How Long will it Be?

Habakkuk 1:2 ~ "O LORD, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not hear? Or cry to you 'Violence!' and you will not save?"

The prophet, Habakkuk, opens up his letter with the cry of an anguished heart. He stands in the midst of a nation plagued with wickedness, surrounded by violence and injustice. He looks to the LORD and, to the lamenting prophet, it seems as if God is standing idly by, just letting the situation grow increasingly worse. Consider what he expresses in Habakkuk 1:3-4, "Why do you make me see iniquity, and why do you idly look at wrong? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. So the law is paralyzed, and justice never goes forth. For the wicked surround the righteous; so justice goes forth perverted." And there are times that every believer gets to wondering the same thing: where is God when things go wrong.

Habakkuk begins with a question: how long shall I cry for help? And, dear ones, have you not also sat in the closet of prayer crying out the same thing? So often, when we are in times of distress and find our hearts gripped with despair, our prayers go from long, pronounced orations to a simple cry for help. We become like a man drowning in the ocean--lifting up our hands in desperation and hoping against hope that someone will see and rescue. We may get like the psalmist in Psalm 69:20, "Reproaches have broken my heart, so that I am in despair. I looked for pity, but there was none, and for comforters, but I found none." And we find that all the platitudes of positivity are merely empty words.

Then, in a clear moment of grief, the prophet languishes with the sense that God will not hear his cry. It is of necessity to point out that the prophet did not say that God "cannot" hear but that He "will not" hear. His lament was not the inability of the Almighty to hear the cry of his heart, but the unwillingness to hear. And is that not our own concern as well? At times, when we mournfully sit upon our beds and cry out to the LORD, we wonder if God has closed His ears to our plea. Perhaps we fear what it says in Ezekiel 8:18, "Therefore I will act in wrath. My eye will not spare, nor will I have pity. And though they cry in my ears with a loud voice, I will not hear them." We know that the Scripture says that God is in His heaven and He will do whatever pleases Him (see Psalm 115:3). And so we ask in our heart--what if God is not pleased to come to our rescue?

But, beloved, God has never forsaken His own, nor will He leave His children in perpetual turmoil. God was well aware of the condition that filled Habakkuk's environment. He knew the rebellions that the nation had embraced--their idolatry and rampant wickedness. And, Christian, the LORD is well aware of your environment also. He knows the grief that comes from walking in a world that despises Him. Just consider Jesus our LORD and you will immediately understand that He was, Himself, despised and rejected--hated by those He came to save (see John 15:24).

It may seem that God is delayed, but keep your faith fixed on Him, for He will do as He promised. In Habakkuk 2:3, the LORD responds, "​For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay." And as we look around our world, it seems as if the rampant wickedness and hateful disposition of much of our society is growing by the day. We cry out to the LORD when injustice happens, and yet it does not get corrected. We pray to God Almighty that He should right the wrongs that are perpetrated against His people, and time just keeps on going as it always has. But as we see in Habakkuk, we are called upon by God to wait for it. Even if it seems slow to us, God will accomplish what He has promised. 2 Peter 3:9 states, "The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance." 

So, let us press on my friends to be faithful to the LORD. The day will come when God will right all the wrongs, and will enact justice against those who are unrepentant. James 5:7 says, "Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains." Do not wring your hands in despair, for the LORD God Almighty is fully aware and faithfully doing what He has promised. Let us be patient, for soon we will stand before Him in glory. Let not a temporary turn of events--even events that last our lifetime--despoil us from our constant hope in Christ.

In His Grace,
​Pastor Michael

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