Watch and Be Utterly Amazed

Habakkuk the prophet prayed a prayer to God saying, “How long, O Lord must I call for help, but you do not listen? 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.” And again he prays, “O Lord, are you not from everlasting? Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrong. Why then do you tolerate the treacherous? Why are you silent while the wicked swallow up those more righteous than themselves?” God has a simple answer. 

WATCH. Look at the nations and watch and be utterly amazed.

How many times do we stop long enough to watch what God is going to do? How many times do we put our own desires behind us to see what God wants? How many times do we put our own knowledge aside and let the all-knowing God have control? 

I’m guilty of that. I’ve seen many things in my life that leave me questioning whether God or evil is prevailing. I hear of another school shooting leaving multiple kids dead. I hear of an earthquake that has destroyed a country. I bury a baby in Zambia who has no family there to mourn for him or care that he’s gone. I leave a village where I’ve seen a family beg for the Havens to take their child back (a child not wanted by any family member…just try and imagine that). I hear of another teenager kidnapped and missing. I volunteer in a hospital where a 5 year old girl is dying because her kidneys won’t work. There is evil in this world. You don’t have to look far to find it. In fact, it’s blown up all over our televisions and radios and social media. It’s physically right in front of our faces.

 And sometimes it leaves me feeling like Habakkuk asking God, “Why do you make me look at injustice?” I don’t want to see those new reports. I don’t want to know someone whose friend is missing. I don’t want to be the one who has to attend that baby’s funeral. I imagine Habakkuk felt somewhat like that. That’s why he prayed that prayer. The injustice was so engulfing that it left him crying out to a God who said he was holy yet was silent while the wicked swallowed everything up. Gosh I know I’ve felt that before. I’ve prayed prayers and sang songs to a God knowing that I wasn’t really believing the good promises he’s made but I was clinging to them anyways because that was my only hope. That was my only relief from the evil and injustice. 

When Habakkuk wanted relief from the injustice, the Lord told him to watch. To be patient. And to wait. He didn’t take the evil away. He didn’t hide it from Habakkuk’s eyes. He said, “Watch. Be utterly amazed. For I am going to do something in your day that you would not believe, even if you were told.” 

So today I’m praying for the faith to watch what God is doing in the midst of good and in the midst of evil. Today I’m praying for the ability to be silent before the Lord and trust that the relief will come. After Habakkuk cries out to God and listens to his answers he concludes the whole situation with this: “The Sovereign Lord is my strength. He enables me to go on the heights.”

When evil is strong and wearing you down, turn to the Lord. 

He will enable you to go on.