Habakkuk 2:2-20 - Big News and Five Woes

Well, welcome to Strength for the Day. Hi, Bryon.

Hello, how are you?

I'm good. You?

I'm doing pretty excellent.

Good. Did you sleep okay last night?

I did. I did. It's pretty early this morning.

I just figured since this is dropping...

It is Monday at 1:15 a.m.

right now.

Early morning? Is that what time it drops?

It does. That way if someone's...

I'm never awake when this drops.

You know, you've got a trucker or someone, and they've got, you know, early start to the day, they can have strength for their day. Or you have a farmer who gets up at 4.30 or whatever.

And it's there at 1.

It's there at 1.

All right. Well, good. Well, we are coming to you and hope you are having a good week, a good start to this fall season.

It's gotten a little chilly here.

We're kind of in it.

Yeah.

In Moses Lake, it's gotten cold.

And we are... Let's see. We're just a few weeks away from a new year.

Yep.

It's crazy.

Coming up very quickly.

Anyway, we got some news for the new year that we just told our church about yesterday, and something that's a little bittersweet that we're excited about.

So, Bryon, why don't you tell everybody what we told the church yesterday?

Yeah.

2:10

Ministry Announcement

So, I was recently, this past week, from the time of filming, voted in as the new pastor of Tabernacle Baptist Church in Essex, Maryland. And we are super excited about what God is going to do there.

And felt for a little bit like some of the specific things that we were doing and participating in here at MOBC were things that God wanted us to be able to continue in somewhat of a fuller way.

And so, felt like God was kind of leading, I would say, us into the pastorate, technically me, Samantha is with me, Pastor Samantha Self, no. But felt like God was kind of leading us in that way.

And through just kind of a series of circumstances, the Lord worked it out and got to be there with the church family a couple weeks ago. And very, very excited about what God is going to do and beginning the new year there at Tabernacle.

And so we're planning on continuing strength for the day. I don't know about your church family, but my church family has expressed that they really love it. And so your new church family.

Listen, I got, don't ditch us yet. Listen, listen, it's like, it's like the selfs and the bucks. It's I have two families and they're both legitimately my family.

Yeah.

So, the listeners are the bucks.

Exactly. Those are my in-laws and they are wonderful people. Yeah.

So this is a, this is news and it's good.

It's exciting. I would tell you pray, be praying for Brian and Samantha. And of course I say it's bittersweet.

It's sweet because we've kind of, we've been working on this. God's been putting this together for about six months or so, probably even longer than that. The Lord's been working.

It's sweet because they're taking their next step. It's sweet because they're moving to help revitalize the church. And what God has done, Tabernacle is exciting.

Over 70 years of history. So, I mean, there's just so much potential there. And of course, for those of us here, it's bitter just because, you know, we're losing Brian and Sam on staff.

And it's a bummer. I'm not going to talk a lot about it because I'll start crying. I'm the emotional one.

But they've been a huge blessing here. And so we told our church family yesterday. And so their last Sunday at Moses Lake Baptist Church, as of right now, it's still December 10th.

And are the night of our Christmas concert. And so we're going to be hearing from them. Actually, this coming Wednesday, Pastor Brown will be preaching our growth groups Wednesdays in the Word for the month of November and December.

And then December 3rd or December 10th, we'll hear from both of them that Sunday morning, just giving a testimony about our church. So you'll be praying for them. And praying for God's wisdom in all of that, all right?

Well, I know you didn't come here today for just some announcement about transitions in the future. You came to get some strength from the Word.

5:18

Habakkuk Chapter Two

So we're going to jump right back into our study in Habakkuk, chapter number two. And so we're actually, we're going to cover a large portion today. But here's what I want to do, if you're okay with it.

Let's, well, I'll give a quick update, kind of where we're at.

Sure.

And then you read it. And then we'll just jump right in. So if you remember Habakkuk, right?

He was a prophet to which kingdom?

Judah.

All right, Judah. So the southern kingdom is where Habakkuk was a prophet to. And during that time in Judah, was there a lot of good things happening?

There was not a lot of good things happening.

Lots of wicked things.

Yeah, a lot of wickedness, a lot of debauchery.

And you have Habakkuk, who's this man of God that's like prophesying, but really that this book, A Minor Prophet, it's really just kind of a prayer between, it's a conversation between Habakkuk and the Lord.

And Habakkuk just goes to the Lord and is like, God, how long are you going to put up with this? Like, why aren't you doing something? And just kind of decides to say, God, here's a bunch of issues, here's what you, here's what I think you should do.

And then we left off with him last week saying, but I'm going to sit and watch and let you tell me how I'm wrong. And so that's kind of where we left off. And so now today, we're going to get God's response back to Habakkuk.

And so Habakkuk chapter number two, and we'll start, I think verse number two is where we're starting, all the way down through the end of the chapter. So Bryon, why don't you read that?

Yep. The Lord answered me, write down this vision. Clearly inscribe it on tablets so one may easily read it.

For the vision is yet for the appointed time. It testifies about the end and will not lie, though it delays, wait for it, since it will certainly come and not be late.

Look, his ego is inflated, he is without integrity, but the righteous one will live by his faith. Moreover, wine betrays, and arrogant man is never at rest. He enlarges his appetite like the grave, and like death, he is never satisfied.

He gathers all the nations to himself, he collects all the people for himself. So here's a prophecy that's being given from the Lord, detailing all about Babylon.

And he's saying, hey, even though it's going to be a little bit, until this comes to pass, it is going to pass. Then he says here, these five woes that are pronounced, unhappy. It's kind of the opposite of blessed, it's woe.

Won't all of these nations, all the peoples that Babylon has plundered, take up a taunt against him with mockery and riddles about him? They will say, woe to him who amasses what is not his. How much longer?

And loads himself with goods taken in pledge. Won't your creditors suddenly arise and those who disturb you wake up? Then you will become spoil for them.

Since you have plundered many nations, all the peoples who remain will plunder you because of human bloodshed and violence against lands, cities, and all who live in them.

Woe to him who dishonestly makes wealth for his house, to place his nest on high, to escape from the reach of disaster.

You have planned shame for your house by wiping out many peoples and sinning against your own self, for the stones will cry out from the wall and the rafters will answer them from the woodwork.

Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and founds a town with injustice. Is it not from the Lord of Heaven's hosts that the people's labor only to fuel the fire in countries exhaust themselves for nothing?

For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord's glory as the waters cover the sea. Woe to him who gives his neighbors drink, pouring out your wrath and even making them drunk in order to look at their nakedness.

You will be filled with disgrace instead of glory. You also drink and expose your uncircumcision. The cup in the Lord's right hand will come around to you and utter disgrace will cover your glory.

For your violence against Lebanon will overwhelm you. The destruction of animals will terrify you because of your human bloodshed and violence against lands, cities, and all who live in them. What use is a carved idol after its craftsman carves it?

It is only a cast image, a teacher of lies. For the one who crafts its shape trusts in it and makes idols that cannot speak. Woe to him who says to wood, wake up, or to mute stone, come alive.

Can it teach? Look, it may be plated with gold and silver, yet there is no breath in it at all. But the Lord is in His holy temple.

Let everyone on earth be silent in His presence.

10:20

Godʼs Judgment on Sin

So we have this reply from the Lord.

And something I didn't mention at this is that when Habakkuk complained to God, right? When you're going to send judgment, God says, I am going to send judgment and I'm going to send it through Babylon.

And Habakkuk's like, well, hold up, Babylon, like they're just, they're worse than us. Like, how are you going to use them to judge us? And then he sits and he receives this answer from the Lord, where basically God is like, I know what I'm doing.

Like, you can trust me in this. And so I'm, you know, there's a lot to cover here. We don't have a lot of time, but Bryon, I would ask you from these pages, from these verses, like what, what stands out to you?

What is something that, I don't know, that you learned from this? And then, and then we'll talk about application in a minute, but what just kind of jumps off the page at you?

Yeah.

I see here that God kind of contra Psalm 103, where in that Psalm talking about how God has forgiveness for those that trust in him, where the statement is made, something along the lines of, if you were to keep a record of my sins, oh Lord, who

could stand?

Right.

And here, we have God keeping a record of the wrongs that the nations do.

Yeah.

And I think the very clear cry from the passage is, if God keeps a record of your wrongs, you will not stand.

Yeah. And I think, lest anyone watching go, oh cool, that's great for the nations, some that I mentioned actually at my sermon that I preached at Tabernacle. If you do not know the Lord, your sins are laid out before him.

Yeah. But God loves you, and he does not want to punish you like he punished Babylon. Yeah.

Through Christ, and through Christ's sacrifice for sin on our behalf, that all of our sin was, all the sins of the world were laid on him, that we can, through accepting his gift of righteousness, and his gift of taking our punishment, if we accept

him, then we do not have to fear condemnation. Right. John chapter 3 would phrase it, he who has the son has life, but he who does not have the son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him continually.

So, I think that's something really important that we can see from the passage, is God isn't oblivious to the wrongs that are done.

Right.

And he does record them. Yeah. Our wrongs and our sins can be completely absolved and completely paid for through accepting Christ's sacrifice on our behalf.

Yeah.

But if we don't know Christ, that should be something that we see from scripture, I am in danger because God isn't unjust.

Right.

Yeah. I think that's a great point. And I want you to make a comparison about Christ in just a minute with the application because I think that's there.

I think it's interesting you talk about, you know, those of you that may be listening or watching that don't know the Lord. Yes. Make the decision to receive Christ.

That's the most important decision you could ever make. There are many on here that you do know Christ. And here's what I see that I think is kind of just interesting.

It kind of stands out to me that we are more often like Habakkuk than we realize in the fact that what Habakkuk was doing, and this is kind of hard because I'm not trying to judge what Habakkuk was doing, but I think we have to kind of analyze what

he's doing and his actions here.

And that he says, like, all right, I'm going to sit back and listen.

I know that my whatever isn't perfect in this. So I think it's fair to say.

So he says, I'm going to be corrected in this. So here's what we do if we're honest about this. We look at the evil around the Habakkuk.

He was looking at the evil around him, and he, Lord, like I see all this evil. When are you going to deal with it? God's like, I see it.

I'm going to deal with it with this evil. Well, no, that's worse evil than our evil. And you know what Habakkuk was doing was he was just comparing sin.

Right? So God, don't use Babylon. They're not your people, and they're worse sinners than we are.

And I think about it, and that isn't necessarily on the passage. It's just something that kind of stands out to me as you were reading. I was thinking about this and as you were talking.

There are times in our life when we want to justify our sin because we're comparing to the wrong ruler, the wrong measuring stick, right? And that's exactly where Habakkuk was. Rather than saying, which he will at the end of the book, right?

It is like, okay, like, all right, which we'll see that as next week. Like, okay, God, like, you're right, I'm wrong, do what you're going to do.

But like, I think that all too often in our Christian life, we can compare ourselves with people around us. And we have to remember what Paul wrote to the believers at Corinth, you know, that it's not wise to compare ourselves among ourselves.

Because when we do that, they compare themselves among themselves. Like, that's not wisdom. And you're always going to end up short.

And I'm reminded, I just had a conversation with one of our church family, talking about the loss of a loved one. And he just said, man, pastor, God has been so good to me, and I don't deserve any of it.

And I loved that statement, but it's just, it's a good reminder for all of us. Like, we look at the sin of the world, and we want to compare and say, well, God, I'm not as bad as, but we are.

We're all sinners and we don't deserve any of his goodness.

And so as you talk about the lists of sins, I'm thinking, man, my sins are there, and I don't deserve his grace, and yet he's filled us with his grace and his mercy and his forgiveness and offered freely, you know?

So that kind of jumps out at me, but let me ask you this. Looking at these verses, well, how much time do we have? Okay, we got a few minutes left.

Before, you can get to some application, but when you look at these verses, we want to always kind of ask the question, where do I see Christ in this? What can I learn about Jesus in this?

Like, what's your answer to those questions from this passage?

17:11

Christʼs Role

Yeah, for these ones, I think, number one, Christ was punished for sin, not his own sin, but he was punished for sin nonetheless.

And as we look at Gethsemane, as we look at his trial with the Sanhedrin, as we look at his trial before Pilate, as we look at how he was beaten and mocked and bruised by the Roman soldiers, as we think about, you know, kind of that via Dolorosa,

that way of suffering to the cross, his suffering on the cross, I think it ought to sober us. As we look at Habakkuk, and we think of the destruction that was meted out on Israel, the destruction that was meted out on Babylon, and the destruction

that was met out on Christ, and cause us to think sin is serious, and it shouldn't be something that we take lightly. I also see here that the Lord that executes judgment and justice is Christ. And so we can rely on Him as the one who will avenge us.

You know, kind of the Romans, is that Romans 12, the very end of it, where he basically says, don't you take vengeance, vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.

And so seeing that Christ is the one who will one day execute all judgment, I think it was Christ who said, even on earth, that all, what's the phrase? All justice has been given to the sun, judgment, authority, there was some, yeah.

Yeah, judgment.

Judgment. Yeah.

My brain went blank for a second. That's not what I'm thinking.

Yeah, all judgment is committed to the sun, which we see even in the Book of Revelation, of when Christ returns, it is Christ who with the word of his mouth destroys the nations of the world, much as he has before, only when he comes again, he does

it, if you will, without mercy because mercy has been shown for all of humanity's history and in that final fight, it is without mercy.

Mercy has been shown across.

Yeah, protecting his people, Israel there from that final destruction.

So, I think realizing that that's the same God that we serve. It's not that the God of the Old Testament, Yahweh or Jehovah was the mean one, and now Jesus is just a really nice, feel-good one.

No, no, no, same God, full of mercy, full of love, full of compassion, but there comes a point in which justice has to be met out.

Yeah.

And Jesus will one day meet out that justice. Right. So I think that's something that's very applicable.

And then just very shortly, as I look at the hardships that came against people because of Babylon, so all of the things that are listed there, pouring out your wrath, even making them drunk in order to look at their nakedness, I think of Christ

stripped on the cross who was given that bitter wine, that vinegar to drink, that so many of these things were there with the idols, yet there is no breath in the idol at all. The human bloodshed and violence against those who live in them, all of

these things, I think, were done against Christ and harmed him. And so as we see human suffering, I think we do our souls a great benefit to realize that all other human suffering, Christ experienced.

Rejection of family, the most brutal things that could ever come against a person, Christ experienced.

And I think that gives us strength in our suffering and in our hardships that we go, okay, God, I don't understand why you would allow this to happen to me, but I know that it happened to Christ and that Christ knows what it feels like.

Kind of the Book of Hebrews that he was in all points, tempted, and I think you could also say tried or tested as well, like we are, yet without sin. So we can look to his example and find strength for that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And that's where I think wrapping this up, looking at that thought, it brings an application to my mind of the last part of it, where it says, but the Lord is in his Holy Temple, let all the earth keep silence before him.

Like recognizing who God is, that he is a God, what you said, he is a God of judgment, but he's also a God of mercy.

Yes.

And he says, I love Matthew 11, come unto me. All you that labor in a heavy laden, I'll give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, you shall find rest under your souls.

Like my yoke is easy, my burden is light. Like there's so much there of recognizing God's mercy. And so as I think about this, maybe I'll give a quick application and you can close with one.

But just, you know, when we look around, here's Habakkuk looking around, seeing God about to judge through Babylon, not understanding it. But the Lord closes up his phrasing to Habakkuk by simply saying, Habakkuk, you can trust me.

Like I've got this under control. I know what's going on. And you can trust me.

And I think that this week, you know, regardless of what you and I face, we have a God that we can trust in. We have a God that we can truly come to. I think we talked about it last week, Habakkuk pouring out his heart before God.

I love that. I'll pour my heart out before you. But I also love, and my mind went to Psalm 56, when David, he's running, and he's just been captured and taken into Gath and all of this.

And he says, Be merciful unto me, O God, for man would swallow me up. He fighting daily oppresseth me. Mine enemies would daily swallow me up or engulf me or capture me.

For they be many that fight against me, O thou most high. But what time I am afraid, I will trust in thee. And I just love that phrase, what time of day, whenever I'm afraid, whenever situation has me in fear, I choose to trust you.

And so, you know, I think here's Habakkuk, sitting in fear, wondering what's going to happen, and yet God just says, hey, I'm still sitting up here. I'm still on the throne. I'm still in control.

Habakkuk, you can still trust me. So whatever situation you're facing this week, just remember, you have a God, we have a God that says, you can trust me. He's still on the throne.

And I know that my situation's in life that I don't understand. I'm so thankful that I have a God I can trust in. So that's a quick application I have.

Anything you got that you want to wrap up with?

24:20

Trust God

I think just the four words that it started off with today, the Lord answered me.

And I think the God that heard Christ's prayer in Gethsemane, and he answered him. He didn't always answer the way we want. You think of Jesus, if it be thy will, let this cup pass for me.

Nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be. Yeah, that's good. That, you know, then God sent the angels to minister to him before all of the suffering that would take place.

God will hear you.

Yeah.

And if God heard Habakkuk in Habakkuk's, we will not surely die. If he heard him in that, if he heard those prayers, if he heard Christ, then he'll hear us. So turn him in faith.

If you ask him for forgiveness, for Christ's righteousness to be placed on your behalf and your record of wrongs to be forever blotted out through Christ's blood, he will hear and he will answer that prayer.

All right. Well, I want to encourage you this today, this Monday. Find your strength in him this week.

Remember, you can pour your heart out to him. You have a God that's listening. He will answer you, and he's a God that can be trusted.

Have a great week living for Jesus, and we look forward to seeing you next Monday back here on Strength for the Day. Have an awesome day.