Habakkuk
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How does a faithful person wrestle with suffering?
Habakkuk faced a world where Judah’s might was failing while its enemies were on the rise. Doom seemed imminent.
Prayerful Complaint: “How long?”
O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not hear? Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save?
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.
God’s Response
“Look among the nations, and see; wonder and be astounded. For I am doing a work in your days that you would not believe if told.
“You wouldn’t understand if I told you.”
Prayerful Complaint: “Are you sure?”
Are you not from everlasting, O Lord my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O Lord, you have ordained them as a judgment, and you, O Rock, have established them for reproof.
Is he then to keep on emptying his net and mercilessly killing nations forever?
I will take my stand at my watchpost and station myself on the tower, and look out to see what he will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint.
God’s Response
“Behold, his soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him, but the righteous shall live by his faith.
“I need you to trust me.”
Prayerful Lament: “Okay, I’ll wait ...”
I hear, and my body trembles; my lips quiver at the sound; rottenness enters into my bones; my legs tremble beneath me. Yet I will quietly wait for the day of trouble to come upon people who invade us.
Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation.
God, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer’s; he makes me tread on my high places. To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments.
But when I thought how to understand this, it seemed to me a wearisome task,
until I went into the sanctuary of God; then I discerned their end.
Suffering is a riddle only answered in trusting the character of God.