Watchfully Waiting for God | Habakkuk 1:12-2:1

February 23rd, 2025

Eager anticipation is an experience common to all. Whether waiting for an answer to a marriage proposal, or the response to a job application, or for the results of a diagnostic medical procedure or wondering what the consequences will be as the result of a mistake we made, there is apprehension as we await the outcome. We wonder what is next. This was Habakkuk’s situation as he waited for God’s answer to his lament in verses 1-4, asking God why He seems to ignore the sins of His people and why He allows injustice to flourish. In verses 5-11 God answers Habakkuk in a way that shocks him to the core; God explains that He will use the vicious, ruthless, vile Chaldeans as a rod of discipline for Judah. 

I. Trusting (vv. 12-13)

Habakkuk’s first lament was a crying out in confusion, where he sees a distance between himself and God: he cries out to God but thinks God doesn’t hear him; he accuses God of ignoring iniquity and allowing justice to be perverted. However, his second lament, beginning in verse 12, has a different focus, a posture of worship, a sense of closeness. Here Habakkuk acknowledges that God is eternal, that He is holy, and that He is Israel’s Rock. This second lament is a hymn, a crying out to God in faith. Habakkuk anchors himself in God’s character while he wrestles with the ways of God. This wrestling is an active faith, where Habakkuk admits that he doesn’t understand God’s ways, but he is going to trust Him while he is waiting for God to act.

• God’s Eternal Sovereignty

Watchful waiting on God, begins with a faith anchored in the character of God. Habakkuk begins by proclaiming the eternal sovereignty of God. Psalm 90:2 confirms the eternal nature of God, stating that He is God from everlasting to everlasting. Isaiah 57:15 declares that God inhabits eternity. God is outside the realm of time, yet He is imminent. God also operates within time and space and reacts personally with His creation.

God’s existence is without beginning or end, it transcends time. His eternality serves as the bedrock for all His attributes. He is eternally self-existent; this is known as God’s aseity. He is unchanging – immutable because He is outside of time. God is all-knowing – omniscient; He never learns anything nor is He ever surprised because the past, present, and future are always before Him. The Psalmist declared that God knows what we will say even before the word is on our tongue (Ps. 139:4). God is omnipotent; His power is without limit. Jeremiah 32:17 states that God created the heavens and the earth by His great power; nothing is too hard for Him. Revelation 1:8 says that Jesus is the Alpha and Omega, who was and who is and who is to some, the Almighty. This verse speaks of both His eternality and His omnipotence. We can trust that God has the power to fulfill all the promises that He makes. God is also omnipresent. Psalm 139:7-8 declares that God is everywhere simultaneously; we cannot flee from His presence; He is in heaven, and He is also in Sheol. 

God is holy; He is completely pure, separate from sin, perfect in righteousness. His holiness is also rooted in His eternality; His holiness does not change. Isaiah 6:3 describes the seraphim proclaiming: "Holy, holy, holy is Yahweh of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!" Leviticus 11:44 commands us to be holy because God is holy. God is also pure; His purity has never changed, and it will never change, because God is eternally holy.

God is love; it is His disposition to do good to His creation. Love is not a temporary emotion; it is a part of God’s eternal character. We can understand love because of God. God is love because God is eternal. God reminds Israel in Jeremiah 31:3 that He has loves them with an everlasting love, and He has drawn them with lovingkindness. Nothing can separate us from God’s love because He is eternally, everlastingly love. 

God is perfectly righteous and just, and He always acts with equity. Because of His eternality He will always be perfect in His judgments. Because God is not constrained by time, He is never rushed to make a judgment; He understands everything from beginning to end. Psalm 9:7 reads, “But Yahweh abides forever; He has established His throne for judgment.” God has established His throne for judgment because He abides forever. Again, everything is rooted in God’s eternality, so He will always act rightly.

God’s kindness toward sinners is a reflection of His mercy and grace. God shows compassion and unmerited favor, also rooted in His eternality. God’s mercy and grace are not momentary decisions. Romans 5:8 reminds us that “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”  God’s mercy and grace are rooted in His eternality, from His election and predestination, from before the foundations of the world.

• God’s Faithfulness

God is faithful; He is steadfast in His promises, and true to His Word, because He is eternal and is unchanging. By His very nature, He must be faithful because He is eternal. Time doesn’t erode his promises or His commitment. In Lamentation 3:22-23, Jeremiah comments on God’s eternality then says, “Great is Your faithfulness”, because God’s faithfulness is tied to His eternality.

It is important for us to understand that God’s eternality is the foundation for His character. God’s eternality defines His character and this is what establishes God as sovereign. Whenever we acknowledge that God is sovereign, we are affirming that His eternality is the bedrock for all His attributes. When we look at the world around us, we can trust in God’s sovereignty because of His eternality. Trust is God’s sovereignty is Habakkuk’s anchor in this hymn, and this is why he is worshipping the Lord.

Habakkuk begins by crying out, God, I don’t know where You are, I don’t know what’s going on, and God responds by saying, you can’t understand if I tell you; I’m raising up the Chaldeans, and they are worse than you think they are. Habakkuk then responds, God, are You not everlasting? Though Habakkuk doesn’t fully understand what God is doing, he anchors himself to the character of God. He acknowledges that God’s decrees are everlasting, and they must be good because they reflect God’s eternal wisdom and character. When Habakkuk says everlasting, he is referring to all of God’s nature. He says to God, You set the boundaries for the oceans, You establish the mountains and tell them when to raise up and when bow down and worship. You tell people who You are, and when they reject You, even those who are condemned to hell, will turn to You and worship because You are from everlasting. 

Habakkuk pivots from this point to a desperate plea where he clings to God’s covenant relationship with Judah. No longer is he seeing God as distant, now he refers to Yahweh as “my God, my Holy One.” Yahweh is the covenant name that God gave to Himself. God identified Himself to Moses in Exodus 3:14-15, as “I AM WHO I AM”, and that he should tell the Hebrew in Egypt that I AM had sent him to redeem them from slavery. God’s covenant name expresses His eternality and self-existence – His aseity.

After Habakkuk refers to God’s everlasting, unchanging nature, he appeals to God’s covenant relationship with His people. When he addresses God as “my Holy One” he is acknowledging that God is totally separate from sin. Habakkuk can see the Chaldeans on the horizon, and even though God is raising up this sinful people who will crush Judah, God does not sin. Habakkuk recognizes who God is, but his heart is torn, and he is struggling to reconcile God’s wrath on the people in using the Chaldeans. At this point Habakkuk, in his heart, begins to question if God’s covenant relationship with Israel has changed. After punishing the Israelites for worshipping the golden calf, killing about three thousand men, Moses had similar emotions when God said that He was “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness” (Exodus 34:6). Both Moses and Habakkuk anchored themselves in the promises of the covenant keeping God.

Habakkuk then declares “We will not die”, meaning that there cannot be a total annihilation of the nation because God’s covenant cannot be annulled. Here Habakkuk is expressing trust in the Abrahamic Covenant of Genesis 12: that God would establish Israel as a nation, that He would bless them, and that all nations would be blessed through them. Deuteronomy 7:9 states that God is faithful, He keeps His covenant and His lovingkindness to a thousand generations with those who love Him. Both Moses and Habakkuk agree that God’s lovingkindness is everlasting.

Through his laments, Habakkuk is trying to show us that trusting God and His faithfulness doesn’t mean that we don’t deny doubt or fear or uncertainty; these are not sinful emotions. God knows that we are going to have these doubts, but we need to speak truth to such doubts. In this hymn, Habakkuk brings these doubts to God through worship and prayer, saying that he will trust God because he knows He will be faithful. In our seasons of uncertainty, we can and must anchor our hearts in God’s character. When circumstances are confusing, we can worship, just like Habakkuk.

• God’s Purity

New Covenant believers also have promises to which we can cling. True believers need never fear being lost because God holds us tight; He never wanders nor wavers; His love remains faithful because it is based on His covenant promises to us. It is in this moment of crisis that Habakkuk clings to God’s promises. He wrestles with what God is showing him, then he reminds himself of God’s faithfulness, then he considers God’s purity. He acknowledges that God has chosen the Chaldeans to judge His people, and he admits that there is purity in God’s judgment; this is God’s sovereign hand in the life of Judah.

Because of His holiness, God alone can use sin sinlessly. Proverbs 16:4 says, “Yahweh has made everything for its own purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil.” We wrestle with the idea that God can raise up wicked people to accomplish His holy will through sinful acts, while not being guilty of sin Himself. Both God and the Chaldeans were participating in this discipline. We see this same scenario in Genesis 50:20, where Joseph tells his brothers that they intended evil when they sold him as a slave, but God meant it for good. Only God can use sin as an instrument of righteousness while remaining pure.

Habakkuk continues in verse twelve to say, “And You, O Rock, have established them to reprove.” A large rock in the desert can provide shade, protection, a place to hide from enemies, and a supply of water as when Moses was leading the Israelites to the Promised Land; these are all good things to which Habakkuk is referring. The Rock, Yahweh, was establishing the Chaldeans as a means to discipline Judah, with the ultimate purpose to bring reconciliation and restoration. This is the model for discipline described in Matthew 18:15ff where we see that church discipline is enacted for the purpose of reconciliation. 

While Habakkuk clings to the Abrahamic covenant, he still wrestles with the knowledge that Abraham was called out from the Chaldeans, yet God was going to use these people to discipline His covenant people. He is thinking to himself, Who would have ever thought of this? Habakkuk knows that God is everlasting, and he knows that the nation will not die because God called them out from the land of the Chaldeans, from their pagan religions. This is a painful irony yet assurance, and Habakkuk clings to this.

There is purity in God’s justice. In verse thirteen, Habakkuk says, “Your eyes are too pure to see evil, and You cannot look on trouble. Why do You look on those who deal treacherously? Why are You silent when the wicked swallow up those more righteous than they.” He is saying we know that we are more righteous than they because You called Abraham out of Chaldea and told him to worship Him only. Habakkuk is trying to understand why God would tolerate the behavior of the wicked Chaldeans and still use them to discipline Judah.

II. Wrestling (vv. 14-17)

• Humanity’s Helplessness (v. 14)

Habakkuk is anchored in God’s character but then the reality of the discipline that God is bringing creates turmoil in his heart; thus, he begins to wrestle with God’s plan. This part of Habakkuk’s hymn captures the beauty of watching unchecked evil flourish from the eyes of someone who truly understands the holiness and purity and goodness of God, who truly desires to live a righteous life, and yet understands the nature of humanity as being helpless. Habakkuk reminds God that He knows the nature of the man He created: like fish of the sea or creeping things without a ruler. 

• Evil’s Arrogance (vv. 15-16)

Habakkuk accuses God of standing idly by while the Chaldeans swallow up nations and consume their wealth. The Chaldeans throw out hooks and nets and swallow up men by the hundreds of thousands. Habakkuk says that not only is God watching but this is His plan. The Chaldeans find enjoyment in their cruelty while mocking God and anticipating the day when they will drink from the holy temple vessels. Judah offers incense to Yahweh, while the Chaldeans offer incense to their fishing nets, while worshipping their own power.

• God’s Tolerance (v. 17)

Habakkuk says, “Will they therefore empty their nets and continually kill nations without sparing.” This is the most pressing section of his lament, where his heart is aching the most. He is thinking this is never going to end; it’s helpless, it’s hopeless and Habakkuk is out of energy, he just doesn’t understand. He sees the power of these people and they grow ever stronger, and this creates a fear in his heart. Habakkuk is wrestling with what he knows about God, then seeing the wicked flourish, and realizing that they are coming to consume Judah as well. He is asking: How can God’s purity allow this?

This lament was a hymn sung at worship. We don’t have to wrestle with the thought that God doesn’t know what we feel or what we need. Since God is eternal, He knows us fully, and He wants us to bring our concerns to Him; this is a sweet aroma to Him. Whether our concern is over a medical diagnosis, a broken relationship, a wayward child or a financial challenge, God wants us to bring our lament to Him. We run to God with our questions, our anxiety, our pain, and our faith. We worship and we watch our life unfold.

III. Expecting (2:1)

We confess our trust and articulate our struggles, and then, like Habakkuk, we wait. Verse one of Chapter Two represents a profound shift from doom and gloom to one of Habakkuk saying that he will stand his ground and keep watch. Habakkuk is speaking to himself, encouraging himself to humbly stand firm in his faith as he awaits to hear God speak then how he will answer when he is reproved. Habakkuk knows God’s character, he knows His covenant relationship, he knows his sin, and he knows that he will be rebuked. Habakkuk recognizes that God is his Creator, and he is His creation, thus he is humbly waiting for God to teach him.

Unlike what we often do when challenged, Habakkuk is not waiting for God to finish His reproof so that he can defend himself. As we wait, we need to have a heart that desires to be corrected. This is expressed by David in Psalm 139: “Search me, O God, and know my heart…and lead me in the everlasting way.” We should pray, Help me to know Your ways, because You are everlasting. Again, all of God’s character is wrapped up in the word everlasting. David is praying, Lead me in Your ways. Habakkuk places himself in the best position to receive God’s Word: physically at the watch tower and spiritually with an open heart. 

As we face trials or seasons of doubt, or blessings or sufferings, or even a lifetime of suffering, we wrestle with the complexities of evil and the confusion of our lives, we must remain steadfast, watchfully waiting on God; this is our call as believers. True waiting on God is not waiting to be satisfied, but a readiness to be shaped by Him. Our faith is most often transactional, we expect God to act in specific ways when we do certain things. However, our faith should be relational where we have the attitude, God, I trust your character and I will endure to the end. Relational faith expects God to act according to His character, and we know He will because He is everlasting.

Calvin said: “We must sit in the watchtower of our mind and remain hopeful because the Morning Star is on the horizon.” Watchful waiting is at the heart of the gospel. Do we, like Habakkuk, wrestle with the brokenness of the world, burdened by sin and injustice and confusion? God has not left us in the dark; the Morning Star, Jesus Christ, has risen to shine light into the deepest, darkest corners of our sinful hearts. He did this by bearing the full weight of our sin on the cross: taking our judgment and, through His resurrection, offering us forgiveness.

For those who know Him, Jesus is the light of life that guides us through this dark world. God gives us the beautiful book of Habakkuk and says, Worship Me with this. If we teach our heart to be disciplined in this way and learn how to lament and worship, you will find the peace that passes all understanding, and a relationship with God that is indescribable. God is near to the brokenhearted, and the brokenhearted bring their worship to God by watchfully waiting.

Selah:

1. How would you explain the idea that God’s character is wrapped up in His everlasting nature?

2. What are some things over which you wrestle with God? Are these sinful?

3. When you face great trials in life, what do you expect God to do?