Friday, October 24, 2014

Do you trust God in the dark? When you can't see His faithfulness or sense His presence? Habakkuk

Habakkuk 3:17-19
" Though the fig tree should not blossom
And there be no fruit on the vines,
Though the yield of the olive should fail
And the fields produce no food,
Though the flock should be cut off from the fold
And there be no cattle in the stalls,
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.
For the choir director, on my stringed instruments."

I personally, have come to these verses in times of despair, perhaps, more than any other passage of God's Word.   Can't we all relate to a time when the "fig tree doesn't blossom" and there is "no fruit on the vine" and the "olive fail" and the "fields produce no food" and the "flock should be cut off" and "no cattle in the stall?"    We wouldn't use those terms but we would use that language.   We might say, "though the job quits paying and the car is broken down and the mortgage is late and the electricity is about to be turned off and my child needs new shoes and the cupboards are bear," yet will I trust in Him.   This is the sound of a man who has been brought to his knees before God.   Habakkuk came to God with his complaint (see chapter one) and finish with God with His praise.   That is how to have an argument with God.   The prophet has recognized that God is allowing the nation to live in wickedness and then he objects to God using the Chaldeans to punish them.   He has argued his case and discovered that in the midst of God's wrath there is still mercy and that God will, in His time, take care of those who trust in Him.  Therefore, the just shall live by faith.    How does that look?  These last three verses are the description of that theme, the "just shall live by faith."   God is to be trusted when all else is fruitful or failing.   If the figs do blossom and the vines to produce and the fields do overflow and the cattle bust out the barn, God is to be trusted.   If the opposite happens, as it does (ask Job), God is to be trusted.  In famine or fruitfulness, "yet I will exult in the Lord."  

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