Habakkuk 2:15-20
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
These 5 woes, the three that we talked about last week and 2 this week show that God sees and knows all iniquity and sin.
Sin is not hidden before God
The fact that this is a prophecy of the future shows both God’s knowledge of the extent of the sin of this nation and all nations: past, present, and future. There is nothing hidden from His gaze.
if he can recount that which is happening in the future and which will happen he knows all.
What we see in this passage also shows that God is not silent, even though he may seem to be.
He may not be acting that we can see at any given point in history (although he is truly at work), in that it appears that the guilty are getting away with their wrongs, that ultimately God will decisively act in the end.
People of faith need to know this, because this is our hope, as we cry out “How long O God with the injustice continue”, “How long O’ Lord will you tarry and your name be profaned by the arrogant”.
This passage, the Woe’s in the 3rd person (He and Him), even though personal indictment to the Babylonians in the 2nd person, tells us that this passages doesn’t only apply to the Babylonians, but also to any who would oppress or seek to destroy others for their own personal gain.
The Lord will recompense them in a like way for the ills that they have done.
This also points us to our Savior Jesus Christ. As we see the sin of man laid out and bare, and God’s justice, we see the one who was made sin for us so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Cor 5) and the shame and wrath he endured for us.
Jesus Christ himself suffered the shaming, stripping naked, and “destruction” and death that we deserved for all of our offenses that match what was shown to the Babylonians here; that Jesus endured all of the judgement from God; and was raised again on the 3rd day for our salvation.
That we could be declared righteous by our simple faith and trust in him.
That we will live, can truly live, because we place our faith and are faithful before him even in the midst of injustices.
People who reject him at the present need this passage, because they need to know, that although its seems right now that they are on top of it, that there seems to be nothing that can tear them down, that their iniquity and sin is being marked by God.
He is in his temple and sees all, that there will be a repayment.
Maybe our God who acts in History will act to tear down the evil or maybe it serves his purpose for the time being such that it continues.
But ultimately, those who refuse to repent need to know that there is a time for judgement.
Their actions may or may not catch up with them here, but will certainly in either case catch up after this life as the books of works are opened and those whose names are not written in the book of life will be judged and condemned by those works.
English Standard Version Chapter 20
And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done.
With that let’s move into the final 2 woes
The Final 2 Woe’s in the taunt song
The Final 2 Woe’s in the taunt song
4th Woe: Debauchery
4th Woe: Debauchery
15 “Woe to him who makes his neighbors drink—
you pour out your wrath and make them drunk,
in order to gaze at their nakedness!
16 You will have your fill of shame instead of glory.
Drink, yourself, and show your uncircumcision!
The cup in the Lord’s right hand
will come around to you,
and utter shame will come upon your glory!
17 The violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you,
as will the destruction of the beasts that terrified them,
for the blood of man and violence to the earth,
to cities and all who dwell in them.
This woe presents a picture of a nation who makes the nations drink, mixing in even their wrath to make them drunk in order to gain a view of their nakedness.
We can see from pictures like Daniel 5 and Belshazzar and the drinking party he had with 1000 of his nobles that this might have been a common occurrence in the nation of Babylon.
I am sure the use of wine and liquor in events such as these resulted in much sexual immorality and abuse of people.
The sin of debauchery seems always to want to drag others with “them” into this.
Scripturally we will see this in a moment. x
But if we take this first verse of the woe with the last verse (v17) , I think Habakkuk might have had something bigger in mind, that this was metaphorical, when he proclaimed this woe.
We’ve already seen how brutish this nation was in its treatment of those conquered and in its aggression to conquer other nations.
Look at v17 as God speaks of the violence down to lebanon, along with the continued discussion of violence against people and bloodshed.
Babylon’s purpose was to intoxicate, then rape, ravish, pillage, steal and strip away everything of value in the nations it conquered (think about how they carried off all the treasure of the temple).
Stripping away the people, towns, the wild beasts, and possibly even all of the natural resources as Lebanon was known for its cedars.
They were insatiable for the wealth of the nations they attacked, and were gobbling up nations as they rolled through.
Nakedness in this case refer to the shame, humiliation and destitution that the attacks and after effects brought on.
But we see in v16, that God will bring disgrace on them rather than Glory & Honor.
That they themselves would face the same and experience the same nakedness.
The cup of God’s judgement and wrath poured out on the nation.
God will reverse their fortunes and surely bring judgements. In the same way we see in the previous woes.
Babylon’s punishment meted out will match that which it will endure as punishment that which it dealt to others.
Here we see again the manner of God’s justice showing through.
That the sins of the babylonians are visited back on them as recompense for what they have done.
God’s right hand, the hand of power, will come around and they will have to drink the same drink with which they made others drink, down to the bitter dregs.
We cannot help but see and remember the ultimate destruction of Babylon in these verses in the end in Revelation.
1 After this I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority, and the earth was made bright with his glory. 2 And he called out with a mighty voice,
“Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!
She has become a dwelling place for demons,
a haunt for every unclean spirit,
a haunt for every unclean bird,
a haunt for every unclean and detestable beast.
3 For all nations have drunk
the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality,
and the kings of the earth have committed immorality with her,
and the merchants of the earth have grown rich from the power of her luxurious living.”
5th and final Woe: Idolatry
5th and final Woe: Idolatry
18 “What profit is an idol
when its maker has shaped it,
a metal image, a teacher of lies?
For its maker trusts in his own creation
when he makes speechless idols!
19 Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake;
to a silent stone, Arise!
Can this teach?
Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver,
and there is no breath at all in it.
Idolatry is folly. Man creates a god in his own vain imagination with part of the wood he burns for fuel to back his bread, and roast his meat, and with part he carves a god and falls down and worship it.
Habakkuk exposes Idol worship for what it is, a creation by a depraved human imagination.
A human putting his trust in the creation of his own hands. Trust that should be reserved for God alone (Trust in the Lord with all your heart).
Habakkuk says that the idol is a teacher of lies. It teaches lies in the mind of the one who conceived the idol; deceived and deluded and not according to the truth.
What profit, Habakkuk asks, is worshiping an idol?
We today, for most of us living in the US, don’t carve things of wood or stone or cast things of metal so as to worship them.
We suffer today far more from the worship of ourselves, our capabilities and our desires.
To this Zechariah says to the worship of ourselves
6 Then he said to me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts.
Or We may be more tempted to the worship of possessions, things made by human hands and coveted by the human heart.
5 For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.
Now comes the woe, mocking those who look to help from an idol, who look for relief from it & call out to it “Arise, Awake, come to my aid”.
The wood, the plant, the tree, the stone, the car, the salary, the thing that we seek to provide happiness, cannot come to our aid. It is silent, breathless.
Is that item or thing expected to come to our aid or to teach us the way to “prosperity” and happiness. It lies and is silent. There is no breath in it at all to help.
We become what we worship, we take on the character of what we give our service and worship to.
The babylonians became all together worthless because of their worship of idols..
Better that we seek the Lord who is alive & who speaks and acts whose words are better than gold, as the psalmist said:
72 The law of your mouth is better to me
than thousands of gold and silver pieces.
127 Therefore I love your commandments
above gold, above fine gold.
36 then hear in heaven and forgive the sin of your servants, your people Israel, when you teach them the good way in which they should walk, and grant rain upon your land, which you have given to your people as an inheritance.
and the true God who can offer us aid
God is in His Temple
God is in His Temple
20 But the Lord is in his holy temple;
let all the earth keep silence before him.”
Habakkuk contrasts the vanity and silence of idols with the awesome presence of the one true God who is ready to respond to the needs of His people.
The I AM, the covenant name of God, in his temple, reigning over His creation.
He is sovereign over all things and in control when all seems out of console.
God has not gone off somewhere, he still reigns and he has not forsaken Judah or Us.
Back in Habakkuk 1, this dialogue began with a complaint to God about his failure to act to remove wickedness, his apparent silence in the midst of this wickedness
Now Habakkuk calls the world to silence (Literally calls the world to HUSH!) before God, willing to let God act in His time and willing to wait for God to open his mouth when God chooses.
Willing to wait in reverential awe and worship before the LORD in his temple.
When we find ourselves in the presence of the lord in worship it can profoundly impact our perspective on events and going’s on in the world.
We need to go to the sanctuary and worship him to get what we need in order to rightly understand the world we are traveling through.
To get the wisdom, strength, insight, whatever it is.
1 Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory,
for the sake of your steadfast love and your faithfulness!
2 Why should the nations say,
“Where is their God?”
3 Our God is in the heavens;
he does all that he pleases.
4 Their idols are silver and gold,
the work of human hands.
5 They have mouths, but do not speak;
eyes, but do not see.
6 They have ears, but do not hear;
noses, but do not smell.
7 They have hands, but do not feel;
feet, but do not walk;
and they do not make a sound in their throat.
8 Those who make them become like them;
so do all who trust in them.
9 O Israel, trust in the Lord!
He is their help and their shield.
10 O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord!
He is their help and their shield.
11 You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord!
He is their help and their shield.
1 Truly God is good to Israel,
to those who are pure in heart.
2 But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled,
my steps had nearly slipped.
3 For I was envious of the arrogant
when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.
4 For they have no pangs until death;
their bodies are fat and sleek.
5 They are not in trouble as others are;
they are not stricken like the rest of mankind.
6 Therefore pride is their necklace;
violence covers them as a garment.
7 Their eyes swell out through fatness;
their hearts overflow with follies.
8 They scoff and speak with malice;
loftily they threaten oppression.
9 They set their mouths against the heavens,
and their tongue struts through the earth.
10 Therefore his people turn back to them,
and find no fault in them.
11 And they say, “How can God know?
Is there knowledge in the Most High?”
12 Behold, these are the wicked;
always at ease, they increase in riches.
13 All in vain have I kept my heart clean
and washed my hands in innocence.
14 For all the day long I have been stricken
and rebuked every morning.
15 If I had said, “I will speak thus,”
I would have betrayed the generation of your children.
16 But when I thought how to understand this,
it seemed to me a wearisome task,
17 until I went into the sanctuary of God;
then I discerned their end.
