God, Why do you tolerate traiatous nation?
Notes
Transcript
Intro
Intro
Dear brothers and sisteres, sometimes if we have to be perfect honest, we would like to ask questions to God right? Something that we thought must be true when we are young, it’s not so clear when we grow up. And one of the universal things about is, how could you allow this injustice happen? How could you allow it happen without acting? Why do you tolerate tratatous nations?
One of the nations history that I still remember very clearly is a trip to Cambodia. If you knew their history, there was a really bloody period, 紅色高棉大屠殺 是指1975年至1979年初，柬埔寨共產黨總書記波爾布特領導的紅色高棉共產主義政權在柬埔寨進行的大規模殺戮事件. 據各方估計，在紅色高棉統治時期，柬埔寨全國範圍內共有150萬至300萬人非正常死亡，約佔當時柬埔寨總人口的四分之一. 自1976年起，波爾布特又認為「黨的軀體已經生病了」，於是開始了對柬埔寨共產黨內部人員的大清洗，中央高層領導以及軍隊總參謀部幾乎被屠殺殆盡, I still remember going to this S-21集中營. Inside all types of torture machines, many many photos of people killed, and many many head skeletons. I felt sad for this country. How could one country bear so much pain, and that even now, Cambodia hasn’t recovered from this.
How do we know all this suffering and believe in a holy God. How to we wrestle with these questions. In Habbakuk God allows such wrestling, even directly answer the prophet. And so in these times, a time where news have been depressing, a time where soceity seems polarized, a time where it seems bad people gain and good people suffer. May we hear from God himself again. Let’s pray.
赤柬
赤柬
Background
Background
Last Sundy, we talked about habbakuk’s first complaint. Habbakuk is crying justice to a horrible situation. It make no sensse. In all of Judah there is injustice.God’s response to Habbakuk patient father. Last week Rev Leung said He listens, he is soveriegn. But his answer is not what the prophet expects, with all these injustices happening, God is going to punish Judah, God is going to raise up Babylyions also known as Calenians. They are coming to Jersualem, to destory the temple and judge the situation of injustice?
But of course prophet said, What Lord, how is that a solution, isn’t it even worse? Judah is going to suffer even more. While we are bad, you don’t need to ask another even worse enemy to destory us right? To deal with evil with even more evil, what is God thinking? And so it bring us to the second conversation with God, the second compliant.
The compliant
The compliant
Habakkuk 1:12-2:1 “Are you not from everlasting, O Lord my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O Lord, you have ordained them as a judgment, and you, O Rock, have established them for reproof. You who are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong, why do you idly look at traitors and remain silent when the wicked swallows up the man more righteous than he? You make mankind like the fish of the sea, like crawling things that have no ruler. He brings all of them up with a hook; he drags them out with his net; he gathers them in his dragnet; so he rejoices and is glad. Therefore he sacrifices to his net and makes offerings to his dragnet; for by them he lives in luxury, and his food is rich. Is he then to keep on emptying his net and mercilessly killing nations forever? I will take my stand at my watchpost and station myself on the tower, and look out to see what he will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint.”
Habakkuk he knows God well. He starts his complaint from the nature of God. He called God the evelasting, Holy God, You are the Rock. How could this happen? Let’s look at each of this titles. Habakkuk used the covenant name of God in his address. The “I AM WHO I AM” (Exod 3:14) is the God who promised to be with his people.The Hebrew term for “everlasting” focuses particularly on God’s past acts in Israel’s salvation history. Therefore, Israel cannot die, they will always be a remanent, because of such covenant. How could he do this to the Israel? How could an evelasting God let this happen? Second, he is the Holy God. While other nations thought of their gods as holy in the sense of “otherness,” that is of being god and not flesh, Isaiah added the idea of perfect moral purity to the holiness of God. Such holiness is unchanging, separating all humans and all creatures and thus all sin from God. Nothing evil can stand before his holy purity. If this is the case, the true description of God, how can he stand silent and inactive before the horribly evil and violent Babylonians? Thirdly, The second half of v. 12 continues the description of the nature of God. The Lord is addressed as Yahweh, the covenant name discussed in the preceding paragraphs, and as the Rock, a common address for God in the Old Testament. Both “LORD” and “Rock” evoke feelings of permanence and stability. The Rock was the protector of the covenant people. All three descriptor said that God is a God of conveant who promised to love and protect his people, like a rock with permancne and stability, why do you idly look at these traitors and remain silent and swallow man more righteous than he? The heart of the problem is that the outside world of history contradicts the interior certainty of the nature of God himself. A holy, righteous God cannot endure the godless acts of a ruthless oppressor. But not only his nature of GOd.
In verse 14-15, Habakkuk argued from the viewpoint of the helplessness of the people (vv. 14–15). Judah could never survive an attack from the savage Babylonians. To the Babylonians, life was cheap, and prisoners of war were expendable. People were like fish to be hooked or sea creatures to be trapped. Prophet Habakkuk uses on image, fishes in the sea to describe the situation of Judah. The Lord had made men like fish of the sea and like crawling things without one to guide them. And actually, when you think of Judah, without God they are always helpless. The history of Israel is that they are in the middle of many big countries and armies. They are usually just responding to agression from different countries. Without God, they are helpless. With the waves of these big powers, aren’t we sometimes also felt we are helpless? Just think about the recent Russian/Ukriane war, don’t we felt helpless? Why would God do that?
And then lastly, haungtiness of Babylion. the prophet compared the people of Judah to the fish of the sea. Before the wicked foe the people of Judah would be as defenseless as fish caught on a hook or trapped in a net and dragged onto the shore. The Babylonians rejoiced at their good fortune, catching men in nets. They use all sorts of method to torture enemy. How could God allow such behavior to go on? The Babylonians lived by the plunder of helpless peoples. In effect, the net and the dragnet became their gods, supplying the people of Babylon with the finest things that plundering the world could bring. “The Babylonian rejoices and shouts for joy because of his success. Then he worships those things that make him rich and successful. How prone are people today to worship whatever makes them rich and successful? And use it for mass destruction. Recently, there were few countries, threatening to use their nucelar power to destroy their enemies, isn’t this idea appear, again and again in history? And so in a way, Habakkuk complaint in some way represent all ages where evil nations rise up, and cause great suffering to people. God, why you let this happen. Same as the first complaint, the God of all creation responded.
The nature of God
The helplessness of Judah
The naughtiness of Babylon
The response
The response
Habakkuk 2:1-4 “I will take my stand at my watchpost and station myself on the tower, and look out to see what he will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint. And the Lord answered me: “Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so he may run who reads it. For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay. “Behold, his soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him, but the righteous shall live by his faith.”
Habakkuk worried about God’s silence, which he had to endure. That was part of the prophetic task. Not even a prophet could force God to answer what appeared to be a burning, immediate issue. All the prophet could do was sit and wait for God’s timing. He had a position, much like the military watchman who had a post above the city looking out for the approach of enemy armies. In some way, we too today have this prophet office, to listen to God, to communicate to the soceity God’s will. Habbakkuk is a good model for us, he waits, and he also waits for God’s judgement of his complaint. DId God answer? Yes, God answered the prophet’s complaint by commanding that the prophet write the vision so that anyone running might read the message. We see again that God cares for the one who is willing to take his needs to the Lord. The significant characteristic of each of these questioners is the willingness to talk to God rather than about God. Habakkuk’s experience suggests that God will help with our questions and concerns. The traditional interpretation seems best: make the message plain enough so the person running,
Then still the Lord say the vision awaits appointed time. Impatience is the normal human response to God’s promise to answer his people. God warned the prophet to wait on the prophecy. God had already decided upon a solution and would reveal it according to his timetable, but God was not indebted to any human to reveal the answer before he chose to. “Habakkuk, like all of us, was living ‘between the times,’ between the promise and the fulfillment. contemporary worshipers demand that God act according to the dizzying schedule of those pressed for time. God reminded the prophet of the certainty of the message but without the promise of meeting Habakkuk’s time schedule in the day of turmoil and destruction, the righteous person shall live by his faithfulness to God. The answer dealt with Habakkuk’s frustrations and fears. Would God leave the guilty—in Judah and in Babylon—unpunished? Would the righteous be consumed with the wicked. By means of a strong contrast, the Lord answered the complaints of the prophet. The one whose life is puffed up in pride and arrogance will die; the righteous, in contrast, by his faithfulness will live. Whether in Judah or Babylon, those in rebellion against God would die. “Wherever human beings rely on something of this earth—whether it be intellectual achievement or wealth or military might or or even the ability to cope and solve problems and master the complexities of modern life—wherever confidence is placed in human prowess and not in God for the achievement of a satisfying and secure manner of living, there true life cannot be had.”
So what is these rightreousness people, from this passage, the righteous are those courageous enough to accept God’s word of promise in a world dominated by the horrors of Babylonian power described in the preceding verses. To look for salvation in a world dominated by persecution requires faithfulness. And it is especially in these dark times that they need faithfulness, to keep living in faith. To believe in all this suffering and injustice there is justice in the end, that there is life after this, that God will is actually always in control and always in action. Habakkuk was not to wait with folded hands and bated breath for all this to happen. He was to live a life of faithfulness.”“Faith in God was the key to consistent living, even though violence abounded and justice was perverted (1:2–4).
Righteousness would live by faith. Yes, the lived at the end. Babylyion in history become history as Persian, another empire raised up and ended it rule. It even been good to the Israels and allowed to go back to their homes. But empire rises and fall. After Persian, then there is Greece and the Roman. Still God’s people are often under suffering. Still injust things happen. The problem of evil and empires still doesn’t seem to be solved. But if we look in the Bible, righteousness live by faith is a seed which is only fully expounded in NT. The seed in OT becomes a flower in the time of Jesus. In fact, this verse itself is quoted three times in New Testatment. Let’s look at them.
The verse
The verse
The first two is used by Paul. As he explains the wonderful truth that for anybody who believes now in Jesus shall live, shall be saved.
Galatians 3:11 “Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.”
The thing is all these suffering, all these rise of empires come back to a deeper root of problem, the sin of every human on the earth. And throughout the ages, many people want to come to God through how the law, through what they do. They try to be more righteousness, to do good things, but ultimately. Here Paul puts in quite blundtly, that if one person wants to live by the law, that it ultimately is a curse.But Jesus changed this all, another evil striked again, but this time on the son of God , that lead him to the cross. But actually because of this suffering, this injustice, everybody now who believes in him will live,because Jesus rightesousness will become our righteousness. Gal 3:13-14 “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”— so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.” For now, through Jesus we have a whole new starting point. The righteous shall live by faith, not becasue they are faithful, not because they are righteousness, by their faith in upon Jesus, and Jesus’ righteousness. Pauls Roman said it again,
Romans 1:16-17 “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”
The crux of the gospel, the power of gospel, is that through Jesus death and resurrection, those who believe, those who have faith would indeed be regarded as righteous. The righteousness of God includes God as a righteouss man, gave us jesus righteous the activity, and reckoned us as righteouss. The faith that is spoken in OT ambiously is now clear. That throughout all generations or evil and oppression, that righteousness would live, not this life by eternal life through faith, and faith particularly in Jesus. But God’s slavation saving us from the penalty of sin, save us from the cycles of sin in this world, as shown through Babylon. But not only in the past we have saved, but also in now and in the future.
Heb 10:37-38 “For, “Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay; but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.””
While Paul stress upon how a person become righteouss, He in Hebrews is upon the continue faithfulness of the righteouss person, as the end of age approaches. It talks about in our whole salavation, santification and glorification. For us Christians we are not only live by faith, the believing of Jesus, but continue faithfulness, which is santification. Each day, before the final end, we are living between ages, and so suffer would continue, we would have crisis of faith, we would still have compliant, but God gave us the holy spirit, and everyday, he gives us power to overcome sin, each day, we endure, we call our to God, we say every morning, God, today I commit to you, let me live by faith, let me overcome the power of sin, let me be closer to you. And this is especially important for this period of uncertainty and health crisis. We are not to shrink back in faith, we are to continue everyday fix our eyes on Jesus and run the race despite everything beside me. It means spiritual disciplines, coming to Lord everyday, reading his word, mediating his word, living out his word.
Because one day, as Hebbakuk and Hebrews both said, there is an end. There would be one day that there will be no more evil empire, no more people punishing us, but that we would be glorified, with abasence of sin. As Christ second coming, the glory of God, his honour, praise, majesty and holiness - will be realized in us, we will be changed with new bodies with unhindered access to God’s presence, enjoying communion Him. That why in each age, each hardship, the saints cry out, Lord Jesus come.
Apply:
And so I want to encourage brothers and sisters, espeically those who have been struggling spiritually, maybe having questions of God. to come to him and ask, that he shall answer you. And that maybe our spiritual lives have been stagnated, or seems that we have so many things clouding our relationship with Jesus. May the coming soon encourage you.
每試煉都彰顯救主恩助，我只要信靠寶貴應許；
甜安慰，使我信心更堅定，你神聖話語成我供應，
每一次我遇見痛苦患難，都願從父手歡然接受；
每件事隨時光如水逝去，我要與主永同在。