Reflection on the Word for the Sunday of October 30, 2022
EVERYTHING HAS A PURPOSE (Habakkuk 2:3-4)
For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end, and does not lie. If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay. Look at the proud! Their spirit is not right in them, but the righteous live by their faith.
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Together with the people prophet Habakkuk was demanding answers from the Lord regarding comprehensive destruction of the land and the pervading violence in society, strife and contention of the wicked, wrongdoings of the leaders, perverted justice by the courts. We all know that these things happen all the time, in every generation, today as well, just as in prophet Habakkuk's era, too. However, as a prophet, he was very much troubled, as his complaint had been written, that "O LORD, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen? "
It is more than likely that the suffering population knew that there was a prophet among them, an envoy of God, to convey the message of God and the answers from Heaven.
Because regarding Habakkuk it was the same with all the great prophets in the land of Israel, exactly, just as Ezekiel wrote that "The Spirit entered into me when he spoke to me, and set me on my feet; and I heard him who spoke to me. He said to me, Son of man, I send you to the children of Israel, to nations that are rebellious, which have rebelled against me: they and their fathers have transgressed against me even to this very day. These people are impudent and stiff-hearted: I do sent you to them; and you shall tell them, Thus says the Lord God. They, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear, (for they are a rebellious house,) yet shall know that there has been a prophet among them."
Thus the people pushed Habakkuk, whom was known as a real prophet, to ask the Lord for them, and the prophet demanded answers on behalf of the people.
And the Lord answered Habakkuk that " Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so that a runner may read it. For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end, and does not lie. If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay. Look at the proud! Their spirit is not right in them, but the righteous live by their faith."
Practically, in his answer the Lord acknowledged that all the calamities happened for real and he was aware of the situation, he was not sleeping, meanwhile God technically had been sitting back for a long obvious period, almost just watching what horrifying affairs were shaking the society and the land from time to time. That is why the prophet had to bitterly yell at the skies that "O LORD, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen? " This complaint is as old as humanity, and we all have it.
However, God does not sit back watching the sufferings happening on people and on Earth and on and on. The law of the universe is so much more terrifying, as it is terrifying beyond all human imagination, as it was figured out by prophet Habakkuk, himself, as well. He was a prophet, more or less a contemporary of the prophet Jeremiah.
Habakkuk foresaw, that as a bitter and hasty nation, the Chaldeans aka the Babylonians will conquer his world, and he had to realize, as it is written in his book, that no other, than God, himself, appointed the Babylonian king as a punisher, a cruel judge without mercy.
God, himself, established Nebuchadnezzar to plunder and kill the nations without remorse. It could seem that Nebuchadnezzar was just a weaponized tool in the hand of God. Nonetheless, it was not an injustice from Heaven, quite the opposite, because that was justice, as it is. Because, it can not ever happen that sin will not harvest its own punishment, for that would be utter lawlessness.
The just Law must punish blatant transgressions, and it does. We have to think about it, that even without natural disasters, plagues and wars, still every generation dies. The very cause of death is sin.
We have to realize that natural death does exist because of the sin in general and by definition. We do not like it, it is indeed an utter horror, experienced by all. Even Jesus, when someone mentioned him the Galileans, whose blood Pilate the Roman governor had mixed with their sacrifices, even Jesus had to ask, that "Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, no, but, unless you repent, you will all perish in the same way.
And Jesus also added, that "Or those eighteen, on whom the tower in Siloam fell, and killed them; do you think that they were worse offenders than all the men who dwell in Jerusalem? I tell you, no, but, unless you repent, you will all perish in the same way."
The very nature of this world is very much shown in the Gospels, that even the absolutely innocent Jesus had been tortured and executed not because of his own sins, but because of the summary of the sins of the people in the gross.
Nonetheless, the prophet Habakkuk got an answer, practically, that like every story, history has a beginning and has an end. It is famously written in the book of the Ecclesiastes, chapter 3, that “ For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven: (...) A time to love, And a time to hate; A time for war, And a time for peace. (...) I said in my heart, ‘ God will judge the righteous and the wicked; for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work.’ "
Prophet Habakkuk had to tell the people that the Lord says that you may see more and more tragedies, especially if you do not repent fully, however there is an appointed time when the proud wicked will be destroyed, and the faithful will live by faith.
By any definition, it does not mean that God is talking about our earthly life here, which ends God forbid sooner or later. The faithful will live by faith means that the faithful will live forever, even if they might loose their physical life in whatever circumstances, like a volcano eruption in Pompei, the black plague in mediaval Paris, the earthquake in San Francisco the disgusting trenches of WWI, the artificially created famine called the Holodomor in Ukraine, the relentless bombardments during WWII, the Nazi death camps established for mass annihilation of people, the nuclear strikes in Nagasaki and Hiroshima. The faithful could be seen as persihed, but rather they entered Heaven to live for ever.
God promised Habakkuk and every other prophet that the judgment day for the wicked is surely coming, though it looks tarrying, but it will certainly come.The wicked can not walk away with their horrible sins. They will be utterly destroyed. They will not live for ever, the spirit will be removed from them.
The term of the “appointed time” written in the Book of Habakkuk, must reassure us that everything, every event, every person has a purpose and all lead to the ultimate redemption, though the ultimate redemption simply means that the good people enter Heaven.
Without the slightest attempt to justify any sufferings, we still should be sure that ultimately not only that everything has a reason, but a purpose too, and ultimately God will wipe away all tears and will destroy death itself, as well. It is beyond all human understanding of course, but we should use our imagination, where imagination was always superior than logical reasoning, when it came to creativity and faith.
The universe around us is so huge, that it makes us dizzy just to think about it, and it still works more accurately than a fine tuned Swiss watch, meanwhile the complexity of its structure is literally infinite. God, the Creator Grandfather Spirit, the source of all moral laws and also the source of all physical laws, is so intelligent, that for us his exact will is incomprehensible.
However, we know it from Jesus, that this super-intelligent entity, God, is benevolent, more over not only good, but perfectly good. Faith is really that action of our hearts, that when we exactly know that we can not really comprehend all the causes and consequences of all events and occurrings in the Universe, still God is good, and at the end, everything will be fine. May the Lord enliven us by the Holy Spirit of the Eternal One.
Amen
