Alan Francis Gardner was a 19th century British Royal Navy officer
and missionary to Patagonia on the very southern tip of South America.
In 1851, he found himself abandoned with a very small group
while he was trying to set up a mission station
on the remote island of Picton,
which is right at the very bottom of South America
in fairly harsh conditions.
Unfortunately, because of bad planning and a range of other things,
the whole group died of starvation while waiting to be resupplied.
Gardner was the last one of the group to die.
When their bodies were finally discovered by the resupply ship,
they buried the bodies and the only thing that they brought back with them
was Gardner's journal.
So here's a man in a remote place, the last one alive.
The rest of his colleagues have starred to death.
His wife and his children are thousands and thousands of kilometres away.
And the last entry in his journal,
he quotes from Psalm 34 verse 10,
the lions may grow weak and hungry,
but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.
And the very last thing recorded in his journal was this.
I am overwhelmed with the sense of the goodness of God.
How do you come to that kind of end,
but still have a life of sustained contentment and joy
in the midst of those circumstances?
Now, frankly, in our world,
people, any sane person,
would spend an absolute fortune,
give their fortune to the answer to that question.
The good news is you don't have to.
It's in fact right in front of you in Habakkuk chapter three
as we draw our brief journey through this book of Habakkuk to a close today.
Now, we've seen over the past few weeks
that Habakkuk lived in a world just like ours.
His nation, Israel, was about to be crushed
by the brutal Babylonian empire,
which was coming upon them as God's judgment to Israel
because of their corruption and their exploitation
and their violence and their sin and their wickedness.
Now, Habakkuk was really confused
about what God was doing in this scenario
and he really challenged God on it.
And yet, what he hears from God
is that Habakkuk, you think you care about it?
I care about it more.
I care about the wickedness and the carnage of this world.
And there is a day of reckoning coming
where I, God, will put all justice down,
all injustice down.
I will bring justice
and I will rescue my people forever.
And so the question for Habakkuk is,
knowing that the Babylonian army is coming,
how do you live with that?
How do you live in the day of disaster and carnage
and in the troubled times?
How did he do it and how do we do it?
How do we live in the day of disaster?
Is it possible to die well like Gardner?
Is it possible to sing praise to God
in the day of calamity?
To have joy in troubled times?
Is it possible for the world to come
collapsing down upon us
and to sing as we did this morning
that the Lord is good to me?
I encourage you to open up the St. Paul's app.
There you'll find out,
you'll find an outline for today's talk,
a Bible passage and a bunch of other stuff
that I encourage you to get to.
So St. Paul's app,
really three things I want to do this morning.
I want to first of all tie faith, grief and joy together.
Then look at what does it look like
to have joy in troubled times
and how do we fuel joy in troubled times?
So faith, a couple of weeks ago,
we saw that the major theme of this book is faith
in chapter two, verse four,
which reads,
the righteous will live by faith.
Then in chapter two, verse 20,
which is the end of the chapter,
we get at least a glimpse
of one of the characteristics of what true faith is.
It says,
but the Lord is in his holy temple
let all the earth be silent before him.
In other words,
my spin on that is God is God and we are not.
That's the point of verse 20.
God stands outside of his creation,
outside of the galaxies that he's made.
He's the creator, the master, the rule of all things.
And that is the starting point
of what it means to have a life of faith.
Of course, this rubs up against a culture like ours
that has personal autonomy
as most likely the highest value.
And unfortunately,
too many Christians operate
with a personal autonomy view.
And in fact,
they've got more of a view of God,
which is classically called
moralistic therapeutic deism.
Moralism is the belief
that at the core of Christianity,
you have to work hard to be really good people,
got to obey the rules and be good people.
People who obey the rules,
who are compliant and diligent
in religious duties especially.
Therapeutic theology is the belief
that God exists to serve me.
His job is to make my life good and well
and secure and happy and at peace.
His job is to stop the bad things happening in life.
God's job is to be a servant,
if you like,
responsible for taking care of my wants and my needs.
And deism means that he's basically
pretty much to stay out of the way
unless, of course, I need him.
Don't interfere in my life.
Just stay out of the way until I need you.
And so you put that together
and it's a worldview
that way too many Christians operate,
especially in the Western world,
is that if I do the right thing by God,
then he will do the right thing by me.
And when things don't work out as I plan,
his job is to jump in and fix it.
That's what he does.
And it's a fatal distortion
that so many operate with.
Of course, when he doesn't work
the way that I expect him to work
or determine him to work,
that's when faith in God
is deeply, deeply rocked.
One of the characteristics
of genuine Christian faith
is it lets God be God.
We submit to his wisdom
and his sovereign rule over all things.
And in chapter three,
the final chapter of Habakkuk,
we see Habakkuk practicing genuine faith.
And the whole chapter is a prayer of faith.
But there's something else I want us to see.
Even though he's practicing faith,
he's a man deeply grieved at the same time.
In verse 16,
we get a glimpse into what faith in troubled time
actually looks like in practice.
Have a look at verse 16 with you.
Get your Bibles open.
Habakkuk 3 verse 16.
This is really important.
Listen.
I heard my heart pounded.
I heard and my heart pounded.
Now, literally,
what that reads in the literal language,
in the original language,
is my bowels trembled.
Now, try not to think about that too much.
But wherever your mind went in that moment,
that's exactly what's going on here.
My bowels trembled.
My lips quivered at the sound.
That is, he's crying.
He's crying uncontrollably.
Decay crept into my bones
and my legs trembled.
He is shaking like a leaf.
He is so overwhelmed with grief and sorrow.
And then he says,
yet I will wait patiently,
which means a deep peace and repose.
Yet I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come
on the nation invading us.
He's weeping uncontrollably with sorrow.
He needs to change his underwear.
He's a crumbled mess on the ground.
And at the same time,
he is filled with peace.
Now, we have trouble with that.
We think you can either have grief and sorrow
or you can have peace and joy.
It is possible, according to this,
to be in deep sorrow
and yet rejoice at exactly the same time.
Joy in the Lord happens within the sorrow,
not once the sorrow passes.
It's a mistake to think that sorrow and grief
is a lack of faith,
as we often might interpret it in our modern eyes.
Job chapter one, earlier on,
is a clear example of this,
earlier on in the Old Testament.
Horrible things happened to Job.
Lost his family, lost his fortune,
lost his friends, lost his health.
And it says,
he tore his garments,
he fell on the ground
and he cried out to God.
And then it says,
in all these things,
Job did not sin.
Don't be afraid of the grief.
Grief is not the opposite of faith.
It can, in fact,
enhance our faith in God
because it drives us into God.
The grief drove Habakkuk into God
rather than away from God.
And that's what faith is.
Faith allows you to feel the grief
in such a way that it doesn't sink you.
And the remarkable thing,
as I've already pointed out here,
is that it's not just that his grief
and faith go together,
but his grief and joy go together.
As we venture into verses 17 and 18 of chapter 3,
we see that Habakkuk's faith
flowed over into joy in troubled times.
Now, we struggle with this one as well.
We don't just struggle with grief and faith,
but we struggle with joy and grief
in troubled times.
Normally, we declare God is good
when the fig tree is fruitful,
when the health is good,
when the money's there,
when the holiday was a blast,
when we're surrounded by loved ones,
when the circumstances are going
the way that we assume
that they should go,
we go,
ah,
God is so good to me.
And yet,
there's nothing remarkably Christian about that.
Anyone can do that.
Habakkuk found a way
to access the goodness of God
despite the calamity.
Most people infer the goodness of God
when things are going well.
Habakkuk, on the other hand,
came into direct contact with it
when things were going terribly wrong.
Have a look at verses 17 and 18.
Though the fig tree does not bud
and there's no grapes on the vine,
though the olive crops fail
and the field produces no food,
though there are no sheep in the pen,
no cattle's in the stall,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord.
I will be joyful in God my Saviour.
Now, what he mentions here
is no small matter.
There's no crops,
there's no food,
there's no sheep,
there's no cattle.
It's a calamity.
It's like all the crops have failed.
There's no imports coming in.
The shelves of Woolworths and Coles
and every other,
they're all empty,
not just the toilet paper
and the flour.
Everything's gone.
There's no storehouses out.
Wherever they are in this country
are empty.
Well, there's nothing coming in.
This is an absolute social disaster.
And that is what's coming
when the Babylonians are coming.
And yet he rejoices
and he is joyful.
His joy doesn't replace the sorrow.
His joy doesn't come after the sorrow.
When the grief drives you into God,
it drives you into the joy
that only God provides.
And therefore,
you can grieve deeply
without being crushed.
So the question before us
is how did Habakkuk get to that point?
How did he get to verses 16, 17, 18 and 19?
How did he get there?
Well, the rest of chapter three answers that.
We get a glimpse of it
in the introduction in his prayer
in verse one of chapter three.
Lord, I have heard of your fame.
I stand in awe of your deeds, O Lord.
Renew them in our day.
In our time, make them known.
In wrath, remember mercy.
Now, Habakkuk's grief and joy
expressing faith in God
is based on God's track record.
That's the rest of Habakkuk, Habakkuk three.
It's the first part of this chapter.
Habakkuk looks back at God's track record
of saving his people.
Now, what you see in this first 15 verses,
if you like,
is the recounting of the Exodus events
events of Israel,
where God rescues his people
out of slavery in Egypt.
And the main thing that Habakkuk does
in chapter three,
and is the source of his joy,
is he remembers.
Habakkuk remembers God's mighty acts
of judgment on Israel
with the devastating 10 plagues.
He remembers the spectacular way
in which God rescued Israel
from oppressive slavery in Egypt.
He remembers the trampling of the sea
and the destruction of the Egyptian army
as they attempt to follow Israel
through the sea,
and yet God closed the waters over them.
He remembers the shaking of Mount Sinai
as God appears to Moses
and gave Israel the Ten Commandments
as his newly formed people.
He remembers the day
that the sun stood still in the sky
as God brought judgment upon the Amorites
through his people.
He remembers the parting of the Jordan River
for Israel to walk across on dry land
so that they could go in
and take possession of their new, new home,
the promised land.
See, what Habakkuk remembers
is the Exodus events,
rescuing from slavery,
the formation of the people of God
and being taken in to the place
that God would dwell with them
in the promised land.
The Exodus events,
the salvation event
in the Old Testament.
Abakkuk is going,
if you like,
back to the gospel
as he knew it.
Israel was in slavery.
They didn't have the power
to get themselves out of it.
God came
and miraculously did
what they could not do
through the leadership of Moses.
They were saved
by what God did
for them
through Moses.
Habakkuk is remembering
the saving of God's people
until he gets to verse 16
and he has peace.
He connects what he knows
about God's saving actions
in the past
and he puts them
into his present.
In his confusion,
in his uncertainty
and his pain
of his current calamity,
Habakkuk looks back
at the faithfulness of God
through history
and everything
that God has done for them
and the result of it
and he has peace.
He's reminded
of God's trustworthiness
and goodness
his mercy,
his salvation.
That's what gets him
to his place of peace
and joy
in verses 16 to 19.
But let me just say,
if you are listening
to this right now,
you and I
have got a leg up
on Habakkuk
because we get
a perspective
of even the
exodus events
that even Habakkuk
doesn't get.
We've got a little bit
more of an insight here.
We get
that by virtue,
that is,
we get this perspective
by virtue
that we are living
on this side
of history,
of the life,
the ministry,
the death
and the resurrection
and the ascension
of Jesus Christ.
In Jesus Christ,
we can be loved
and accepted
and approved
by God
in a way
that even Habakkuk
couldn't fully grasp
with the exodus events.
The exodus events
where Moses leads Israel
from slavery
into their new home,
the promised land
where God would dwell
with his people
was simply a forerunner
to a greater rescue
and a permanent
future home.
The exodus
that Jesus
pulls off
is the ultimate
one.
You see,
Moses
risked his life
to liberate Israel
from social
and political bondage
in Egypt.
Jesus gave
his life
to liberate
us
from evil
and wickedness
and sin
and death
itself.
On the night
before the liberation
that Moses
commanded Israel
to slay a lamb
and to put their blood
on the doorposts
of their houses
so that the angel
of death
would go straight
pass over
their house,
that they would live
and be liberated
from slavery.
and yet we hear
in the New Testament
that Jesus
is
the Lamb
of God
who shed
his blood
so that God's
judgment
would pass
over us
and that we
would be liberated
from sin
and death
and live forever
with him.
In Exodus
28
we read
that Moses
engraved
the names
of Israel
the children
of Israel
on precious
stones
and he had
those stones
placed
on the breastplate
of the high priest.
So when the high priest
wearing the breastplate
walked into
the tabernacle
to do ministry
before God
on behalf
of the people
of Israel
he had their names
written
over his heart.
And we discover
in the New Testament
that Jesus
is the great
high priest
who sits
at God's
right hand
intervening
for those
who are his.
And our
advocate
the Lord
Jesus
he has
our names
those who
trust in him
written
in his heart.
All
who have
faith
in him
are precious
to him
they are
priceless
to him
and that's
what lasts
and that is
why
the Christian
still has
everything
even
when
they lose
everything.
they
are
told to do
and they're
so excited
that things went
so well
they had
power
they're becoming
famous
they're
accomplishing
great
things
and Jesus
says to them
in verse 20
do not rejoice
that the spirit
submit to you
but rejoice
that your names
are written
in heaven.
what he is
saying
is that
your value
your worth
your importance
your significance
your happiness
your joy
is not tied
and should not be tied
by what you accomplish.
He is saying
that there is
something even
greater
than power
and wealth
and reputation
and achievement
knowledge
it is that
your name
is engraved
in heaven.
More important
than your name
being on a degree
on a
on a desk
on
on the top
of a large
bank account
a title deed
an award
is that
it is
engraved
in heaven.
And what he's
saying here
in Luke 10
he stops
savoring
and treasuring
and doting
and fondling
in your mind
the things
that are
so easily
destroyed
by calamity
by viruses
by disease
by hardship
by suffering
by global
financial crises
when circumstances
change
and they
will
for all
of us
he says
you will fall
in that moment
eternal life
in Jesus
is the
only thing
that the
Babylonian army
cannot destroy
as we just
read
from
Romans chapter
8
who shall
separate us
from the love
of Christ
shall trouble
or hardship
or persecution
or famine
or nakedness
or danger
or sword
no
in all
these things
we
that is
those
who put
their faith
in Jesus
Christ
are more
than conquerors
through him
who loves
us
for I'm
convinced
that neither
death
nor life
nor angels
nor demons
neither the
present nor the
future
nor any
powers
neither height
nor depth
nor anything
else in all
of creation
will be able
to separate
us
from the
love of God
that is in
Christ Jesus
our Lord
when calamity
comes
when the times
of trouble
come
all things
can be taken
away from us
except this
one
the one
of promise
of life
forever
the one
promise
that you
are my
much loved
child
that is
secure
nothing
can touch
that
the source
of joy
in the
Christian
life
is not
whether
things are
working out
in my
life
in the
moment
the way
that I
expect
them to
be
it's
not even
what God
might
in fact
be doing
in me
right now
it is
what God
has done
for me
then
in Jesus
historically
2000
years ago
that guarantees
a future
for me
forever
of hope
and joy
for the
Christian
even the
worst of
things
will turn
out for
good
the good
things can
never be
taken away
and the
best things
are yet
to come
so how
do we
fuel a
life of
joy
despite
the
circumstances
now this
is the
great thing
about
Habakkuk
if you
followed us
through this
season
over the
last
you know
it's been
a quick
one
four messages
through
Habakkuk
but you
notice it
starts with
complaint
the book
of Habakkuk
starts with
Habakkuk
complaining
against God
because of
the coming
calamity
and yet
it ends
with joy
verse 18
again
yet I
will rejoice
in the
Lord
I will
be joyful
in God
my
saviour
now this
is not
a
classic
stiff
upper lip
attitude
from Habakkuk
this is not
Habakkuk
being stoic
here
and it's
not him
being
indifferent
to the
trouble
we fuel
our joy
in troubled
times
by constantly
going back
to the
gospel
of the
Lord
Jesus
Christ
and
remembering
see
Habakkuk
in verse
18
says the
same
thing
twice
I will
rejoice
I'll
be
joyful
says it
twice
remembering
repeating
it
repeating
it
repeating
it
Habakkuk
is calling
us here
to the
discipline
of going
back
remembering
and rejoicing
in what
we have
now at
first glance
it's easy
to miss
the way
that this
prayer
ends
there's
this little
subscription
at the
end
which reads
for the
director
of music
on my
stringed
instruments
you see
this
chapter
is not
merely
a personal
resolution
of faith
which was
achieved
by
Habakkuk
this
prayer
of
faithful
submission
to
God
is
meant
to be
duplicated
and celebrated
amongst God's
people for
generations to
come
this prayer
is intentionally
placed in
the first
person
so that it
draws each
of us
into the
prayer
into the
experience of
surrendering to
God together
and rejoicing
in his
salvation
and so
while the
mood of
Habakkuk
is somber
this
song
is not
somber
verses
17 and
18
of Habakkuk
3
would have
to be
some of
the most
uplifting
verses
in the
entire
Bible
integral
to the
life
of faith
despite
the
calamities
is turning
our
remembering
of the
gospel
into
repeated
praise
of
and to
the
redeemer
and the
sustainer
of life
the Lord
Jesus
Christ
you see
rejoicing
in the
gospel
means to
treasure it
it means
to savor
it
it means
rejoicing
is to
take
something
that has
happened
and to
say
this
is the
most
important
thing
that's
happened
to me
over
and over
again
rejoicing
is to
adore
who God
is
and what
he has
achieved
it's not
the same
as knowing
it's not
the same
as thinking
it is
appreciating
it is
valuing
in his
daily
devotional
book
my rock
my refuge
Tim Keller
writes this
the character
of this
praise
that is
praise
to God
is to
be
glorious
what is
glorious
praise
glory
has
connotations
of
weightiness
dignity
magnificence
and beauty
glorious
worship
is
exuberant
never
half-hearted
it is
attractive
not off-putting
it is
awesome
never
sentimental
it is
brilliant
not
careless
it points
to God
not to
the
speakers
so
worship
should
never
be
trivial
never
pretentious
and so
as we
draw
our time
in Habakkuk
to a
close
in this
coronavirus
season
we're going
to do
that now
not with
the words
of Habakkuk
three
but with
words
written
by
another
one
who
faced
a day
of
calamity
more
than
2,000
years
after
Habakkuk
Horatio
Gates
Spafford
was a
prominent
American
lawyer
and
Presbyterian
church
elder
in the
1800s
he
lost
almost
his
entire
fortune
in the
great
fire
of
Chicago
of
1871
scarlet
fever
killed
his
four
year
old
son
in
exactly
the
same
year
and
two
years
later
he
decided
to
take a
holiday
take the
family
what was
left of
his
family
on
holiday
to
Europe
for
some
respite
unfortunately
Spafford
was held
up with
business
and so
he had
to stay
behind
but his
wife
and his
four
daughters
travelled
ahead of
him
to
Europe
and he
was going
to meet
them
afterwards
on the
22nd
of
November
1873
while crossing
the
Atlantic
the ship
that his
wife and
his four
daughters
were on
was struck
by an
iron
sailing
vessel
and it
sunk
and
226
people
lost
their
lives
including
all
four
of
Spafford's
daughters
when his
wife finally
got
to
Europe
she sent
a telegram
saved
alone
Spafford
sailed to
England
as soon
as he
could
and as
he sailed
over the
location
of his
daughter's
death
in the
Atlantic
Ocean
he wrote
a hymn
it's called
It Is
Well
With My
Soul
Though
Satan
should
buffet
though
his
trial
should
come
let
this
blessed
assurance
control
that
Christ
has
regarded
my
helpless
estate
and
has
shed
his
own
blood
for
my
soul
my
sin
oh
the
bliss
of
this
glorious
thought
my
sin
not
in
part
but
the
whole
is
nailed
to
his
cross
and
I
bear
it
no
more
praise
the
Lord
praise
the
Lord
oh
my
soul
let's
stand
and
sing
that
together