Habakkuk 2

[00:00:00] Last week we started a study in Habakkuk so hopefully you know where the book is at this morning but

[00:00:06] Get yourself situated there, Habakkuk chapter 2

[00:00:11] Last week we started this study and I've called our series in Habakkuk

[00:00:16] unreasonable reasonable trust

[00:00:20] Because Habakkuk by the end of the book after a conversation with God

[00:00:25] A walks away with a trust that is unreasonable in the sense that it's not based on what he can see

[00:00:33] But it's reasonable in the sense that it is based on God and if we could get to that place in our lives

[00:00:40] Of that kind of trust, I think we'd see incredible things take place in a current. Now last week when

[00:00:46] The dialogue opened Habakkuk had a complaint about God's people to God

[00:00:52] So the laws paralyzed there's lots of injustice on an unholyness in the land and God surprised

[00:00:58] Tobacco with his answer he said I've seen it and I'm going to discipline it with the armies of Caldeer or the

[00:01:05] Babylonian armies they're going to invade you take you away into

[00:01:10] Captivity and that's my answer that's how I will spark a revival among my people and that floored

[00:01:17] Habakkuk he argued with God how can you use a people more unrighteous than we are

[00:01:24] A people who are clearly evil to discipline us and that's where we left off this dialogue last week

[00:01:32] So what I want to do this morning is read the next stage of this conversation first the whole second chapter

[00:01:39] Pray and then think about these

[00:01:42] Words so let's start off there in verse one if you would follow along with me

[00:01:48] He said I will take my stand at my watch post and station myself on the tower

[00:01:56] And look out to see what he God will say to me and what I will answer concerning my complaint

[00:02:03] And the Lord answered me right the vision make it plain on tablet so he may run who reads it

[00:02:10] For still the vision awaits it's appointed time at hastens to the end it will not lie

[00:02:16] If it seems slow wait for it will surely come it will not delay

[00:02:21] Behold God said and this is about the Babylonians his soul is puffed up

[00:02:28] It is not upright within him but the righteous shall live by his faith

[00:02:34] Moreover wine is a traitor an arrogant man who's never at rest his greed is as wide as she'll like death

[00:02:42] He has never enough he gathers for himself all nations and collects as his own all peoples

[00:02:49] Shall not verse six all these take up their taunt against him with scoffing and riddles for him and say

[00:02:56] What a him who heeps up what is not his own for how long and load himself with pledges

[00:03:03] Will not your debtors suddenly arise and those awake who will make you tremble then you this is God

[00:03:10] Speaking to Babylon will be spoiled for them

[00:03:14] Because you have plunged many nations all the remnant of the people shall plunder you for the blood of man and violence to the earth to cities and all who dwell in them

[00:03:24] Well verse nine to him who gets evil game for his house to set his nest on high to be safe from the reach of harm

[00:03:32] You have devised shame for your house by cutting off many people's you have forfitted your life

[00:03:37] For the stone will cry out from the wall and the beam from the woodwork respond

[00:03:42] Wodehember 12 who builds a town with blood and founds a city on an equity

[00:03:48] Behold is it not from the Lord of hosts that people's label people's labor merely for fire and nations

[00:03:55] Where do themselves for nothing for the earth?

[00:03:58] Will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea

[00:04:04] Wodehember 15 who makes his neighbors drink you pour out your wrath and make them drunk in order to gaze at their

[00:04:11] Nakedness you will have your fill of shame instead of glory

[00:04:16] Drink yourself and show your uncertain

[00:04:18] Consicent the cup in the Lord's right hand will come around to you and utter shame will come upon your glory

[00:04:27] The violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you as will the destruction of the beasts that terrified them

[00:04:33] For the blood of man and violence to the earth to cities and all who dwell in them

[00:04:39] What profit verse 18 is an idol when its maker has shaped a metal image a teacher of lies

[00:04:45] For its maker trusts in his own creation when he makes

[00:04:50] Speechless idols

[00:04:51] Wodehember who says to a wooden thing awake to a silent stone

[00:04:58] Arise can this teach?

[00:05:00] Behold it is overlaid with gold and silver and there's no breath at all in it, but the Lord is in his holy temple

[00:05:10] Let all the earth keep silence before him

[00:05:15] Father we come to you this morning. We thank you for this

[00:05:18] Movement in your word somber words these woes of judgment being proclaimed upon

[00:05:26] Ancient Babylon and perhaps even more than them and so Lord we come to you today

[00:05:31] And we ask that you would speak to and teach us on how to live this life of trust and faith the righteous living by faith

[00:05:41] Instructus Lord and help us Lord by your spirit we pray in Jesus name we pray together a men

[00:05:50] Well many of us we love I think in our culture the idea of the courtroom. I think this is even been

[00:05:57] Demonstrated in recent weeks we love our courtroom dramas whether they're on television

[00:06:03] We love live court TV we love following court cases

[00:06:08] We love seeing people being questioned and on the stand watching them squirm we love the tension of

[00:06:15] The courtroom and at this stage in the book of Habaccak God is in

[00:06:21] Habaccak's courtroom

[00:06:23] Habaccak is questioning God and challenging God God has as I said announced to Habaccak that a more unrighteous nation than Israel

[00:06:32] Is going to be his scalpel to remove the cancer from within Israel and Habaccak is floored by God's statements

[00:06:41] He can't imagine how God would use such a wicked people to accomplish such a righteous work and so he argues with God

[00:06:49] He tells God of his disagreements. He tells God that he doesn't think of God as wise in this instance and he's

[00:06:58] Challenging who God is challenging God's goodness challenging God's justice challenging God's love and challenging God's wisdom

[00:07:09] How could God allow this unrighteous nation to run rampant against all the nations

[00:07:15] Now the main idea of the passage that we just read the big idea is that God makes a promise to Habaccak and I think

[00:07:24] A promise to people beyond Habaccak even us today that Babylon and everyone who emitates Babylon will one day answer to God for the evil that they've committed

[00:07:37] God responds here to Habaccak's accusations

[00:07:40] By assuring him that Babylon's crimes will not go unpunished

[00:07:46] God does this by pronouncing these five woes of judgment that we read in verse 6 through 20 against Babylon

[00:07:54] Detailing the evil that Babylon had committed and when God pins these woes he's demonstrating that even though Habaccak thinks

[00:08:02] He's all in touch with the evil and in justice of the Babylonian people God sees it

[00:08:09] Way more clearly than Habaccak ever could God is saying I see all of this I see more than you can see

[00:08:17] Habaccak and God summarized what he thought of the Babylonian way of life in verse 4 look at it again with me

[00:08:26] In your Bibles God summarized them by saying his soul is puffed up

[00:08:32] It is not up right within him

[00:08:36] That word puffed up is the same word that would be used to describe a bloated toad

[00:08:41] It's like he's saying they are bloated with pride and arrogance they think they answer to no man

[00:08:48] They think that their power their military authority means that there will never be a day of reckoning for the evils and the atrocities that they've committed

[00:08:57] But God saw their pride and he committed to judging them

[00:09:02] But if that's how God described the unrighteous does he have a description for the righteous in this passage

[00:09:10] Absolutely it's also found in verse 4 after saying that the unrighteous his soul is puffed up and not up right within him

[00:09:19] God says at the end of verse 4 but the righteous will live by his faith

[00:09:27] A lot of you know that this is an important phrase

[00:09:31] In Christianity in the New Testament this verse is quoted in Galatians

[00:09:36] It's quoted in Romans and it's quoted in Hebrews drawing now different facets of the truth of

[00:09:43] This verse but all making the bigger point that

[00:09:48] Through faith in Jesus Christ in his gospel

[00:09:52] We can access the righteousness of God in other words how can I be righteous before God through faith in what Jesus Christ has done for me

[00:10:03] In this passage or this verse was also used not just in quotations in the New Testament

[00:10:09] But in a significant way in the life of Martin Luther the great reformer in the 16th century before Martin Luther was a Christian

[00:10:16] He was a Roman Catholic monk who was trying to earn his way to favor with God trying to earn his salvation

[00:10:24] One day he left Germany

[00:10:26] His home country and went to Rome as a pilgrim

[00:10:30] They're in Rome. There were steps that the church had said had been miraculously transferred from

[00:10:36] Pontius Pilots judgment hall in Jerusalem to Rome

[00:10:40] So steps that Jesus himself had walked on were there they said in Rome

[00:10:46] There were stains on the steps that the church claimed were remnants of blood that had dripped from Jesus when he was

[00:10:54] Walking on those stairs they taken glass and putting them over those

[00:11:00] Stains so that pilgrims could kiss the glass and the stains would not fade

[00:11:06] And in making pilgrimage many would get on their hands and knees and

[00:11:11] With pain and suffering and

[00:11:13] agonizing in spirit climb up those stairs and kiss those blood stains

[00:11:20] And one day in the midst of doing that Martin Luther who was trying to earn his way to God in that moment

[00:11:27] Habaqat 2 verse 4 flashed into his mind the righteous will live by their faith

[00:11:35] He realized in that moment that he was trying to live by his

[00:11:39] Works and not by faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ and in the middle of

[00:11:45] Doing that pendent's type of thing he stood up went back to Germany and the rest is history

[00:11:53] He became the great reformer and helped us get to in a part where we are today

[00:12:01] So that's how the church has used this passage throughout the ages

[00:12:07] But for the original readers the faith that God described meant simply trusting in God's plan

[00:12:14] Believing that God could use the Caldians in the way that he said he'd use the Caldians and also believing that God would

[00:12:22] Judge these Caldians or Babylonians in the distant future

[00:12:26] So even when the Israelites were 600 miles from home in slavery and captivity for decades

[00:12:34] They were to be trusting believing confident that God was still on the throne and that God would one day

[00:12:42] Vanquished their enemies and judged them for their evil not brand of faith if you can get it into your soul

[00:12:50] Into your spirit into your bones

[00:12:53] It produces a solid steadfastness inside of you. It's a faith that leads to a faithful life

[00:13:02] A strong conviction that God is worth following no matter what situation you find yourself in

[00:13:10] With this kind of faith you depart from the brand of Christianity that says if God does these things on my list

[00:13:17] Then I will follow him. No, this kind of faith says no matter what I face

[00:13:23] I want to walk with God

[00:13:26] This faith is described in Hebrews chapter 11

[00:13:29] It tells us that it generates an assurance and a confidence about God's unseen promises

[00:13:35] It generates an able like thankfulness to God it generates an enoc like walk with God

[00:13:43] It generates a Noah like obedience to God

[00:13:47] It generates an Abraham like endurance that waits for God

[00:13:52] It generates an Isaac like submission to God and it generates a Jacob like desire for the blessing of God

[00:13:59] Along with a Joseph like anticipation of the future permanent city of God this type of faith

[00:14:07] Produces a beautiful brand of life in us so the question that I have is is there anything in this passage

[00:14:16] That shows us how this kind of faith or trust can be developed in our lives and I want to draw out three things for you today

[00:14:25] The first thing I want to show you is that this passage

[00:14:28] I think tells us that we need to be a people who

[00:14:32] Patiently wait for God

[00:14:35] How back it realizes right right off the bat some people have their arguments against God their reasons they won't believe in God

[00:14:43] And they think it's a real mic drop kind of moment like if there's such a good God then why would and then they just drop the mic and walk away as if

[00:14:52] The conversations over a back-o-goek new otherwise he had his arguments

[00:14:56] But he realized I've got to go back. I've got to see if God has anything to say so in verse one look at what he said

[00:15:04] He said I will take my stand

[00:15:06] At my watch post and station myself on the tower and look out to see what he God will say to me and what I will answer

[00:15:17] Concerning my complaint

[00:15:19] a back-o-cat a sense

[00:15:21] That God was going to give him his

[00:15:24] Own perspective

[00:15:26] He'd shared his thoughts with God but now he believes that he needs to hear

[00:15:30] God's thoughts to himself

[00:15:33] So he goes to this place called the watch tower. I think it's a proverbial watch tower

[00:15:39] It's a place where how back-o-go to get into the word and to see if God might

[00:15:45] Minister to his heart and it's a super prophetic or super common biblical idea from the Old Testament

[00:15:52] Profits were often pictured as watchmen or watch people who would stand in the watch tower and look out to see what God wanted to show

[00:16:02] God's people and so he goes up to the watch tower God. What do you want to say?

[00:16:07] We might feel that when Habeck did this it was a profit thing and not something that we can do

[00:16:13] But it's actually a step that we can also take when we're reasoning with God

[00:16:20] When our arguments with God take us as far as they can take us

[00:16:25] When we become stuck on the problem as far as we can see it

[00:16:29] We need to like Habeckic go to our watch tower and patiently wait for instruction

[00:16:36] We have to wait for God

[00:16:38] Now the cool thing about a watch tower if you think about it is that it is an elevated place

[00:16:43] That is above the area that it's designed to protect

[00:16:48] So perhaps in the middle of a field or in the edge of the city you'd climb into the watch tower

[00:16:52] And you'd get a perspective that you could not get in the flow of every day life

[00:16:58] And I think we as Christians need to find

[00:17:01] Watched how we're like experiences throughout our lives that pull us out of the flow of life

[00:17:07] So that we can hear what God is trying to say about the regular flow of life

[00:17:13] Hopefully church services are like this hopefully Bible reading is like this hopefully our prayer closet is like this moment's where we pull out of the regular

[00:17:23] Course of life

[00:17:25] Here what God has to say about the regular course of life

[00:17:30] We have to like a student stuck on a problem

[00:17:34] Raising his hand waiting for his teacher or tutor to come and give him the right teaching

[00:17:40] We have to raise our hand and say God I don't know the right thing to think but I need to get into your word

[00:17:47] I need to know what you have to say

[00:17:50] And God was willing to say it notice in verse two that before God gave his full answer all the woes that we read

[00:17:58] He said in verse two write the vision

[00:18:01] Make it plain on tablets

[00:18:04] So he may run

[00:18:06] Who reads it now I'll let you in on a little pet peeve that I have this is often used this verse

[00:18:12] by Christian business people to

[00:18:15] Describe or even church leadership to describe how what we need to do is we need to make clear

[00:18:22] Our vision and mission statements. We need to write them down memorizing and be able to tell them to people

[00:18:27] So that when they see the vision and hear the vision we can run with the vision

[00:18:31] So our church is vision statement Jesus famous like you got to know it and I'm gonna talk about him

[00:18:36] I'm gonna write it down make it plain so you can run with it. It might be a good concept

[00:18:39] But that's not how a back-up would have understood what God was saying

[00:18:43] Well, he would have understood God to be saying is a back-up

[00:18:47] I have a perspective and what I want is for you to write it down so that prophetic runners can go all throughout Israel

[00:18:55] Reproducing the word I say to you to everyone else in Israel and when I tell you that the Babylonians will one day be judged

[00:19:05] Even though they are coming first to judge you. I want everybody in Israel to be confident of that knowledge

[00:19:12] I want them to be like Daniel who in Daniel was drug into captivity was confident that that was not the end of the story

[00:19:22] Daniel would study prophets like Jeremiah who said we're gonna be here for 70 years

[00:19:28] Submit to the captivity because

[00:19:31] Rescue is coming one day and Daniel was able to run in the truth that God had declared

[00:19:38] And this is another great way to

[00:19:41] Patiently wait for God

[00:19:44] It's to get into his words so that you can have a biblical perspective on all that is happening in our word to get

[00:19:51] World to get further clarity on his truth and on his promises when you cling to them

[00:19:59] You can run through life with the correct mentality

[00:20:03] You know trail race organizers understand this

[00:20:06] They understand the importance of

[00:20:09] Learning what's coming in advance if you go to a trail race website one of the

[00:20:15] Features of every race unless they're trying to punish you on purpose one of the features of every race is there will be a little tab

[00:20:22] Or a page you can go to where it will show you the course the map of the course and it will give you an

[00:20:29] Elevation change profile that you can look at you can see when there's big hills and when there's down hills

[00:20:36] And this is important for a runner to know in advance

[00:20:39] Sometimes a runner will even take a sharpie marker and draw on their

[00:20:45] Forearm you know mile five mile eight mile 12 mile 19 indicating a big climb is coming at each one of these

[00:20:54] Mile markers it helps you know how to run don't sprint at mile four if you're gonna have to truck uphill at

[00:21:02] Mile five prepare yourself for that next climb that's coming and as we sit with God's word

[00:21:09] We learn what the course of this world is like we find out what is coming we find out where all this is going and how we as God's people should respond

[00:21:21] But before I move on to the next point I want to also say that another way that we should patiently wait is

[00:21:29] This should be obvious is with patience

[00:21:33] There's not something that we really like to do we don't want to patiently wait for God

[00:21:39] To administer his justice and his judgment. We'd like him to do it right now. We'd like it to be immediate

[00:21:46] But God wants us to patiently wait for it

[00:21:49] There's an illustration of our unwillingness to be patient in the ministry of the prophet Jeremiah

[00:21:57] Jeremiah said a lot of the same things that Habakkak said but with a little bit more prophetic

[00:22:02] Flair and a lot more words and one day Jeremiah took a yolk that was designed for oxen or cattle

[00:22:10] And he put it on his own neck and he went in before the important authority figures and he said thus says the Lord

[00:22:19] The Babylonians the Cowdians Nebuchadnezzar they are coming and they are going to yoke us into slavery

[00:22:26] And carry us into captivity and other places Jeremiah had said in this captivity will last for 70 years

[00:22:33] Well, there's a false prophet there that day when Jeremiah gave that prophecy his name is Hannah Naya

[00:22:40] He went up to Jeremiah and he took the yolk off of Jeremiah's head and he broke the yolk in front of everyone and he said

[00:22:47] Thus says the Lord

[00:22:49] In two years

[00:22:51] God will break the Babylonians just like I have broken this yolk and so the people had a choice

[00:22:59] Do we believe Jeremiah who just predicted that we will for seven decades be in slavery in a foreign land

[00:23:07] Or do we believe Hannah Naya that

[00:23:10] After two years of military struggle we will overcome and God will defeat these Babylonian people

[00:23:17] And you can guess who they sided with

[00:23:20] Faced with a long-term judgment or a short-term gain they went with Hannah Naya

[00:23:25] They refuse to believe the very word of God

[00:23:29] But we have to believe in God what some call his slow

[00:23:34] Moving justice

[00:23:36] Now I believe personally that the prophecies at God administered over the Caldians or the Babylonians in

[00:23:42] Habacaca chapter two actually have an application beyond the

[00:23:49] Original Babylonians

[00:23:51] You see in the book of Revelation and chapter 17 and 18

[00:23:55] There is a figure a new Babylon not the Babylon from Habacook's day but something else

[00:24:02] And when you read about it it appears to be everything that our world system is about

[00:24:08] There's greed there's lust there's idolatry there's slavery there's

[00:24:15] Coviciousness there's false worship it's all there and in Revelation 17 and 18

[00:24:22] What's described is the final judgment of that great Babylon

[00:24:28] And I believe what God is saying here is that look this judgment is coming

[00:24:33] I will deal with all of it one day but you have to patiently wait for that judgment to come

[00:24:43] All week long as I've been studying this chapter

[00:24:46] I've had a song rolling through my head

[00:24:50] It's a song that Bob Dylan originally wrote but I've got the Jimmy Hendrix version of it rolling through my head

[00:24:56] The all along the watch tower

[00:24:59] The song is a conversation between two people one of them is a joker or an entertainer

[00:25:05] Some people think that Dylan was talking about himself and the other person is a thief

[00:25:11] And the joker is telling the thief that he has been taken advantage of by business people who are

[00:25:18] Thieving from his land and have

[00:25:22] No one asking them to repay their debts. He feels that an injustice has

[00:25:28] occurred in his life but they're on their way to the watch tower

[00:25:33] A lot of people think that the song was actually inspired for my Zia chapter 21

[00:25:38] Which is a chapter that probably inspired Habeckock to go up to the watch tower to see if God would speak

[00:25:46] To him in that chapter God tells Isaiah to go to the watch tower

[00:25:51] So that he could witness the future fall of the same Babylon that Habeckock was talking about in this passage

[00:25:59] The idea is simple though we see an experience in justice and evil

[00:26:06] One day God will settle all accounts

[00:26:09] So we have to take the trip to the watch tower to climb up on it and to re

[00:26:16] Imagine the moment that God will judge every evil and injustice and make all things right one day

[00:26:25] But another way that the passage shows us to live by faith is to sing the five woes that God pronounced

[00:26:34] Over evil Babylon in verse 6 through 20 and I'm saying it this way on purpose

[00:26:40] God is actually not the singer of these five woes in verse 6 through 20. He's very careful to say that someone else is going to sing these songs

[00:26:50] The Babylonians came it took advantage of people and the people they took advantage of will be the singers of

[00:26:57] This song look at verse 6 God said

[00:27:00] These are those who will take up their taunt against Babylon was scoffing and riddles for him

[00:27:07] And when you go back to verse 5, you see that these are those that Babylon had taken advantage of

[00:27:12] What this means is that Israelites and other nations that Babylon had destroyed

[00:27:17] They were meant to sing this song. It's like a battle rap to Babylon like you're going down with the confidence that God is our

[00:27:26] Defender and I think in his senses they saying these woes over ancient historical Babylon

[00:27:32] We can sing these woes as well the child of God can sing these woes over the spiritual

[00:27:38] System of Babylon today

[00:27:40] We can rejoice that one day all oppression and violence and greed and sensuality and idolatry will be destroyed

[00:27:49] So what did these people sing about? Well, let's just do a quick overview of what they sang

[00:27:55] In the first world in verse 6 through 8 they basically sang that the plunderer

[00:28:01] Would one day be plundered and God had an interesting way of expressing it he said that they had come in

[00:28:07] They'd taken people that weren't their own wealth that wasn't their own land that wasn't their own

[00:28:14] They'd plundered but God said one day you will be plundered

[00:28:18] What the Babylonians thought they were doing was taking

[00:28:22] But God kind of compared it to a bank he's saying to them you thought you were robbing the bank

[00:28:29] Over and over and over again, but that's not what you were doing you were pulling out loans

[00:28:35] Over and over and over again in one day you will be asked to repay

[00:28:41] In verse 9 through 11 in the second part of the song

[00:28:45] It says that the one doing harm will eventually suffer harm

[00:28:51] God depicted them in this movement of the song in a very interesting way

[00:28:56] Compared them to birds that build their nest high in the branches

[00:29:00] Trying to get security from everyone and everything else warning

[00:29:06] Subsequent generations not to put their own personal security in such a high and

[00:29:12] Exalted position and place think about others

[00:29:16] Everyone's entitled to

[00:29:18] Build and save and prosper but with these Babylonians had done was create their secure position

[00:29:24] By destabilizing other peoples and nations and God said that even the stones and the timber

[00:29:32] That they stole from other lands would cry out against them as a witness

[00:29:37] The third well of the song is found in verse 12 to 14

[00:29:41] There God said that the oppressor would eventually experience

[00:29:46] oppression and end up with nothing

[00:29:49] They built their towns God said and founded their cities with the blood of laborers and slaves

[00:29:56] Who were given no choice in the matter?

[00:29:59] God said that building a society like that was like building a bonfire

[00:30:05] You think you're building something great and beautiful, but in the end all you have is a pile of ash

[00:30:12] All their efforts he said would be lost their future

[00:30:15] was nothingness the fourth well of the song is found in verse 15 to 17 it says that those who promote

[00:30:23] rampant sensuality will one day be exposed the

[00:30:27] Exposure in other words will be exposed

[00:30:31] God said in verse 15 that they were using alcohol or substance to get their neighbors drunk

[00:30:36] All with the goal of increasing

[00:30:39] Nakedness in the world this was God's way of saying that this Babylonian society and system

[00:30:46] Promotes sensuality and sexual expression that defies God and uses alcohol and substance to get there

[00:30:54] But God saw all this violence he said that he would judge it including by the way in verse 17 saying

[00:31:02] That he would judge the violence they did to the forests of Lebanon and the animal species in Lebanon

[00:31:08] God would judge it all and the last well is found in verse 18 to 20

[00:31:13] It says that those who try to make their own gods

[00:31:17] Well one day hear the voice of the true god

[00:31:21] You know making an idol is the production of something that you can say this is how I want you to talk to me

[00:31:29] I'm making the rules

[00:31:31] But at the end of this chapter God says all the world must be in silence before me

[00:31:38] God is a speaking god and the last will declares this truth now these are heavy

[00:31:45] portions of God's word but each will I think is worth our contemplation today

[00:31:53] In each one of these wills

[00:31:55] The Babylonian actions should make us sorrowful

[00:32:00] These are not things that we should gloss over or not be mournful over within our spirit

[00:32:07] No

[00:32:08] They should make us sorrowful, but we should add to our sorrow the joy of knowing that God will write every single wrong one day

[00:32:20] And this desire is embedded in the human heart they know this in the movies

[00:32:24] You know when you're watching a movie and the villain is revealed

[00:32:29] Maybe it's a husband who's been unfaithful to his wife or someone who is cheating someone else

[00:32:36] Or just some

[00:32:37] Super villain that has terrible powers and he's using them for evil. You know whatever it might be

[00:32:43] When those characters are revealed in movies there's something that happens to the audience's heart

[00:32:49] We begin looking forward to the moment that day will get theirs

[00:32:54] We begin looking forward to the moment where this wrong is

[00:32:58] Corrected and we love it in the movies because usually they wrap it up right during the movie inside of three hours

[00:33:06] Justice is served and we walk away feeling like yeah, that's right. That guy got what was coming to him

[00:33:13] But this song it's encouraging us to sing it

[00:33:19] So that we might wait with patience

[00:33:21] for the justice that God promises to deliver

[00:33:25] It's coming in the classic book and of green gables of of course have read it

[00:33:34] I have three daughters and I'm a Christian but

[00:33:40] The main character is this little orphan girl named Anne

[00:33:44] She's five stitches. She's got red hair that she doesn't like and she's adopted by this loving but hard woman named Marilla and her brother

[00:33:52] And one day she asks Marilla if she'd ever seen anyone who'd outgrown their red hair

[00:33:59] And Marilla says to her no I've never seen that and I don't suspect I will ever see that and it crushes and and she says

[00:34:08] Well, that is another hope gone my life is a perfect graveyard of buried hopes

[00:34:19] Now this is true

[00:34:21] Without the gospel

[00:34:23] every time we see injustice

[00:34:26] Every time we see rampant sensuality

[00:34:30] Every time we see greed and covetousness

[00:34:34] Every time we see violence committed against someone else every time we see these things without the gospel

[00:34:40] There is no hope whatsoever and life would be a perfect graveyard of buried hopes

[00:34:48] But because of Jesus when we see these things witnessed these things experience these things

[00:34:55] They even partake of these things

[00:34:59] When those seeds go in out can come hope that that is not the way that it always

[00:35:05] Has to or will be so when we see injustice or greed or violence or sensuality or idolatry

[00:35:14] We should let them go in not to the graveyard but to the fertile ground of

[00:35:20] Hope that hope would bloom forth and what Jesus is going to do

[00:35:25] Because of Jesus despair is the fertile ground of hope

[00:35:31] I think all of this is hinted out as I close in this passage

[00:35:35] God said in verse 14 for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord

[00:35:42] That's the waters cover the sea

[00:35:45] God made the same promise by the way to the prophet Isaiah

[00:35:49] And right here God pronounces this promise in a beautiful spot

[00:35:55] There's five woes the middle woes the third woe

[00:35:59] Attached to the third woe right in the middle of all this chaos is God's promise a

[00:36:04] Day is coming where every single person on earth is going to love me

[00:36:10] A day is coming where I am appreciated and loved and adore that day is coming and of course as Christians

[00:36:17] We know that that day comes with the second coming of Jesus Christ

[00:36:22] And we're waiting for that day. We're waiting for that moment and as we're confronted with a culture or a world

[00:36:30] That is often hostile to Christianity

[00:36:32] We have the strong confidence that a day is coming when God will be loved by everyone

[00:36:39] Like Abraham in the Old Testament era

[00:36:42] We are waiting in faith for that day he brews said it this way of Abraham. It said by faith Abraham

[00:36:49] Went to live in the land of promise as in a foreign land living

[00:36:54] Intents with Isaac and Jacob heirs with him of the same promise for he was looking forward to the city

[00:37:02] That has

[00:37:04] Foundations whose designer and builder is God

[00:37:09] But often we're like children in the back of the family SUV

[00:37:14] You know God are we there yet

[00:37:17] When are we gonna arrive when are you going to deal with all of this evil that we are witnessing

[00:37:24] And for this feeling God and Habeckhook gave us a wise practice

[00:37:29] In his last word to Habeckhook in verse 20, and this is the last time God is speaking in the whole book of Habeckhook

[00:37:37] It says the Lord is in his holy temple

[00:37:40] Let all the earth keep silence before him

[00:37:45] This excitation is in direct contrast with what came right before it right before it gone said that the Babylonians made idols

[00:37:53] That could and speak

[00:37:55] The Babylonians could say whatever they wanted to say they could argue with their gods all day long and always win the argument because their gods could not respond

[00:38:04] But we as Christians

[00:38:07] We must be silent because

[00:38:10] Our God speaks he's alive

[00:38:13] He's working he's promising and

[00:38:16] Judging and will judge like Habeckhook we can replace our complaints and our arguments and our doubts with the firm expectation

[00:38:25] That God will come and establish his kingdom

[00:38:30] There's a passage I love in CS Lewis is

[00:38:34] The lion the witch in the wardrobe

[00:38:37] Where at the beginning of

[00:38:41] That book the pevency children stumble across this new land called Narnia

[00:38:48] They don't understand the place it's winter there and they soon discovered that the animals in Narnia are able to talk

[00:38:54] And they're brought into the house of Mr and Mrs Beaver who quickly tried to acclimate them to Narnia by explaining some things to them

[00:39:03] And Mrs Beaver begins explaining that all of Narnia is under the spell of a wicked witch

[00:39:10] And that she had the power to keep winter around but also to turn her enemies into stone

[00:39:18] And that they were waiting though for the return of a lion whose name was Aslan and that Aslan would defeat the witch in battle

[00:39:27] One of the pevency kids

[00:39:29] Interjected at that moment and asked a question it was Edmund he said won't she just turn him into stone also

[00:39:37] And Mrs Beaver replied

[00:39:39] Turn him into stone if she can stand on her to feet and look him in the face

[00:39:44] It'll be the most she can do and more than I expect of her

[00:39:49] No he'll put all to rights as it says in an old rhyme in these parts

[00:39:55] Wrong will be right when Aslan comes in sight at the sound of his roar

[00:40:00] Sorrows will be no more when he bears his teeth winter meets its death and when he shakes his mane

[00:40:08] We shall have spring again a

[00:40:11] Major facet of the Christian life is our questions about evil and injustice in the world

[00:40:18] What is God doing how will God react

[00:40:21] But like how back we must trust God's promise just as Mr. and Mrs Beaver awaited Aslan

[00:40:28] We must await God's wise

[00:40:30] God's certain and God's successful judgment of evil

[00:40:36] We must believe that a day is coming when the knowledge of the Lord will cover the world like the waters

[00:40:43] Cover the sea

[00:40:45] We must know that a day is coming where his fame will run from pull to pull and every nation every

[00:40:51] Culture every society will be a legend to his name when he returns and in trusting silence

[00:40:59] We must wait for the day when Christ comes to rule the nations with a rod of iron as it says in Revelation chapter 19

[00:41:07] When the lion will lie down with the lamb as it says in Isaiah 11 and when the whole world

[00:41:15] will flow to the house of God in adoration and worship like it says in Micah chapter 4

[00:41:23] We must believe in other words that because Christ returns spring will come again