In the sermon titled 'God Gives The Prophet a Heavy Burden,' Jason Dohm explores the themes of divine justice and sovereignty as depicted in Habakkuk chapter 1. The prophet Habakkuk is troubled by the rampant injustice and violence in Judah and questions God's apparent silence. God responds by revealing that He is raising up the Chaldeans, an unlikely and fierce nation, to bring judgment upon Judah. This prompts Habakkuk to wrestle with the idea that the cure may be worse than the disease, as the Babylonians are even more violent than the people they are meant to judge. Dohm emphasizes that while God's ways may be difficult to understand, believers are encouraged to trust in His sovereign plan and bring their concerns to Him in prayer. The sermon also highlights the importance of understanding historical context and recognizing the fulfillment of God's promises, even in judgment.

Good morning, Sovereign. Sermon text for today will be in Habakkuk chapter 1. The burden which the prophet Habakkuk saw. O Lord, how long shall I cry and you will not hear, even cry out to you, violence, and you will not save. Why do you show me iniquity and cause me to see trouble?

For plundering and violence are before me. There is strife and contention arises. Therefore the law is powerless and justice never goes forth, for the wicked surround the righteous. Therefore perverse judgment proceeds. Look among the nations and watch.

Be utterly astounded, for I will work a work in your days which you would not believe, though it were told you. For indeed I am raising up the Chaldeans, a bitter and hasty nation, which marches through the breadth of the earth to possess dwelling places that are not theirs. They are terrible and dreadful. Their judgment and their dignity proceed from themselves. Their horses also are swifter than leopards, and more fierce than evening wolves.

Their chargers charge ahead. Their cavalry comes from afar. They fly as the eagle that hastens to eat. They all come for violence. Their faces are set like the east wind.

They gather captives like sand. They scoff at kings and princes are scorned by them. They deride every stronghold, for they heap up earthen mounds and seize it. Then his mind changes and he transgresses. He commits offense, ascribing this power to his God.

Are you not from everlasting, O Lord my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O Lord, you have appointed them for judgment. O Rock, you have marked them for correction. You are of pure eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on wickedness.

Why do you look on those who deal treacherously and hold your tongue when the wicked devours a person more righteous than he. Why do you make men like fish of the sea, like creeping things that have no ruler over them? They take up all of them with a hook, they catch them in their net and gather them in their dragnet. Therefore, they rejoice and are glad. Therefore, they sacrifice to their net and burn incense to their dragnet, because by them their share is sumptuous and their food plentiful.

Shall they therefore empty their net and continue to slay nations without pity? Let's pray. Lord, I thank you that we see in this text, Lord, that you're powerful and that you're sovereign. Lord, even when we see nations like this and their wickedness rise up, Lord, we don't fear them. Lord, we know that they're from you.

Lord, we know they have no power that isn't granted to them. And Lord, how true that is now even in this time that we're in. Lord, I pray we would look to nothing for refuge, Lord, nothing for security other than you. Lord, for it's you who works, it's you who is sovereign, it's only who sustains, and Lord, I thank you that you work in a special way, and your people through your word and the preaching of it. Lord, I pray this morning that as Jason preaches, you'd be with him, Lord, you would use him to teach us and to encourage us and to instruct us and to teach us your word Lord for those who know you and love you Lord help us to love you more as we see your greatness in this chapter what does we see your mercy in this chapter Lord for those who don't I pray you'd reveal to them just how hopeless it is to hope in anything else.

There's no escape from you. There's no running from you and there's a free offer of salvation given to us because of Christ when he's done on the cross. We'll reveal these things to our hearts today. I pray in Jesus' name, Amen. The title of the sermon this morning is God Gives the Prophet a Heavy Burden.

I feel like it's sort of a clunky sermon title, but it at least accurately reflects what is happening in Habakkuk chapter 1. God in heaven, God who knows everything, is giving words to the prophet. And The prophet actually calls them a burden. Last week we finished Jonah. God was exemplary in Jonah.

Jonah not so much. There were some things he did that we could copy and follow in his footsteps, but certainly not everything. We're moving now to another minor prophet, Habakkuk, who also has questions for God. He's going to be asking God a series of questions about his dealings. But he's a prophet with a different disposition than Jonah.

We're going to find Habakkuk to have a much more exemplary disposition in his wrestlings with God than Jonah had and will be a lot safer in following the practices of Habakkuk than we would be in following the practices of Jonah. So we'll probably feel like another sprint. Jonah felt like a sprint to me. We're used to spending months if not years preaching slowly and carefully through a book. Jonah was here and gone and Habakkuk will be worse probably.

We have three chapters. I'll do the exposition of it on three Sundays. And then James will take an additional Sunday to trace out Habakkuk in the New Testament, which will be wonderful. There's actually some things in chapter 1 that appear in the New Testament. I won't even touch on it today because James is going to spend a full week just fully developing those things.

So three weeks for me, three chapters, and only 56 verses. It'll go fast. So as we come to Habakkuk chapter 1, let's ask the Lord to help us. Oh God, thank you for not staying silent. Thank you for speaking.

Thank you for raising up prophets and speaking through them things that we so desperately need to hear and learn. Thank you for bringing us to this prophet and his burden, the burden that you laid on him so we could learn things that he needed to learn and we need to learn. Press truth on us God we pray in Jesus name. Amen. I'd like to just begin by giving you some background on the book of Habakkuk.

He only appears in Habakkuk. That was almost true of Jonah, but he appeared in a couple of verses in 2 Kings. So you at least had him mentioned outside of his own book. That's not true of Habakkuk. He's only mentioned in the book of Habakkuk.

But even so, it's commonly accepted that Habakkuk wrote the book of Habakkuk. And in chapter 2 verse 2, God instructs Habakkuk to write the vision. So it makes perfect sense that he's the author of this. God commanded him to write down the vision that he saw. The postscript at the very end might tell us something too.

If you just go to the very end, It says something like you would expect to see in many of the Psalms and do see at the heading of many of the Psalms, to the chief musician with my stringed instruments. So Many commentators say that this could very well indicate that he had a position in the temple and the official worship of God there in Jerusalem. I think that's quite likely, but no more is said than that. But This was written and given to the chief musician, I'm assuming to be sung. The only clue to the date when the prophecy was given is found in verse 6.

I am raising up the Chaldeans. For our purposes here, I'll be using Chaldeans and Babylonians synonymously. They're not quite synonyms, but during this period of time, The Chaldeans were the Babylonians and the Babylonians were the Chaldeans. If you look in history, sometimes they were mixed and sometimes they weren't. But at the time when this was giving, they would have been one people.

So the Chaldeans are the Babylonians and who knows what I'll say as I work through the book, it could be one or the other and probably going back and forth. So this is a prophecy. It is a divine foretelling. It is God saying what's going to happen in the future of the judgment of God against the rebellion of Judah coming on them in the form of the Babylonian invasion and captivity. So we know, because we're after the fact that Babylon did invade Judah, which was very unlikely at the time of this prophecy happening.

And they did carry captives like sand, which we'll encounter in the first chapter. So, to the book itself, I'd like to begin by reading, re-reading verses 1 through 4 and then developing those. So hopefully you still have a finger there. Follow along as I re-read Habakkuk 1, 1 through 4. The burden which the prophet Habakkuk saw.

Oh Lord, how long shall I cry and you will not hear. Even cry out to you, violence and you will not save. Why do you show me iniquity and cause me to see trouble? For plundering and violence are before me. There is strife and contention arises.

Therefore the law is powerless and justice never goes forth. For the wicked surround the righteous, therefore perverse judgment proceeds." In these verses, the prophet questions a silent heaven. So if you're filling in blanks on the handout, silent fills in the blanks. It fills in the blank. The prophet questions a silent heaven.

All this sin and rebellion is happening all around the prophet and nothing from heaven. Heaven is totally quiet. And Habakkuk can't believe that there has been no response. Verse 1 calls this the burden which the prophet Habakkuk saw. In chapter 2 verse 2 next week.

We'll see that God calls it a vision. So this probably came to Habakkuk in a vision. He saw these things and received these words. Now, why is it called a burden? The burden which the prophet Habakkuk saw.

Well, for at least two reasons. By the way, in some translations it says the oracle instead of the burden. That is a meaning, but it's the secondary meaning. The primary meaning of the word is just like a heavy burden. So those two Different definitions are part of a range of meaning of that Hebrew word.

So it's called a burden for at least two reasons. One, God is delivering truth from heaven. There's weight to that. So just think about that for a minute. You'll agree that makes perfect sense.

Anytime God puts words in a man's mouth, raises him up to put words in his mouth to speak to people, can you say that there is no weight to that? No you cannot. And so It is weight. It is heavy when God speaks to people. God is the ultimate source of truth.

Often that truth from heaven is in the form of warning and it is in the book of Habakkuk. So this just adds weight to the weighty words of God from heaven. It is a burden when God gives a warning. You better listen when God gives a warning from heaven. He is king.

He rules. Secondly, once God has spoken, the prophet is duty bound to proclaim the truth. God raises up a man, he puts words in his mouth, It is not private revelation. He's not at liberty to keep it to himself. God has put the words in his mouth so that people, peoples, would know the truth.

God speaks to him to speak to the people and so it's not private revelation and he's duty bound to proclaim the truth You can turn to Jeremiah 20 if you'd like. I'm at least going to read read from Jeremiah 20 The context is that the chief governor of the house of the Lord, so a priest who governs the temple, has had Jeremiah beaten and put in the stocks. So talk about thankless work. It's thankless work to be a prophet when wickedness pervades the whole land, even to the governor of the temple, so that when you just speak the words that God gives to you, he has you beaten and put in the stocks. So Jeremiah decides, I'm not speaking for God anymore.

If this is the thanks I get, I'm not speaking to God anymore. And then he relates what happened when he determined in his heart not to speak for God anymore in Jeremiah 20 verses 7 through 9. Listen. Oh Lord, you induced me and I was persuaded. You are stronger than I and have prevailed.

I am in derision daily, everyone mocks me. For when I spoke, I cried out, I shouted, violence and plunder. Now think, this is just like Habakkuk, violence and plunder. Because the word of the Lord was made to me a reproach and a derision daily. Then I said I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name.

But his word was in my heart like a burning fire. Shut up in my bones. I was weary of holding it back and I could not. But his word was in my heart like a burning fire shut up in my bones and I was weary of holding it back and I could not. When God speaks to a prophet, it's a burden to him.

It's like a burning fire in his heart. And even when he determines, this is thankless work, I'm not doing it anymore, he can't, he can't, He can't hold it in. It's a weight that's pressing on him. It's not private revelation. He's duty bound to proclaim it and it burns inside him until he releases it.

It's a burden. Now starting in verse 2, the prophet asked two questions. How long and why? How long do I have to cry out to you about the violence that I see, while it seems that you don't even hear and you don't act. So that's what's happening.

I'm weeping and I'm crying out to you and it's like you don't even hear me and there's no action from heaven. Heaven is silent. How long is it going to be like that? The implication of the question is this, based on what Habakkuk knows about God, this can't last forever. So how long?

Habakkuk doesn't know everything about God, But he knows enough about God to know that heaven can't be silent in the face of all this wickedness forever. And so he cries out, how long? By the way, he's in a long line of those who cry out, how long? Job and David and many of the Psalmists, many of the prophets say how long. He knows God will hear and save because of his eternal attributes.

And he's surprised it has taken this long. The second question is, why? Why does God make Habakkuk witness sin running wild? When you look at the description here, I think that's an accurate summary. Sin running wild.

Look at the words, iniquity, trouble, plundering, violence, strife, contention. What he's describing is like a boiling cauldron of sin. This is how you should think of Judah at the time when Habakkuk is prophesying. A boiling cauldron of sin. So Habakkuk asks, why are you making me watch this?

All the law and the prophets hang on the two great commandments of love. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. And the second is like it. You shall Love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets, says Jesus in Matthew 22.

So ultimately what is Habakkuk describing? He's describing a loveless culture. Love is gone from the culture. When iniquity is widespread and unchecked, it just means love is gone. Or you could say it from the other side, it's a culture filled with hate.

You would think nothing of robbing your neighbor, cheating your neighbor, harming your neighbor. But even in the word choices we have the acknowledgement that God is King in heaven, that God is sovereign. Look at verse 3, you show me iniquity. Iniquity is happening, sin is happening all around me, You're showing it to me. You cause me to see trouble.

Look at all this trouble that we're swimming in. You're causing me to witness it. Finally in verse 4, Habakkuk brings us to the present condition. Lawlessness unchecked has resulted in lawless multiplied and even to lawless institutionalized. So let me say that again.

I think that's sort of a summary of what Habakkuk is saying in the first four verses. Lawlessness unchecked, heaven silent, God's not checking the lawlessness, stopping the lawlessness. So lawlessness unchecked has resulted in lawlessness multiplied. The crooks have determined that God's not seeing and hearing too. And they're not inhibited by the thought that God's going to act because he hasn't been acting.

And so lawlessness unchecked has resulted in lawlessness multiplied and even to lawlessness institutionalized. Meaning even what God has appointed to be the instrument of justice has been turned upside down and the instrument of justice is being used for injustice. When you go to the courts and you can't count on getting justice, you know you're in trouble. This is what Habakkuk is describing. The law is no longer fulfilling its function of restraining evil.

God says, you shall not murder so that people don't murder. You shall not steal so that people don't plunder. The law is no longer serving that function. Habakkuk says the law is powerless. Therefore the law is powerless.

That word rendered powerless literally means numbed. The law is numbed. It's paralyzed. The law was given to restrain evil but it's not restraining evil. It's numbed.

It's paralyzed. It's powerless. Sin is supposed to be met with justice, but Habakkuk says justice never goes forth. We get no justice. The righteous few are overwhelmingly outnumbered.

Habakkuk says they're surrounded. They're surrounded. So even when you go to court, justice is perverted. The instruments of justice have been weaponized against the righteous. I mean that's terrible.

Corruption in a justice system does this. It weaponizes what's supposed to God designed to be the instrument of justice. It weaponizes those same institutions against the righteous. So the righteous don't dare to go to court because it will be flipped on them and they'll get blamed and condemned when they went to the court for justice. This is what is happening in the time of Habakkuk and this is what he's observed and he cries out to God.

In verses 5 through 11 God responds. So let's follow along as I read 5 through 11. God says, Look among the nations and watch, Be utterly astounded, For I will work a work in your days which you would not believe though it were told you. For indeed I am raising up the Chaldeans, a bitter and hasty nation which marches through the breadth of the earth to possess dwelling places that are not theirs. They are terrible and dreadful.

Their judgment and their dignity proceed from themselves. Their horses also are swifter than leopards and more fierce than evening wolves. Their chargers charge ahead. Their cavalry comes from afar. They fly as the eagle that hastens to eat.

They all come for violence. Their faces are set like the east wind. They gather captives like sand. They scoff at kings and princes are scorned by them. They deride every stronghold for they heap up earthen mounds and seize it.

Then his mind changes and he transgresses. He commits offense ascribing this power to his God. Habakkuk cries out, God responds. In these verses, God reveals the near future. If you're filling in blanks on the handout, future fills in the blank.

God reveals the near future. I say near future Because in verse 5, God says, I will work a work in your days. Often, when a prophet gets a divine foretelling of what's going to happen in the future, it could be generations, it could be hundreds of years in advance. Isaiah prophesied about the return from captivity and he was over 150 years away. But Habakkuk is told that this divine foretelling is about things that will happen in his own days in his lifetime.

The first thing I should say is this, Habakkuk addressed his questions to God alone. He cries out to God. God responds to Habakkuk but he does it in the plural meaning that the U's in this section are plural. It is the plural form of the word. God is responding to Habakkuk's questions but God's intent is that the people would hear his response.

It's given to the people. In response to Hebacch saying that it seems as if God is deaf and blind to the injustice in Judea, God says that he's raising up the Chaldeans or the Babylonians from among the nations. God hasn't been blind. God hasn't been unwilling to act after all he says I am Raising up not I will raise up But I'm in the process of raising up this nation. You thought I was deaf in heaven or blind in heaven or unwilling to act in heaven.

I'm in the process of raising up the response to the things that you thought I didn't hear or see or wouldn't act about. The remedy is in motion. And yet God acknowledges that he is prescribing something very hard to believe. Look again at verse 5. Look among the nations and watch.

Be utterly astounded, for I will work a work in your days which you would not believe, though it were told you. Historically speaking the Babylonians were a very unlikely candidate to conquer Judah and Jerusalem. They themselves were ruled by the Assyrians. So the Assyrians had come to the northern kingdom, the ten tribes, Samaria, Israel, the northern kingdom. Assyria had conquered them and taken them into captivity.

And the Assyrians had also conquered the Chaldeans or the Babylonians. And The king of Babylon was a vassal king to the Assyrian king. A vassal king is a king that just gets left in place as a figurehead after you've been conquered. The king that conquered you lets you keep your spot in order to be his governor and the one who collects taxes for the tribute that your country will now have to pay to the conquering kingdom. The king of Babylon was just a vassal king to the king of Assyria, just like the king of Judah was.

They themselves, the Babylonians were ruled by the Assyrians and then Nebuchadnezzar's father broke away from Assyria and went to war against Assyria. And it was Nebuchadnezzar, the son, who defeated Assyria at their old capital in 614 BC and then at Nineveh in 612 BC. Now remember we're just coming out of Jonah. Jonah went to Nineveh, that great city. Well now it's about a hundred years later and it's the greatest, most populous city on earth.

And Nebuchadnezzar, the son of the king, took an army and went and defeated their old capital in 614 BC Nineveh in 612 BC and then finished them off at Haran in 610 BC and then he defeated the Egyptians in 605 BC. They went from unremarkable vassal kingdom of Assyria to the dominant world power in a decade. I want you to think about that. The Chaldeans, the Babylonians, went from an unremarkable vassal kingdom, a conquered kingdom, conquered by Assyria, to the dominant world power having overthrown the Syrians and the Egyptians in less than a decade. I think That's why God says, you won't believe what I'm doing.

Our text even indicates how the Babylonians would be lightning fast and dreadful. And history backs it up. This is how the Babylonians rolled, so to speak. They rolled. They were fast as lightning and they were dreadful.

They are described as unstoppable ravenous predators. Verse six, bitter and hasty. Verse seven, terrible and dreadful. Verse eight, they have horses swifter than leopards, more fierce than evening wolves. Their warriors on horseback fly as the eagle hastening to eat.

Unstoppable, ravenous predators. Furthermore, God describes the people he's raising up as extremely autonomous and self-willed. At least they view themselves that way and comparing to man, they are autonomous. They're ruled by nobody and they're self-willed. In verse 7, their judgment and their dignity proceed from themselves.

They are a law unto themselves. They do what is right in their own eyes. Their dignity proceeds from themselves. They're an arrogant people. Verse 10, they scoff at kings and princes are scorned by them.

They are not to be reasoned with and they are not to be governed by any man. Habakkuk said that violence was part of his existence in verse 2. He cried out to God, violence, I see violence. And he said the same in verse 3 but in verse 9 God says of the Babylonians they all come for violence. It is their great overriding purpose.

So the contrast I'm making is between what Habakkuk witnessed himself that violence was part of life in Judah. It was part of his existence. But God says of the Babylonians in Verse 9, it's their great overriding purpose. They all come for violence. It's not part of their existence.

It's their reason for existence. It says they gather captives like sand. You can't even count their captives. It's like the sand of the sea. There's one phrase that I don't think we're as sensitive to as the original hearers would have been.

But which they would have instantly recognized and been alarmed by. And That is the phrase that you find in verse 6, to possess dwelling places that are not theirs. They come, they're swift, they're like unstoppable ravenous predators, and they Possess dwelling places that are not theirs So this is language that has already appeared in the Old Testament turn to Deuteronomy 6 We know Deuteronomy 6 for the happy parts. Teach your children diligently. Write the law of God on the doorposts of your house.

So this is that chapter, but this is after that section. Follow along as I read Deuteronomy 6 verses 10 through 15. So it shall be when the Lord your God brings you into the land of which he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give you large and beautiful cities which you did not build, houses full of all good things which you did not fill, hewn out wells which you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees which you did not plant. When you have eaten and are full, then beware lest you forget the Lord who brought you out of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage. You shall fear the Lord your God and serve Him, and shall take oaths in His name.

You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are all around you. For the Lord your God is a jealous God among you. Lest the anger of the Lord your God be aroused against you and destroy you from the face of the earth." God brought this people out of slavery into the promised land where they would be given houses that they didn't build, wells that they didn't dig, vineyards that they didn't plant. Now God is putting them in the opposite position. Now they're the builders of the houses, and their houses are given away.

They're the diggers of the well, and their wells are given away. They're the planters of the vineyards, and their vineyards are given away. God waited to give them Canaan until the iniquity of the Canaanites was full. Now their iniquity is full. And it's their land, their vineyards, their wells, their houses that are given away.

God is putting them in the opposite position. If you go back and look at Deuteronomy 28, I plan to use Deuteronomy 28, but it's just a long section. I couldn't figure out how to do it. But it's the blessings and cursings. It's the whole chapter where God says, this will be your blessings for obedience.

This will be your cursings for disobedience. Habakkuk could have been pulled right out of the cursings for disobedience. That a foreign people would be brought and would take your children into captivity. Exactly what God said would happen for rebellion and disobedience and idolatry in Deuteronomy 28 is exactly what he's promising to do in Habakkuk's lifetime in the book of Habakkuk. Finally, look again at verse 11.

We're back in Habakkuk 1. Back in Habakkuk 1 verse 11. Then his mind changes, now this is talking about the Babylonians or the Chaldeans, then his mind changes and he transgresses. He commits offense, ascribing this power to to his God. So, I'm like an unstoppable, ravenous predator.

Why? My God did that for me. My idol did that for me. God tells Habakkuk ahead of time that the Babylonians won't understand what is really happening. They are God's instrument, but they have no idea that they are God's instrument.

God is using them for judgment, but they have no idea that they are being used for that. They say that their gods have given them this strength. They say that their gods have made them into unstoppable, ravenous predators. Listen to Isaiah 10 verse 5. Isaiah is actually writing about the Assyrians, ironically, who the Babylonians will conquer before they conquer Judah.

Isaiah is writing about the Assyrians in Isaiah 10 verse 5. Listen to this, Woe to Assyria, the rod of my anger, and the staff in whose hand is my indignation." So God raised up Assyria to conquer the Northern Kingdom and to take them into captivity. And he simply calls them the rod of my anger. I'm angry and so I'm bringing discipline to the northern kingdom. I'm taking them into captivity and so I'll use this rod.

It's a nation. That's what's happening with God in Chaldea or God in Babylon. Sets up the next section that describes, that God describes as autonomous idolaters. Where God describes the Babylonians as autonomous idolaters. God knows exactly what they'll be like and Exactly who they'll give the credit to that they won't give the credit to him God is that that's not a surprise to God He knows and tells a back at the head of time All right our last section Habakkuk 1 verses 12 through 17 Habakkuk says this in response to God's response.

So this is Habakkuk. Are you not from everlasting, O Lord my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O Lord, you have appointed them for judgment. O Rock, you have marked them for correction.

You are of purer eyes than to behold evil and cannot look on wickedness. Why do you look on those who deal treacherously and hold your tongue when the wicked devours a person more righteous than he. Why do you make men like fish of the sea, like creeping things that have no ruler over them? They take all of them with a hook, they catch them in their net, and gather them in their dragnet. Therefore they rejoice and are glad.

Therefore they sacrifice to their net and burn incense to their dragnet. Because by them their share is sumptuous and their food is plentiful. Shall they therefore empty their net and continue to slay nations without pity? In this section, a Habakkuk finds the cure to be worse than the disease. If you're filling in blanks on the handout, cure, fills in the first blank and disease fills in the second.

Habakkuk finds the cure to be worse than the disease. He cries out to God, violence, I see it all around me. God says I'm raising up the Chaldeans to come and judge and to take Judah into captivity. Habakkuk says, that's worse. How is that not worse?

How is your cure to our violence and rebellion, how is the cure not worse than the disease of our violence and rebellion? We've just seen Jonah question God, Now we're watching Habakkuk wrestle with God. They're different. They're different. Habakkuk even in the way he addresses God, addresses God always with his questions, in his questions, with the utmost reverence, out of a place of trust.

He clings to what he knows of God and he asks his questions from a place of trust. Verse 12 starts with the declaration which leads to a conclusion. God, because you are like this, your people shall not die. So verse 12 starts with the declaration, are you not from everlasting, O Lord my God, my holy one? It's a rhetorical question.

It's not calling into question God's eternity in being from everlasting it's actually a statement that he is and then he concludes from that that the Lord's people will not die. How can Habakkuk say this with any confidence? Because he knows that the promise of this everlasting holy God from Abraham and to David have yet to be kept. And so the people of God can't be wiped out because God hasn't kept his promises that he made to their forefathers. Hundreds and thousands of years earlier these promises were made.

They haven't been kept yet. God is eternal. God is holy. God is a rock. He must keep his promises.

That's what's here in the text. So he concludes that the Babylonians have been appointed for discipline, not annihilation. God is using them to discipline His people, not to wipe His people off the face of the earth. In verse 13, Habakkuk continues to cite truth that he knows about God, that God is no participant in wickedness. Look at the first part of verse 13.

A famous section. You are of purer eyes than to behold evil and cannot look on wickedness. The disciple John or the Apostle John says it this way, God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. God is all truth, no falsehood. God is all purity and righteousness, no impurity and unrighteousness.

James, the author of the book of James says it this way, let no one say he is tempted. I am tempted by God for God cannot be tempted by evil nor does he himself tempt anyone. God never tries to lure anyone into sin and he can't be lured into sin because God is light in him is no darkness at all. By the way the quote is from 1 John 1 5 God is light and in him is no darkness at all 1 John 1 5 and from James James 1 13 Let no one say when he is tempted I am tempted by God. For God cannot be tempted by evil nor does he himself tempt anyone.

So is God oblivious to evil? No, In that sense he does look upon evil. He is aware of evil. He knows that it's happening. He is all knowing.

But God is never a participant in evil. He is light. This is what Habakkuk is grappling with. How can a God like that use a dirty instrument to accomplish his purposes? That's really the struggle of the book.

How can a God who is light, in whom is no darkness at all, who can't be tempted by evil and who never tempts to evil, who can't even look upon wickedness, how can a God like that use a dirty instrument like the Babylonians, who are more violent than the people they're being used to judge, and more idolatrous than the people they're being used to judge. That is the great question of the book of Habakkuk. We'll be grappling with that as well as our study progresses. Let me give you a couple of previews. The first by the commentator James Bruckner.

He says this, I think it's helpful. Like the Assyrians before them, they, the Babylonians, are not the source of justice for God's people. They are simply God's agent in bringing the fruit of unrighteousness to Jerusalem's doorstep. What's he saying? To me this is a really helpful way to think about this.

What's he saying? He's saying God using Babylon isn't to set everything right. It's to bring the fruit of unrighteousness to Jerusalem's doorstep. Sowing and reaping. What have they been sowing in Jerusalem and Judah?

Violence and plundering and strife and contention. They're about to reap a harvest and the Babylonians are for that. Not to set every wrong in the world right, but to bring the fruit of unrighteousness to Jerusalem's doorstep. Here's what Matthew Henry says which is I think a good companion to that thought. Matthew Henry says, those who have been unjust and unmerciful among whom the law is slack, remember Habakkuk says the law is powerless, among whom the law is slack, and judgment does not go forth, will justly be paid in their own coin and fall into the hands of those who will deal unjustly and unmercifully with them.

What's Matthew Henry saying? He's saying, don't be surprised if you deal unjustly and unmercifully if you find yourself falling into the hands of people who will treat you unjustly and unmercifully. You're just being repaid in your own coin. I know you've heard this expression. Have a taste of your own medicine.

This is the violent plunderers having a taste of their own medicine. Then in verses 14-17, Habakkuk describes ways in which the Babylonians, as described by God, are worse even than the Judeans. Look again at verse 9. Verse 9, they all come for violence. Their faces are set like the east wind.

They gather captives like sand. So that's what God said about them. They come for violence. They gather captives like sand. Habakkuk picks right up on that and he says they take captives like a fisherman catches fish.

They use hooks, They use nets and they just bring them in. There's no organizing against them for defense or escape. Rather than being an instrument of righteousness, the acts of the Babylonians are acts of selfish acquisition which they then attribute not to God but to idols. This is what Habakkuk is remarking on. Habakkuk expected from his cries Maybe revival.

God, there's violence, there's plundering, there's strife, there's contention. Revive us. God says, I'm judging you. I'm disciplining you. I'm not using an instrument of righteousness.

I'm paying you in your own coin to use Matthew Henry's words. I'm giving you a taste of your own medicine. In the words of Paul, The Babylonian's God is their belly. It's just selfish acquisition for them. They don't attribute their conquering victories to God, but to the net which they use to scoop up the fish.

They're burning incense to their nets. This is figurative language for appreciating the things which bring them wealth. Their acts of unrighteousness which bring them wealth. The Habakkuk ends by essentially saying, will this last forever? Will they just empty their net and then just keep fishing?

Keep taking captives to the ends of the earth? And that's where chapter 1 ends. That's where we're going to end today. And we'll pick up next week with Chapter 2 verse 1 with Habakkuk says, I'm waiting, I'm waiting for you to help me understand. Applications, I'll give you two.

Number one, wrestling with God over things we don't understand. Got any of those? Got any things you don't understand happening in your life right now? You are in calm waters If the answer to that is no. Wrestling with God over things we don't understand and things which disquiet us has always been acceptable.

Provided it comes from a disposition of trust. You have to add that last phrase. Provided it comes from a disposition of trust. Wrestling with God over things we don't understand and things which disquiet us has always been acceptable. God has never expected His people to just shut up and follow.

It's always been acceptable to say, God I don't understand. God, this bothers me. From a disposition of trust. He could just treat us like servants to just do what we're told. He has that right.

He makes his people his friends. And He tells them what's on his mind when they come to him from a disposition of trust. Does that mean God is going to answer every question the minute you ask it? That's not what I said. That's not what this text teaches.

But it's okay to say that's acceptable. To have things that you don't understand and things that disquiet you and you go to God about them to ask about that has always been acceptable among the people of God and it is now provided it comes from a disposition of trust. I would actually call it necessary to a long-term Christian walk To take the things that you don't understand to God, rather than just keep not understanding them, never wrestle with God about them. God does not want that. Yes, he wants us to be content.

Yes, he wants us to trust him, but we are invited to cast our cares upon him. Listen to 1 Peter 5 verses 6 and 7. 1 Peter 5, 6 and 7, therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God. I think you see Habakkuk doing that here. He's humbling himself under the mighty hand of God.

That he may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you." What are your cares to be cast upon them if they're not the things that puzzle you, that you don't understand, and the things that disquiet you? What are they if they're not that? Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God. Cast your cares upon Him. He cares for you.

Number two. By the way, Job wrestled with God. David wrestled with God. The other psalmist wrestled with God. The Bible is full of saints wrestling with God.

Jacob is the perfect example. He is physically, literally wrestling with God and he is clinging to the one he is wrestling with saying, I will not let you go until you bless me. That's the disposition of trust. That's the disposition of trust. You can bless me.

So I'm wrestling with you until you bless me. Number two. God sees everything that's happening in our nation now. Some frightening things happening in our nation now. We have some of our countrymen are killing other of our countrymen.

I'm not talking about police and non-police. I'm talking about citizens killing other citizens. That happened in our nation this week. God saw it. You might be tempted to think, does God even hear what's happening in our land right now?

Does God even see it? He has the remedies in motion. When Habakkuk was crying this out, God was in the middle of raising up a nation to deal with these things. He always sees, He always hears, He's always willing to act. The only question is timing.

He saw everything that happened in the United States of America this week. He saw everything that happened in your home this week. He already knows how he will respond to it in perfect wisdom. Romans 8, 28. And We know that all things work together for good to those who love Him, to those who are the called according to his purpose.

That includes Habakkuk. That includes the Babylonians coming and conquering and taking them into captivity. It was for their good. If God hated them, he would have just left them alone in their violence and plundering and strife and contention and just let it got worse and worse and let them drift off. But he didn't let them drift.

He brought discipline in them to bring them back to himself. That's what Ezra and Nehemiah was all about, restoring them. God didn't bring the Babylonians because he hated them, He brought the Babylonians because He loved them. And He wouldn't just let them plunge off the cliff. God, I thank You.

I do pray for our nation, the things that happened in our nation this week have been happening. I pray that you would have mercy on us. I pray that you would cause all of your people to arise to contend for righteousness and to preach hope through your son in our nation. As the times get darker, as the actions get worse, make your children bolder and bolder, I pray. I thank you that you don't just leave us to ourselves to drift off into worse and worse sin, but you do Discipline those you love.

Thank you for this great sign of this. Help us as we work through this book to learn what to do when we don't understand and we're disquieted by the things that we see all around us. I pray in Jesus name. Amen.