. It's pretty self-explanatory, so let me just read it back at 3, 17-19. Though the labor of the olive may fail, and the fields yield no food, though the flock may be cut off from the fold, and there be no herd in the stalls, for a farmer that would be pretty devastating, even if I have lost everything. Yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation. The Lord God is my strength. He will make my feet like deer's feet, and He will make me walk on my high places." This is a statement that we need to repeatedly make. When life begins to turn bad, what does Satan do? He starts beating up on us. When life goes good, He makes us proud. When life goes bad, He starts beating up and makes us doubt God or doubt ourselves or doubt the possibility of progress. And basically Habakkuk preaches that. Don't do that. Don't think that way. No, no matter how bad things go, determine to rejoice in the Lord, though Satan may be able to take a lot of things away from you. He cannot take the Lord away from you. And the Lord is your strength. The Lord can give you light in the darkness and joy in the midst of sorrow. He ends the book by saying, to the chief musician with my stringed instruments. Now that last verse indicates that God did not simply want Habakkuk to sing this. He gives it to the chief musician who had a responsibility to teach it to the congregation. So that means he calls upon all of the elect in every age to express the same determination to trust, follow, rejoice in, serve the living God, no matter how difficult life may become. Basically, Habakkuk is saying the same thing that Job did when he said, even though he slay me, I'm still going to trust him. May this faith be our faith today and forevermore. Amen. Father, we thank you for your word that reminds us that our eyes must be fixed on Jesus, who is the author and the finisher of our faith. Help us, even in the midst of our doubts, to cast those doubts upon you and resolve those doubts in your word. Help us, Father, to be like Habakkuk, having a faith that embraces you fully and trusts you fully, even when we do not know how much longer we can wait. We can do all things through you. through Christ who strengthens us. And so I pray for your encouragement to this your people to have a persevering faith, a faith that determines no matter whether the fig tree blossoms or not, that we will trust in you, rejoice in you, follow you, be faithful to you. And I pray this in Christ's name. Amen.