Our Struggle to Understand God’s Ways

MEMORY SELECTION: “I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation.” —Habakkuk 3:18

SELECTED SCRIPTURE: Habakkuk 1:1-4; 2:1-4; 3:17, 18

THE Old Testament prophets wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and while they comprehended much of what they wrote concerning contemporary events, they did not fully understand the much larger features of the divine plan which were to be implemented in the future. The Apostle Peter states: “Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you: searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.”—I Pet. 1:10,11

Habakkuk was disturbed about the vision the Lord had given him concerning the terrible punishment that he was sending upon the nation of Israel because of disobedience. The instrument that the Lord had chosen to punish Israel was the Chaldeans, who were cruel and merciless. In his prayer to the Lord, Habakkuk expressed an age-old question as to how the Lord, who is righteous and merciful, could permit all those foretold evils to come upon Israel. “Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity: wherefore lookest Thou upon them that deal treacherously, and boldest Thy tongue when the wicked devoureth the man that is more righteous than he?” (Hab. 1:13) The essence of the problem expressed in more general terms is, why does God permit the righteous and the innocent to suffer at the hands of the unrighteous?

The Lord gave a partial answer to the prophet, who said: “I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower, and will watch to see what He will say unto me, and what I shall answer when I am reproved. And the Lord answered me, and said, Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it. For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry.” (Hab. 2:1-3) The answer to the prophet’s question was withheld because the Lord said, “For the vision is yet for an appointed time.” The answer was to be revealed fully in the future, but Habakkuk was given full assurance that it was certain to come to pass.

The Lord gave the prophet some fragments of information that were not meaningful to him but are to us, because the Lord’s time clock has indicated that it has long since been time for the vision to be revealed. In verse 4 of the 2nd chapter we read: “Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith.” In Habakkuk’s day the Jews were under the Law Covenant. The promise was held out to them that if they could keep all the precepts of the Law they would be acknowledged by God as just and would be given life. (Lev. 18:4,5) But no man could keep the Law, and so all were condemned by it. It made their sinful condition manifest, and none could receive life through it. (Rom. 3:19,20) And so, in harmony with the prophecy, “His soul which is lifted up [by his own works] is not upright [or just] in him.” In other words, no man will be accepted by God and justified by his own works.

The Apostle Paul tells us, in Galatians 4:4,5, that in due time God sent forth his Son as the long-promised Seed of the Abrahamic Covenant. He came to redeem the nation of Israel, and not them only, but the whole world of mankind. In addition to the provision of a general salvation provided by Jesus, it was also God’s plan that a few who were willing to walk in the footsteps of Jesus (Matt. 16:24) would be justified by their faith in the shed blood of Jesus (Rom. 5:9) and would be given life. And so the Lord’s statement: “But the just shall live by his faith.”—Hab. 2:4

The ultimate objective of the divine plan of the ages is the reconciliation of the world of mankind during the thousand-year reign of Christ and his church. It is during this time that the world of mankind will be brought back to the perfection that was once enjoyed by Adam in the Garden of Eden. But to accomplish this “the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.”—Hab. 2:14

| Home Page | Table of Contents |