stress-filled times

We live in stress-filled times. Economic stress, political stress, emotional stress, spiritual wandering and uneasiness, global anxiousness, wars and rumors of wars, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornados, disease, pestilence…and in conjunction with this we see lawlessness, greed, pride, arrogance, injustice, innocent bloodshed – not very attractive times. Yet none of this is new and unique to our times nor unknown to the Lord our God.

Habakkuk was a man concerned about his times and was perplexed about what the Lord was doing in and through His people. Here are Habakkuk’s words:

His question to the Lord -
“How long, O LORD, will I call for help, And You will not hear?

His observations of his times -
Why do You make me see iniquity, And cause me to look on wickedness?
Yes, destruction and violence are before me; Strife exists and contention arises.
Therefore the law is ignored and justice is never upheld.
For the wicked surround the righteous; therefore justice comes out perverted.
Their justice and authority originate with themselves.

His questioning of the Lord’s actions (inaction) -
Your eyes are too pure to approve evil, and You cannot look on wickedness with favor. Why do You look with favor on those who deal treacherously? Why are You silent when the wicked swallow up those more righteous than they?

His stance –
I will stand on my guard post and station myself on the rampart; and I will keep watch to see what He will speak to me, and how I may reply when I am reproved.

The Lord’s response –
Then the LORD answered me and said, "Record the vision and inscribe it on tablets…For the vision is yet for the appointed time; it hastens toward the goal and it will not fail. Though it tarries, wait for it; for it will certainly come, it will not delay.” “Behold, as for the proud one, His soul is not right within him; but the righteous will live by his faith.” "For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.”

Habakkuk’s prayer –
LORD, I have heard the report about You and I fear. O LORD, revive Your work in the midst of the years… I heard and my inward parts trembled, at the sound my lips quivered. Decay enters my bones, and in my place I tremble. Because I must wait quietly for the day of distress…

As we look at Habakkuk and his concern for what the Lord was doing, for how he questioned what was going on, how it was difficult to see through the stress of his day, how the Lord responded to him and his subsequent response to the Lord, I believe that we can glean the following for our day:
1) There will be stress in our times
2) None of what is going on is out of God’s sight
3) We are to stand firm and listen for the Lord and be prepared to respond
4) God does have His plan and it will certainly come, it will not delay
5) It is our FAITH in the One True God that matters
6) God WILL have the final say and His glory will reign
7) We are to pray with perseverance trusting by faith
8) And finally, the key to it all -
Yet I will exult in the LORD, I will rejoice in the God of my salvation. The Lord GOD is my strength, and He has made my feet like hinds' feet, and makes me walk on my high places.