WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.560 Inevitable and irreversible. 00:00:05.560 --> 00:00:11.240 Those are two words that are there in the verdict of that report that I'm sure you heard 00:00:11.240 --> 00:00:19.019 about in the news in August, just last month, by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 00:00:19.019 --> 00:00:24.640 Because what they're telling us is that the world's climate has undeniably changed, and 00:00:24.640 --> 00:00:29.980 even if we are able to stave off the worst effects of that in the longer term, if we 00:00:29.980 --> 00:00:35.719 act now and do something about it, and that will be possible in November over in the other 00:00:35.719 --> 00:00:38.920 city in Glasgow at the COP26. 00:00:38.920 --> 00:00:45.399 Even no matter what we do in a sense, we cannot go back to even where we were about 00:00:45.399 --> 00:00:47.320 50 years ago or so. 00:00:47.320 --> 00:00:51.960 I have to say that the most dramatic thing that I read around that report when it came 00:00:51.960 --> 00:00:58.600 out was one scientist saying that all the achievements of the human race in the last 00:00:58.600 --> 00:01:05.400 10,000 years, now that takes you right back to the very earliest, even of biblical times, 00:01:05.400 --> 00:01:09.640 all the achievements of the human race in 10,000 years have happened within a global 00:01:09.640 --> 00:01:12.560 climate that has gone forever. 00:01:12.560 --> 00:01:18.200 No matter what we do, we're not going back to where we were before. 00:01:18.200 --> 00:01:20.159 So it's scary. 00:01:20.159 --> 00:01:26.200 Meanwhile, of course, our COVID pandemic that we're still struggling with rages on and 00:01:26.200 --> 00:01:30.600 is claiming millions of lives around the world and livelihoods even in this country 00:01:30.600 --> 00:01:33.280 and will probably not be the last. 00:01:33.280 --> 00:01:37.320 Because again, scientists are saying that very likely there will be more such pandemics 00:01:37.320 --> 00:01:41.960 of the same sort where viruses jump from animals to humans. 00:01:41.960 --> 00:01:47.560 And then we've got Afghanistan and the more forgotten places that we were thinking about 00:01:47.560 --> 00:01:53.000 just a while ago like Myanmar and Ethiopia and Yemen and Lebanon. 00:01:53.000 --> 00:01:55.600 And so it goes on. 00:01:55.599 --> 00:02:00.759 And so as Derek was praying in his prayer just a moment ago, we are baffled, we are 00:02:00.759 --> 00:02:06.679 puzzled, we are grieved by our world and our hearts bleed for the suffering of so many 00:02:06.679 --> 00:02:15.079 people and our, like, habecox, our knees tremble for the suffering of the earth itself. 00:02:15.079 --> 00:02:20.959 And so where can we turn in the Bible as we struggle with these things in our minds and 00:02:20.959 --> 00:02:21.959 our hearts? 00:02:21.960 --> 00:02:27.800 Well, this prophet that I've just read from, the prophet Habakkuk, he also lived at a terrifying 00:02:27.800 --> 00:02:33.920 time in his own era of history in which the same questions that I've just sort of raised 00:02:33.920 --> 00:02:39.200 about where do we turn, what do we think, where is God in all of this, we're afflicting 00:02:39.200 --> 00:02:40.200 him. 00:02:40.200 --> 00:02:46.360 He lived in a world in which the idols of, in his own country of Judah, a little tiny 00:02:46.360 --> 00:02:52.040 little country of Judah, was plagued with the idols of lies and injustice and violence, 00:02:52.040 --> 00:02:54.520 which he talks about in those first few verses. 00:02:54.520 --> 00:02:59.480 And as he looked at the international scene, it was a world which was afflicted by the 00:02:59.480 --> 00:03:06.680 idolatries of international terrorism and war and violence and military power with the 00:03:06.680 --> 00:03:11.440 great powers of Assyria and then Babylon, which was about to invade Judah. 00:03:11.440 --> 00:03:15.080 So it was a terrifying world in which he lived. 00:03:15.080 --> 00:03:20.880 And so how can we take his little, only three chapters there in Habakkuk, and I encourage 00:03:20.880 --> 00:03:27.120 you to read it and to think about it in response to what I've been saying this morning and 00:03:27.120 --> 00:03:29.680 see what it has to say to us. 00:03:29.680 --> 00:03:34.320 And the first thing that I wanted to bring from it is this, if we move on, is that Habakkuk 00:03:34.320 --> 00:03:40.120 calls us to be a people who look for God at work in the world. 00:03:40.120 --> 00:03:43.240 See, that's what he's doing there in chapter one, isn't it? 00:03:43.240 --> 00:03:49.480 He wants to see God in action and he cries out to God to listen to him because he just 00:03:49.480 --> 00:03:53.760 can't understand what's going on and why God is doing nothing. 00:03:53.760 --> 00:03:56.120 Why are the wicked being so successful? 00:03:56.120 --> 00:03:59.159 How long do I have to wait for anything to happen? 00:03:59.159 --> 00:04:01.320 Why do you make me look at injustice? 00:04:01.320 --> 00:04:07.960 The law seems to be paralyzed, justice never prevails, and it sounds just like our world 00:04:07.960 --> 00:04:09.400 today. 00:04:09.400 --> 00:04:14.760 But God answers him in the second half of chapter one and then on to chapter two. 00:04:14.760 --> 00:04:18.639 God answers him by saying, in fact, look, Habakkuk, you need to look wider, you need 00:04:18.639 --> 00:04:21.280 to look deeper, look at the nations. 00:04:21.280 --> 00:04:25.319 I'm already there, I'm present, I'm active, I'm at work. 00:04:25.319 --> 00:04:26.840 Do you see what he says? 00:04:26.840 --> 00:04:30.120 I am doing a work in your days. 00:04:30.120 --> 00:04:34.759 Literally in the Hebrew that is, I am working a work already. 00:04:34.759 --> 00:04:38.840 Not so much that he's only just about to do something which he is, but that he's already 00:04:38.839 --> 00:04:40.759 there, he's already active. 00:04:40.759 --> 00:04:42.079 God is present. 00:04:42.079 --> 00:04:44.359 God is not forgotten. 00:04:44.359 --> 00:04:48.560 It's not as if when we look at the world and are astounded, God is, oh, I didn't notice 00:04:48.560 --> 00:04:49.560 that. 00:04:49.560 --> 00:04:51.039 God already knows. 00:04:51.039 --> 00:04:56.519 However, the problem is, of course, that when God does answer Habakkuk and tells him what 00:04:56.519 --> 00:05:01.199 he's going to do, it seems to make things even worse because God says, well, if Judah 00:05:01.199 --> 00:05:04.879 is bad, I'm going to bring my judgment on Judah, don't worry, I'm going to judge those 00:05:04.879 --> 00:05:09.759 wicked people in your country, but I'm going to do it by raising a Babylon. 00:05:09.759 --> 00:05:14.439 And the Babylonians, as Habakkuk, well, knew were even worse. 00:05:14.439 --> 00:05:18.560 And they are described, if you read it sometime in the second half of chapter one, and Habakkuk 00:05:18.560 --> 00:05:19.560 knew it. 00:05:19.560 --> 00:05:22.560 He knew what kind of people the Babylonians would be. 00:05:22.560 --> 00:05:27.680 He knew what his country would suffer if they were to invade, all the destruction that would 00:05:27.680 --> 00:05:31.600 happen and the death and the siege and everything else. 00:05:31.600 --> 00:05:38.000 But here's the point, you see, having raised the question with God and having heard God 00:05:38.000 --> 00:05:46.879 speak at last, he knows that God is still active, God is sovereign, God is in his world. 00:05:46.879 --> 00:05:52.240 That doesn't make it any less scary, but he does know that it's in God's hands and he's 00:05:52.240 --> 00:05:56.080 willing to look and see and wait for that to happen. 00:05:56.080 --> 00:06:00.720 And so that's my first point in a sense that like Habakkuk, we need to have the courage 00:06:00.720 --> 00:06:08.000 and it does take courage to have some discernment, to be asking that question, where do I see 00:06:08.000 --> 00:06:13.720 God at work, even in the midst of the evils and the horrors that are evil to him as to 00:06:13.720 --> 00:06:14.800 us? 00:06:14.800 --> 00:06:17.800 Where is God at work? 00:06:17.800 --> 00:06:21.560 And historically, of course, we can look and see that God has been at work even in some 00:06:21.560 --> 00:06:23.360 of the most terrible times. 00:06:23.360 --> 00:06:29.480 And remember writing to my friend, Riyad Kasis, who's a Syrian scholar, lives in Lebanon. 00:06:29.480 --> 00:06:33.920 He heads up our Langham scholar programs, a wonderful Christian brother. 00:06:33.920 --> 00:06:38.080 He lives in that, in the mess that the country of Lebanon now is. 00:06:38.080 --> 00:06:41.800 But you remember a few years ago at the beginning of the Arab Spring and there's awful things 00:06:41.800 --> 00:06:43.600 that are happening in Syria. 00:06:43.600 --> 00:06:47.480 And I wrote to Riyad to say, you know, we struggle with you. 00:06:47.480 --> 00:06:52.280 We're just wondering what on earth is happening, what is God doing in the Middle East, in the 00:06:52.280 --> 00:06:53.280 midst of all this? 00:06:53.280 --> 00:06:58.720 And I said, perhaps we may have to wait 50 years to see the results of what God will 00:06:58.720 --> 00:07:02.520 have done because I was using the example of China. 00:07:02.520 --> 00:07:08.160 Because I'm just old enough to remember in the early 1950s when the communists came to 00:07:08.160 --> 00:07:14.600 power in China and expelled all the Western missionaries, how the missionary world at 00:07:14.600 --> 00:07:17.360 that time was convulsed with bafflement. 00:07:17.360 --> 00:07:18.360 What is God doing? 00:07:18.360 --> 00:07:22.840 If all the missionaries have left China, that would be the end of the church in China. 00:07:22.840 --> 00:07:27.840 You know, they thought at the time, well, how wrong they were. 00:07:27.839 --> 00:07:32.479 The fact is that this morning there will have been more Christians worshiping in churches 00:07:32.479 --> 00:07:37.519 in communist China than in all of Western Europe put together. 00:07:37.519 --> 00:07:42.679 The church in China has grown phenomenally in the past half century, in the midst of 00:07:42.679 --> 00:07:46.519 all the pressures and struggles and persecution that's going on there. 00:07:46.519 --> 00:07:50.599 So I wrote that to Riyad and I said, you know, maybe we'll have to wait like in China to 00:07:50.599 --> 00:07:51.919 see what God is doing. 00:07:51.919 --> 00:07:56.879 And he wrote back in the way he can, sort of almost gently and humorously rebuking me 00:07:56.879 --> 00:07:58.839 and saying, we won't have to wait 50 years. 00:07:58.839 --> 00:08:02.120 We can already see what God is doing in the Middle East. 00:08:02.120 --> 00:08:08.159 And how so many Syrian refugees who had come from Syria to Lebanon had been loved and befriended 00:08:08.159 --> 00:08:13.159 by Christian churches there and had come to feel something of the truth and love of God 00:08:13.159 --> 00:08:14.159 and of the gospel. 00:08:14.159 --> 00:08:17.360 Now, that doesn't make what happens in Syria good. 00:08:17.360 --> 00:08:21.639 It just simply proves that even when human beings do their worst and when evil was at 00:08:21.639 --> 00:08:27.879 its worst that God is still at work and God is still building his kingdom, even in such 00:08:27.879 --> 00:08:28.879 circumstances. 00:08:28.879 --> 00:08:34.720 So that's the first thing Habakkuk calls us to open our eyes and to live as those who 00:08:34.720 --> 00:08:38.840 are aware that God is still sovereign and God is at work in the world. 00:08:38.840 --> 00:08:42.919 But that moves us to the second thing because it means that we also therefore need to live 00:08:42.919 --> 00:08:49.000 as people who live by faith because that's the second thing that God says to Habakkuk 00:08:49.000 --> 00:08:52.639 in chapter 2, at some point you can look at there. 00:08:52.639 --> 00:08:59.600 But in chapter 2 verse 4, we read this famous verse, the righteous shall live by faith. 00:08:59.600 --> 00:09:03.519 The righteous person, righteous people must live by faith. 00:09:03.519 --> 00:09:07.399 Now that verse Habakkuk 2,4, the righteous shall live by faith, of course quite famous 00:09:07.399 --> 00:09:13.120 because the apostle Paul quotes it in Romans chapter 1 when he's talking about how God 00:09:13.120 --> 00:09:19.360 has brought us salvation and put us right with God, not by our works, not through anything 00:09:19.360 --> 00:09:21.879 we can do but simply by faith. 00:09:21.879 --> 00:09:26.279 And of course Paul is talking about faith in the Lord Jesus Christ so that as we trust 00:09:26.279 --> 00:09:29.399 God for our salvation we are put right by God. 00:09:29.399 --> 00:09:34.080 We receive justification by faith in the classic words of that doctrine. 00:09:34.080 --> 00:09:37.919 But that's not what Habakkuk is talking about just here. 00:09:37.919 --> 00:09:43.319 What Habakkuk is talking about here is that those who have come into a right relationship 00:09:43.319 --> 00:09:48.079 with God by faith must go on living by faith. 00:09:48.079 --> 00:09:51.120 It's only actually three words in Hebrew but it's so powerful. 00:09:51.120 --> 00:09:56.959 The righteous person by faith or by their faith shall live. 00:09:56.959 --> 00:10:00.959 They've got to live, go on living by faith in God. 00:10:00.959 --> 00:10:07.279 Faithful trust and obedience to God even in the midst of the evils and the bafflement 00:10:07.279 --> 00:10:13.000 and the struggles of this world that we go on trusting that in the end God is going to 00:10:13.000 --> 00:10:15.199 put things right. 00:10:15.199 --> 00:10:20.399 And that's you see where this chapter, Habakkuk chapter 2 then goes on. 00:10:20.399 --> 00:10:28.079 It may seem paradoxical but what God does is that he assures Habakkuk that he will ultimately 00:10:28.079 --> 00:10:35.559 deal with the wicked, that evil will not have the last word in our world and that even the 00:10:35.559 --> 00:10:41.159 idolatries and the wickedness and the violence that was there in his world under the Babylonians 00:10:41.159 --> 00:10:44.799 and under King Nebuchadnezzar, God would deal with it. 00:10:44.799 --> 00:10:48.159 Now when you read the rest of this chapter, I'm not going to take time to do it now, you'll 00:10:48.159 --> 00:10:54.199 find that there are five woes in the chapter and that woe is effectively God saying, I 00:10:54.199 --> 00:10:57.159 will judge this, I will deal with this. 00:10:57.159 --> 00:11:01.519 And there are five of them and the list is surprisingly modern. 00:11:01.519 --> 00:11:06.879 If you look at them you'll see there in verses 6 to 8 that it talks about piling up wealth 00:11:06.879 --> 00:11:09.600 through extortion and theft from the nations. 00:11:09.600 --> 00:11:15.360 Woe to him who builds this house by unjust gain, you have plotted the ruin of many peoples 00:11:15.360 --> 00:11:17.159 building up your own house. 00:11:17.159 --> 00:11:19.399 Well isn't that happening today? 00:11:19.399 --> 00:11:24.360 Secondly there are those who build security for themselves while impoverishing others. 00:11:24.360 --> 00:11:30.240 Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and a time by injustice. 00:11:30.240 --> 00:11:32.840 Again that's happening all over the world. 00:11:32.840 --> 00:11:37.680 And thirdly there are those who build cities on the foundation of bloodshed and slavery 00:11:37.680 --> 00:11:39.680 in verses 12 to 13. 00:11:39.680 --> 00:11:46.159 There's a woe against those who humiliate their enemies in verses 15 and 16 and remarkably 00:11:46.159 --> 00:11:49.519 those who are destroying God's creation. 00:11:49.519 --> 00:11:52.120 This makes it uncannily modern. 00:11:52.120 --> 00:11:58.399 Woe to those who, this is, let me just check again in verses 17. 00:11:58.399 --> 00:12:03.840 The violence that you have done to Lebanon, which means not just the country but the forests 00:12:03.840 --> 00:12:08.039 because Lebanon was a way of speaking of the cedars of Lebanon, the violence you have done 00:12:08.039 --> 00:12:13.679 to the forests and the trees will overwhelm you and your destructions of animals will 00:12:13.679 --> 00:12:20.480 terrify you for you have shared human blood and destroyed land and cities and everyone 00:12:20.480 --> 00:12:22.000 in them. 00:12:22.000 --> 00:12:26.720 It's calling to account those who are the destroyers of the earth as well as the destroyers 00:12:26.720 --> 00:12:28.120 of human life. 00:12:28.120 --> 00:12:30.840 Uncanny modern, Habakkuk 2 verse 17. 00:12:30.840 --> 00:12:35.320 And in all of this at the end of the chapter it speaks of those who are worshiping false 00:12:35.320 --> 00:12:41.879 gods, the idolatry that produces these results, which is exactly what Paul talks about in 00:12:41.879 --> 00:12:46.320 Romans 1 because human beings have rejected God. 00:12:46.320 --> 00:12:52.360 We end up with a complete mess that we are in socially, personally, morally, spiritually 00:12:52.360 --> 00:12:53.879 in Romans 1. 00:12:53.879 --> 00:12:57.440 But you see what God is saying here is that God knows all this. 00:12:57.440 --> 00:13:03.080 God understands all this and God pronounces a woe against such behavior. 00:13:03.080 --> 00:13:05.480 God will judge the earth. 00:13:05.480 --> 00:13:09.440 We just sung that in Psalm 96. 00:13:09.440 --> 00:13:15.600 The end of Psalm 96, the whole of creation is pictured as rejoicing. 00:13:15.600 --> 00:13:17.520 Why is creation rejoicing? 00:13:17.520 --> 00:13:22.560 Because says the Psalm, God is coming and God is coming to do what? 00:13:22.560 --> 00:13:26.680 To judge the earth with equity and with righteousness. 00:13:26.679 --> 00:13:29.959 And when God judges the earth, he will put things right. 00:13:29.959 --> 00:13:35.959 He will deal with all wrongs and he will put all things right before ultimately he makes 00:13:35.959 --> 00:13:39.120 all things new in the new creation. 00:13:39.120 --> 00:13:44.079 And that's of course what takes us to the end of the Bible to Revelation, chapters 18 to 00:13:44.079 --> 00:13:45.199 22. 00:13:45.199 --> 00:13:49.599 So trust me says God in Habakkuk 2. 00:13:49.599 --> 00:13:53.599 Go on living by faith. 00:13:53.600 --> 00:14:01.720 Faith in the sovereign justice of God, just as faith in the sovereign grace of God for 00:14:01.720 --> 00:14:03.519 our salvation. 00:14:03.519 --> 00:14:09.360 God has put us right through faith in his son and God will ultimately put all things 00:14:09.360 --> 00:14:13.920 right in the final rectification of the final judgment. 00:14:13.920 --> 00:14:15.320 Now that's a challenge to us. 00:14:15.320 --> 00:14:16.600 It's not easy to do that. 00:14:16.600 --> 00:14:20.600 It's not easy to go on saying Lord, I trust you, Lord, I don't know what's happening 00:14:20.600 --> 00:14:23.080 and it's horrible and I hate it. 00:14:23.080 --> 00:14:31.280 But I trust that in the end the judge of all the earth will do right as Abraham says. 00:14:31.280 --> 00:14:35.680 But even as we believe that it leads us to our third point that we need therefore I think 00:14:35.680 --> 00:14:42.680 to live as people whose prayer can include lament and protest. 00:14:42.680 --> 00:14:48.640 It's not contradictory to live with faith and to live with protest. 00:14:48.639 --> 00:14:56.399 You see Habakkuk, this book of Habakkuk stands among many in the Bible, including many of 00:14:56.399 --> 00:15:04.360 the Psalms as we know, people like Jeremiah, like Job, even Jesus himself on the cross. 00:15:04.360 --> 00:15:05.360 Why? 00:15:05.360 --> 00:15:09.360 Why, my God, my God, have you forsaken me? 00:15:09.360 --> 00:15:18.159 This voice, this cry of lament, of question, of protest, that's suffering and evil. 00:15:18.159 --> 00:15:22.159 It's there in the Bible and I think sadly we often ignore it. 00:15:22.159 --> 00:15:23.159 We overlook it. 00:15:23.159 --> 00:15:27.879 We sort of blanket out of our thinking and our worship. 00:15:27.879 --> 00:15:31.559 You see, now I hope you don't get me wrong here. 00:15:31.559 --> 00:15:37.039 In our churches, in our services, of course, we pray for our government. 00:15:37.039 --> 00:15:42.559 We pray for our nation as we ought, as we're commanded to by the Apostle Paul and that's 00:15:42.559 --> 00:15:45.319 absolutely right that we should do so. 00:15:45.320 --> 00:15:50.320 Our leaders, our government, our rulers, they need God whether they acknowledge Him or not. 00:15:50.320 --> 00:15:56.280 They need God's wisdom, they need God's strength, they need the gospel too, of course, because 00:15:56.280 --> 00:15:58.280 like the rest of us, they are sinners. 00:15:58.280 --> 00:16:03.440 They need to be confronted with repentance and truth and the gospel and come to repentance 00:16:03.440 --> 00:16:04.440 and faith. 00:16:04.440 --> 00:16:11.480 So yes, we should pray for our country and our leaders and our rulers and our government. 00:16:11.480 --> 00:16:15.639 But do we ever pray against them? 00:16:15.639 --> 00:16:18.600 Because the Psalms often do. 00:16:18.600 --> 00:16:24.000 Many of the Psalms, when they are confronted with people who are in authority, judges or 00:16:24.000 --> 00:16:29.879 rulers who are doing wrong, who are doing what is wicked, who are telling lies, who are increasing 00:16:29.879 --> 00:16:34.279 suffering and poverty, they pray, Lord, will you stop them? 00:16:34.279 --> 00:16:35.960 And they pray against them. 00:16:35.960 --> 00:16:40.399 Like for example, Psalm 10, arise, Lord, lift up your hand, O God. 00:16:40.399 --> 00:16:42.199 Don't forget the helpless. 00:16:42.199 --> 00:16:44.840 The victims commit themselves to you. 00:16:44.840 --> 00:16:47.639 Break the arm of the wicked man. 00:16:47.639 --> 00:16:53.759 That's what one of the prayers in the Psalms, call the evil doer to account for his wickedness. 00:16:53.759 --> 00:16:59.039 Psalm 10, Psalm 140, do not grant the wicked their desires, Lord. 00:16:59.039 --> 00:17:01.319 Don't let their plans succeed. 00:17:01.319 --> 00:17:04.200 He prays in Psalm 140. 00:17:04.200 --> 00:17:09.759 And then in Psalm 12, because the poor are being plundered and the needy grown, I will 00:17:09.759 --> 00:17:15.160 now arise, says the Lord, and I will protect those from those who malign them. 00:17:15.160 --> 00:17:18.759 Do we pray those prayers ourselves? 00:17:18.759 --> 00:17:21.039 The Psalms are full of prayers like that. 00:17:21.039 --> 00:17:25.680 But I don't know what I ever last heard one used in a church service. 00:17:25.680 --> 00:17:27.879 And I sometimes wonder why? 00:17:27.879 --> 00:17:35.119 Why have we in a sense blanked out the voice of lament, of protest, of crying out to God 00:17:35.119 --> 00:17:40.239 against that which is evil in our world, even in our own country? 00:17:40.239 --> 00:17:46.799 And I would say that one thing that perhaps both this climate crisis and the pandemic 00:17:46.799 --> 00:17:52.359 and the violence in places like Afghanistan and elsewhere surely should be doing is bringing 00:17:52.359 --> 00:17:58.839 back to our attention the importance, the power of these words that God himself has 00:17:58.839 --> 00:18:00.719 given us in his word. 00:18:00.720 --> 00:18:04.759 God has said, look, this is what you could say to me, and I would listen. 00:18:04.759 --> 00:18:09.720 The voice of grief, the voice of protest, the voice of suffering, and the voice that 00:18:09.720 --> 00:18:14.240 objects when evil is done and says, God, how long are you going to let this go on? 00:18:14.240 --> 00:18:15.240 Why does it go on? 00:18:15.240 --> 00:18:17.000 When are you going to stop it? 00:18:17.000 --> 00:18:23.000 I think there's something perfectly valid and not contradictory about both praying 00:18:23.000 --> 00:18:30.160 for our leaders and in some respects, in these respects, praying against what they do when 00:18:30.160 --> 00:18:31.960 we know it to be evil. 00:18:31.960 --> 00:18:36.400 I think Habakkuk does both, and we should too. 00:18:36.400 --> 00:18:42.720 And then here's my fourth point, that Habakkuk calls us to live as people who know the story 00:18:42.720 --> 00:18:48.800 of God, by which I now mean, though he didn't at his time, mean the whole Scripture, the 00:18:48.800 --> 00:18:51.640 whole Bible, the whole story of God in the Bible. 00:18:51.640 --> 00:18:57.320 Because when you come to Habakkuk chapter three, it sounds to our ears all really a 00:18:57.320 --> 00:18:58.560 bit odd. 00:18:58.559 --> 00:19:00.799 It is effectively a song. 00:19:00.799 --> 00:19:05.039 Habakkuk turns, it says Habakkuk's prayer, the prayer of Habakkuk, but actually it's 00:19:05.039 --> 00:19:07.919 a kind of song because he puts it to music at the end. 00:19:07.919 --> 00:19:10.519 He says, go and play this and sing it. 00:19:10.519 --> 00:19:16.679 And it's a worship song in which he rehearses in his mind and in his singing many of the 00:19:16.679 --> 00:19:20.639 great episodes of the past history of his people. 00:19:20.639 --> 00:19:26.159 Now, that may not be terribly obvious because when you read this chapter, it's full of all 00:19:26.160 --> 00:19:29.640 kind of very poetic imagery. 00:19:29.640 --> 00:19:35.800 We've got smoke and plagues and pestilence and mountains shaking and rivers rising and 00:19:35.800 --> 00:19:37.440 all sorts of language. 00:19:37.440 --> 00:19:43.440 But what he's doing is he's talking about the great saving acts of God in the history 00:19:43.440 --> 00:19:44.440 of Israel. 00:19:44.440 --> 00:19:51.560 You will find fairly obvious echoes there of the Exodus, of the victory over the sea, 00:19:51.559 --> 00:19:58.879 the victory over the Canaanites, or probably also the victory of Deborah over the Canaanites 00:19:58.879 --> 00:19:59.879 and so on. 00:19:59.879 --> 00:20:04.799 So what he's doing is he's reminding himself of the story. 00:20:04.799 --> 00:20:08.039 Habakkuk knows the story he's in. 00:20:08.039 --> 00:20:11.480 He knows the people he belongs to. 00:20:11.480 --> 00:20:19.279 And so he uses that great story of the Scripture, this great story of God in his worship song 00:20:19.279 --> 00:20:26.799 to give him hope and faith and courage even when he's feeling angry and afraid as he 00:20:26.799 --> 00:20:30.559 still is at the end of this chapter. 00:20:30.559 --> 00:20:35.519 So what the book of Habakkuk is doing really, indeed what the whole Bible calls us to do, 00:20:35.519 --> 00:20:42.559 is to live our lives within the story of God, not just the story of the world. 00:20:42.559 --> 00:20:45.039 Now, of course, we have to live in the story of the world. 00:20:45.039 --> 00:20:46.039 We live here. 00:20:46.039 --> 00:20:47.799 We've got to participate in society. 00:20:47.799 --> 00:20:50.039 We've got to belong to our community. 00:20:50.039 --> 00:20:55.200 We've got to participate in all that is happening around us and be good citizens and engaged 00:20:55.200 --> 00:20:56.200 and so on in society. 00:20:56.200 --> 00:20:58.039 Yes, of course we must. 00:20:58.039 --> 00:21:02.720 But as we do that, what story is governing that? 00:21:02.720 --> 00:21:07.960 And the biblical story is the story which in a sense becomes the overarching pattern 00:21:07.960 --> 00:21:13.519 of our lives, or should be, that we believe in the God who created this world, that we 00:21:13.519 --> 00:21:19.039 know why things went wrong because we've rebelled against him, that we know God's promise to 00:21:19.039 --> 00:21:23.799 Abraham to bring blessing to all the nations on the earth, which is a great driving purpose 00:21:23.799 --> 00:21:28.720 of God through the story, that we know God has accomplished that redemption through the 00:21:28.720 --> 00:21:34.400 life and death and resurrection and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the focus 00:21:34.400 --> 00:21:38.559 of our faith and who has accomplished that salvation for us. 00:21:38.559 --> 00:21:43.639 And we know that ultimately where this story goes, where it leads, that in the end it is 00:21:43.639 --> 00:21:49.399 a story which ends with hope and with future in the new creation, with God returning to 00:21:49.399 --> 00:21:54.919 this earth to deal with evil and to bring about the restoration of the new heaven, the 00:21:54.919 --> 00:21:59.960 new earth, a whole new creation in which God will dwell with us forever. 00:21:59.960 --> 00:22:01.919 That's the future that we believe. 00:22:01.919 --> 00:22:07.559 And so here we have this great biblical narrative, this great biblical story within which we 00:22:07.559 --> 00:22:14.559 live our little lives and within which we struggle to see God in sovereign control of 00:22:14.559 --> 00:22:21.119 history now as he was in Habakkuk's day and in the days even of the Lord Jesus Christ 00:22:21.119 --> 00:22:22.799 and the Book of Acts. 00:22:22.799 --> 00:22:25.679 So we need to get hold of that Bible story. 00:22:25.679 --> 00:22:30.399 That's why it's so important that in any church regularly, week by week, that you're 00:22:30.399 --> 00:22:34.480 getting into the scriptures and soaking in this narrative. 00:22:34.480 --> 00:22:36.700 Here's the people we belong to. 00:22:36.700 --> 00:22:38.480 This is the God who has called us. 00:22:38.480 --> 00:22:40.080 This is the story we're in. 00:22:40.080 --> 00:22:42.039 This is the future we're headed for. 00:22:42.039 --> 00:22:47.600 This is the hope we have in the Lord Jesus Christ because that is what gives us security 00:22:47.600 --> 00:22:53.920 and hope and assurance in a world like we live as it did for Habakkuk. 00:22:53.920 --> 00:22:58.279 So that was my fourth and that brings me therefore to our final point, which is that we need to 00:22:58.279 --> 00:23:05.920 live then like Habakkuk as people who are still on mission for God. 00:23:05.920 --> 00:23:10.400 He says you come to the end of Habakkuk's book and he's heard from God and he's sung 00:23:10.400 --> 00:23:13.320 his song and he's done his worship. 00:23:13.320 --> 00:23:18.200 Do you imagine that he would sort of end up a little bit like Bob Marley, you know, in 00:23:18.200 --> 00:23:19.200 that sort of mood. 00:23:19.200 --> 00:23:22.480 Don't worry about a thing because every little thing is going to be all right. 00:23:22.480 --> 00:23:24.560 Is that the mood he's going to be in? 00:23:24.560 --> 00:23:27.160 Well, no, not at all. 00:23:27.160 --> 00:23:28.160 He's still terrified. 00:23:28.160 --> 00:23:32.519 I mean, did you hear the way he describes himself? 00:23:32.519 --> 00:23:37.119 He says my body's trembling, my lips are quivering, there's rottenness in my bones, my legs are 00:23:37.119 --> 00:23:38.119 trembling. 00:23:38.119 --> 00:23:44.920 This man is still scared about what he anticipates will happen when Babylon would invade his 00:23:44.920 --> 00:23:51.400 country when God would bring judgment on Judah as he did in 587 BC. 00:23:51.400 --> 00:23:56.319 God brought the Babylonians down on Judah and it was horrendous. 00:23:56.319 --> 00:23:59.759 I mean, there was siege, there was suffering, there was death, there was destruction, there 00:23:59.759 --> 00:24:02.339 was bloodshed, there was starvation. 00:24:02.339 --> 00:24:03.339 It was horrible. 00:24:03.339 --> 00:24:06.839 And Habakkuk, in a sense, as a prophet, could foresee that. 00:24:06.839 --> 00:24:11.039 He knew what was coming and it's scarce and stiff. 00:24:11.039 --> 00:24:17.319 And yet he says he's still prepared to put his faith and trust in God because he knows 00:24:17.319 --> 00:24:23.399 that this will be under the hand of God and God still has a plan and a purpose and a future 00:24:23.399 --> 00:24:26.679 for his people, no matter what will happen. 00:24:26.679 --> 00:24:28.279 So what will then he do? 00:24:28.279 --> 00:24:32.000 Will he just say, okay, well, I'll just sit back and wait for all that to happen. 00:24:32.000 --> 00:24:35.680 And if I lose my life, so be it, I'll just sort of wait for God. 00:24:35.680 --> 00:24:36.680 No. 00:24:36.680 --> 00:24:42.799 What he says, his last words, verse 19 of chapter 3, is, God, the sovereign Lord is my strength. 00:24:42.799 --> 00:24:46.079 He makes my feet like the feet of a deer. 00:24:46.079 --> 00:24:48.440 He enables me to tread on the heights. 00:24:48.440 --> 00:24:49.440 Now that's very interesting. 00:24:49.440 --> 00:24:52.319 First of all, he says, I'm not just going to sit back and wait for God. 00:24:52.319 --> 00:24:54.039 I'm going to run. 00:24:54.039 --> 00:24:55.839 He wants his feet to be like the feet of a deer. 00:24:55.839 --> 00:24:58.119 He wants to be active and busy. 00:24:58.119 --> 00:25:00.839 Well, busy doing what? 00:25:00.839 --> 00:25:03.959 Well, I think what he's remembering here is who he is. 00:25:03.959 --> 00:25:08.639 He introduces himself in the very first verse as Habakkuk the prophet. 00:25:08.639 --> 00:25:10.199 That was his job. 00:25:10.199 --> 00:25:16.000 That was his mission was to be a prophet of God, to be a spokesman for God and to tread 00:25:16.000 --> 00:25:18.599 on the high places. 00:25:18.599 --> 00:25:21.720 Now the high places or the heights doesn't just mean he's going to, you know, go for 00:25:21.720 --> 00:25:23.879 a little bit of mountaineering somewhere. 00:25:23.879 --> 00:25:28.439 The heights was an expression used as you can find all through the Old Testament of the 00:25:28.440 --> 00:25:34.960 place of the idolatrous worship of Baal, the false God of the Canaanites, and all the evil 00:25:34.960 --> 00:25:42.279 that went with that, all the social injustice, the theft of land like for Naboth because 00:25:42.279 --> 00:25:45.480 of Queen Jezebel and her worship of Baal. 00:25:45.480 --> 00:25:50.960 The country had been riddled with this false God worship, which was leading to such terrible 00:25:50.960 --> 00:25:53.960 social and spiritual consequences. 00:25:53.960 --> 00:25:59.079 And the job of the prophets like Habakkuk was to expose that and to put their finger 00:25:59.079 --> 00:26:04.279 on it and to say that God's judgment was coming and call the people back to repentance, to 00:26:04.279 --> 00:26:07.880 return to the Lord and to forsake those false idols. 00:26:07.880 --> 00:26:11.400 And so what Habakkuk is basically saying here is that's my mission. 00:26:11.400 --> 00:26:12.400 I'm a prophet. 00:26:12.400 --> 00:26:13.600 I better get on with it. 00:26:13.600 --> 00:26:18.279 And he, in a sense, he finishes his book not by sitting back and waiting for God to do 00:26:18.279 --> 00:26:22.600 something that's saying, I will now do what God has given me to do, which is to be that 00:26:22.599 --> 00:26:28.919 prophet, to be the one who will run with the word of God, to speak the word of God, to 00:26:28.919 --> 00:26:29.919 expose. 00:26:29.919 --> 00:26:30.919 That was his job. 00:26:30.919 --> 00:26:31.919 That was his mission. 00:26:31.919 --> 00:26:34.000 And he was going to live it out. 00:26:34.000 --> 00:26:39.319 And so the challenge and the question is, what's our mission? 00:26:39.319 --> 00:26:42.839 What's yours in this world? 00:26:42.839 --> 00:26:48.240 This world that is so frightening and so violent and so unpredictable, in a sense, not a lot 00:26:48.240 --> 00:26:54.480 has changed since the days of Habakkuk, but in that world, we are still called to be the 00:26:54.480 --> 00:27:01.000 people of God in everyday life, in everyday work, in our families, in our church community, 00:27:01.000 --> 00:27:03.359 in this city, and to the ends of the earth. 00:27:03.359 --> 00:27:07.799 We are called to be God's people on mission for God. 00:27:07.799 --> 00:27:11.759 We are called then to be, just to remind us of those points again, we are called to be 00:27:11.759 --> 00:27:17.160 people of discernment who are spiritually seeking God, looking for the seeds and the 00:27:17.160 --> 00:27:20.120 signs of the kingdom of God at work in the world. 00:27:20.120 --> 00:27:26.560 We're called to be a people of faith, living by faith, trusting in God with all the hard 00:27:26.560 --> 00:27:28.120 work that that calls for. 00:27:28.120 --> 00:27:33.880 A people also of prayer, prayer which is real prayer, prayer that includes the word of lament 00:27:33.880 --> 00:27:38.000 and protest and being real and honest in the presence of God. 00:27:38.000 --> 00:27:42.360 And also a people of Scripture who know the story of the Scripture, who know the Bible, 00:27:42.359 --> 00:27:47.519 who know the story we're in and how it ends and how that gives us hope for the future. 00:27:47.519 --> 00:27:53.759 And then a people of real holistic, mission engagement in our world for God's sake and 00:27:53.759 --> 00:27:55.759 for the Lord Jesus Christ. 00:27:55.759 --> 00:28:01.639 So may God give us the grace and the courage to have that, what Paul calls the obedience 00:28:01.639 --> 00:28:08.959 of faith, to trust God and then to obey him in this world for the sake of the Lord Jesus 00:28:08.959 --> 00:28:11.879 Christ himself and for the sake of the Gospel. 00:28:11.880 --> 00:28:13.480 May that be so. 00:28:13.480 --> 00:28:15.080 Let's pray together. 00:28:15.080 --> 00:28:22.200 Father, we thank you that you have put into your word books like this one and many of 00:28:22.200 --> 00:28:27.080 the Psalms and the encouragement of the Lord Jesus Christ and you've given us your Holy 00:28:27.080 --> 00:28:30.120 Spirit as well to understand these things. 00:28:30.120 --> 00:28:34.760 So we pray that you will send us out from this morning of worship with a greater sense 00:28:34.760 --> 00:28:40.640 of both encouragement of who we are as your people and of faith and trust that you are 00:28:40.640 --> 00:28:46.080 still the sovereign God of all of nature, of this earth, this planet, as well as its 00:28:46.080 --> 00:28:48.280 history and of the nations. 00:28:48.280 --> 00:28:53.800 And we pray, dear Lord, that you would give us not only faith but also courage and comfort 00:28:53.800 --> 00:28:58.880 when we need it, as our hearts are broken and as we shed tears over the suffering of 00:28:58.880 --> 00:29:00.080 this world. 00:29:00.080 --> 00:29:04.560 We pray that you would help us to see that our grief and our suffering is nothing compared 00:29:04.560 --> 00:29:06.160 to yours. 00:29:06.160 --> 00:29:10.759 As you look at the world which you created so beautiful that we have made such a mess 00:29:10.759 --> 00:29:11.759 of. 00:29:11.759 --> 00:29:14.200 So we long, dear Lord, that you would return. 00:29:14.200 --> 00:29:18.200 We look forward to that day when you will indeed come to judge the earth to put things 00:29:18.200 --> 00:29:24.759 right and when the whole of creation will rejoice to see you enthroned as our King and 00:29:24.759 --> 00:29:26.800 as our Lord and our Governor. 00:29:26.800 --> 00:29:30.880 So help us, Lord, in the meantime to live for you, to go out into our daily lives, our 00:29:30.880 --> 00:29:36.000 families and our work, determined to serve you and to live in this world as those who 00:29:36.000 --> 00:29:37.880 know you and trust you. 00:29:37.880 --> 00:29:38.880 For Jesus' sake. 00:29:38.880 --> 00:30:06.880 Amen.