But What About Us?
But What About Us?"Lord I have heard of your fame; I stand in awe of your deeds, O Lord. Renew them in our day, in our time make them known; in wrath remember mercy." (Habakkuk 3:2)
These are the opening words of a prayer. A man has just recently been told that the nation is about go through purgatory and doesn't like it a bit (Habakkuk 3:16). ("Your wife has an inoperable and malignant tumour." "We can't extend the loan at the bank. You'll forfeit your business." "I want a divorce." "Our daughter is eighteen. We just learned she is pregnant to a cocaine addict and they're getting married." "They've just destroyed the Twin Towers. We're under attack.") "Lord I have heard of your fame." We believe all the stories and in the right setting they send chills down our backs but we are hoping that God will make himself famous in our day. "The Lord is with you, you mighty man of valor." And Gideon said, "Pray, sir, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this [Midianite oppression] befallen us? And where are all his wonderful deeds which our fathers recounted to us?" (Judges 6:12-13) We've all heard the stories and revel in them but when the roof falls in on us we say, "Yes, yes, the stories are fine but what about now?"
Does God in his sovereign might simply ignore this distress? No, he doesn't, he takes into account the conditions and hurts that lead to our head-scratching and our desperate appeals. But these troubles of ours are part of a larger picture and while God will take into account our personal and immediate troubles he will treat them as part of a larger picture. It may be, as it was in Habakkuk's day, that God's means of fulfilling the bigger picture would deepen our hurt or leave it untouched. But it's never ignored!
Habakkuk, like the rest of us, had heard the stories and he believed them and it was because he had heard and believed that he was able to say, "in wrath remember mercy."
The famous stories all bore witness that God had a large and generous purpose in mind though it might be hidden by the immediate circumstances. God was famed not for his bitterness or indifference to the heartache of people. It was the reverse--he was famed for deliverance. Yes, but must it come through pain and loss and must we suffer in the process? Yes, when he wills it! In a world where holiness meets evil and in a world where love meets sin, hope and forgiveness on a global scale come to us via judgement and temporary loss.
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