August 28, Reading 2 – Habakkuk 3

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Here is Habakkuk’s response to God’s answers to his serious complaints. It is prayer. I find Habakkuk’s request: renew Your deeds in our day, and his ending: yet will I rejoice in the LORD, challenging, uplifting and heartening. Don’t you?

SJA Notes

* Holy God, please show us both the truth of who You are, and the truth of who we are.

“I will take joy in the God of my salvation.”

Here is a wonderful clear picture from Habakkuk that breaks down false religion, prosperity doctrine.

A lack of material blessing has no bearing in our walk with the Lord. In fact, Habakkuk specifically says _in spite of those things_ (the “yet” in v18).

YET I WILL REJOICE IN THE LORD.

This is to be our cry. Not just words, but our heartfelt response and wrestling with where the Lord has us in life.

Where should our joy come from? Material things, the gamut of experiences in this life?

No.

“I will take joy in the God of my salvation.”

What a word this is for us!

Habakkuk too knows this truth – That the only strength that matters comes from the Lord.

It is not our own inward stubbornness that will win the day. Not our own intellect or reasoning, not our own strength of body.

IT IS THE LORD.

“GOD, the Lord, is my strength;”

Because Habakkuk has laid out who the Lord is. Our God is POWERFUL and FEARFUL. Our God is JUST and HOLY.

And our God marches through the earth here in FURY. He threshes the nations in ANGER.

It is good for us to meditate on the character of our God. On our response to Him.

* Mighty Sovereign God,

May arrogance and vanity be far from us, rid us of pride in self and the desire to be great!

Because it is YOU that is great. YOU that is mighty.

Please Lord, in Your mercy, please guide us to find our joy in You, our strength in You.

Amen.

August 27, Reading 2 – Habakkuk 2

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Habakkuk’s second complaint asks why God allows evil, cruelty and economic oppression. God’s answer is: judgment is certainly coming upon God’s people. Judgment (the woes) will also come upon the agent of God’s judgment on Judah, Chaldea, for her violent ways. Faith in God as in Daniel – verses 13,14 and 20 – will guard God’s people through the Chaldean invasion.

SJA Notes

* Dear God, please write Your word on our hearts today.

“But the LORD is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.”

There are four woes called out by Habakkuk’s preaching in this passage.

Woe #1: To the one who heaps up what is not their own.

Woe #2: To the one who gets evil gain for his house.

Woe #3: To the one who builds a place on blood and sin.

Woe #4: To the one who makes those around drink their cup of wrath.

Woe #5: To the one who worships an idol.

These are the outworking of rejecting God’s good law.

Greed. Injustice. Lawlessness. Manipulation. Terrible violence. Depravity.

And idolatry.

BUT.

A coin-truth here, one of the big absolute realities, is in this verse,

“But the LORD is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.”

Are we anxious because of the broken morality we see in the world today?

BUT THE LORD IS IN HIS TEMPLE.

Are we stressed because of the apparent success of greedy ways and injustice and lawlessness?

BUT THE LORD IS IN HIS TEMPLE.

Are we fretting over the idols we struggle with in our own lives?

BUT THE LORD IS IN HIS TEMPLE.

This is a wonderful strong absolute truth and reality to wrestle with.

Our Lord and King, the Almighty God, the Maker and Creator of all things, the Just God, Holy God, Righteous God – He is in His Holy Temple.

* Father God,

Please remind us that You are in Your temple. Your holy temple.

When the world’s influence bears down, when the weight of concern and worry hover and bring darkness, when our sight shrinks down and we start to fear what is around us – Remind us Lord, please Lord God.

Let all the earth keep silence before You.

Amen.

August 26, Reading 2 – Habakkuk 1

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Judah was torn by violence and great injustice in Manasseh’s reign. Habakkuk complained that God wouldn’t listen to his cries for relief, for revival. God’s answer was that a terrible judgment, not revival was coming. This is a call for repentance as in Hezekiah’s day when the LORD delivered Jerusalem.

SJA Notes

* Mighty God, please teach us from Your word today.

“So the law is paralyzed, and justice never goes forth. For the wicked surround the righteous; so justice goes forth perverted.”

The law is paralyzed.

Justice never goes forth, and when it does go out it is perverted.

These statements from Habakkuk should be ringing bells for us today.

We see this clearly in our world today, both in other nations and in our own public square.

What is the answer?

When we see the wicked surround the righteous, what can be done?

When God’s people were taken into exile to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar, Jeremiah spoke these words for them to do,

“But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.”

God has placed us where He wants us. He is working the good of His people. And we are to seek the welfare, work for the good, where He has us.

This can be a hard word. But it is God’s word.

* Father God,

Thank You for Your sovereign will. Please help us to trust Your will for us, and to go about each day doing Your will.

Please help us tomorrow to seek the welfare of where You have placed us.

Amen.