When we think about Habakkuk, many of us know he’s a minor prophet. When we look at the entire book, it’s a record of the prophet Habakkuk. There were 2 prayers he made in chapter 1 where he asked something of God and God answered him. Chapter 2 contains God’s answer to his second question. Chapter 3 says directly that it’s Habakkuk’s prayer. Since it’s a book on prayers, we will learn about prayers from this book.

Habakkuk was written in late 7th C BC. It would happen before the fall of the kingdom of Judah and the destruction of Jerusalem. The kings who were ruling then were mostly evil. Things were about to get worse because the city of Jerusalem would get destroyed; the people would be taken captive to Babylon.

This was the background of the book of Habakkuk. Here was a prophet and his prayers in a time where the people were very evil.

Let’s think about what we can learn about Habakkuk. When we think about prayers, we think of people of faith who ask of God and have their prayers answered. Habakkuk is interesting because there’re many times he calls out to God but He doesn’t answer. Just like when we have prayed for a long time over a matter and God doesn’t answer. He seems oblivious to our suffering and doesn’t lend a hand to help. That’s similar to what Habakkuk felt.

Hab 1:2-4
This records the first prayer of Habakkuk. He cries out to God, “Look at what’s happening to the people. They’re getting attacked by wicked people!” We can sense the desperation in his prayers, as though God doesn’t see their plight. “I’ve cried out to You for so long but You don’t seem to hear.” “We, Your people, are suffering yet You don’t seem to see.”

Have we thought like prophet Habakkuk when we pray today? That He’s silent and He doesn’t seem to hear our prayer. He doesn’t seem to see our plight. It’s at this juncture we have to learn from Habakkuk. Because even though Habakkuk cried this out to God many times, he still continued. He continued to pray despite God’s silence. He even put his thoughts on God’s silence into prayer.

If we feel God is silent, continue to pray. We can be like Habakkuk who made it known in his prayer. It may seem God doesn’t hear at this juncture. But if we continue to pray and even put into prayer that we feel He doesn’t hear us, we will ultimately get our answer just like Habakkuk. We don’t know how long Habakkuk cried out, but when he cried out once more, God answered him in Hab 1:5ff.

God told Habakkuk that the violent and ferocious Chaldeans/Babylonians were coming to punish Judah.

v11 They also had their own gods. In those days would be Madook(sp?) - the god of the wind.

When God responded to Habakkuk, we derive another lesson. Yes when He’s silent, we can continue to pray for an answer. But further, when God answers, His answer may not be according to what we expect. Sometimes when god makes His will clear, it may not be something we may be able to grasp.

When Habakkuk realised God’s answer to him was that the people of Judah were wicked and would be punished by the Babylonians. He couldn’t grasp or understand it. That’s when he called out his second prayer.

When he heard it, he was distressed and prayed from v12-17.
“The Babylonians are more wicked than Judah. Why do you give them power to destroy the more righteous?”

Not only did Habakkuk feel that it cannot be so for God to use a more wicked nation to punish wicked Judah, he even points out to how evil the people of Babylon were. They didn’t worship God; they were idolators. At least the people of Judah had some notion of who God is. Why let them fall into this snare like fish in a net?

Habakkuk couldn’t comprehend why God would allow this. Why would God stain His hands to use even more wicked people?

He didn’t like God’s answer and didn’t understand it. Maybe he was thinking in his head that God’s unfair.

We may not get an answer from God sometimes when we have prayed for a long time. But we continue to pray, because we understand He has His reasons. But then when He answers, we may not comprehend His question.

For example you have trouble at work. A colleague makes work miserable. You pray about it and then you go to work and find out he got promoted and has more power over you. At this juncture will you wonder, “Why are You doing this??”

Doubt may start to creep into our hearts. We may start to wonder if God really loves us.

If this happens to us, what will we do? When we pray to God and the problem doesn’t get better but worse.

If we learn from Habakkuk, what he did was to continue to turn to God.

Hab 2:1
This is what Habakkuk says after he talked back about how he didn’t understand why God’s answer was that. “I will stand my watch and set myself on the rampart, and watch to see what He will say to me, and what I will answer when I am corrected.”

When Habakkuk had a lot of questions in his head about God’s answer to his prayer; about God’s plan to use the Babylonians to punish the people of Judah, he turned to God to clarify his problems/doubts.

It’s inevitable we start to have doubts in our head. We may stay to doubt God’s fairness and whether He loves us. At this juncture it’s important to learn from Habakkuk to continue doing our duty. But at the same time to turn to God to clarify our doubts. Even the strong in faith sometimes have questions about God’s will.

Take for example John the Baptist who was a powerful preacher. The forerunner of the Messiah. He was very clear he was serving Jesus Christ. Before the start of Jesus’ ministry when He went to get baptised by John the Baptist, he already had an inkling already of who Jesus was. That’s why he said he should be baptised by Jesus and not Jesus by him. Nonetheless he baptised Jesus because Jesus said that all righteousness might be fulfilled.

John 1:31-34
When the Holy Spirit descended onto Jesus, it became an even clearer testimony to John the Baptist that Jesus was the one.

Matt 11:1-6
But when John the Baptist was in prison, at a low point in his life of faith, for whatever reason when he heard about what Jesus was doing, he started to have doubts about whether Jesus was truly the Christ. The good thing was that he sent 2 disciples to ask Jesus directly. When they asked Jesus, they were able to bring the answer back to John the Baptist.

Even John the Baptist had some doubts about God in his life of faith. Maybe because he heard what Jesus was doing and it was different from what he expected. So he went to clarify. He couldn’t reconcile what Jesus was doing with what he expected the Christ to do.

So he directly clarified his doubts with Jesus. Jesus answered, “The blind see and the lame walk; the leper’s and cleansed and then deaf hear…And blessed is he who is not offended because of Me.”
The last part was either a comfort or threat to John the Baptist. If he truly believed Jesus, then he would be blessed. If not he wouldn’t be blessed.

But we know John the Baptist was blessed. Although it’s not recorded, the answer must’ve satisfied him and his faith must’ve been renewed.

Today if we have doubts about God’s will for us, we shouldn’t think God doesn’t love us and stop praying. Instead turn all the more to God like Habakkuk and John the Baptist.

For us turning to God today would be reading the Bible and pray. If we start to doubt God’s answer to us, we should read the Bible and pray.

It’s normal for people to have some doubt about God’s ways from the Bible. We’ve read about Habakkuk, John the Baptist who questioned God’s will at a low point in life. Another example is Psa 73 where the psalmist questions why the evil people seem to be prospering. “Of what use have I been so good to keep God’s commandments?” But his conclusion was that when he entered the sanctuary of the house of God; to the holy place to pray and find out more from God, v17-18 the psalmist understood the end of the wicked. “Surely you have set them in slippery places and cast them down.” He realised it wasn’t what he saw before and that there was an end destruction.

All these examples given to us today are for us to start to think: if we start to have some doubts because God’s answer to us is not what we expect or what we really want, and we start to question God’s love, working, and fairness, what do we do?

All examples point to continuing to turn to God to seek Him and His answers. But of course we should ask these questions with the right attitude. Some ask God with the intent of denying God ultimately.

The examples we turned to all resulted in them closer to God.

One type of questioning leads you to denying your faith. Another type of questioning leads you to strengthened faith. That’s because the attitude is different.

Hab 3:1-6
In Habakkuk’s prayer here, we see how he describes God as glorious but frightening. Before God went pestilence and fever followed at His feet.

With the Covid-19 virus now, many people are in fear. Some of us even fear to congregate in church because of this.

v5 reminds us God is in control of all this; God is in control of pestilence and fever. Instead of fearing this pestilence, what we should really fear is God and falling into the hands of an angry God.

v8-10 (read)
Seems like the whole creation trembles and fears before God. When Habakkuk heard, his body trembled and rottenness entered his bones.

All these descriptions of God remind us that we must fear God. When we question God, it’s important to retain the fear of God in our hearts. When we say God is an awesome God, it’s different from how we use it today “this is awesome!” It means to be fearful of this God. It’s a fearful thing to fall into the wrath of God. It is this fear we should keep in our hearts when we question God. Yes God is loving and kind, but He is also to be feared. When we question God at this juncture, if we want our faith to increase and relationship with Him to grow, we need our fear of and for Him to grow.

Habakkuk’s fear of God enabled him to be strengthened by God. If we think about our situation today and are frightened about the virus, then all the more we must fear God, because pestilence is before and fever after Him.

Another thing we must have when questioning God is the realisation/remembrance that God is our salvation/Saviour.

Habakkuk describes God as frightening. But in v13 God goes forth for the salvation of His people. God is frightening to those who are wicked. But those who are good and have faith in Him must be assured God does this for our salvation.

When we doubt God, we must go back to Him and ask of Him. But do so with the full assurance that He can save us. Hold on to the fact that He wants to save us. That’ll settle us and anchor our soul so our questioning doesn’t lead us to doubt God. Not only that, we’ll start to grow in our faith to God.

So if we’re praying and God doesn’t seem to answer, legs learn from Habakkuk who continued to pray even though God seemed oblivious to the righteous in Judah. We can even tell God directly we find He’s not hearing us. Or when we question God’s answer and why He allows this to happen. When His answer is completely out of your expectations. Whatever it was, he kept two things in his heart - the fear of God & the belief that God does all these things for his salvation.

Habakkuk made this ultimate prayer, a prayer that for whatever circumstance will continue to praise and give glory to God.

Hab 3:17-18
This is a triumphant prayer. Even though the circumstance is so dire, v17 says there’s nothing to look forward to - figs are important because they’re an important energy source; the fruit of the vine/grapes are important for merrymaking and also tarts; olives are important for oil and worshipping God - nothing seems to be working well.

If we can learn from Habakkuk, we’ll be able to praise and rejoice in the Lord no matter what circumstance. Such is truly a prayer of faith.

“The just shall live by faith.”
How we live by faith is even in the most difficult circumstance, even when God doesn’t seem to answer, even when God’s answer is not what we expect, we’ll be able to rejoice.

There was no change in Habakkuk’s situation but there was a change in his heart. He was able to rejoice no matter what he was going through.

If we can pray in the same manner, then whatever happens to us in life, then we can truly say it is well with our soul.