The following sermon is made available by Lakeside Bible Church in Cornelius, North Carolina.
For more information about our church or to find more recorded sermons,
please visit us online at lakesidebible.church.
We'd also love to connect with you on social media.
You can find us by searching Lakeside Bible NC on Facebook and Instagram.
For specific questions about the Bible or our church, please email us at info at lakesidebible.church.
Well, I want to invite you to take your Bibles and turn with me to Habakkuk chapter 1.
Habakkuk chapter 1, we'll finish this chapter today,
and we'll get right into chapter 2 and finish that chapter, Lord willing, next Sunday.
But Habakkuk chapter 1 is where we are for now.
Now, it's not unusual for seasons of understanding to be followed by seasons of doubt and confusion.
Because our lives before Christ are consumed with great darkness,
the light of Christ at the moment of salvation brings an amazing sense of clarity.
More is gained in that one moment, as far as knowledge and understanding is concerned,
than perhaps any other moment leading up to that point in your life,
and maybe even after in your spiritual walk.
But as we progress in our walk with Christ,
we soon realize that not every moment of our life is characterized by great light and understanding.
seasons of hardship, especially, can disorient us,
even to the point of leading us to doubt what at one time was abundantly clear.
We usually look back at these seasons of our lives and at these difficulties,
and we can see that they are God's way of bringing us into a much deeper fellowship with Him.
But in the moment, we don't always sense that spiritual growth is indeed what is happening in that moment.
Many times, all we can do is cry out to God and we simply ask,
Why?
Why is this happening to me?
Why, Lord, are you allowing this to go on?
I just don't understand.
And throughout the course of our lives, we'll have many moments like that.
Our text finds Habakkuk in the midst of one of these confusing seasons.
His initial question was to determine why God wasn't doing anything about the wickedness in Judah.
And God finally answered him and informed the prophet that he had actually been working all along
to raise up the Chaldean army that would serve as his instrument of judgment.
Habakkuk understood the need for judgment.
But he had great difficulty in understanding why God would judge the nation in this way.
What follows this perplexity is a very humble yet honestly transparent prayer to the Lord.
Habakkuk was desperate to understand why God was acting in a way
that seemed to be contradictory to God's holy nature.
And that, in essence, is the question that causes Habakkuk so much issue here in our text.
Now, like Habakkuk, we will inevitably face periods of confusion
that lead us to ask God why he's working in a particular way.
And right here at the beginning, I want you to understand that there is nothing inherently sinful
about asking God for answers.
But there is a right way and a wrong way to approach God with our questions.
Some people might withdraw and pout against God whenever they're going through difficulty.
Others may come to a point of confusion in their Christian life,
and they actually just abandon the faith altogether,
considering that whatever they had believed to be truth up to that point was actually false.
Habakkuk's question was weighty, and it was sincere.
But it's sandwiched in between faith and submission.
And because of that, it serves as a classic example
of how we are to approach God in prayer,
how it is that we are to righteously bring our questions about life and hardship
and misunderstandings to the Lord.
Well, let's read our text.
Habakkuk chapter 1, we pick up in verse number 12,
and we'll read down through the first verse of chapter 2.
Habakkuk says,
Art thou not from everlasting, O Lord my God, mine Holy One?
We shall not die.
O Lord, thou hast ordained them for judgment,
and, O mighty God, thou hast established them for correction.
Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil,
and cannot look on iniquity.
Why do you then look upon them that deal treacherously
and hold your tongue when the wicked devour the man that is more righteous than he?
You make men as the fish of the sea,
and as the creeping things that have no ruler over them.
They take up all of them with the angle or the hook.
They catch them in their net, then gather them in their drag.
Therefore, they rejoice and are glad.
Therefore, they sacrifice unto their net and burn incense unto their drag,
because by them their portion is fat and their meat plenteous.
Shall they therefore empty their net
and not spare continually to slay the nations?
I will stand upon my watch and set me upon the tower,
and will watch to see what he will say unto me,
and what I shall answer when I am reproved.
I want to look at three features that are contained in Habakkuk's prayer here,
and then I want to conclude our study today with just a few practical steps
that Martin Lloyd-Jones actually presented in a series of sermons on this book as well.
But let's first examine Habakkuk's prayer.
The first thing that we notice here,
as we understand the right way to approach God with our questions,
is that Habakkuk approached God reverently.
He approached God reverently.
Now, there's no mistaking the spirit with which Habakkuk approached God as he prayed for answers.
Ignoring verse number 12 would make it very easy to misjudge the prophet's question.
It might lead us to conclude that Habakkuk was arrogantly lashing out at God.
But a careful examination of verse number 12 reveals the spirit of reverence that actually permeated his heart.
Truly, if we're going to bring our questions to God in a way that's not sinful,
we must give consideration to the way in which we approach God in prayer.
And Habakkuk's approach included both worship and it included faith.
Let's first look at his worship.
That's what it was foremost, was worshipful.
And as with anyone, the nature of worship reveals the depth of their theology.
It was because of Habakkuk's faithful walk with God and study of the scriptures
that he was able to worship God in this prayer.
Now, I want you to consider with me all the attributes of God
that Habakkuk brings into the equation as he approaches him in prayer.
Look with me first at verse number 12.
We see that he recognized God as the one true God.
The one true God.
Look at the very first phrase.
He prays, art thou not from everlasting?
Now, the Chaldeans would credit their own idols with the great success of their conquest of the world.
But Habakkuk recognized that Yahweh was the only true and living God.
As he faced the uncertainty of why God was working in this particular way,
he reminded himself of one thing that was absolutely certain.
And that is God is the eternal, everlasting God.
He is the one true God.
No matter how it may have seemed,
God had not lost.
The Chaldeans were not greater than him.
Their idols were nothing.
They were nothing but carvings.
There was no life in their idols.
And it's the same truth that we must acknowledge as we come to the Lord with our questions.
That he is the one true and living God that is from everlasting.
He is eternal.
He's not been defeated, nor has he abandoned his purpose.
He's God.
So no matter what the difficulty is that you're facing today,
we can stop and we can acknowledge that we serve the one true and living God
that cannot be defeated.
He has not lost control.
He is God from everlasting to everlasting.
And he has not taken a break as it relates to our lives.
So we see he recognizes the one true God.
Secondly, he sees that God is the self-existent God.
Look at the second phrase.
He says,
Then he says,
We understand Lord there to be the holy covenant name of God.
We pronounce it as Yahweh or Jehovah.
It's the great tetragrammaton that was given to Moses as Moses and God had this dialogue.
And God tells Moses,
I want you to go back to Egypt and I want you to tell Pharaoh to let my people go.
And Moses says,
Who am I supposed to tell the people has sent me?
And God says,
Tell them I am that I am has sent thee.
And it's this name for God.
And what it represents is the self-existent nature of God.
He does not depend on anything else.
He does not depend on anyone else.
He was not a created being.
He is the eternal God, the self-existent one.
He is the I am of the scripture.
Over 5,000 times in the Old Testament alone, this name for God is used.
And it's significant as Habakkuk prays this prayer.
The third attribute that he brings up is God's holiness.
And this one's important as it relates to Habakkuk's question.
Look at the third phrase here.
Art thou not from everlasting?
O Lord my God, my holy one.
My holy one.
Habakkuk understood that God is absolutely righteous.
He does no wrong.
He's perfect in all that he does.
John reminds us in one of his epistles,
God is light and in him is no darkness at all.
Abraham said, shall not the judge of all do what is right?
Over and over and over the scriptures testify
to the perfect righteousness of God and his holiness.
So as Habakkuk brought his question to the Lord,
it was actually a recognition of God's perfection that perplexed him.
How is it that you as the holy God could exalt
or seem to exalt a nation that was so wicked?
And whatever your confusion, whatever your perplexity is today,
you can rest on the fact that God is holy,
that he always does what is right.
Next, we see that God is sovereign.
He says, we shall not die.
O Lord, thou hast ordained them.
He recognized that God was in full control.
He was the one that had raised up the Chaldeans.
And it becomes a part of his worship.
And then finally, he recognizes God as his firm foundation.
Look again at the last phrase.
He says, almighty God.
Now this word actually means rock.
And it represents stability and security
that comes from God for his people.
The psalmist used this title of rock for God all the time in the Psalms.
And it indicates that Habakkuk knew whatever God was doing,
he was doing it for the best for his people.
And we can rest on that.
When we come and we bring our questions to the Lord,
we can work through in worship first
the things that we have learned are true of God in the scriptures.
We can rest on the fact that he is the eternal God,
that he's the self-existent God,
that he is holy and never does anything wrong.
He is always right.
We can rest in the fact that he's in control.
And then we can feel security in the fact
that everything God does,
he does for the good of his own people.
This worship set the tone in the spirit of Habakkuk's question.
Worship has a way of bringing peace to perplexity.
By taking our eyes off the circumstance
and focusing solely on the Lord,
great comfort is introduced to our hearts.
Habakkuk's worship didn't dismiss his question,
but it certainly reveals the spirit with which he prayed.
And when we come to God with our questions,
genuine worship must initiate the prayer.
But his reverent approach didn't just include his worship,
it also included the evidence of Habakkuk's faith.
Now, a great statement of his faith is mentioned in verse number 12.
He says this,
we shall not die.
Well, what does that mean?
God had just told Habakkuk that he is raising up this massive army
that's gonna come in and he's gonna carry the nation away captive.
Great destruction was coming to Judah
and the covenant nation of God.
But considering God's judgment
without regarding his eternal covenant with his people
would have led Habakkuk to think that God was planning
to annihilate the nation completely.
But the law and the prophets
that had at least prophesied up to that point,
like Micah,
had all indicated that God's promise
was to bring a Messiah from the lineage of King David.
And if God were to destroy the entire nation
and completely annihilate them,
that would mean the end of the promise.
But this wasn't total annihilation.
This was just severe correction.
And while this judgment was unlike anything else
that they had ever faced before,
God was not abandoning his promise
and Habakkuk knew that.
As Habakkuk studied the scriptures,
as he reflected on the character of God,
he knew that God had never broken a promise
and he wasn't about to start then.
And just because severe correction was coming
from the hand of God
did not mean that God was abandoning his promise
and annihilating the nation altogether.
He trusted fully that God would not forsake his covenant.
But that didn't mean that he was incapable
of being confused by God's methods.
What it means is that because of his faith,
Habakkuk's confusion would be the servant of his faith
rather than his faith being contingent
on his full understanding.
He didn't need a full understanding to trust God.
And had he not trusted God,
his faith would have become a servant to his confusion
rather than his confusion,
the servant of his faith.
And here Robertson is helpful.
He simply states that it's not a weak faith,
but a perplexed faith that torments Habakkuk.
Now significant to his faith
is its connection to the regular study of the Bible.
And I want you to think about that.
Everything that we've just looked at in verse 12,
Habakkuk was able to know and trust God's promise
because he had immersed himself in the scriptures.
The peace that he found in spite of his confusion
came directly from the testimony of God's word.
Had he not committed himself to God's word
in a time where it was not as readily available
as it is to us,
he had committed himself to it,
he had believed it,
he had trusted it,
and because he had immersed himself in the scriptures,
his faith was strengthened.
And though he had questions about God's method,
he did not have a question about God's character
and God's fulfillment of his promise.
Now if your perplexity as to God's ways has overcome you,
it might be that you've either neglected
to regularly study the Bible,
or you've chosen simply not to believe
the things that you've studied.
Our faith will overcome our questions
only when it's founded on the inerrant,
eternal, unchanging word of God.
Well secondly, quickly,
we see not only did he approach God reverently,
but he asked God,
he brought his question to God
humbly, with humility.
Now I want you to look with me at verse number 13.
Habakkuk says,
This is the summary of Habakkuk's question.
Now his first question in verses two through four
essentially was,
Why aren't you doing anything about this wickedness?
But the essence of this second
and more earnest question
is,
Why are you doing it like this?
Habakkuk had no issue with the fact
that God was judging the sin of the nation.
That's actually what he'd been praying for all along.
And though I think he was primarily looking
for God to send a revival,
he still understood the necessity of judging sin.
What he couldn't understand
was how the holy God
would seemingly exalt a wicked nation
in the process of judging his own people.
In other words,
God's actions to Habakkuk
didn't seem to be consistent with his character.
And he makes his case in verses 14 through 17.
Let's just make a few notes of this,
of what it was that was confusing Habakkuk.
He makes this comparison
between God's holy character
at the beginning of verse 13
and then with the actions
of the army that God was actually using.
Look at verse 14.
We see dehumanization.
He says,
You make men as the fish of the sea,
as the creeping things
that have no ruler over them.
God had created man
and has created man in his own image.
And therefore, he has demanded
that we put a high value on human life,
a different value on human life
than any other type of life in his creation.
That was God's doing
because of making man in his own image.
But in allowing the Chaldeans
to devour the nations in this way,
it was like God had reduced mankind
to the level of the fish of the sea.
It was like God had devalued human life
and he was allowing them to be caught
and devoured without conscience.
And Habakkuk couldn't understand
how God could you put such a high value on life,
such a high value on your own holiness,
and then you would allow this nation to do this.
You would allow us to be like the fish of the sea.
In verse 15, we see cruelty.
He says,
They take up all of them with the hook.
They catch them in their net
and gather them in their drag.
Therefore, they rejoice and are glad.
Now, this army was noted for its brutality.
The description of the Chaldean invasion
in its verse is it's more than figurative.
It's true that their conquest can be pictured
as a successful fisherman
grabbing his fish in his net
and reeling it in and great rejoicing.
But this army was literally known
as we study history
to take hooks
and put them through the lips of their captives
and string them along in a line
as they marched them across the world
back to Babylon.
This was a cruel people,
a brutal army.
And Habakkuk couldn't understand
how God would allow that
after having condemned
that type of behavior so often.
Well, in verse 16, we see idolatry.
Therefore, they sacrifice unto their net
and they burn incense in their drag.
Because of them, their portion is fat
and their meat is plenteous.
Rather than give God the rightful credit
for their success,
they worship themselves in their own strength.
How could God exalt such a pagan people?
And then in verse 17,
we see that they were merciless
and relentless.
Shall they therefore empty their net
and not spare continually
to slay the nations?
God is a God that delights in mercy
as Habakkuk understood it.
How could he then use a nation
that was so merciless
and relentless in what they were doing?
So we see Habakkuk's concern
is not lightweight at all.
It is a legitimate, heavy question,
the likes of which all of us
are bound to face
at some point in our Christian walk.
James Boyce, again,
compared it to God allowing
the wicked atheistic systems
to prevail in more modern times.
He said it would be like crying out to God
about the state of the visible church
in America and hearing
that God is going to destroy it
by a communist invasion.
The church may be in a deplorable state,
we would argue,
but surely it is not as bad as all that,
even if it were.
It would not seem right
that it should be destroyed
by an utterly godless nation.
Now, this prayer of Habakkuk
and this prayer that you and I
have often prayed before
is repeated in the scriptures.
In fact, there's a specific place
that I'd like for you to turn
just quickly.
We're not going to examine the whole thing,
but if you'll go to Psalm 73,
just flip there in your Bibles
to Psalm 73.
Asaph is the writer of the Psalm
and he's dealing with the same dilemma
as Habakkuk in a different time.
Look at verse number three.
Asaph says,
I was envious at the foolish
when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.
In Asaph's day,
he would look out
and he saw the wicked people of the nation
actually being the ones with great wealth.
They were the ones that prospered
in everything that they did
and he couldn't understand.
Here I am, God.
I've given my life to you.
I'm living my life
to do everything that I can to serve you,
yet I am plagued all day long
and I look out
and these people that are wicked
and they deny you
and they mock at you,
they are the ones
that seem to be prosperous.
And he says,
I was envious at this.
And then he describes them.
He says,
for there are no bands in their death
and their strength is firm.
Bands is just a name for pain.
They had an easy death.
They didn't seem to struggle like others.
They are not in trouble as other men,
neither are they plagued like other men.
Therefore, pride compasseth them about
as a chain.
Violence covereth them as a garment.
Their eyes stand out with fatness.
They have more than heart could wish.
They are corrupt and speak wickedly
concerning oppression.
They speak loftily.
They set their mouth against the heavens
and their tongue walketh through the earth.
Therefore, his people return hither
and waters of a full cup are wrung out to them
and they say,
how does God know?
And is there knowledge in the most high?
Behold, these are the ungodly
who prosper in the world.
They increase in riches.
And Asaph says in verse number two,
I was about ready to give up.
I was ready to give up
because what I saw didn't seem fair
and it led him to begin to question God
and to doubt God's faithfulness
and God's love
and God's promise for his people.
But instead of acting rashly,
instead of just quitting on God in that moment,
we find out that Asaph instead does what Habakkuk does
and he reminds himself of the character of God
and he goes into the sanctuary of God for worship.
And it's in that moment of worship
and that moment of faith
that God brings a resolution to Asaph's problem.
Look with me down at verse 17.
He says,
Until I went into the sanctuary of God,
then understood I their end.
And he says,
Surely thou did set them in slippery places.
Thou casteth them down into destruction.
How are they brought into desolation?
As in a moment,
they are utterly consumed with terror.
As a dream when one awaketh,
so, O Lord,
when thou awakest,
thou shalt despise their image.
Instead of getting angry towards God,
instead of being accusatory towards God,
Asaph went into the sanctuary of God
and he worshiped
and he exemplified his faith
and there God answered him
and brought resolution to his question.
And it's the same resolution
that God will bring to Habakkuk
in his question.
But we'll have to wait till next week
to examine exactly what that is.
For now,
we focus our attention on the humility
with which Habakkuk prayed.
Now, the point of our study today
is to follow Habakkuk's example
in the right way to ask God about these matters.
And it's necessary for us
to rightly interpret his tone.
I suppose that every aspect
of Habakkuk's prayer points to his humility.
But I think it's especially true here
in the question itself.
If understanding first
the reverence with which he approached God in prayer,
we come to see more clearly
the spirit of the question.
Now, listen.
A prideful heart might say to God,
how dare you?
How dare you use a wicked nation
to judge your people?
How dare you, God,
prosper the wicked
and put down the righteous?
How dare you, God,
cause me to lose my job?
How dare you, God,
take away this loved one?
How dare you, God,
allow this to happen to me
or that to happen to me?
A prideful heart
exalts itself against God in that way.
But Habakkuk's humble heart
said in essence,
not how dare you,
it says,
please help me understand.
Please help me understand.
There is honesty and transparency
and passion in Habakkuk's words.
But those things are met
with a genuine desire
to understand God's ways,
not condemn God's ways.
And this humility is absolutely necessary
when we bring our questions to God.
We are not to be lifted up with pride
and say,
how dare you do this
and condemn the work of God.
Rather,
we are to humbly submit
to what God is doing
and genuinely seek understanding
as to why he is doing it
the way that he is.
There's a lot of talk right now
about rights.
And one right that you do not have
is a right to be angry with God.
Why?
Because he's the everlasting God.
He's the self-existent God.
He's the holy God that does no wrong.
He's the sovereign God.
He is our security,
our rock,
and our stability.
We have no right
to question him in that way.
So how are we to pray
about these questions?
We approach God reverently.
We ask God humbly.
Thirdly,
we anticipate God's answer
submissively.
Submissively.
We patiently wait for God's answer
and we submit to that answer.
Look at verse 1 of chapter 2.
Habakkuk says,
I will stand upon my watch
and set me upon the tower.
And you can immediately hear
the kid in Sunday school saying,
this is how we know
that Habakkuk was the smallest man
in the Bible
because he was able
to stand upon his watch.
And I'm just going to trust
right now in faith
that you laughed
a little bit at that
as you watch this video at home.
What's the significance of this?
After Habakkuk had finished
with this question,
he patiently waited
for the Lord's reply.
There's a picture here
of anticipation.
He eagerly awaited
for the Lord to answer him.
And there's a simple lesson in this.
The waiting rooms of life
are often the most difficult,
but they're also the moments
that God uses
to strengthen us
in ways that blessing
and clarity often cannot.
And then he says,
I will watch to see
what he will say unto me
and what I shall answer him
when I am reproved.
Now look at that last phrase again.
This is a little strange, right?
He says,
I will wait to see
how God will answer
and what I shall answer him
when I am reproved.
Now,
taking this entire series of verses
into the equation of our thought
helps us to understand
what he means by this statement.
There was no way for Habakkuk
to prepare an argument
against an answer
that hadn't actually
been delivered to him.
And there's even a sense here
to where he recognized
the audacity of his question
and expected even to be rebuked
and reproved in a way by God.
So his preparation in this verse
indicates for us
and his evidence
that he was actually submitting
to God's answer.
Whatever that answer was going to be,
he had prepared himself
to patiently wait for it
and then he was going to submit
to God,
understanding that God is right
and he would come probably
with a level of reproof.
There was no way for him
to know what God was answering
and even to build
a replying argument.
So it's not that Habakkuk
was here determining
that he was going to dispute
with God indefinitely.
That's not what he was doing.
He knew too much
of God's faithfulness
and holiness
to dispute his character.
He had expressed his confusion
and he would now wait patiently
and submissively
for God's answer.
And we find the ultimate example
of this in Jesus Christ.
As he prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane
on the night of his arrest,
what was it that he prayed?
He repeated over and over,
not my will,
but thy will be done.
It's this submission
that is the reason
that we pray in Jesus' name,
that we tack those words on
at the end of many of our prayers.
It's not that there's a magic
in those words
and Jesus didn't mean
to specifically command
that we add those words
to every prayer.
That wasn't the purpose
of him saying
that we are to pray
in his name.
The purpose in saying that
at the end of our prayer
is it's a reminder
and it's a recognition
that everything we pray,
we are praying
and submitting
to the will of God,
to the will of our Savior,
Jesus Christ.
In addition to his faith
and humility,
what makes Habakkuk's spirit
and prayer so significant
is his submission
to whatever answer
God would end up providing.
Now, I want to conclude this way.
Martin Lloyd-Jones in 1953,
I've mentioned this
in our studies already,
had preached through
the book of Habakkuk
and as he approached
this section of verses,
he gave four practical steps
for how we are
to deal with
the perplexities of life
and I just want to
quickly give them to you.
I think they'll be
an encouragement to you.
First, he says,
stop and think.
Stop and think.
Now, my mom always told me
growing up
that my mouth was in drive
but my brain was in neutral
and what she meant by that
is that I have a tendency
to speak without first thinking
and she's right.
But unfortunately,
we're prone to deal
with spiritual issues
in the same way.
We often act on emotion
rather than thinking
through the truth
of a given circumstance.
And Christians would do well
to recover the discipline
of thinking deeply
about God and his word
before acting in an emotional way.
Habakkuk's spirit
would have been vastly different
had he not taken the time
to stop and think things
through first.
So we stop to think.
Secondly,
restate basic principles.
Restate basic principles.
Lloyd-Jones says this,
we must first remind ourselves
of those things
of which we are abundantly certain.
Things which are entirely
beyond doubt.
Write them down
and say to yourself,
in this terrible
and perplexing situation
in which I find myself,
here at least is solid ground.
The moment you return
to basic principles,
you immediately begin
to lose your sense of panic.
It is a great thing
to reassure your soul
with those things
that are beyond dispute.
It's like walking
on an icy sidewalk.
You take your steps carefully
and you keep your eyes
focused on the ground
and you put your steps
on firm ground
rather than the unstable ground.
And James Boyce says,
your problem
is a slippery spot.
But surely,
not all your experience
with God is like that.
Get onto the parts
that are firm.
Habakkuk's basic principles
are seen in his worship
and faith in verse 12.
And we should always interpret
our practical
and theological questions
with the fundamental truths
that have been clearly revealed
revealed in the Bible.
If your perplexity today
has to do
with the loss of a job,
perhaps what you need
to be reminded of
is the certainty
of God's providential care.
And be reminded
of the scriptures
when Jesus said
that God sees
every sparrow that falls.
Are you not more
important than they?
And if God clothes
the lilies of the field
even more beautifully
than he did Solomon
in his most royal garments,
does God not care
to clothe you?
God cares for us.
Find firm ground in that
and trust him.
If your question today
has to do with
the wickedness
that you see around you,
the firm ground
on which you need to stand
is the reality
of God's holiness.
that in his time
and in his way
he will judge
all sin
and you can trust him.
So stop and think.
Remember and restate
basic principles
of which you're certain.
Thirdly,
apply the principles
to the problem.
Once you've written down
the things
which you're certain,
apply them
to your current dilemma.
It was the basic principles
of verse 12
that guided Habakkuk's
understanding
and his response.
And then the fourth step
is this.
If you're still in doubt,
commit the problem
to God in faith.
Commit the problem
to God in faith.
If you're still unsure,
take the problem
to God
and leave it there.
And this is most clearly seen
as Habakkuk
waited submissively
for God's answer.
So when you're perplexity today,
stop and think.
Restate the basic principles.
Apply those principles
to your dilemma.
And if you're still unsure,
commit it to God
and leave it there.
In Corrie Ten Boom's
autobiography
called The Hiding Place,
she recalls a moment
when she was a little girl
riding on the train
back from Amsterdam
with her father.
Now her dad was a
watch and clock repairman.
And he had a pretty heavy
tool bag
that had all of his
things in it
that he needed
for their trip.
And as they were
on their way back
from Amsterdam
to where they lived,
Corrie Ten Boom
remember asking her father
about a question
about marital intimacy.
It was a question
that certainly
she was too young
to understand
and answer for
and certainly
too immature
to grasp everything
that came about
with that kind of question.
But instead of
plainly denying
her an answer,
her dad illustrated
an answer for her
instead.
As they were
getting off the train,
he asked Corrie
if she would
carry his work bag.
Well, she was
much too weak
to do that.
She couldn't even
lift it off the ground
and she recalls
calling out to her dad
and saying,
it's much too heavy.
I cannot carry it.
To which her
father replied,
well, I guess
you'll just have
to let me
carry it for you
until you're
strong enough.
And that's the way
that he illustrated
not giving her
a particular answer
about marital intimacy.
It wasn't time
for her to carry that.
So he needed
to carry it for her
until the right time
would come.
Years later,
as she sat
and endured
the atrocities
of a Nazi
concentration camp
in World War II,
she found herself
crying out to God
asking,
why?
Why are you allowing
such wickedness
to reign?
Why are you allowing
me and my sister
to go through
such devastating
circumstances?
Why are you subjecting
me to see
such violence?
Why are you subjecting
me to see
such death
and cruelty?
And it was in that
moment that she writes
in her book
that God reminded her
of that conversation
with her father.
And she immediately
recognized,
realized,
that even in adulthood,
there are some things
that are too heavy
for her
to carry.
And instead of wrestling
with the impossible task,
she would just have
to let Jesus
carry it for her.
you may be in a situation
today
that you just
don't understand.
You've thought it through.
You've reassured
yourself
with the basic
principles of the Bible.
You've tried
to apply them
to your circumstance,
but you're still
left in doubt.
And I want to
encourage you
in these moments
to trust Jesus
and let him
carry that weight
for you.
he loves you.
And you know
you can trust him.
Now it's time
to leave it with him
and simply submit
to what he's determined
for you to endure.
Thank you for listening
to this sermon
made available
by Lakeside Bible Church.
Feel free to share it
wherever you'd like.
Please do not charge
for it or alter it
in any way
without express
written consent
from Lakeside Bible Church.
Don't forget
to visit us online
at lakesidebible.church
or find us on Facebook
and Instagram
by searching
for Lakeside Bible NC.
If you live in the Charlotte
or Lake Norman area,
we'd love for you
to attend one
of our worship services.
We meet every Sunday
morning at 10 a.m.
We'd love to meet you.