Habakkuk 3:16: “I heard and my heart pounded, my lips quivered at the sound; decay crept into my bones, and my legs trembled. Yet I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us.”
I cannot imagine how awful the sounds of gunfire in Las Vegas when one evil man rained down automatic weapon fire upon those gathered peacefully and unaware below. One radio station played a segment of it that someone recorded and hearing it—even after the fact—knowing the devastation it brought was shocking.
Habakkuk not only had a vision, but he heard the awful sound of God’s judgment upon his own people for their idolatry and unrighteousness. He heard not the violence of one evil man, but the violence of an army coming against his own nation. It shook him to his core. But it did something else also. He took God at His word that there would be an end. One day God would judge Babylon even more harshly. Habakkuk would wait patiently for that day.
I am not a harbinger of gloom and doom. I am a preacher of grace. I know that when God judges His own, no matter how severely, He does it in mercy and love. He disciplines us always with the goal of restoring us to holiness in His presence. The writer of Hebrews reminds us of that fact. “My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those he loves.” [Hebrews 12:5-6 NIV]
Father, I trust in Your love. I trust that even as You discipline Your beloved, You do it with the goal to restore not to harm. Remove every spot and wrinkle from us, we pray. Amen.
