H is for Habakkuk

So, growing up, my parents were a disaster. They divorced when I was super young. I was like, four, I think. And my sister was two. And they were in court until my sister turned 18. Like, just raging, tumultuous, terrible. And my father was really the catalyst and the driver for a lot of that. He was just a mean person.

That was a thing for my father especially- I had to be in his image. Because if I wasn't in his image, I was wrong. And everything I did either glorified him or embarrassed him. And I was an embarrassment. He would literally say like, you're not glorifying me and showing that I am raising you appropriately.

And so, in all that, religion was never really a thing for us. I tried youth group in junior high. My mother was a terrible person in another way, in that she liked other people's husbands. So, I was really rejected because of her, you know? And so that was it. It turned out the woman that led that charge was having an affair with our pastor. I found that out in high school, and I was like “What in the world?!”  So, okay, whatever. And I never bothered with [church] again.

[My father] didn't ever put any effort in. He was like, well, if you want a relationship with me you need to do XYZ.

I went through my time in the service and, and all of that. And really just was like very unworried, I guess would be the way to say it. Because I was like, well, home life is crap. I can't trust those people. So I'm gonna go do my thing and do [it] the best way I can. You know, and even through my divorce [from my first husband], which was also a disaster. There's lots of disasters there… Yeah, it was just me. Just trying to do the best I could.

Habakkuk is a minor prophet, meaning his writings are short (not that he is unimportant). His book can easily get lost there at the end of the Old Testament, but it is worth reading. Habakkuk certainly has some meaningful words for us today. There is not sufficient evidence to be able to place a specific date on when he was writing, but it is likely that Habakkuk was writing around the same time as the prophet Jeremiah. As their country fell apart around them, first because of the incompetence and injustice of their king and then because of the increasing threat of the Chaldeans (AKA Babylonians), these prophets wrote.

In the opening of Habakkuk, the prophet cries out to God in anger. Habakkuk comes to the Lord ready to fight. The book records a conversation, a fight, really, between Habakkuk and God. Hear Habakkuk’s opening blow- O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen? Or cry to you ‘Violence!’ and you will not save? Why do you make me see wrongdoing and look at trouble? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. So the law becomes slack and justice never prevails. The wicked surround the righteous—   therefore judgement comes forth perverted.

Verse 4 reads differently in different translations. Here, the NRSV says “the law becomes slack,” but know this- Habakkuk isn’t referring to the laws of the land; he is referring to God’s law, God’s teachings. “Your laws are slack.” The Common English Version says it “The Instruction (capital I) is ineffective.” Simply put, what Habakkuk is trying to say is this- “O God, your Word has failed.” Habakkuk feels that evil is winning, that following God’s laws has not led him into anything good. No, rather those who commit violence and wrongdoing are overwhelmingly powerful. Justice doesn’t exist anymore. Habakkuk’s nation is falling apart in horrific violence and God isn’t listening. Why won’t you rescue me? Habakkuk asks. He continues his argument, saying, essentially that the punishment of all of this violence does not fit the crime and why does God continue to be silent “when the wicked swallows one who is more righteous?”

But notice this- Habakkuk refuses to give up. “I will stand at my watch-post, and station myself on the rampart; I will keep watch to see what he will say to me, what he will answer concerning my complaint.” Habakkuk will not give up or back down. He will hold God accountable. And God responds with the words we heard earlier. Words that offer no easy answers, only hope. Hope that the vision will come, and when it does, Habakkuk is to write it so big someone running by can read it. Put it on a billboard, Habakkuk. The vision will come at the right moment, the appointed time, it does not lie. It’s worth waiting for. The righteous, that is, those who are dependent on God, those whose love for God leads them to right action, they will live by faith.

Chapter 3 is Habakkuk’s prayer, and it seems to reveal to us the vision that he received- and again, it offers no easy answers, only hope. Habakkuk’s vision, his word to the nation of Judah as it fell into rubble, his word to us, is that God will not be tamed. That God is beyond our understanding. That the events of our lives and world don’t have to make sense to us. That God is powerful and mighty and everlasting. That’s the vision. No easy answers, just hope.

The prophet responds to the vision. He acknowledges that justice and understanding are not coming on the timeline he wants, and yet… he writes, “I hear, and I tremble within; my lips quiver at the sound. Rottenness enters into my bones, and my steps tremble beneath me. I wait quietly for the day of calamity to come upon the people who attack us. Though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails and the fields yield no food; though the flock is cut off from the fold and there is no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will exult in the God of my salvation. God, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer and makes me tread upon the heights.”

Basically, everything is terrible and there is no hope in sight, but God is with me and I will not give up. And I don’t know, but sometimes that seems like the best answer we’re going to get. Maybe resolution will come. Maybe peace will one day rule. But maybe all I can do today is know that God is here, even now.

Habakkuk is arguing, fighting with God. Some may say that he is disrespectful, even blasphemous as he calls God to account for not intervening. And God doesn’t seem to mind. God does not appear to be angry with Habakkuk’s challenge. God can handle his anger and resentment, his questions, and his conflicts. And friends, God can handle yours as well.

In seasons of conflict, violence, and strife, questioning and doubt is a faithful response. Crying out to God in pain and anger is still crying out to God. Don’t you see? You are still leaning into your dependence on God. The faithless response is dishonesty- pretending you aren’t struggling, aren’t questioning, lying to God and to yourself. The faithless response is to walk away completely, certain that there is no God, certain that there is no peace to be found, no hope. “Come to me,” says Jesus. “Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest.” Jesus isn’t saying “buck up” or gaslighting you that your burdens and anxieties are not real. He simply bids us to come, just as we are, bringing with us all that we are required to carry.

On the personal level of wondering where God is in the troubles of our daily lives and in the large-scale conflicts of national turbulence and strife, God is still here. As our nation is in a conflicted and contentious election cycle where division reigns and violence is threatened, God is still here. God does not leave Habakkuk alone in his suffering and fear. Instead, God offers us presence, and it is enough. God offers hope, even when there is not a fix.

Habakkuk ends not with healing and wholeness, but with tenacious hope, tenacious faithfulness. May we too hold steady, though our journeys are painful, though we suffer and struggle. May our hope be durable enough to rejoice in the Lord, even when all is lost. Hear the second part of our opening story-

My husband grew up in the church. He never once questioned because he always knew that love was there. He knew that God was there, and God loved him and he loved God.

When we had our first child, I really wanted the kids to have community. And so I insisted, we're gonna find a church. And, you know, like, I don't necessarily have to believe in or be involved in it, but they need people.

And so we went for maybe a year, almost two. And the more [the pastor] talked, the more I listened. And the more I was like, “okay.” And then I finally read the Bible for the first time. I've never done that either.

I broke down one night because I told my husband, “so I wasn't alone…” We don't have a choice. God's like, “nope, you’re mine.” And [my husband’s] like, “Yeah, you’re his whether or not you wanted it. And you weren't alone. No matter what it felt like.”

And so I was baptized, and all that, but I still felt distant from God. And I still felt that I wasn't worth that. Because we tend to conflate God with our own fathers. And so if you don't have that, you know, when you know, your own father didn't love you. And love to use you as a pawn and whatever else. Then, you know, it takes working through and separating that out to be able to realize, you know, just because he was a terrible person, doesn't mean that God is and that God's gonna treat you that way. And it was actually some guy on Instagram that said, “your father wasn’t your curse, you were his blessing and he didn't know what to do with you.”

That was one of those deep hits, like, “Okay, I am worthy, I am worthy of that.” And I still struggle with it so hard, because you spend 30 years not being good enough in your own mind and your own heart. It's hard to break that pattern.

But we did a Bible study and it talked about how the Jews had to wander for 40 years until they could get themselves right and get to go on to the promised land. And I was like, “oh, so all of that time in the service, in life, in my divorce, and in all of it. I had to wander until I could accept, and I could come home.”

Friends, stand at your watch-post, station yourself on the ramparts, keep watch to see what the Lord is doing. A vision is coming and it does not lie. Amen.