Habakkuk 1: How Long?

​Key verses
2 O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not hear? Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save?
 
Meditation
Bold faith fully trusts God and His work, knowing He is using evil and injustice for His purposes. God is faithful, and faith focused on Him and His word gives “strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow.”

Habakkuk was a prophet to the Southern Kingdom after Nineveh fell (605 BC) and before Babylon targeted Jerusalem. Chaos reigned on the international stage and problems within his home country amplified anxiety (sound familiar!?!). The questions of God’s justice and the faith of God’s people dominate the book. Palmer Robertson summarizes the general message saying, “A mature faith trusts humbly but persistently in God’s design for establishing righteousness on the earth.” Faith trusts God’s faithfulness in a fallen world.
 
A dialogue with God is the prophet’s proclamation to his nation, potently commencing with a question: “How long!?” will God’s people need help and God not act (v. 2), violence perpetrated without justice, and the wicked win (vv. 1-4)? God responds, “I am doing a work you will not understand…” raising up the enemy for His purposes (vv. 5-11). Habakkuk responds: Does God’s use of evil for His purposes mean He approves of injustice (vv. 12-17)?  
 
God is big enough for our toughest questions. 
In a world of fear and frustrations, faith that saves focuses on God and His faithfulness.
 
Habakkuk uses lament (See Psalm 13) to launch his questions into God’s steadfast love. Jesus lamented, too, before giving Himself to enemies and injustice to purchase a people for Himself. God uses evil for His good. God is faithful and His grace invites you to have bold faith in Him.
 
Today’s Reading
The oracle that Habakkuk the prophet saw.

Habakkuk's Complaint
2 O Lord, how long shall I cry for help,
    and you will not hear?
Or cry to you “Violence!”
    and you will not save?
3 Why do you make me see iniquity,
    and why do you idly look at wrong?
Destruction and violence are before me;
    strife and contention arise.
4 So the law is paralyzed,
    and justice never goes forth.
For the wicked surround the righteous;
    so justice goes forth perverted.

The Lord's Answer
5 “Look among the nations, and see;
    wonder and be astounded.
For I am doing a work in your days
    that you would not believe if told.
6 For behold, I am raising up the Chaldeans,
    that bitter and hasty nation,
who march through the breadth of the earth,
    to seize dwellings not their own.
7 They are dreaded and fearsome;
    their justice and dignity go forth from themselves.
8 Their horses are swifter than leopards,
    more fierce than the evening wolves;
    their horsemen press proudly on.
Their horsemen come from afar;
    they fly like an eagle swift to devour.
9 They all come for violence,
    all their faces forward.
    They gather captives like sand.
10 At kings they scoff,
    and at rulers they laugh.
They laugh at every fortress,
    for they pile up earth and take it.
11 Then they sweep by like the wind and go on,
    guilty men, whose own might is their god!”

Habakkuk's Second Complaint
12 Are you not from everlasting,
    O Lord my God, my Holy One?
    We shall not die.
O Lord, you have ordained them as a judgment,
    and you, O Rock, have established them for reproof.
13 You who are of purer eyes than to see evil
    and cannot look at wrong,
why do you idly look at traitors
    and remain silent when the wicked swallows up
    the man more righteous than he?
14 You make mankind like the fish of the sea,
    like crawling things that have no ruler.
15 He[a] brings all of them up with a hook;
    he drags them out with his net;
he gathers them in his dragnet;
    so he rejoices and is glad.
16 Therefore he sacrifices to his net
    and makes offerings to his dragnet;
for by them he lives in luxury,
    and his food is rich.
17 Is he then to keep on emptying his net
    and mercilessly killing nations forever?
 
Richly Dwelling
-What stands out to you in today’s reading, especially Habakkuk’s Divine dialog?
 
-Why is it difficult to trust in the Lord with all our heart and lean not on our own understanding when chaos seems to reign in our world?
 
-How does the cross of Christ demonstrate God’s sovereignty over what seemed dark and despairing in the moment? How does this fuel both security and hope for you at such a time as this?
Key verses
2 O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not hear? Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save?