Here Is My Solution Lord

Good Morning Joes and Janes;

If you will recall, yesterday we were in Habakkuk chapter 1 and the prophet was calling on God to bring judgment on the sinful in Judah.  Judah was the Northern Kingdom of the divided tribes of Israel.  God said that he would answer his prayers.  The problem was, God’s answer to the problem was much different than what Habakkuk was expecting.

In the Habakkuk’s second complaint he asks how God can use such evil as the Chaldeans, (Babylonians), to discipline the, (“much better relatively”), nation of Judah.  That brings us to chapter 2.

Habakkuk 2

1 I will stand at my watch and station myself on the ramparts; I will look to see what he will say to me, and what answer I am to give to this complaint.

So, Habakkuk is waiting on an answer from the Lord.  I am not a trained seminary student, just a Regular Joe, but it almost sounds to me like he is thinking that the Lord will give a different answer!  In his second complaint in chapter 1 he points out that, while the people of Judah are bad and have turned away from God, the content of his first complaint, they are not evil like the Babylonians.

The LORD’s Answer

2. Then the LORD replied: “Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it.  3. For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and will not delay.  4. “See, he is puffed up; his desires are not upright– but the righteous will live by his faith—5. indeed, wine betrays him; he is arrogant and never at rest. Because he is as greedy as the grave and like death is never satisfied, he gathers to himself all the nations and takes captive all the peoples.  

Judah led into captivity

The Lord’s answer has not changed.  Imagine that, Habakkuk’s reasoning with God about the relative goodness of the Jews has not worked.  God realized the difference between the Jews and the Babylonians from the beginning.  God acknowledges the evil of the Babylonians and even elaborates on it.  But notice in verse 4; even though the ruler of Babylon will be and do all these evil things, the righteous will live by their faith.

6. “Will not all of them taunt him with ridicule and scorn, saying,” ‘Woe to him who piles up stolen goods and makes himself wealthy by extortion! How long must this go on?’  7. Will not your debtors suddenly arise? Will they not wake up and make you tremble? Then you will become their victim. 8. Because you have plundered many nations, the peoples who are left will plunder you. For you have shed man’s blood; you have destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them.  9. “Woe to him who builds his realm by unjust gain to set his nest on high, to escape the clutches of ruin!  10. You have plotted the ruin of many peoples, shaming your own house and forfeiting your life. 11. The stones of the wall will cry out, and the beams of the woodwork will echo it. 12. “Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and establishes a town by crime!

The Lord tells Habakkuk that the Babylonians will be judged for their works.  As the Babylonians go out conquering the surrounding nations they build up a heavy debt.  They plunder many nations but the people that are left in those nations will eventually rise up and plunder the Babylonians in return.

13 Has not the LORD Almighty determined that the people’s labor is only fuel for the fire, that the nations exhaust themselves for nothing?  14. For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. 

These two verses, I think, look to yet a future time when God has established his eternal kingdom.  All of the labor that people have done, (unless it has been for God), is only fuel that has helped feed the fires of destruction.  But, God will establish knowledge of Him in all the world.  As the waters cover the sea!  Waters don’t just cover the top of the sea, they are the sea, and water soaks into every crack and crevice of everything it comes into contact with.

Have you ever justified that you were not as “bad” as someone else and therefore should get special treatment?  Have you said; “our nation has a lot of troubles, sure we have our sins, but we’re not as bad as _____.  God does not judge man and nations the same way we do.

God sends judgment on men and nations at appointed times (vs. 3).  But through all of these judgments we, the righteous, as believers, should live by faith.  What faith is that?  Our faith is in Christ, for our eternal salvation.  Christ Jesus, the Living Creator God has everything in control.  He will bring about events at appointed times and in the end cause the knowledge of his Glory to be known everywhere.  He will bring about heaven on Earth and eternal peace.

In the meantime we are to have faith in Him.  Do his will where we are.  I don’t believe it was wrong for Habakkuk to plead his case before the Lord, or for us.  But we shouldn’t be too surprised if the answer we get is not the one we expect.  After all we are seeing a very little window in history and even it is clouded with our own personal wants, needs and prejudices.

Regular Joe

Assyria

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• Advent 2011, Day 20 (alicelontok.wordpress.com)
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