In 1969, in Pass Christian, Mississippi, a group of people were preparing to have a "hurricane party" in the face of a storm named Camille. Were they ignorant of the dangers? Could they have been overconfident? Did they let their egos and pride influence their decision? We will never know.
What we do know is that the wind was howling outside the posh Richelieu Apartments when Police Chief Jerry Peralta pulled up sometime after dark. Facing the Beach less than 250 feet from the surf, the apartments were directly in the line of danger. A man with a drink in his hand came out to the second-floor balcony and waved. Peralta yelled up, "You all need to clear out of here as quickly as you can. The storm’s getting worse." But as other joined the man on the balcony, they just laughed at Peralta’s order to leave. "This is my land," one of them yelled back. "If you want me off, you’ll have to arrest me."
Peralta didn’t arrest anyone, but he wasn’t able to persuade them to leave either. He wrote down the names of the next of kin of the twenty or so people who gathered there to party through the storm. They laughed as he took their names. They had been warned, but they had no intention of leaving.
It was 10:15 p.m. when the front wall of the storm came ashore. Scientists clocked Camille’s wind speed at more than 205 miles-per-hour, the strongest on record. Raindrops hit with the force of bullets, and waves off the Gulf Coast crested between twenty-two and twenty-eight feet high.
News reports later showed that the worst damage came at the little settlement of motels, go-go bars, and gambling houses known as Pass Christian, Mississippi, where some twenty people were killed at a hurricane party in the Richelieu Apartments. Nothing was left of that three-story structure but the foundation; the only survivor was a five-year-old boy found clinging to a mattress the following day.
People are sent into our lives to warn us of coming storms. Habakkuk was just that man for the nation of Israel. Let’s go, Habakkuk 1- In this awesome, prophetic, historical exposition we have the prophet Habakkuk, right in the middle of the progression of God’s kingly dimensions of kingdom building in Old Testament theology. And in the Old Testament you will find hidden in the crevice of the minor prophets, a remarkable character whose name is Habakkuk. We don’t know a lot about this prophet. Except his name means, “to embrace”. He came at a time when the Babylonian empire was at it’s peak militarily and economically with Nebuchadrezzar as its emperor. Assyria, Syria, Palestine and Egypt were all under his feet. / And here we have Habakkuk. /
Before the Babylonian empire came to power we have pictures of God in the Old Testament that are very easy to worship and love. We get to see God, the object of our worship, the destination of our worship. We praise Him because He is God. He has created the heavens and the earth like Genesis has told us. He delivered the Israelite slaves out of bondage and slavery. He is a loving Father who takes you back time and time and time again after you’ve failed Him so many times.
Yet here in Habakkuk we see a part of God that is hard to Habakkuk, hard to embrace. Why? If you will have the ears to hear for a few minutes I want to talk to you about that reason. Is that all right? (READ v. 1) Habakkuk had a burden. Do you believe that what a judge says has weight? If you don’t hang out in a courtroom for a few hours. I’ve been in courtrooms where every word that the judge speaks is listened to and hung on as if they were the very words of life and death. Will I go to jail? Will I see my child again? Will I be able to work? Will I be free from this monster? Judgments have weight. Judgments are heavy. Judgments, can be a burden. / So we have Habakkuk here with a burden of judgment on God’s very own people. (READ vv. 2-11)
God has gone from being a God of redemption and deliverance to a God of justice. He has gone from speaking as a father to acting as a judge. Habakkuk has the burdens that you and I have had as believers. The burdens of, “Why?” and “How long?” But it was God that first asked those questions in Exodus when His people ignored how good He was and how much He had given them with manna from heaven. You see God, sympathizes with Habakkuk. He asks, “How long do you refuse to keep My commandments and My laws?”
You know that tells me? That tells me it’s ok to ask questions. It’s ok to ask God, “What is going on here?” “What is happening?” “I don’t understand.” On TV right before the 1988 Winter Olympics there was a story about blind skiers being trained for slalom skiing, impossible as that sounds. Paired with sighted skiers, the blind skiers were taught on the flats how to make right and left turns. When that was mastered, they were taken to the slalom slope, where their sighted partners skied beside them shouting, "Left!" and "Right!" As they obeyed the commands, they were able to negotiate the course and cross the finish line, depending solely on the sighted skiers’ word. It was either complete trust or catastrophe.
It is ok to ask questions. To ask, “Where is this going God?” “What am I to do?” Habakkuk asked the hard questions. “How long do I have to pray and cry out to You?” “Why do I have to go through this and see these terrible things? Why isn’t anyone doing anything?” The problem wasn’t that unbelievers persecuting the Jews. It wasn’t some enemy militia threatening their homes and families. It was God’s own people smacking each other around. It was God’s own people who were full of violence and contentions. Worse than violence is contention. Beware of anyone who is happy about someone else’s trouble, someone else’s tragedy and crisis. Those are contentious people that do not love God. Because of strife, because of contention, because of wickedness in God’s own people, because of them violating the covenant He made with them there are curses promised to those who break His commandments. Let me be very clear here before some of you start saying, “Well that was Old Testament. We’re not under curses but under grace. Jesus paid it all. I can’t be touched by curses or condemnation.” In Acts 13, shortly after Jesus has ascended to heaven, after He paid the price, after Jesus took our punishment and ushered in God’s grace in a new way…we see Paul and his young friend Barnabas in Antioch telling the Jews who reject Jesus Christ and God’s Word, “It was necessary that the word of God should be spoken to you first; but since you reject it, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, behold, we turn to the Gentiles.” God’s people rejected Paul’s message and warnings and Paul now says they will be turned over to the Gentiles.
That is exactly what Habakkuk sees with God’s people 600 years before. He sees God’s people rejecting God, breaking His commandments and serving themselves to the point of violence and contentions. He sees this and He has a clear vision of the coming judgment on them. He is asking God, “How do you explain the fact that Your own people are oppressed and the few righteous there are, are surrounded by the wicked?”
You know, maybe God doesn’t answer right when we want Him to. But when He does, He can do it in an awesome and overwhelming way. Listen to God’s answer (READ vv. 5-11). One way that God answers Habakkuk’s questions is when He tells him to look at the international horizon. God is raising up another nation, the Chaldeans, for His divine purposes. And His divine purpose for His people is judgment and correction. Do you see the language He uses to describe the conquering army? (READ vv. 6-9) / Listen, China until just a few days ago was beating us in total Olympic medals won. They’re killing us in how many gold medals taken./ China has a population of 1.32 billion people. They outnumber us more than 4 to 1. / That nation has been referred to as, “the sleeping Giant”. Do you think we could be any less prepared for when China awakes? Do you think that we could be any less in position for God’s correction?// I’m afraid we’ll be just as unready as people were when Jesus did come to earth.
You see, God will use what He needs to, to show us and teach us. / And yes, He does discipline us. The funny thing about the Chaldeans is that they rose and fell all within 75 years. Going from superpower to the back page in just a lifetime. That is short by history’s standards. Yes, God did raise them up but He brought them down. The bitter irony of God using a defile, profane, false god worshipping people to swallow up and bring judgment on His own people is almost too much for Habakkuk. And he responds. (READ vv. 12-17)
You see, Habakkuk doesn’t have a weak faith. / He has a perplexed one. To see God using this profane nation to defeat and capture the people of the, “Promised Land” overwhelms him and he asks God, “Aren’t You God!? Aren’t You eternal? Aren’t You pure and holy?”// But you see, along with the beautiful promises of God is the conditional clause of severe discipline if they break His commands and His laws./ But Habakkuk is so distraught, so devastated at the judgment that’s coming - He can’t grasp the full justice of God. So He asks, “How can You let these terrible things happen to Your people? Do something!” Think about this, God’s people will become slaves of this ill-tempered, violent, fierce nation. They will lose their daughters to concubines and harems. They will lose their sons to be drafted in their massive army. They will lose their homes and land and possibly their lives. Is this a righteous way of God. Does God deal this way?
Maybe Habakkuk is trying to provoke God. Because in a way Habakkuk is asking, “Are You, God, really behind all this suffering?” / “Will this never end?”/ Are we really all like fish in the sea just being caught and gutted over and over again?//
No doubt, Israel needed a spanking. They needed correction. They were brutal, they were wicked, they were contentious, they didn’t know what justice was.“But God, do you have to do this?”///
If our small human brains could just get a grasp of what Jesus had to suffer, it would blow - our - minds! Before Jesus went to the cross where did He have to stop? The Garden of Gethsemane. Or literally, “The place of pressing”. / Jesus knew that the same thing that the grape and olive went through… was the same thing that He had to go through./ Olive oil can only come when the olive has been under pressure. So when Jesus got ready to go to the cross He had to stop at the garden of Gethsemane to let the world know, that, “You may press Me on Friday,/ you may press Me on Saturday,/ but Sunday morning… I will rise! // Your trouble will stop when it has finished what God has sent it to do./
Have you ever gone through something in your life where you’re like, “I don’t even know if God is hearing my prayer?” “I don’t even know if I’m saved or not? I don’t feel any glory, I don’t feel His presence, I feel so dried up and used.” Well I’ve got news for you - you’re just right for God to break loose in your life. For as sure as His judgment comes - so His mercies come - they are new every morning. Great is Thy Faithfulness! Amen!
