Sermon Tone Analysis

Questioning God

Justice is a popular topic these days.

A lot of people are crying out for justice.

However, not everyone means the same thing when they are talking about justice.

Someone may say justice will come when we all have equality of wealth.

Some may say justice will come when we get rid of the police department.

Some say justice will come when all the people I don’t like are in jail.

There are many ideas about what justice is.

But biblically speaking, our aim should be to seek justice as God defines it, not as we would on our own.

We try to bring justice about.

We try to bring people to justice.

We understand that justice is two fold: It involves 2 parties: The guilty and their victim.

Justice to us usually means punishing the guilty and bringing a sense of justice to victims.

This is generally in line with God’s view of justice according to the Bible, but we are often unsatisfied with justice brought by human courts, because we either think the judgment was too harsh or not harsh enough.

Or, we think the guilty went free on a technicality.

Or perhaps there was a corrupt judge, police chief, or lawyer involved that perverted the justice.

So we are outraged when someone who seems clearly guilty to everyone walks away with no punishment.

Or we are outraged if the court hearing takes so long, or an arrest is not made soon enough.

There is a saying we may use, “justice delayed is justice denied”.

But no one escapes God’s justice.

And sometimes, God does not exact punishment immediately on the guilty.

In fact, we ought to be very thankful for that, since every time we sin we are not immediately struck down.

God’s justice may not be visible to us.

We may not see it at all in some cases in a way that satisfies us.

But still, we cry out for justice.

Is it ok for us to question God about his justice?

Can we be righteous in questioning him about why someone seems to get away with murder?

Paul noted that there would be all kinds of evil done by people:

Paul observed the reality of this in his time, and also is predicting it would continue in future generations.

We see it today, all of these sins, and maybe even more varieties on a theme.

And there was a prophet, who we are going to study the writings of for the next 4 weeks or so, who also questioned God about why he lets people get away with their sins.

That is his initial question to God.

And we will see that question answered this morning, and next week, Lord willing, we will see how the answer to the first question prompts a second question.

I’ll sum up the questions now, and we will look into both the questions and God’s answers as we go.

The first question, or complaint, is, more or less, “why are you letting people get away with so much sin?”

And God’s answer is, my response to the sin of Israel is coming, and it is going to be very harsh.

And next, Habakkuk says, “How can you punish so harshly?

I don’t like the punishment you are promising.”

God’s answer is, “wait and have faith.

You will see in the end that my judgments are right, the wicked will be punished”

We don’t know much about Habakkuk.

He is one of a few in scripture who we have no description of.

Sometimes we get someones lineage or the town they came from, but we don’t know much about Habakkuk other than he was around probably between 640-615 BC, before the decline of assyria and the rise of Babylon (Chaldea).

So let’s look at Habakkuk’s first complaint and God’s answer:

Habakkuk’s Complaint

We can definitely relate to Habakkuk’s complaint.

I could spend all day just giving examples of things that are going on in the present and recent past that make us shake our heads and say, how can they get away with that?

IN this case, Habakkuk is complaining about his own country.

Everywhere he looks, God is being mocked by the sin of the people.

Habakkuk is not just bringing this up.

He has been crying for help for some time.

You may have, as I do, a couple of cross references here: Ps13.1

Habakkuk is by no means the first, and certainly was not the last, to question God about his justice.

He sees violence being done to helpless people, and no one is saving them.

I feel like this all the time when I hear of all of the violence done against children, the horrible treatment of people who are the most vulnerable.

When you consider how the most innocent are murdered in the womb, and you ask God, why?

Why don’t you step in and save these babies?

Why don’t you step in and stop abusive people who are ruining the lives of so many children?

Why do you let this continue?

Why does it seem like you don’t even care, God?

They are getting away with it!

All I see is destruction and violence and strife and contention! the law is paralyzed, justice never goes forth.

the wicked surround the righteous.

Now, some may say, “you must never question God”.

And certainly in the end, we are called to trust him and his sovereign plan, that he will make all things right.

But is God offended by our questioning?

The answer is… sometimes.

But other times in scripture, God lovingly allows his creatures to process their emotions, to ask difficult questions.

He knows what we are thinking anyway.

You see, that it may have been impudent in a sense for Habakkuk to question God like this, but God does not give Habakkuk a hard time, he actually answers the question.

The answer is not an answer that is going to satisfy the questioner.

Because the answer is that I am going to punish the sins of my people, and I am going to punish the sins of my people by sending an even more evil people to be the instrument of my wrath and judgement.

This is going to blow your mind.

You aren’t going to understand it.

My justice is coming, but not how you would have hoped.

The Chaldeans, that is the residents of Chaldea, also known as the Babylonians, are being raised up by God to bring punishment to Israel.

These Chaldeans are a bitter and hasty nation.

What does that mean?

What is a person like who is bitter and hasty?

Bitter people are those who have allowed themselves to become absorbed by an attitude that is tainted by the past, they hold grudges, they are cynical, they assume the worst about people.

Bitter people will tell you they already know how bad things will turn out because they never turn out well.

And hasty, quick to jump to conclusions.

Now, some people are hasty to think the best of others, to jump to good conclusions about people when maybe they should wait a little to see if there can be trust there.

We may say these people are naive or gullible.

Well, that may be a problem, but if I am going to error sometimes by being hasty, I would rather have it be a hastiness to trust, especially in the church, but apparently the Chaldeans are hasty in a way that corresponds to their bitterness.

So God is about to use as his instrument of judgment a people who are bitter and hasty.

Perhaps, then, it is fair to consider, when we feel harassed by people who are bitter and hasty, whether God is using that person to correct us.

Because God loves us, when we sin, he often corrects us, and sometimes his means of correction may be ungodly people.

However, this does not mean we always need to assume that because someone is mistreating us that this must be God’s punishment.

But whenever we are in difficult times, and even when we are not in difficult times, we should be asking God to search our hearts, to find if there is any iniquity there.

These Chaldeans march through the earth, they seize dwellings not their own.

They are plunderers, they are imperialists.

They conquer to make their own kingdom greater.

Besides being bitter and hasty, the Chaldeans are dreaded and fearsome.

They have their own standard of justice and dignity.

They are also powerful.

They have horses and soldiers who ride them that move quickly, and are fierce, like an eagle they come to devour.

they are all about violence.

They devour what is ahead of them like an eagle.

They are violent, they capture and enslave people.