Habakkuk 1:2: “O Lord, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt not hear! Even cry out unto thee of violence, and thou wilt not save!”
Habakkuk 3:18: “Yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will joy in the God of my salvation.”
Many books have been written about prayer and almost without exception they attempt to give you some hint, some clue, some guidelines and even a checklist to follow in how to get an answer to prayer. We Western Cultured people love our formulas. We live in a modern age where everything has instructions. It is just natural that when we pray we need to follow instructions. If you follow instructions properly you will arrive at your destination while driving, or you will cook the meal the way you want it cooked. Yet, if you follow instructions on prayer, the result is not always answer to prayer. We take the Lord’s prayer and analyze it. Our Father who art in heaven, well, let see, we start off by addressing the person who we are praying to. Then we have hollowed by thy name, we slip in a little praise. Thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, we show a little submission to the will of God. Give us this day our daily bread, ok after getting through the preliminaries we finally get to the good stuff, addressing our needs. Obviously, by following the pattern of praying like Jesus laid out every prayer we pray should be a winner. Usually it is not.
Check out old Habakkuk, he was fasting, praying and pleading with God for an answer to his prayer for God to do something about the violence in Israel. Apparently, God was not Johnny on the spot to answer that prayer. That was a pretty noble prayer, why should not God respond?
The English word violence I believe is a very poor choice of word to plug in here for the Hebrew word is chaman. But in some ways it is not. This word has extremely broad usages. This word expresses the idea of wealth or pleasure that is obtained through violence, oppression, theft, etc. In includes predatory lending, ponzie schemes, corrupt businessmen who put others out of business to enhance their own. Ultimately, it carries out the idea of enhancing your own power, wealth and/or pleasure at the expense of another person. Chaman even involves little things like that subtle difference of asking for a donation from someone and telling them rather than reminding them that God will bless them in a financial way for that donation.
Habakkuk cries to God in verse 2 asking why He allows all this to go on. It is not that God does not answer this prayer, it is that He already has. There is an old saying that I get sick of hearing, but have to admit that there is some truth in it, “Be careful what you pray for.” He gives Habakkuk a glimpse of the future a future that shows the natural result of one’s rebellion against God. Their nation, one of the most powerful and wealthiest nations in the world will be reduced overnight into a nation like a third world nation.
That wasn’t the answer Habakkuk wanted. He expected God to send a great revival in the land and there would be singing and dancing and everyone would be secure and happy and all that evil chaman would end. Being reduce to poverty and third world nation status is not what Habakkuk was praying for. Yet revival would come, just not quite the way Habakkuk wanted. Why should the just and righteous have to suffer along with the chaman makers? God tells Habakkuk 2:4: “But the just shall live by faith.” Well, that is not much of an answer until God brings Habakkuk to the realization of verse 3:17-18: “Although the fig tree will not blossom, neither will there be fruit on the vines; the labor of the olive will fail, and the fields will yield no food, the flock will be cur off from the fold, and there will be no herd in the stalls: still I will be able to rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation.”
In other words the righteous will be caught up in the destruction just like the unrighteous only the righteous will be able to rejoice in the God of their salvation. It is not that God did not answer Habakkuk’s prayer, He simply refined it and helped him see just what it was he was really praying for. There was no joy in the land because of the oppressors. What Habakkuk was really praying for but did not realize was simply for people to be joyful again. God assured Habakkuk that is what will happen.
The word rejoice is alaz which means to be so full of joy that your are expressing it physically in a smile, a dance or a shout. Now that is really joy. In the midst of poverty and desolation there will be joy. Ultimately that is what we want. We think money, power, fame, and a mansion will bring us joy. But true joy is something spiritual, something that has to do with our relationship with God. I remember hearing a powerful billionaire being interviewed and the interviewer asked him just how much more money did he need to earn before he would be satisfied. He replied, “Just a little more.” That is all we want, just a feeling of satisfaction, and joy. The word joy that is used here in Hebrew is the word gayal which means moving or spinning around in a circle. We go to a place like Great America or Disney World and ride on the many different rides which simply spin us around in a circle. There is something joyful and satisfying to just doing a simply thing like spin around in a circle. Whether we are rich or poor, powerful or powerless, we all get a feeling of joy in just a simple thing like gayal, spinning around in a circle. God created us that way.
So in answer to the question as to how long before the Lord gets around to answer our prayers, the Lord is simply showing Habakkuk what he really wants and what he is really praying for, what we all really want and that is to simply to feel joy again and the Lord is saying, “It’s right under your nose Habakkuk, it is as simply as spinning around in a circle. “The best things in life are free, just trust in Me.”
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