Ever feel like Habakkuk?

Of course, at this point you're probably asking, "How exactly did Habakkuk feel?" Or maybe you don't even know who he is. Well, he was a prophet who was really not satisfied with how God was running things... and he complained about it. Really complained...

"How long, O LORD, must I call for help, but you do not listen? Or cry out to you, "Violence!" but you do not save? Why do you make me look at injustice? Why do you tolerate wrong? Destruction and violence are before me; there is strife, and conflict abounds. Therefore the law is paralyzed, and justice never prevails. The wicked hem in the righteous, so that justice is perverted."

Yep, I'd say that qualifies as complaining. But God was not put off by Habakkuk's complaints. Instead, He answered. But His answer was not the answer that Habakkuk wanted. So what did Habakkuk do? You guessed it... he complained again. So the Lord told him plainly of the judgment coming upon Habakkuk's people. Again, this was not what he wanted to hear, and yet this time he did not complain. Instead, he prayed. And he asked that God - in the midst of His wrath - would remember His mercy. And then Habakkuk began to remind himself who the Lord really is and began to praise Him saying, "His splendor covered the heavens, and the earth was full of His praise. His brightness was like the light; rays flashed from His hand; and there He veiled His power."

After he recounts the many ways God's power and might have been shown, he comes around again to the fact that God is about to judge the people and says, "I hear, and my body trembles; my lips quiver at the sound; rottenness enters into my bones; my legs tremble beneath me. Yet I will quietly wait for the day of trouble to come upon people who invade us." But the last few verses of this interesting book are the really amazing to me and are filled with Habakkuk's knowledge that only God is his strength and hope:

"Though the fig tree should not blossom,
nor fruit be on the vines,
the produce of the olive fail
and the fields yield no food,
the flock be cut off from the fold
and there be no herd in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the LORD;
I will take joy in the God of my salvation.
GOD, the Lord, is my strength;
He makes my feet like the deer’s;
He makes me tread on my high places."

This small book helps me also to process my complaints but to realize that God is my strength and my hope.

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