Psalm 63 A Psalm of David, when he was in the wilderness of Judah. O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands. My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips, when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy. My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me. But those who seek to destroy my life shall go down into the depths of the earth; they shall be given over to the power of the sword; they shall be a portion for jackals. But the king shall rejoice in God; all who swear by him shall exult, for the mouths of liars will be stopped.

I think we all know what it’s like to be thirsty. The athletes among us may feel this sensation more frequently than others. Those that work out in the gym may as well, but we all, even the youngest among us, have felt this sensation of thirst. And if you felt it, maybe in the midst of a marathon, what you don’t want is soda. When you’re thirsty, you’re thirsty. You don’t want soda, you want what will refresh and quench your thirst. But have you ever been exceedingly thirsty? I mean, desperate for something to drink? That is the metaphor that David employs in Psalm 63. He expresses a real desperation of thirst. Well, physical thirst, of course, is one thing, but I want to consider the theme of spiritual thirst.

Now, here’s the question. I’ll ask it a few different times in a few different ways. Where are the spiritually thirsty ones in the church today? I want to be careful that I’m not misunderstood this morning and that we instantly begin to think of the church at large, the church out there. And here I am in the pulpit merely bemoaning the state of the church as it is in America or in the earth, the dead orthodoxy or the blasphemous liberalism that is so pervasive today. That’s not my intention at all. I’m speaking to you, my own church, my beloved ones, my family. I’m speaking to Providence Chapel, not the church at large. So I ask, are you, are you thirsty for God?

A.W. Tozer said it this way, “One of the greatest forces of the Christian religion against the Christian religion is complacency. Orthodox Christianity has fallen to its present low estate from lack of spiritual desire. Among the many who profess the Christian faith, scarcely one in a thousand reveals any passionate thirst for God.” Now while Tozer is speaking to Orthodox Christianity at large, and that, many decades ago, it is only increasingly apparent that this complacency he identifies has only increasingly crept into even the healthiest churches today. Even this church. Even my heart and your heart.

Now, I know that there are many spiritually thirsty ones among us. Yet, it’s clear that there is so much ground to be gained even among those that are thirsty. Now I want to clarify just a few things briefly about spiritual thirst this morning, even before we begin to dig into the text. For starters, I understand the Bible to teach that all mankind is actually thirsty. This is what I believe the Bible teaches. Because humanity was created in the Imago Dei, in the image of God, we come out of the womb thirsty, we come out of the womb worshiping, we come out of the womb with a real, legitimate, lasting inward thirst. Before a person is born again, that inward thirst is unformed and sinfully deceived. That thirst is what led Augustine into pursuits of sexual immorality. That thirst is what led George Whitefield into the strictness of self-reformation. That thirst is what led Martin Luther into multi-hour, sometimes six-hour long, confessions of his sin. You see, these men, prior to conversion, are examples to us of how thirst can manifest itself, yes, in the life of an unbeliever. They’re thirsty and it’s very true what Augustine said when he opened the Confessions chapter 1 book 1, you have made us for yourself and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee. He spoke from the deep well of personal experience when he wrote what he wrote there. You see, a sinner’s thirsty heart will chase after 10,000 different idols in an effort to find rest. And every time, they’ll come up empty handed. Because that’s what a sinful and unformed thirst does. And we have all, every one of us, lived that kind of broken cistern life.

But once born again, once a child of God, once united to Jesus Christ as His bride, everything changes. The thirst doesn’t evaporate. No, the once unformed thirst is suddenly transformed. The newborn Christian is now no longer satisfied, no longer thirsty for the broken cisterns of this world, but now they are thirsty for God. Hungering and thirsting for righteousness, to use the language of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. It’s part of the new creation. It’s part of what God works in His children according to their new life in Christ, which comes with a new thirst. So spiritual thirst, then, is an essential characteristic of Christianity. Not optional, not an upgrade. It is an essential part of who the believer is. And this is important. I want you to this way from Martin Lloyd-Jones who so pointedly asks a series of questions. He said, “and he felt like this, “The most vital questions to ask all who claim to be Christian is this. Have they a soul thirst for God? Is their life centered on him? Do they press forward more and more that they may know him?” There are the truly most vital questions. I believe the text before us speaks to this very reality.

So again I ask, dear ones, are you thirsty for God? Do you really want God this morning or are you simply stuck with wanting to want God? Are you really in pursuit of Christ? I believe this is where Psalm 63 can help us. I want to reread the first three verses, “O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands.” (Psalm 63:1-3)

I’ve broken the remainder of the sermon into two parts. First, what the thirsty feel. Second, what the thirsty crave. I just want to begin where the text begins. What the thirsty feel. Consider the opening verse of the Psalm. This verse is packed with such emotion and longing. This is no dry-faced David as he’s penning this Psalm, nor is he penning it in the lap of luxury. He’s on the run in the wilderness of Judah, likely in the region of Ziph. He’s on the run for his life. Saul would like to kill him. And yet, in the midst of that perplexity, as David himself is pressed, he pens this Psalm by God’s grace, giving real insight into what true thirst for God looks like.

For starters, the metaphor that David employs is key, and I want you to see this. I believe this is the beginning point. If you’re ever to be thirsty for God, it really needs to start here. The psalm originates in this season where David is on the run in the wilderness. He is endeavoring to avoid capture and being killed. He knew then the physical realities of tremendous thirst, right? He didn’t have any vending machines nearby. He also knew the reality of supreme weariness. There was no nieghboring Holiday Inn and Suites. He knew the reality of exhaustion and the heat pressing upon him night and day as he’s traveling through this arid wilderness. So what does the metaphor communicate? What is he trying to say? He is verbalizing how deeply he feels, how deeply the Christian feels, how deeply you and I feel the harsh reality of this present world. He’s making this association between physical thirst and spiritual thirst. He’s including in that the daily threats and challenges, the significant responsibilities, the constant pressures that are upon him and us. And he describes it as something like a desert wilderness where there is no water. And this is our lives here and now. We, too, are wandering through this arid wilderness. No, we’re not running from a evil king intent on killing us, but rather the wilderness of this life, my life, your life. It’s very real today.

I could illustrate that briefly by just thinking of recent events among us. Many of them mentioned in our church’s weekly prayer email. And just this week, I want you to take this in. Tomi’s dad is told he has a few weeks to live. Darius’s dear friend Marcus with brain cancer is declining. A little girl is diagnosed with cancer. There are children among us, young and grown, that are dead in their sins. They need salvation. Jay falls last night and is hospitalized. And then there’s the persecuted church in the earth. One week, a brief snapshot. You see we’re in a dry and weary land. And I think it’s crucial that you see the inability of the world along with the things of the world to ever satisfy you. This is where we need to begin. The world and the things of the world can never satisfy you. It’s a dry and weary land. That’s all it has to offer, a place where there is no water. Not some water somewhere — no water. If we still hold on to hope that there’s something out there besides God, anything in the earth besides God that can actually satisfy us, then we will never be thirsty for God Himself.

So, the first thing that the Christian feels is a proper dissatisfaction with the world. A realization that the world and all the things of the world can never quench your thirst. This is the helpfulness of the dry and weary seasons that you and I encounter. The difficult days, the challenging weeks and months. They teach you and me to want most and to seek most what we need most. And that is God himself.

But David says even more than that in this opening verse, doesn’t he? He expresses how deeply personal God is to him. Oh God, you are my God. Much like Paul in our New Testament, as I cited last Sunday, Galatians 2.20, speaking of “….Christ who loved me and gave himself for me.” So deeply personal is the Christian’s relationship with God. To be truly thirsty for God then you must know the living God and you must know that God knows and loves you. There must be real relationship with God or you will never seek the living God. How many deists do you know are hungry for God? There aren’t any. If God isn’t personally known to you today, you can’t be thirsty for Him. You’ll never be thirsty for the God you don’t know.

But David goes on to say something else, “earnestly I seek you.” This is the activity of thirsty ones. It’s where the rubber meets the road, isn’t it? A real thirst for the living God actually mobilizes us to pursue Him. And that makes sense, right? That which we truly love will be that which we truly labor for. That is just how it works. It would be very hard to argue that you’re thirsty for God when you’re not in pursuit of God because that’s not what thirst produces in a life. That just doesn’t add up. You can’t tell me that you love Christ and not be pursuing Christ. That makes no sense. What kind of love is that? But sincere seeking, earnest pursuit with an intensity about it, that is what the thirsty give themselves to. And you need to see this, it’s this kind of intensity, it’s this kind of desire that cuts through ten thousand distractions and focuses us like nothing else can. So when you awake in the morning, the first cry of your heart is for the Lord. “Oh, Father, weak as I am this morning, frail as I am, creature of dust as I am, stir up my affections for you. I’m thirsty, but I’m not that thirsty. Increase my thirst for you. Breathe upon me this morning. New strength, fresh hope, renewed faith, come, Lord.” And then throughout the day, it is regular intervals of prayer and longing and thoughts hastening back to the Lord. The pulse of your thirst and desire races in the moments when you sense God’s activity in and around you. And so you press on. You’re in pursuit. You’re chasing after the one whom your soul loves. We all need daily infusions. of this kind of earnestness, beloved.

But David’s not done yet. He says something else critical. With metaphor in hand, he pictures for us the desperation of it all. He describes it again with the physical imagery of wandering in the desert, thirsty for even a drop of water, but there is no water to be found anywhere. Desperation. Total desperation, single minded, one track kind of desperation. I must have water or I die. It is a kind of life or death desperation. I want you to think back, dear believer, to a time when you were earnestly seeking Him. Desperate for Him. And He visited you in mercy. Do you remember the depth of longing? The deep desires of your heart? And then the sweetness of His coming? I submit there is nothing else that compares to communion with God in this life. There’s nothing like the peace and comfort and exhilarating joy of the presence of God. And we must recognize that God is most glorified when people know they will die unless they have Him. This is what the thirsty feel.

Now, what the thirsty crave. Look with me briefly at verse 2 and 3. “So I have looked upon you.” In light of this, David is saying, some translations render “so” as “thus” or “in light of this”. In light of this desperation, “I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you.” In short, dear ones, the thirsty crave God. They crave his love. Verse three, “your steadfast love”, It’s better than anything. It’s better than life. They crave his worship to be in the sanctuary. They crave his people. They crave his presence. They crave his nearness. Give me God is the cry of the thirsty heart!

As a dear pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you. (Psalm 42:1)

How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts. My soul longs, yes, faints for the courts of the Lord. My heart and flesh cry out for the living God.(Psalm 84)

One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after. that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple. (Psalm 27)

That I may know him. And the power of his resurrection and may share in his sufferings… (Philippians 3)

There is simply no substitute for God Himself. Nothing else satisfies. Nothing else can ever quench your thirst. I love the language of the early American Puritan Thomas Shepard who wrote, “There is in true grace an infinite circle. A man by thirsting receives and receiving thirsts for more.” Because the believer thirsts for God, they seek Him. And they seek Him, according to verse 2, where He is preeminently to be found. This is what David is communicating when he says what he says in light of verse 1.

Dear ones, we must go in our thirst where God has promised to be, where He has promised to meet with us. This is the nuts and bolts of how we seek after God. And we seek Him with the promise that we will find Him. God is a rewarder of those that diligently seek Him. Or according to the prophet Jeremiah, “You will seek me and find me when you seek for me with all your heart. I will be found by you.” (Jeremiah 29:13)

So where can we find God? Well, David, as an Old Testament Jew, highlights the preeminent place in the mind of an Israelite, the sanctuary. The place of God’s worship in Old Testament Israel. Yet, today we have been gloriously liberated from a specific geographic location and we can meet with God in the closet, at the breakfast table, in the car, on the drive to work. It’s true. Thank of John 4 and Jesus’s conversation with the woman at the well. Not this mountain, not that mountain. And yet, there is something truly significant and special about the sanctuary, or what I’m saying is the New Testament modern equivalent of the public worship of God. You remember in Psalm 73, it wasn’t until Asaph, the psalm writer, went into the sanctuary of God, that he saw his error and was brought out of his frustrations into repentance and refreshment. It wasn’t until he went into the sanctuary of God.

It was the sinful tax collector in the 18th chapter of Luke’s gospel that so met with God in the sanctuary that he went home a justified man. I often think that American Christians who have so long swam in the waters of good ole American independence, somehow lose an accurate and biblical picture of the priority and the preciousness of public worship on the Lord’s Day. It’s here that the Lord has promised to meet with us in song. He hears us in our corporate and pastoral prayer time. He speaks to his people through the proclamation of the Word. He draws near to us in the ordinances. Every Sunday that you gather here ought to be a morning of awe and wonder. A morning when you’ve come in and you’ve already sought the Lord and you’ve prepared your own heart for worship. A morning when you’ve interceded for the brothers and sisters in Christ that you will stand with side by side singing the songs of God because you long for them to meet with God and to receive needed mercies for the day. A morning when you’ve cried out to God for the preacher that He would preach with unction and power exactly what you need to hear. This is the way to approach this great gathering.

When was the last time you walked into this place flat-out thirsty for God, filled with expectations and longings and desires, eager to receive God’s multiplied bounties? When was the last time? This is what each Sunday should be to you and me. Bounty upon bounty. The joy of the Lord is our strength. Celebratory in a sense. Not that we come and merely go through the motions. Not that we come to hear a fine sermon. Not even that we come to see friends and catch up in Christian conversation. But that we come thirsty. Not knowing what God might do, expecting the supernatural, pleading for his magnificent presence, hoping that he might come powerfully and revive his weary church.

Wake up next Sunday morning and take your Lord’s Day preparations seriously. Pray that God would so manifest himself to us next Sunday that the unexpected happens. Don’t you want to come to church just wondering what God might do instead of expecting the same old quality stuff? We should always be thankful for the regular weekly Lord’s Day gathering but never content with the status quo. Thirst then, brothers and sisters, for more of God’s presence, for more of his power among us, for more of his saving work among us, for more of his reviving work among us, for more of his sanctifying work among us.

I so I so love and respect my wife’s grandfather, who has now been with the Lord six and a half years. If I’m honest, I’m sometimes envious of the fact that he’s beholding the face of Christ right now. As a preacher and evangelist for 61 years of his life, he longed, I think, for the vast majority of those years for genuine revival to come. He knew God. He was thirsty. And he had tasted firsthand of God’s reviving work. Many are the stories that he could tell, but several I remember especially well. He had been in East Texas in a church meeting. where God had so powerfully visited the place that he couldn’t even preach. He came to the pulpit and essentially felt like the Lord wouldn’t let him preach. And in those meetings, the church pianist publicly confessed to having an affair with the music leader. And he had real hope that the two of them were truly converted in the midst of those meetings. Many in the church confessed sin publicly and turned to the Lord in repentance. He would share about when he and the pastor of that church were together before the prolonged series of meetings began. How they both had such a hunger in their heart. Even as they prayed together that afternoon, how it physically hurt. And when they pulled up into the parking lot that evening it was already full, overflowing full. And the Lord just began to work. At other times in his preaching ministry, he saw those active in ministry converted. Later in his ministry, he was preaching one morning when a very rough Vietnam veteran, a friend of our family to this day, ran down the center aisle crying out, “I don’t want to go to hell.” That man was powerfully saved that morning.

Do you long for something like that to happen today? Do you pray for something like that to happen today? Do we even want someone to stand up in the middle of the sermon this morning and shout out, “What must I do to be saved?” Just imagine what Sunday mornings could be like when it’s not just the normal routine, when the corporate testimony time turns into something greater than those testifying. When hearts are aflame and people share spontaneously and joyfully. When instead of a couple of testimonies here and there, a couple of kind words about the church; it’s exhortation, it’s the Lord met with me in the scripture, let me show you this. It’s the God of heaven answered my prayer this week. And one after another, it compounds, it builds.

Or what about after the meeting. What is instead of the benediction, no one felt like ending the meeting. Instead, prolonged periods of prayer where you just don’t feel like you could get up yet and go on with your life, that some things need to be dealt with. Some things needs to be confessed. A right needs to be made wrong with a brother. Nothing prescribed but a worshipping people free in Christ to worship as he ought to be worshiped. Holy longings, expectation, deep desires. You see the truly thirsty crave God at all cost. They’re satisfied with nothing less than His presence.

Dear ones, please, I say this on behalf of all your pastors, please don’t become content with a mere theological conviction that it is good to thirst for God. Nor be content with merely wanting to want God. Nor grow content with merely having a reputation as one that is thirsty for God. But rather, don’t be content until you actually break through and taste and see that the Lord is good. That God is even better than this life.

I am concerned for the Reformed community today. More and more I see leaders within the movement promoting theological precision. I love theological precision. But neglecting experiential themes like revival, prayer, intimacy with Christ, thirsting after God is Biblically responsible. Your elders do not want this church to become so theologically rigorous that we lose the rigorous elements of experiential Christianity. We love doctrine. We don’t admire sloppy theology. We want to grow and mature and raise up Christians here that are thirsty for the living God. Men and women and children who have a big view of God and an insatiable appetite for Christ.

Indeed, we prize personal holiness over academics. We prioritize a life of prayer over the ability to engage in public discourse. We prioritize seeking the face of Christ over everything else in the world. That’s the kind of church we feel the New Testament calls us to be. To be the most academic or intellectual Reformed church in town is not our aim. God willing, may it never be our aim. But to cultivate a thirst for God that leads to true tasting and seeing, this is the need of the day. This is the Christianity Denton County needs today.

If a greater thirst for God is what you’re looking for, then I trust you’ve landed in a good place. To be among a people thirsty for God will only encourage your own thirst for God. And if more of a thirst for God is what you long for, dear ones, such longing is never in vain. God comes to thirsty ones. He comes! And I believe you can have as much of this great God as you want. He simply is not stingy with his presence. So don’t be discouraged to the point of inactivity this morning. It would be easy for any of us to be discouraged merely at the question of are you thirsty for God? My intent is not to discourage you, especially to the point of inactivity. Rather, I want you to be convicted to the point of repentance, to the point of turning.

I love what John Piper once wrote. He said, “If you don’t feel strong desires for the manifestations of the glory of God, it is not because you have drunk deeply and are satisfied. It is because you have nibbled so long at the table of the world. Your soul is stuffed with small things and there’s no room for great things. God did not create you for this. There is an appetite for God and it can be awakened.” I like that.

Or as C.S. Lewis said, “We are half-hearted creatures fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered to us. Like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at sea, we are far too easily pleased.”

I’m urging you, be content with nothing less than God himself. And let this morning’s sermon just be a wake-up call for you, dear brother and dear sister. If you failed in thirsting after the living God for a day, an hour, a week, a month, or years on end, if you failed to cultivate this thirst in your life, just repent. He will embrace you in His arms. There is grace for you. There’s a merciful Savior eager to receive you. You don’t have to delay. You don’t have to beat yourself up. You don’t have to pursue the path of self-reformation. You just turn to Christ, the one who offers free and full forgiveness, the one who has promised to sanctify you! If you’re lacking in thirst for God, ask Him to make you more thirsty. It’s not rocket science. Are your priorities so out of whack, so misdirected that you feel like you don’t even have time to be thirsty for God? Plead for grace. Let God mercifully wash and renew you. Plead for new desires and clear thinking and power to correct what you have so messed up. The Lord will do that. He does it all the time for his kids. Christ loves to come to the aid of returning ones.

God has longings for you. Will you long for him? I believe it’s time to shake off the stupor of your complacency. It’s time to let go of any worldly delights that distract you from the supreme delight. It’s time to press in closer and closer to the Lord, thirsting for Him. I want this for me, and I want this for you. So can we, brother, sister, member of Providence Chapel, my dear church family, can we hand in hand thirst for God and expect with eagerness these manifestations and movements of God among us and pray and pray and pray until the blessings come. Won’t you come with me as we thirst for God together? Can David’s testimony and desire be your testimony and desire? Even when he said, I was glad when they said to me, let’s go to the house of the Lord. The greatest way you can benefit a fellow believer is to inspire them into a deeper thirst for God. Oftentimes the greatest ministry you can have to your church family here at Providence Chapel is an abiding commitment to pray them into an increased thirst for God. I’m not sure if you’ve ever thought about it this way, but it’s true.

Thankfully, we are called to be thirsty only for God who satisfies. God doesn’t send us to broken cisterns, which can never quench a man’s thirst. He sends us to himself, the fountain of living water, the only one who can satisfy the thirsty soul. So, be thirsty and drink deeply. There’s more than enough of God for you and me. And there’s no life more exhilarating, more thrilling, more fulfilling, more joyful than a life of intimacy with God. Be thirsty for Him!

Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight.

Paul in Romans 12:9–16 is discussing the necessary graces in the Christian life. In these tremendous verses, Paul is laying down imperative after imperative. In the 8 verses here, there are 20 different imperatives, 20 different authoritative New Testament demands. To any humble reader, it can feel a bit overwhelming. And thus, I feel compelled to make several introductory observations before we begin to analyze the text itself. 

First, we must all freshly recognize that these graces are fruits following salvation in Christ. We do not work such things in our own lives in order to be saved, but these fruits follow the saving work of God in us. While affirming that, we don’t want to back off the fact that these graces are evidences of true spiritual life in Christ. If a person exhibits none of these graces, then that person isn’t in Christ. 

Second, the picture Paul gives us here in Romans 12 is a life lived unto Christ having the “mercies of God” clearly in view—it is the normal Christian life. In the earlier years of my Christianity, before coming to embrace the doctrines of grace, I read a helpful book by Watchman Nee by this very title, The Normal Christian Life. The whole premise of that book is based on Romans 6:11. We must consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Jesus Christ. Brothers and sisters, that kind of “consideration”—along with the “be transformed by the renewal of your mind” as well as “let love be genuine”—is all a part of the normal Christian life. This is not some kind of super Christianity reserved for a few spiritual elites. This is for all who live godly in Christ Jesus—varying degrees, various strengths and weaknesses, and plenty of beautiful diversity—but this is the norm. 

Third, the high calling of the normal Christian life simply can’t be worked up by the natural man. Sure, an unbeliever might be able to weep with one who weeps. But who among the worldly ones would ever bless their persecutors? Who among them serves the Lord with fervency? You see, Romans 12 is a non-starter for the unregenerate. This is only the result of a supernatural and inward change—a new heart! 

Fourth, these graces Paul identifies in our text can only be done by the power of the Holy Spirit working in us and through us. Regeneration alone readies us to bear this kind of fruit. The Spirit of God then empowers us to bear this kind of fruit. Even the true Christian cannot work such works apart from the power of God—God working in him both to will and to work for His good pleasure. 

Fifth and final, texts like this are supremely useful to us. They help us to see ourselves and gauge our progress (or lack thereof) more clearly. It is one thing to have a view of Christian graces in general, but it is altogether different to view into these particulars. We don’t want to be those that hide behind generalities like “I am a pretty nice guy.” We want to be those always striving to walk in the light. So, if pride is exposed, so be it; Christ has grace for proud men. If lovelessness is exposed, so be it; our Lord has plenty of love to give. Let these rapid-fire admonitions work their work in you. Fear not—God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind. And freshly invite the Christ—who is love—to come to you and change you. 

The Preeminence of Love

The text begins with the preeminence of love. Paul is quite purposeful in verse 9: “Let love be genuine.” Why start here? Why begin with love? Paul is only emphasizing and pointing to the very thing Jesus identified and taught. The ESV renders the Greek as a positive, “Let love be genuine.” The original language literally reads, “Let love be un-hypocritical”—or without hypocrisy. And that is how many of the modern translations render it. The NIV along with a few other translations render it this way: “Love must be sincere.” Again, this is stating it positively much like the ESV. Sincere in English is a transliteration of the Latin words sine cera, which mean “without wax.” It refers to the ancient practice of utilizing wax to fill in the cracks of a piece of pottery to hide its blemishes and give it the appearance of being in better condition in order to make it more valuable. The high-quality pottery would often be marked “sine cera” to certify it had not been tinkered with in any way. Thus, a sincere person is one who doesn’t hide his true self through hypocrisy. It is a person without wax. Genuine is a synonym of sincere. Authentic would be another. This is the biblical view of love—it has to be real. It can’t be feigned or hypocritical. It can’t be for show. There’s nothing counterfeit about it. 

You don’t have to read very far into the pages of our New Testament to grasp this. Think with me for a moment of Scripture’s clear testimony to love’s preeminence. We begin with the decisive and deliberate words of Christ in Matthew’s Gospel: 

And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” 

Matthew 22:37-40

Jesus also makes this profound statement: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34–35). The apostle Peter commands, “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins” (1 Peter 4:8). And the apostle John says, “We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death” (1 John 3:14). Now circle back to Paul, and hear what Paul says elsewhere about love: “So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” (1 Corinthians 13:13). 

If that wasn’t clear and concise enough, consider this, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love” (Galatians 5:22). What Christian grace, what fruit of the Spirit, comes first? It’s love. And one last pairing of verses, though many others could be cited. See how the apostle Paul makes the connection back to what Jesus said in Matthew 22, “For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Galatians 5:14)? And the Galatians citation has its own parallel in Romans: “Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law” (Romans 13:8).

This kind of love—a love without hypocrisy, a love that is genuine—this is the very kind of love our Savior so fully manifested in His life and death. And we must bear this in mind. Jesus Christ loved exactly this way. He didn’t just talk the talk of love for His bride. He actually laid down His life for her. As J. V. Fesko said, “Christ’s words and actions were inseparably bound in a holy union of love and integrity.” 

By God’s powerful grace, we are to be imitators of Him. We mustn’t view this call as merely a moral ideal to aim for but rather the life of Christ in us—imaging Him to the world around us. You see, naturally, every one of us was selfish and unloving. But the Christian is a new creature. We aren’t slaves to sin any longer. Thus we are to live and walk in light of “Christ in me.” Then and only then can we begin to love as Jesus loves. 

In summary, love is the necessary starting point here in verse 9. Without it, everything else is a non-starter. Without it, the car sits on empty and goes nowhere. Without genuine love, none of these other graces even exist. 

The Manifestations of Love

Now let’s consider 10 admonitions from Paul in Romans 12:9–16.

1. A Holy Love 

Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. (v. 9) 

So many in our day and age know nothing of genuine love, a love that loves what is righteous and hates what is evil. The kind of love flaunted in our day is so sick and twisted, it refuses to call much of anything evil and is willing to embrace whatever someone feels is right. This is not love at all. Rather, it is unloving and destructive. 

Paul is aiming to be very clear in what he says here. He utilizes a very strong Greek verb in “abhor.” We could say “utterly abhor” or “detest.” He isn’t content to say “avoid what is evil,” though we must. He goes a level beyond this—because this is the very character of God. Paul tells us to abhor evil. Christians are to increasingly feel what God feels toward evil. The man who truly hates his laziness will radically labor to cut it out of his life. The brother who detests pornography will continuously work to eradicate it from his life. Isn’t this so clearly visible in the life of Christ? 

I’m reminded of the opening chapter of the book of Hebrews. Speaking of the Son, of Christ, Hebrews 1:9 says, “You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness; therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.” (The writer of Hebrews is quoting Psalm 45:7 here.) And this is the character of the Messiah in total perfection! 

The rest of the verse 9 of Romans 12 reads, “Hold fast to what is good.” Other translations render it “cling to what is good.” I like both. It literally means “to glue” or “to bond to.” Isn’t that lovely? Another form of this very verb is used in Matthew 19:5 about husbands and wives: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” 

This abhorring and clinging is much of our sanctification. More and more, as we grow in grace, we will hate evil. And more and more, as we mature in Christ, we will love good. Genuine love is always a holy love. As radical as it is to begin to hate the sin you once loved, this is exactly what the power of the cross can do in you and me. This holy love sees evil as evil, calls a spade a spade, and deeply detests it. At the same time, it sees good as good and holds fast with all its might. 

2. A Familial Love

Love one another with brotherly affection. (v. 10)

One man translated this as “Love the brethren in the faith as though they were brethren in blood.” That captures the sense of the text well. You see, on the day of our birth into this world, we became a part of a physical family. But even more significant than that, on the day of our spiritual birth—our regeneration—we became a part of the family of God with the people of God as our brothers and sisters. Jesus highlights this in responding to Peter in both Matthew and Mark. Jesus said, 

Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life. 

Mark 10:29-30

The fact is that the redeemed have been brought into the greatest family on earth, an eternal family. We will one day dwell together in glory as just ones made perfect. There we will perfectly love one another to all eternity. The here and now is where this proves difficult at times. And yet, this genuine love will prove to be a familial love, a love that day by day and week by week is laying down its life for brothers and sisters in Christ. 

What will you, believer—God with you and in you—not sacrifice for your siblings in Christ? “So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith. Do good to one another, brothers” (Galatians 6:10). Behave like siblings. If you don’t know each other, get to know each other. Cultivate relational depth; don’t stay in the shallow waters with your floats on. You can’t do this with every brother and sister everywhere, of course, and not even in the local church. But you can do this. Loving like Christ loves, you will pursue this. Genuine love is familial love. 

3. An Appreciative Love 

Outdo one another in showing honor. (v. 10)

This has always been a fun verse to me. It gets me thinking and smiling. Here is holy competition—but the kind of competition where the winners don’t want or need human recognition. This competition involves doing “nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility counting others more significant than yourselves” (Philippians 2:3). That is the undergirding necessity if we are to exemplify appreciative love. 

This kind of sincere love despises jealousy and instead aims to build others up. It genuinely wants what is best for the brethren even when it means that others excel or enjoy what they themselves don’t have. This is entirely rooted in Romans 12:1, “by the mercies of God.” The Christian who takes in the multiplied mercies of God they’ve received is then liberated to spend the rest of their time and energy blessing brethren and appreciating God’s work in them.  “Therefore encourage one another and build one another up” (1 Thessalonians 5:11). Genuine love is appreciative love, edifying love, and it will express itself with words of affirmation and encouragement and mercy again and again and again. 

4. An Ardent Love 

Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. (v. 11)

Here is a significant pairing of admonitions all pointing to the fact that sincere love is ardent love. It is fervent. It is constant. The Greek word translated “fervent” in the text is most helpful. It literally means “to boil,” so the image is that the Christian is one who is boiling over in love and zeal and service. We are to be living vigorous lives. We are to live as those truly alive. The Christian should resist every temptation toward a lackadaisical attitude or laziness. We are to be careful, not careless. 

The Word of God calls us to such a life, and the Spirit of God empowers it in us. “For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline” (2 Timothy 1:7 NIV) The Spirit of God is a Spirit of infinite power and infinite energy and infinite willingness. Think no little thoughts of the Spirit of the Almighty God! It is by this great power that God works in us that we are to regularly rouse ourselves out of lethargy and also spur one another on to love and good works. 

Quench not the Spirit, brothers. Fan fervency into a flame! Believe what Scripture says—things like 1 Corinthians 3:16, “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?”; Colossians 1:29, “For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me”; and Ephesians 6:10, “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.” 

I appreciate what John Murray says here: “When discouragement overtakes the Christian and fainting of spirit as its sequel, it is because the claims of the Lord’s service have ceased to be uppermost in our thought.” It reminds me of the account of Count Zinzendorf and the experience he had as a result of looking at a painting of Christ on the cross. As he looked at the painting, it was as though it spoke to him, “I have done this for you—what have you done for me?” This is part of what inspired his zeal in “serving the Lord.”  Christ died for you. Will you not live for Him? The text is telling us that genuine Christian love is an ardent love. It is love aflame. 

5. A Durable Love 

Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. (v. 12)

These three admonitions are woven together in a way that if any one of them fell away, the rest would soon follow. Who can be patient in tribulation apart from being constant in prayer and rejoicing in the glorious hope of Christ to come? 

And so, the Christian is one who “rejoices in hope.” We live today in light of that eternal day. We look for the city whose builder and maker is God. We embrace tribulation today knowing that pleasures forevermore come tomorrow. We know Christ is with us, even to the end of the age, and in this our hope is fixed. “We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf” (Hebrews 6:19–20). This hope undergirds our patience in tribulation. A Christian’s hope so informs his thinking amid his pain that he can view such tribulations as “light momentary affliction” (2 Corinthians 4:17), as something “not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18).

All of this is undergirded by a life of prayer. Continual communion with God, a regular receiving from Him. Luke 18:1 says, “[We] ought always to pray and not lose heart.” Genuine love is a durable love. It perseveres to the end. 

6. A Generous Love 

Contribute to the needs of the saints. (v. 13)

Maybe the clearest and best comment here is one we’re already familiar with:

But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him.

1 John 3:17–19

When I consider this admonition, I can’t help but think of the way Paul uses the back-to-back examples of the church of Macedonia and Jesus Christ. He powerfully persuades the Corinthian church working from the lesser example (which is quite amazing) to the greater example in Christ. 

We want you to know, brothers, about the grace of God that has been given among the churches of Macedonia, for in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part. For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their means, of their own accord, begging us earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of the saints. 

2 Corinthians 8:1-4

Isn’t that something? In extreme poverty, they gave beyond their means. They wanted to! They begged earnestly for an opportunity to “contribute to the needs of the saints.” How is this with you and me? This is the stuff of the early church—Acts 2 and 4.

Paul gives one further example and argument, the picture of Christ’s giving, in 2 Corinthians 8:9: “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.” No giving like this giving—ever. Christ’s sacrifice was total sacrifice. He put it all on the table. “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). 

Don’t you see it? Genuine love is generous love. There is an infinite gulf between Christ and stingy! 

7. A Hospitable Love 

Seek to show hospitality. (v. 13)

Seek to do this. Pursue hospitality, as several translations render it. This isn’t a passive activity for the Christian; the term Paul uses is a strong term. It is the very word Paul uses when he says, “I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14) We want to be eager, even zealous to show hospitality. Especially toward the saints, but also toward those outside the faith, even strangers. 

Christian, we ourselves have been brought in! “He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me was love” (Song of Solomon 2:4). And it is our privilege now to go and do likewise. The Christian should be both warm and inviting. Don’t we see this in the life of Christ? He attracted the multitudes—there was just something about Him. There should likewise be something attractive about our lives too. The whole of our demeanor should cause the watching world to wonder “What is different about that person?” Genuine love is a hospitable love. 

8. A Merciful Love Romans 

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. (v. 14)

Remember the high call of Christ’s Sermon on the Mount—“Love your enemies.” We aren’t those who just love those that love us. Even the worldly ones make an ugly attempt to do that. We are to love and even bless those who hate us, who persecute us, who would kill us. 

Again, this is impossible to do apart from the grace and power of God. But the Christian has the grace and power of God, don’t we? We do! And we see this kind of merciful love in Stephen, the church’s first martyr. 

And as they were stoning Stephen, he called out, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep. 

Acts 7:59-60

As Christ did from Calvary’s cross, so did Stephen outside Jerusalem. And so must we. This isn’t merely the restraint of not cursing. This is the act of blessing those who despise you and want to harm you. It is as though Paul is saying, “Call down God’s blessing upon those who would harm you instead of calling down God’s curse upon them.” 

This is radical, I get that. But the way Christ “blessed” you is far more radical! Do you remember in Luke 9 when James and John were ready to call down fire from heaven to consume the people who didn’t receive Jesus? See how Jesus responded—it’s short and sweet!  “But Jesus turned and rebuked them” (Luke 9:55).

Genuine love is a merciful love. Because of the “mercies of God” we’ve known, we show mercy. 

9. A Sympathetic Love 

Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. (v. 15)

It has been noted by several commentators that Paul begins with “rejoice with those who rejoice” because it is the harder thing to do. Even unconverted men and women can be moved to show compassion or sympathy toward a mourning one. Tears move us—naturally. And yet to rejoice with someone rejoicing, well, that requires real humility. The natural inclination of the sinful heart is to be envious or jealous. And much like the preceding verse, Paul isn’t calling us to merely resist jealousy. He is calling us to actually rejoice with the one rejoicing. Good news has come to a person, and we are to celebrate it with them, to be joyful with them and for them. Using the picture of the body of Christ being like parts of a human body, Paul says it this way:  “If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together” (1 Corinthians 12:26). 

All this points to the fact that the Christian life is a communal life. The Christian isn’t independent and must never become isolated. We need each other and we must feel for each other. If I hurt, you hurt. If you rejoice, I rejoice with you. Genuine love is a sympathetic love. 

10. A Humble Love 

Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight. (v. 16)

Humble love endeavors to “maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:3). I love Acts 2:44, “And all who believed were together and had all things in common.” What a beautiful snapshot from the life of the early church. They were given to the same things, the same loves, the same pursuits. And they all had each other’s welfare in mind. There was “genuine love” among them.

This verse should remind, too, of Paul’s warnings from the previous chapter, Romans 11. “So do not become proud, but fear.” “Lest you be wise in your own sight.” This is the path to real unity in the church, the way of real body life among us. No class distinctions, no cliques, no factions. Martyn Lloyd-Jones put it this way: 

This is the only thing that matters to Christian men and women. They do not care whether people are rich or poor, high or low, intelligent or unintelligent—whatever the world may say. No, their question is: Is this person a Christian? Are these people rich in faith? Are they children of God? If so, I belong to them and I like talking to them; I like meeting them.

We need a great deal of this humble love in our day. Away with posturing. Away with hypocrisy.  Have this humble mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus. Genuine love is a humble love. 

This was a marathon. You read these 20 admonitions, and you almost feel winded. That is much of the point, I think. Brothers and sisters, we are entirely dependent on He who is in us and with us! Never forget it! None of this love in a Christian exists without Christ being present in us. 

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.  

Galatians 2:20

And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.

We only thought this myth was once and for all crushed in the days of the Reformation. But sadly, it is still kicking. To some degree, this unbiblical mentality still exists in most every church today.

Part of what the reformers of the 15th and 16th centuries were fighting for was the “priesthood of all believers”.  The Roman Catholic Church has systematically elevated the clergy to the point where there existed a huge chasm between church officers and church members. Over centuries the NT doctrine of the priesthood of all believers was effectively nullified and forgotten. Luther and others saw NT texts like this…

To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father…

~ Revelation 1:5-6

And they saw the wicked effects of the pulpit / pew divide. It was as though the clergy were the clean ones and the laity were the unclean. Something had to be done and something was done. A reformation had begun… And yet, the reformation must continue. We have yet to fully comprehend and apply what we see in our text today. Until that happens, we must always be reforming.

Christ has given these gifts to the church. These office holders, having been appointed and given to local churches, are to be faithful in exercising their gifts. For what purpose? Why has Christ given these gifts to His church? Verse 12: “…to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ…” There it is in a single verse.

Generally speaking, all gifts are for the edification or the building up of the body of Christ. Specifically, these offices within the church are to equip the Saints for the work of the ministry. Now, there has been some confusion with regard to verse 12 and I want to clarify a few things.

First, the lovely King James Bible muddies the water a bit. “For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ…” It gives us these three prepositional phrases all separated by commas, all beginning with the word “for”. The problem that has helped cultivate is that an argument can be made that each of those prepositional phrases is modifying the same thing, namely the various offices or gifts of Christ to the church. Thus, it is the responsibility of pastors to “equip the saints”, to do the “work of the ministry”, and to “edify the body of Christ”. While there is a sense in which this is true, of course, it places a breach between the church officers and the church members. It can then be argued that the church officers are the ones giving and the church members are the ones receiving. But that isn’t NT church life. — That isn’t New Testament Christianity. The pulpit / pew divide is a concept foreign to the pages of Scripture.

Certainly church officers are to be spending and being spent for the sake of the church. And yes, in some cases that is a full time, vocational calling. Yet, every member of the body of Christ is a minister. I’ll say it again, every member of the body of Christ is a minister. As much as your elders have received graces and gifts to pastor and equip you dear Saints, you have received gifts and graces with which you are to faithfully serve this body as well. And this is where reformation is still needed today.

As I alluded to the problem earlier, there is a great need today, even in healthy churches, for every member to own the fact that they are a minister. That means that every Christian hearing my voice right now has a ministry to fulfill in the body of Christ. I hear it regularly, different ones who will express their gratitude for the church and for the pastoral ministry and for all they’ve received from their time in a local church. But dear ones, hear me now, freely receiving, freely give. The equipping from the pulpit, the equipping in the living room with pastoral visits, the equipping of Bible studies and book studies, all of that is for the purpose of cultivating your ability to minister with the gifts and graces Christ has given you. Your elders aren’t super Christians and you lovely Christians aren’t dummies. We are fellow laborers. A kingdom of priests. All of us ministers.

It is all to make a name for Christ. To show forth His beauty and grace. To build one another up and usher one another to the gates of heaven.

I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. Therefore it says, “When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.”

In chapter 4, where does Paul begin when it comes to living out the Christian life secured for us by Jesus Christ? Though Paul will address home life, married life, and workplace life, he actually starts with church life. And what a beautiful beginning it is!

He begins by highlighting the unity of the body of Christ secured for us on Calvary’s cross. The dividing wall of hostility has come crumbling down (Ephesians 2:14). The church was established on the foundation of the apostles and prophets (Ephesians 2:20). And now we see this marvelous, seven-fold unity that exists in the church universal: one body — one Spirit — one hope — one Lord — one faith — one baptism — one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. (Ephesians 4:5-6)

What a mighty unity Christ has gifted to the church! This is truly wonderful, a very real and tangible taste of heaven, of unity perfected and eternally enjoyed.

And yet, many throughout church history have felt that in order to preserve this unity, to maintain it as we read in verse 3, there must be uniformity. This ideology says that if we are all going to get along, we must all be the same.  We must talk the same, look the same, and think the same. We need to like the same stuff and read the same books. Only in uniformity can there be true unity. But this is false. It is a lie.  It is the twisting of something Biblical and beautiful into a one-dimensional mess.

And this is what Paul points us to in the our text. Yes, unity is invaluable. Yes, it is to be fought for. But, no, it does not mean we need a church full of clones. Not theological clones. Not cultural clones. Not personality clones. None of it.

In the context of Christ purchasing this universal unity for the body of Christ, we see that Christ has done something else for His people. To each of His people He gives grace and gifts! And there’s a bunch of them!

In addition to the 5 gifts or offices listed in verse 11, we have Paul in Romans 12 and 1 Corinthians 12 pointing to a wide array of gifts Christ has given to His people. Everything from generosity to teaching, from administration to exhortation. When you combine the four or five New Testament passages that involve Christ’s gifts to His church, there are at least twenty distinct gifts Christ has given.  In no way do these lists seem to be comprehensive or complete. 

And yet the encouragement from these passages is always the same…

Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them…

~Romans 12:6

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. 

~ 1 Corinthians 12:7

What Christ gives to you, dear Christian, you must use for the sake of others! And why? Why all the variety? Practically speaking we can say it is for the edification of the body, but there is something bigger we afford to miss.

The church is the body of Christ. He is the Head and we are His body. He informs, charges and strengthens us as His members and we do His holy will here in the earth. From the head, to and through the body. This is the very language, the language of one body, many members, that Paul uses in each of the three chapters when he discussed Christ’s gifts to the church.

Here’s the big picture! Christ is so glorious, so beautiful, and so abundant in perfections. A one-dimensional body operating in the earth, or as a local church for that matter, is not going to cut it in displaying Christ’s beauty to the world. The variety of gifts, the varying graces Christ gives to each of us, only serves to make Him more known and more beautiful to one another and to the watching world.

Yes, the church was given unity. No, the church was not given to lifeless uniformity! For you and I to be all that we are called to be as a local church, we need one another, as those whom Christ has gifted and graced, to exercise these things for the sake of each other. So, we strive for unity. We are called to maintain it. But we must never strive for uniformity. Rather, we must walk in the beautiful and colorful variety of the gifts and graces Christ has given us. These are differences to be both embraced and celebrated. When this happens in the life of a local church, then you have true and Biblical unity on display. Then the watching world will know that you are Christ’s people, by the way you love one another.

The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him.

The Mirage. Something that appears to be real but is not in fact real at all. While I don’t live in a desert (too much humidity during the Texas summers) or even near one, everywhere I look I see mirages. Turn on the television, read the headlines, scan social media, overhear a conversation, and mirages pop up all over the place.

There is a false narrative already written that is being actively, intentionally disseminated through every channel possible and available. It is a story that has a dark ending, the end of liberty and diversity. This is Orwell’s 1984 a bit delayed, albeit, but nevertheless humming along like the purpose driven machine it is. This false narrative is full of false promises. Promises of peace and equality and freedom. But this narrative can only over promise and under deliver. That is what all false narratives do. And when an opponent speaks up, the first amendment becomes the last amendment you’d better reference, and the NEA (Narrative Enforcement Agency) moves into position for the kill. If the NEA can squash enough of these bigoted, ignorant opponents, then others of less hutzpah will no doubt cower in the corners of silence. And thus the opponents of this false narrative, or positively put, the proponents of liberty and equality, stand with the Psalmist in saying, ‘I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war!’ (Psalm 120:7).

But this is what the Agency is tasked to do in 2020. Drown out rational thought with the irrational. Disregard the truth and set aside evidences for one liners that look good on poster board. Those who have something valuable to contribute to the conversation are penalized by referees in a rigged game so that those who have nothing valuable to contribute can have the mic to themselves. Pandering. Propaganda. The politicalization of all things. Welcome to a Brave New World.

At some point, Christians, those who have been apprehended by the Gospel of Jesus Christ, will have to make the tough call and take a hard stand against the tyranny of the Mirage. The church of Jesus Christ will be driven to the point of contending for the truth in costly battles. This is where the false narrative will drive us. This is the corner the NEA plans to put us in. The slippery slope just gets more and more perilous the faster our nation slides. I mean, killing babies in the womb was so 20th century, right? Marriage between one man and one woman was so 2015. Two genders, seriously? And if we could get a peak at the NEA’s playbook, the laundry list of unholy aims would be shocking. The false narrative freight train that appears to be ‘off the rails’ is actually on track and advancing every day. By all appearances, fresh recruits are volunteering by the truckloads daily.

Church arise. Put your armor on. Buy the truth. Resist the Deceiver. Stop the infighting. Live honorably in light of the Cross and eternity.

I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

~ Ephesians 4:1-3

Even so, come Lord Jesus.

Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. GOD, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer’s; he makes me tread on my high places. To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments. 

The book of Habakkuk is a book for our times—not just because the coronavirus has surfaced and spread but because Christians in every part of the world are surrounded by real evil and experience some degree of tribulation. The winds of the world blow against us. We are the fish always swimming upstream. We feel this sometimes rather acutely and sometimes overwhelmingly.  

But whether we feel it or not, this is the reality for every Christian. And what this book has done is given us a glimpse into the heart of a real man and the ability to watch the progression that takes place within his soul. This journey has carried us from seeing Habakkuk in turmoil as the perplexed prophet all the way to this moment where we see the joyful prophet. But it wasn’t a short walk down “easy street” to get from point A to point B. 

Habakkuk was God’s prophet, but he wasn’t some super saint. He wasn’t and we aren’t. We are weak people cleaving to the strong Sovereign. And if we’re being honest, sanctification often looks pretty messy. We aren’t traveling down some well-paved highway; instead, we’re all over the side streets full of potholes. And when the going gets tough, Christians aren’t always so tough in response. Often, the going gets tough, and our immediate response is fear or grumbling or questioning God’s wisdom or confusion. 

So, this book is a true gift from God to us. Habakkuk was a real man writing for real people this timeless and real book. What do we do, then, amid sloppy sanctification and turbulent times? How do we walk with God when, due to pressures and anxieties and circumstances, we feel we can barely stand? This is where Habakkuk’s realization in these final verses of this book will prove so helpful to us. This chapter contains rich and majestic imagery that Habakkuk so poetically provides to us. That poetic and fearful language leaves Habakkuk saying what he says in verse 16: 

I hear, and my body trembles; my lips quiver at the sound; rottenness enters into my bones; my legs tremble beneath me. Yet I will quietly wait for the day of trouble to come upon people who invade us. 

~ Habakkuk 3:16

“I hear”—What had Habakkuk heard? Habakkuk 3:2: “O Lord, I have heard the report of you, and your work, O Lord, do I fear.” Habakkuk is no longer deep in struggle, fearing the invading armies of Babylon. His fear has been redirected; it has regained its proper footing. A wrong kind of fear has been forsaken, replaced with the only right kind of fear. He has seen the Lord as He is—high and lifted up! He had forgotten, and we, too, forget, that the Fearsome One is the only one we should be fearing. 

That weighty realization—Habakkuk’s greater sight of the Lord omnipotent—leaves him trembling. But this is the trembling of true faith. This is real trust in rough times. This is seeing God with us even when the fridge is empty. Or when the loved one breathes his last breath. Or when the city is on fire. 

This, then, is the preface to our text. Devastating circumstances. The greatness of God. Real faith. 

The text before us is Habakkuk’s realization in chapter 2, “The righteous shall live by his faith,” being lived out in real time. So much so, you can read it and think of it as Habakkuk’s statement of faith. While this great Old Testament book began on a low note, one of confusion and dismay, it ends on the note of triumph and jubilation. It almost reads like an ascent up a mountain, and here we have reached the peak and break out into celebratory song! 

There is a story of a group of American preachers who traveled to London to hear some of the great preachers of their day. They went with a genuine desire to learn from their British brothers. One Sunday they went to hear a well-known London pastor who preached a rousing sermon. As the American preachers left the meeting that day, they were full of praise for what they’d heard: “What a great preacher! What a great sermon!” The next Sunday they decided to go sit under the preaching of Charles Spurgeon. They came out of that service in exultation as well. But this time they walked out proclaiming, “What a Savior! What a Savior!” Habakkuk closes out this short book saying much the same: What a Savior! What a Savior! It is both the conclusion and crescendo of the whole book. How thankful I am for these verses. They are like apples of gold in settings of silver. 

Let’s now peer into the heart of this joyful prophet and learn from his example, processing what we’ve read into three parts: (1) joy’s realization, (2) joy’s response, and (3) joy’s reasoning. 

I. Joy’s Realization 

When Habakkuk looks down the road, what does he see barreling toward him? What does his future hold? He doesn’t have to guess about the future, does he? He is a prophet, and as a prophet he has received revelation about the events to come. The revelation was rather specific and graphic in nature.  It will be the stuff of nightmares, the devastation and ravages of war. 

Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls. 

~ Habakkuk 3:17

Israel was known for figs and olives, and they will be no more. There will be no fruit to harvest, no grapes to make wine. The food-producing fields, the produce that fills the dinner plates, will fail. The flocks and the herds, the meats and the milks, will also be devastated, slain, and stolen. In one fell swoop, the Babylonian army will deal a death blow to the Southern Kingdom, to Jerusalem. All its rich provision, all these signs of God’s blessing, will be blotted out by these harsh invaders. This is what a war-torn region looks like when the fighting is over and the city is ruined.  

Habakkuk describes in a single verse the coming reality of horticultural, viticultural, and agricultural disaster. But he is merely highlighting the economic devastation to come—no, he is highlighting the fact that the stuff people need to live, the basic necessities, will be no more. That is how bad things are going to get. Babylon will come, and Jerusalem as they know it will be destroyed. Thousands will die by the sword, and thousands more will starve during the siege or be taken into captivity. Those who remain will attempt to scrape out their existence among the war-torn remains of this desolate city. 

This is Habakkuk’s realization—a realization that leads to despair, right? I mean, what else could it possibly lead to? Well, there is something else, dear Christian!  

II. Joy’s Response 

Facing that kind of future, how does Habakkuk respond? Some would say, “How else could he possibly respond but with fear or despair or denial?” But what does Habakkuk have to say for himself? “Yet I will rejoice in the Lord!” (Habakkuk 3:18, emphasis mine). Has this guy gone mad? Has he lost his mind? No, he is thinking more clearly than he has ever thought before. Remember, Habakkuk has seen something of the glory of God. All that misplaced fear, all the perplexity, has been cleared up, and this is his honest and hope-filled response—joy. Habakkuk isn’t merely standing on the promises nor is he simply sober minded. He is singing! 

When your life becomes the stuff of nightmares, when things that seemingly can’t get any worse, get worse, and when the sun is setting on your pain-filled life, what will you do then? Yes, Christians are to stand, but we can do more than stand. We can and should rejoice. Because we know God, we have every reason to rejoice. Our joy isn’t rooted in our circumstances; it is rooted in the eternal and unchangingly good God who loves us and keeps us. 

I really do think—in my own life and the life of the modern-day Reformed movement—that this is one of the biggest disconnects between our theology and our experience. Reformed men and women simply are not known by their joy. In church services reverence is exalted, and rightly so, but never should it be so at the expense of rejoicing. Sadly, many of us behave more like Pharisees in our worship. Do you recall the scene of Jesus’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem for the last time? 

As he was drawing near—already on the way down the Mount of Olives—the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen, saying, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples.” He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.” 

~ Luke 19:37–40

There it is. Haven’t we been like those Pharisees at times? Someone rejoices during our meeting, and we begin to question their sanity. Another weeps tears of joy, and we being to pray for their emotional wellbeing. What are we thinking? We have every reason to weep tears of joy if we’re in Christ. We have every encouragement to rejoice knowing how our story ends. Isn’t God a rejoicing God? Isn’t He singing loudly over us today? Aren’t the angels in heaven rejoicing right now and busying themselves in singing praises? 

We can and should be rejoicing along with them, along with our God. The Gospel is good news. God could have called it serious news if He wanted, but He didn’t. Remember what the angel said to those shepherds: “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people” (Luke 2:10). Right here, right now, we have every reason to rejoice. Will you rejoice today? What we see in the text is that Habakkuk will rejoice in the face of the coming harsh reality. Not because of the harsh reality, but despite it. And this rejoicing is born out of real, living faith—faith in the God who will never let us down. 

If it is Habakkuk’s faith in God that produces this rejoicing, we need to consider what this faith is and isn’t. First, what this faith is not. Is it blind ignorance? Clearly not. Habakkuk sees what is coming. He isn’t blind to it. He knows what Babylon will do, and he has God’s word on it. So, faith isn’t a lack of knowledge or blind ignorance. 

Nor is faith merely courage. Though faith may make one courageous, that isn’t the essence of faith. It’s not a “pull-yourself-together” mentality. Faith doesn’t look inward to one’s own strength or ability at all. If you think that is what Habakkuk does here, you have missed the point entirely. 

Also, faith isn’t simply optimism. For starters, the coming reality for Jerusalem doesn’t allow for optimism. And we surely don’t see Habakkuk trying to encourage himself by saying, “Maybe it won’t be so bad after all.” No, faith is something more than “glass-half-full” sentiment. 

Lastly, true faith isn’t escapism either. This isn’t Habakkuk hearing of the coming Babylonian invasion then burying his head in Jerusalem sand. This isn’t being surrounded by difficulties and overwhelmed by pressures then resorting to mindlessly browsing Facebook. No, genuine faith stares circumstances in the face and refuses to run or retreat or recant (think of our Christian history of singing martyrs being burned alive). 

When hard things came to Habakkuk, see how he responded:  

The fig tree won’t blossom.

The vines will be dried up and dead.

The olive tree will be barren.

The fields will yield no harvest. 

The flocks will be cut down.

The herds will be stolen.

The city will burn.

The people will be slaughtered. 

Though God does all this, yet I will trust Him! Come what may—come all that may—I will trust Yahweh! I will rejoice in my God! 

This is what real faith does. This is how it responds to a horrid future. 

III. Joy’s Reasoning 

But the questions, then, are these: How can faith do that? How is such faith even possible? How do we get from point A to point B in our journey of faith? 

You may be asking, “How can my faith mature like Habakkuk’s faith matured?” This is where we can glean so much from this short Old Testament book, one that has a lot to say about the journey of faith. For starters, we see in these three chapters that faith in God is not ignorant and uninformed. Rather, Habakkuk’s faith is rooted in God and God’s acts. Christianity is the religion of facts; it isn’t merely a religion of ideas and pithy sayings. God has spoken. God has acted. History tells the story of it all. We are not saved by religious ideas, we are saved by actual events, the great things God has done. We see this in the text: “I will take joy in the God of my salvation. God, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer’s; he makes me tread on my high places” (Habakkuk 3:18–19). Not only in verses 18 and 19 do we see this but the whole chapter, the whole book, speaks to this reality. Habakkuk has seen something of the glory of the Lord. He has seen God as supreme. 

His splendor covered the heavens, and the earth was full of His praise. His brightness was like the light: rays flashed from His hand; and there he veiled His power.

~ Habakkuk 3:3–4

He has seen God as sovereign. 

Look among the nations, and see; wonder and be astounded. For I am doing a work in your days that you would not believe if told. For behold, I am raising up the Chaldeans. 

~ Habakkuk 1:5–6

But the Lord is in His holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before Him. 

~ Habakkuk 2:20

He has seen God as salvation. 

You went out for the salvation of your people, for the salvation of your anointed. You crushed the head of the house of the wicked.

~ Habakkuk 3:13

I will take joy in the God of my salvation. 

~ Habakkuk 3:18

He has seen God as strength. 

God, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer’s; he makes me tread on my high places. 

~ Habakkuk 3:19

Thus, the faith that rejoices is rooted in the revelation of God to the soul. It isn’t rooted in mystical mumbo jumbo but in the truth of God, the facts of God, we could say. It is rooted in what God has said and what God has done. It is whole-hearted trust in the One who again and again and again has proven Himself trustworthy. 

And when we possess that kind of faith, that kind of deep-rooted trust in the God of our salvation, then we can face whatever future comes our way. More than just face it, we can rejoice in the fires of tribulation. Recall what Jesus Himself said to His disciples, some of his last words to them before He went to the cross: “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). 

In Christ you will have peace, and you can be of good cheer. If we could only grasp this. Our rejoicing is rooted in God, not in anything else. When we look at the “anything elses” of this world, we have every reason to fear and panic and hide. But when we look at our good and glorious King, we have every reason to stand, every reason to rejoice. Paul captures this well in Romans 8: 

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? … No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

Are you more than a conqueror or not? Will any weapon fashioned against you succeed? Doesn’t this give you at least a little wiggle room to rejoice? 

If only you and I would take hold of the living reality that we are already in some sense seated in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. If only we’d live knowing the end of our Christian journey from the beginning. And yet we do know our blissful end. 

If only moment by moment we would desperately depend on the Spirit of the living God residing in us, then surely we’d rejoice more than we currently do. Unadulterated joy is the product of unyielding faith in an indescribable God. Or it could be said like this: Mature faith in a majestic God produces much joy. “Shout, and sing for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel” (Isaiah 12:6). May God in His mercy make us a more joyful people. 

There is a strong tendency among religious teachers these days to disassociate anger from the divine character and to defend God by explaining away the Scriptures that relate it to Him. This is understandable, but in the light of the full revelation of God it is inexcusable.

Let a man question the inspiration of the Scriptures and a curious, even monstrous, inversion takes place: thereafter he judges the Word instead of letting the Word judge him; he determines what the Word should teach instead of permitting it to determine what he should believe; he edits, amends, strikes out, adds at his pleasure; but always he sits above the Word and makes it amenable to himself instead of kneeling before God and becoming amenable to the Word.

This is the world we are living in. Liberalism has fortified its walls and barricaded its doors. The “God is love and only love” folks have stockpiled their ammunition. People all around us are happy to talk about spirituality, but what they worship wouldn’t even accept a handout from the God of the Bible. The “gods” of this Western world are cowardly, one-dimensional, feminized hypocrites. And that is, by no means, the God of the Bible as He has revealed Himself to us in the Scriptures.

Habakkuk 3:3–16 tells us fascinating things about our God. It is poetic and the sole focus is God, His character, His ways. There are parts hard to translate and hard to understand, but it is Scripture, the revelation gifted to us from God Himself, preserved for us by God Himself. This is God’s self-disclosure. The great I Am is letting us in on a more intimate knowledge of Himself.

So, what do you do when you come across passages like this? Do you skim it? Do you get lost in your own thoughts, distracted by the lack of “practical helps” in the text? Or do you worship? Do you either metaphorically or literally fall on your face and worship? Do such texts irritate you or invigorate you? 

Such an admonition is worth our consideration this morning. Each of us can fall into the trap of casually approaching God’s Word, lazily reading it, then getting up from the chair without having prayed, without having worshiped, without having adored the Lord. Is this where you are today? Is this where you’ve been in recent weeks? Recent months? Recent years? 

This is where the slow decay of a once biblical view of God begins. The things that once fascinated us and caused our heart rate to quicken now seem worn out and dry. We once could read a portion of a Psalm and sense God’s voice in the text, not even grasping the entirety of what we’d read. But now we just churn through that same Psalm to get our daily reading commitment out of the way.

If your appetite for Scripture diminishes, I can guarantee that your appetite for God will go right along with it. Oh, you will publicly admit your fondness for the Sacred Book, but when the temperature of your circumstances begins to rise, your waning view of God Almighty just won’t keep you in the fight. And this is the very reason we need a text like this one, which confronts us with the greatness of God—no apologies, no uneasiness, no political correctness. Here is God as He is. Take Him or leave Him—at your own risk.

It reminds me of a scene from The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis:

Mr. Beaver: “Aslan is a lion — the Lion — the great Lion.”

Susan: “Ooh — I’d thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel quite nervous about meeting a lion.”

Mrs. Beaver: “That you will, deary, and make no mistake, if there’s anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking, they’re either braver than most or else just silly.”

Lucy: “Then, he isn’t safe?”

Mr. Beaver: “Who said anything about safe? Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”

We may yet have a lot more ground to gain in remembering the “lion-ness” of our God. So, with that in mind, let’s look to the text. I have broken it into three parts: 

1. God is majestic.
2. God is fearful (i.e., very great and to be feared).
3. We are spectators.

We will begin where our text begins.

1. God Is Majestic

For the sake of bridging the gap between this and my last article, you need to remember that, according to the opening verse of chapter 3, this entire chapter is a prayer. Habakkuk has come a long way since the opening verses of chapter 1. His perplexed and troubled heart has been quieted, and the Lord has disclosed more of Himself to His prophet. Chapter 2 ended with this: “But the Lord is in his holy temple, let all the earth keep silence before him” (v. 20).

And as Habakkuk begins to pray, we see the first of two bookends. In the second verse of chapter 3 we read, “O Lord, I have heard the report of you, and your work, O Lord, do I fear.” That great second verse really sets the stage for the remainder of his prayer. “In wrath remember mercy!”

Now, Habakkuk’s prayer continues: 

God came from Teman,
    and the Holy One from Mount Paran.           Selah
His splendor covered the heavens,
    and the earth was full of his praise.
His brightness was like the light;
    rays flashed from his hand;
    and there he veiled his power.

~ Habakkuk 3:3–4 

God truly is majestic. 

In verse 3, God comes. This is picturing a visitation from the Most High God. By the time we get to Habakkuk in the Old Testament, we have seen many such visitations described and prophesied. A similar example of this is seen in Deuteronomy 33:2: “The Lord came from Sinai and dawned from Seir upon us; he shone forth from Mount Paran; he came from the ten thousands of holy ones, with flaming fire at his right hand.” 

Notice that the various “comings” of God are always attended by the spectacular, the fearsome, the majestic. Now, what do I mean when I say majestic? I like the Cambridge Dictionary’s attempt here: “having the quality of causing you to feel great admiration and respect for [something] because of its size, power, or beauty.” God is majestic. He fits that definition and then some. Do you see all the “His” statements in these two verses in Habakkuk?

1. His splendor covered the heavens.
2. The earth was full of His praise.
3. His brightness was like the light.
4. Rays flashed from His hand.
5. There He veiled His power.

Can you even imagine what the scene would be like if God didn’t veil His power? It is as though the picture Habakkuk paints is what he sees of God, who displays only a small part of His greatness. God can’t show it all—we couldn’t handle it. So we see only in part, a muted hearing, a dimmed perspective, and still, His divine majesty overwhelms those who behold it. Do you remember the scene at Sinai after the giving of the Ten Commandments?

Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.” Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.” 

~ Exodus 20:18–20

God’s majesty comes and overpowers everything else. He is far more wonderful than we imagine Him to be. He is greater, wiser, holier, mightier, more merciful, more just, more gracious—He is more.

You should read a passage like this and walk away thinking and praying, My God is far more majestic than I ever imagined. Please show me your glory, O God! This kind of majesty repels the ungodly and reels in the godly. But is this your experience? As much as it is your experience, will you seek God for more? As much as it isn’t your experience, will you seek God for more?

2. God Is Fearful

That God is fearful really seems to be the focus for the next 12 verses (5–16). However, there is a shift from verses 3–7 to verses 8–16, where Habakkuk moves from third person (i.e., “he” and “his”) to second person (i.e., “you” and “your”). The significance of that change seems to indicate the prayer getting increasingly personal. In verse 8, the prayer turns into Habakkuk directly addressing the Lord. 

Consider what Habakkuk says of our God who is to be feared. 

Before him went pestilence,
    and plague followed at his heels.
He stood and measured the earth;
    he looked and shook the nations;
then the eternal mountains were scattered;
    the everlasting hills sank low.
His were the everlasting ways.

~ Habakkuk 3:5–6

The visitation of the Lord has dire consequences for all who are opposed to Him. That language of God standing and God looking is marvelous. If, with just a look, the nations shake and tremble, what will God’s judgment on the nations be like? His wrath is great. His judgments are great. His justice is great. Everything about our God is great!

Dr. A. H. Edelkoort stated, “Here we have a knowledge of God which few may come to, but which shows us the awful and holy being of God, in contrast to the sweet ideas from which men may draw their image of God, which is then no more than an idol.” On which side of the fence are you standing? Are you worshiping God as He has revealed Himself in Scripture—both sovereign and condescending, transcendent and immanent? Or have you pieced together a god of your own making who wants to cuddle and pacify you in your sin?

Look at more of this imagery. Habakkuk isn’t finished yet, and his poetic pen is on the move. Next, God is pictured as a fierce warrior. 

Was your wrath against the rivers, O Lord?
    Was your anger against the rivers,
    or your indignation against the sea,
when you rode on your horses,
    on your chariot of salvation?
You stripped the sheath from your bow,
    calling for many arrows.                            Selah
    You split the earth with rivers.

~ Habakkuk 3:8–9

Again, this is poetic. God needs no chariot and shoots no arrows, but these images speak volumes. God executes judgments. He wields infinite power to vanquish all His enemies. God can part seas and rivers and cause the earth to open up and swallow men. The Lord can shake the earth—“The mountains quake before him; the hills melt; the earth heaves before him, the world and all who dwell in it” (Nahum 1:5)—whether the quaking of the earth in judgment or His manifestation of Himself to His people in prayer: “And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness” (Acts 4:31). 

God is fearful, to be feared. He is fearsome, inspiring the fear of Him. When I think of the fearfulness of God, I can’t help but think of a scene in Revelation 6:

Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?” 

~ Revelation 6:15–17

Before we move on, there is something that really must be pointed out. There is this special note of salvation amid all this poetic language regarding God’s fierceness and fury.

You went out for the salvation of your people, 

   for the salvation of your anointed. 

You crushed the head of the house of the wicked, 

   laying him bare from thigh to neck. 

~ Habakkuk 3:13

God will exercise His great power to save His people from their sins. As one brother has said, “God comes in frightening majesty when He comes to be merciful to His people.” It seems God is fiercely protective of both His glory and His people. He will crush His enemies and your enemies, dear Christian, in great fury, from top to bottom, thigh to neck. Think about it—God as warrior is a common biblical motif. Moses once proclaimed, “The Lord is a man of war” (Ex. 15:3). Never forget God’s fierce affection for His church. God is the Divine Warrior Champion who keeps watch over you. Who can stand against Him?

When we come to verse 16, there is something critical we must see as Habakkuk transparently exposes his innermost thoughts:

I hear, and my body trembles; my lips quiver at the sound; rottenness enters into my bones; my legs tremble beneath me. Yet I will quietly wait for the day of trouble to come upon people who invade us.

~ Habakkuk 3:`16

Habakkuk is no longer deep in struggle, fearing the invading armies of Babylon. His fear has been redirected; it has regained its proper footing. A wrong kind of fear has been forsaken, replaced with the only right kind of fear. Habakkuk has had his mind renewed. He has seen the Lord as He is. It is highly likely that we all could use a “renewing of the mind”: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind” (Rom. 12:2). Many of us struggle far too often with far too many fears. William Gurnall said, “We fear men so much because we fear God so little.” We forget that the fearsome One is the only one we should be fearing.

Now I want you to consider one further reality. 

3. We Are Spectators

My third point is that believers are spectators. To be clear, I am not promoting inactivity, as though I were saying, “Christians, you just sit on the bleachers over there.” Not at all. And yet, God’s people are spectators in a very real sense. We are spectators of divine majesty, onlookers of the greatness of God. When we think of some of the greatest deliverances in Scripture, we capture this reality well. When God so powerfully brings Israel out from under Pharaoh’s domination, God did it. God’s people merely watched the devastating events unfold. They walked with God in it, though, as the just always live by faith. But God was the actor. He sent the plagues. He led His people out by a pillar of flaming fire. He drowned the pursuing Egyptian army in the Red Sea. God did all of that and needed no accomplice. 

Or think of the Assyrian army camped around the walls of Jerusalem in Hezekiah’s day. God didn’t ask His people to fight by faith. He stepped in and delivered them. In a single night, God dispatched one of His angels and won the day. It was quick—not a single arrow needed to be fired from an Israelite bow. God killed 185,000 enemy soldiers and liberated His people from certain slaughter. God did that. No military counsel required.

But we haven’t even scratched the surface, spectators. There is a greater victory, something even more wonderful and more glorious we haven’t yet considered. How about the salvation of a people? How about the victory over sin and death? How about the battle won once and for all on Calvary’s cross? What say you, spectator? What role did you play in so great a salvation? 

From beginning to end, salvation is of the Lord. He worked that work. He accomplished our liberation. He sets the captives free, and only He can do that. So, spectators must spectate. We must “behold our God.” We must do so from a seat of humility and be transported to heights of adoration and praise. 

Our God is great. He is greatly to be praised. His greatness is unsearchable. 

I am the LORD, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I equip you, though you do not know me, that people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the LORD, and there is no other. I form light and create darkness; I make well-being and create calamity; I am the LORD, who does all these things.

~ Isaiah 45:5-7

This is the One we worship, church. He is majestic. He is to be feared. And we get to watch Him win the day!

A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet, according to Shigionoth.

O LORD, I have heard the report of you, and your work, O LORD, do I fear. In the midst of the years revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy.

We have come to the third and final chapter of this prophetic book, and Habakkuk has a renewed disposition. He isn’t the man he was in chapter 1. God has spoken. Things have changed. 

Think for a moment of the final verse in the second chapter: “But the Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him” (Habakkuk 2:20). This was the final portion of God’s second reply to Habakkuk, and it is evident that our prophet brother has heard the word of the Lord and responded in humility, for in the opening chapter, amid Habakkuk’s complaint, his heart was not quiet. He was a man in turmoil, a prophet perplexed. But in chapter 3 we will hear the prayer of a prophet at peace. A humbled prophet. A praying prophet.

When a man one day asked George Mueller the secret of his walk with God, Mueller responded, “There was a day when I died, utterly died—died to George Mueller, his opinions, preferences, tastes, and will; died to the world, its approval or censure; died to the approval or blame even of my brethren and friends—and since then I have studied to show myself approved only to God.” It seems as though Habakkuk has come through a similar experience. So much of his attention had been on himself:

“O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not hear?” (1:2)

“Why do you make me see iniquity?” (1:3)

So much of his attention had been on the wickedness around him:

“Why do you idly look at wrong? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise.” (1:3)

“Why do you idly look at traitors and remain silent when the wicked swallows up the man more righteous than he?” (1:13)

But now something has changed. His perspective in chapter 3 is totally different. He has died a kind of death—a death to self—and his whole perspective has changed. It is this kind of death each one of us needs to die as well. We need to be those believers whose eyes aren’t fixed on ourselves or on the things around us but have our gaze fastened to the Lord seated on His throne of grace. 

So Habakkuk, having recognized that the Lord is “in His holy temple,” now offers up this prayer with the renewed expectation that the Lord will hear and answer him. The fact that this prayer is documented for us in Scripture is quite wonderful. This prayer is also a song, which is also a psalm. That is what we can discern from the opening verse of the chapter: “A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet, according to Shigionoth” (Habakkuk 3:1). We see this kind of introductory language in five of the psalms. 

Habakkuk then recorded his prayer to the Lord as a prophetic intercessor. He documented this prayer on behalf of his people for the sake of his people. This prayer would then be sung by the Israelites, likely during the exile that was to come on the heels of the Babylonian invasion. That is a pretty amazing picture.

Habakkuk has fully settled into the justice of God and the reality of His chastening work to come. He has accepted God’s wisdom in sending a nation even more wicked than Israel to destroy Israel. The turmoil and confusion within Habakkuk have ceased and been replaced by settled conviction and firm trust. 

Now the prophet pens his prayer in order to lead his people into this same perspective. He would help them as he has been so helped by God. And, of course, this should be our work today: “Freely you have received, freely give” (Matthew 10:8 NKJV). 

Let’s begin to look now at this psalm of Habakkuk, his prayer.

O Lord, I have heard the report of you, and your work, O Lord, do I fear. In the midst of the years revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy. 

~ Habakkuk 3:2

Habakkuk opens prayer his prayer by addressing Yahweh, which is the opening word of the final verse of his prayer in 3:19: “God, the Lord, is my strength.” The covenantal and personal name of God serves as bookends to Habakkuk’s prayer, which is rather significant. Habakkuk has God’s covenant in mind as he prays. He is really a perfect picture of one who is pleading the promises of God, and that is where his prayer begins: first with his recognition, then right into his petition. 

What is it that Habakkuk has recognized or acknowledged? “O Lord, I have heard the report of you, and your work, O Lord, do I fear.” From hearing to fearing. God had given him the “report” of what was soon to come: 

Look among the nations, and see; wonder and be astounded. For I am doing a work in your days that you would not believe if told. For behold, I am raising up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, who march through the breadth of the earth, to seize dwellings not their own.

~ Habakkuk 1:5-6

The phrase God spoke, “I am doing a work,” which literally rendered would be “I will work a work,” is the same language we see here in Habakkuk’s prayer: “O Lord, I have heard the report of you, and your work.” But Habakkuk is no longer fearful of the coming army of Babylon. Instead, he fears the Lord and His mighty work. This is no servile fear that leaves Habakkuk hidden in a dark corner; this is no fear of God that causes the prophet to flee from God’s presence. This proper fear of the Lord sets the prophet to praying and pleading the promises of God. He has this heightened sense of the greatness of the Lord and the severity of His holy judgments. Habakkuk has begun to grasp the sheer awesomeness of God’s great power because the one who can wield an ungodly nation as a sword of judgment is all powerful. Habakkuk sees this now. He is finally convinced that the glory of God is far more important than his own little fears and concerns. The great concern of the Christian is God’s glory and God’s name—even when it costs us. 

Habakkuk’s posture is one of submissive, humble, longing prayer. How is it with us? We who claim to have a high view of God, how is it with you in the prayer closet? This is what the prophet has recognized. He is simply astounded at the power and majesty and wisdom of God. It reminds me of the apostle Paul’s doxology in Romans 11: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Romans 11:33). 

But now I want you to see his petition. We are living in days much like Habakkuk’s day. If you are at all perceptive of the times and aware of the great evil around us, you likely recognize the judgment of God is near. He may not be sending a great army to crush our wicked nation tomorrow, but instead God has “raised up” (to use the language of Habakkuk 1:6) an army of cults and false religions to tickle the ears of prideful and privileged Americans. Never have there been so many heretical movements in the earth or so many churches in our land and yet still so little truth. Lies are abundant. Lust has saturated the country, leading to all manner of perversions. Violence is everywhere. More than 17,000 murders occur each year outside the womb and more than 800,000 last year inside the womb. I’m not sure there has ever been a time that our nation has been so dark and in such a moral free-fall as it is in our day. Our nation is dying a slow death. Apart from the intervention of God, America is a goner. And all the while, the church sleeps on.

Now I know there are pockets of life here and there. But so much of the modern church is lethargic, inactive, and ineffectual. Bloody Mary feared the prayers of a single man, John Knox. She feared his prayers more than invading armies. Where are the John Knoxes of our day? Where is the fear of God anywhere? Our love is waxing cold. Our prayers have grown unconcerned. Apart from the intervention of God, the church will remain quiet and sleepy.

Yet, it was in such a time as this that Habakkuk’s prayer was birthed. And what is the essence of his prayer? It is a prayer for revival. This is certainly connected by the grand encouragement from Habakkuk 2:4 (NKJV): “The just shall live by his faith.” This is the believing prophet doing what believers in God’s sovereignty and power do. Habakkuk is well acquainted with the need of the hour. Ralph Erskine, preaching on this text, said, “The time of wrath is a sinning time. It’s a sleeping time. It’s a time of apostasy. It’s a dead time.” Habakkuk knows this; he knows it is a time of God’s wrath. Yet, what does he do? He prays, he petitions God, and he pleads the promises. 

So, in his prayer, we see Habakkuk emphasizing two important realities surrounding revival: (1) God’s sovereignty in revival and (2) God’s mercy in revival. With God’s character in view, Habakkuk begins his pleading: “O Lord, I have heard the report of you, and your work, O Lord, do I fear. In the midst of the years revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy” (Habakkuk 3:2). Do you see the reliance here in God’s sovereignty? He is asking God to do what only God can do: “Revive Your work, O Lord! Make it known! Man can’t revive it. Man can work it up. Man can’t make it known. God, you must do it, or it won’t be done. You must stretch forth Your arm to save. You must rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake at your presence.” 

He prays for revival—revival that originates with God. He isn’t looking to big stadiums filled with itching ears and eloquent preaching. He isn’t looking to marketing budgets and Easter egg drops. Habakkuk cries out to God to revive His work among His people amid His wrath. Isn’t that amazing? But isn’t that the very thing needed right here and right now?

Bow your heavens, O LORD, and come down! Touch the mountains so that they smoke!

~ Psalm 144:5

Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you?

~ Psalm 85:6

This is what Israel needed in Habakkuk’s day. And this is what America needs in our day, church. Look at the language of Habakkuk’s prayer in verse 13: “You went out for the salvation of your people, for the salvation of your anointed. You crushed the head of the house of the wicked, laying him bare from thigh to neck” (Habakkuk 3:13).

Do you hear the utter reliance on God who is sovereign? You went out…You crushed…You laid bare. God must act! This is the way it is and has always been with revival. Why else would a freshly restored Peter stand up within weeks of his cowardly acts and begin to preach to a great crowd in Jerusalem when suddenly 3,000 are converted? 

In September of 1857, an inner-city missionary working a Dutch Reformed Church in New York City began a weekly hour of prayer from noon to one o’clock in the afternoon. The first week it seemed no one would join him, but at 12:30 p.m. the first visitor arrived. By the end of the time, there were 6 men who gathered for brief prayer. The following week, there were 15–20 men gathered. By the third week it was 30–40 men. From that week forward, they began meeting daily for prayer.

The agenda was simple. They prayed for the salvation of souls. There was singing and brief edifying exhortations. By the start of 1858, the room was so crowded they began to have three simultaneous prayer meetings on three separate floors of the church building. From the church, another prayer meeting was birthed in a large theater. Thirty minutes prior to the start of the prayer meeting, the theater would be filled to capacity. Theodore Cuyler, pastor of Nineteenth Street Church in New York, said that he was “struck with the earnestness of petitions for the descent of God’s Spirit on our city churches.” The newspaper editor, Horace Greely, who worked for the New York Tribune sent a reporter with horse and buggy to ride from one prayer meeting to the next to see how many men were praying. In one hour he could only get to 12 meetings, but he counted more than 6,000 men. According to eyewitnesses, within six months’ time, these noontime prayer meetings were attracting 10,000 businessmen, all of them confessing their sins and praying for revival. 

From New York City it began to spread to other cities. In cities such as Cleveland and St. Louis, thousands of people packed downtown churches three times per day, just to pray. There were 6,000 people in attendance in Pittsburgh. Daily prayer meetings were held in Washington DC at five different times to accommodate the crowds. The effects were remarkable. Many ministers began having nightly services in which to lead people to Christ. People were converted, at times 10,000 people a week in New York City alone.

Bishop Charles P. McIlvaine of the Episcopalian Church of Ohio wrote: “I rejoice in the decided conviction that this is the Lord’s doing; unaccountable by any natural causes, entirely above and beyond what any human device or power could produce; an outpouring of the Spirit of God upon God’s people, quickening them to greater earnestness in his service; and upon the unconverted, to make them new creatures in Christ Jesus.” 

It is estimated that over the two years or so this revival of prayer continued that 1,000,000 people were converted to Christ. This was at a time when our nation’s population was approximately 30 million people. It is a sovereign act of God like this that is needed again in our day. 

So often, God has done this kind of extraordinary work amid prevailing darkness. Think of the Reformation. The condition of the world and the church was pitiful in the 15th and 16th centuries. Alexander VI, the pope at the turn of the 16th century, was a perverted man. He filled the Vatican with his own illegitimate children and didn’t hesitate to put those children in places of influence and power. He held large orgies in the Vatican, at times with as many as 50 prostitutes hired for the perverted parties. In the days of Luther’s awakening, it was Pope Leo X who ruled the church. He was remembered for saying, “God has given us the papacy, let us enjoy it.” The church was in darkness. People were ignorant, perverted, and superstitious. And from that darkness, God birthed the Reformation.

The Great Awakening came about when England was a spiritual desert as well. The preaching of George Whitefield, the Wesley brothers, and other men lit two continents on fire. 

This is how God works. He is sovereign. And how desperate is our situation today? Will you look to your Sovereign King and plead with Him for revival? And still we must consider God’s mercy in revival. As much as it is a sovereign act, it is likewise a merciful act. Habakkuk pleads for that which is central to God’s character. “In wrath, remember mercy!” He wrestles with God in prayer, calling Him by His covenant name Yahweh, holding up to Him in prayer His own mercy: “If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared” (Psalm 130:3–4). 

But with you there is forgiveness. But with you, God, there is mercy—plentiful mercy!

We do not ask God to send revival our way because of our own merits. We only ask on the basis of mercy. We do not want what we deserve but what God can freely and mercifully give. As Martyn Lloyd-Jones said, “We have nothing to say but to ask that Thou shouldest act like Thyself, and in the midst of wrath shouldest have pity upon us!” We are to be those storming God’s mercy seat in times like this. “God, please remember mercy! Mercy, Lord, mercy!” 

Moses interceded for the people of Israel on the heels of their refusal to go into the promised land and take it: 

And now, please let the power of the Lord be great as you have promised, saying, ‘The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation.’ Please pardon the iniquity of this people, according to the greatness of your steadfast love, just as you have forgiven this people, from Egypt until now.” 

~ Numbers 14:17-19

In wrath, Lord, remember mercy. Please pardon. This is the foundation of our plea, isn’t it? The mercy of God.

Not what my hands have done, Lord. But we ask You to do what only Your hand can do! You are merciful! You delight to save sinners! In revival Your glory is made manifest in a special manner. In mercy, rend the heavens and come down!

We need revival, dear church. When we are sleepy, when we are downcast, when we are confronted by the calamity of comfort every day of our lives, we must plead with the God of mercy for revival. Yes, revival is an act of God’s mercy, a sovereign act of the Almighty, but God is pleased to use means. Church history tells us in large letters that the typical means by which God brings about revival is prayer. I challenge you to study church history to find one revival that wasn’t birthed through prayer, whether it was six businessmen, a group of pastors, two women, or whatever it might be. We must give ourselves to prayer, brothers and sisters—Prayer for revival, Prayer for mercy.

Let me close with one more account of revival in the late 18th century at Hampden Sydney College in Virginia. It began with one student reading Joseph Alliene’s Alarm to the Unconverted and talking to two other students about it. Those three students began to meet for prayer, then another student joined them. And then the word got out that they were praying. They were harassed and shunned. One student went to the president of the college to accuse them of holding this prayer meeting, but the president replied, with tears streaming down his face, “God has descended. I will join them.” At the next meeting the president joined them, and a remarkable revival swept through the college. More than half of the students of the whole college were converted and began attending prayer meetings. This revival spread to other colleges and universities like Yale, Dartmouth, and Princeton. Many, many students were coming to Christ and crying out for revival at God’s mercy seat. 

Dear church, will you pray for your nation? Will you ask God to revive His church?  Do you long such a movement of mercy in our day? Honestly answer these questions, and then pray as Habakkuk prayed: “Revive your work in the midst of these dark years. In wrath, remember mercy!”

Then the LORD said to Moses, “Rise up early in the morning and present yourself before Pharaoh and say to him, ‘Thus says the LORD, the God of the Hebrews, “Let my people go, that they may serve me. For this time I will send all my plagues on you yourself, and on your servants and your people, so that you may know that there is none like me in all the earth. For by now I could have put out my hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, and you would have been cut off from the earth. But for this purpose I have raised you up, to show you my power, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth. You are still exalting yourself against my people and will not let them go. Behold, about this time tomorrow I will cause very heavy hail to fall, such as never has been in Egypt from the day it was founded until now. Now therefore send, get your livestock and all that you have in the field into safe shelter, for every man and beast that is in the field and is not brought home will die when the hail falls on them.”’” Then whoever feared the word of the LORD among the servants of Pharaoh hurried his slaves and his livestock into the houses, but whoever did not pay attention to the word of the LORD left his slaves and his livestock in the field.

I very much appreciated this morning Matthew Henry’s comments on this passage which I felt rightly captured the heart of the text.

A particular prediction of the plague of hail (v. 18), and a gracious advice to Pharaoh and his people to send for their servants and cattle out of the field, that they might be sheltered from the hail, v. 19. Note, When God’s justice threatens ruin his mercy, at the same time, shows us a way of escape from it, so unwilling is he that any should perish. See here what care God took, not only to distinguish between Egyptians and Israelites, but between some Egyptians and others. If Pharaoh will not yield, and so prevent the judgment itself, yet an opportunity is given to those that have any dread of God and his word to save themselves from sharing in the judgment. Note, Those that will take warning may take shelter; and those that will not may thank themselves if they fall by the overflowing scourge, and the hail which will sweep away the refuge of lies, Isa. 28:17. See the different effect of this warning. 1. Some believed the things that were spoken, and they feared, and housed their servants and cattle (v. 20), like Noah (Heb. 11:7), and it was their wisdom. Even among the servants of Pharaoh there were some that trembled at God’s word; and shall not the sons of Israel dread it? But, 2. Others believed not: though, whatever plague Moses had hitherto foretold, the event exactly answered to the prediction; and though, if they had had any reason to question this, it would have been no great damage to them to have kept their cattle in the house for one day, and so, supposing it a doubtful case, to have chosen the surer side; yet they were so foolhardy as in defiance to the truth of Moses, and the power of God (of both which they had already had experience enough, to their cost), to leave their cattle in the field, Pharaoh himself, it is probable, giving them an example of the presumption, v. 21. Note, Obstinate infidelity, which is deaf to the fairest warnings and the wisest counsels, leaves the blood of those that perish upon their own heads.

~ Matthew Henry

In recently wrapping up a series of sermons through the book of Habakkuk, I read this passage this morning and am freshly thankful for our God who “in wrath remembers mercy”. Even to this pagan, oppressive nation, God grants a way of escape from this hail and fire judgment. If they would only fear the Lord and harken unto this threat, they could be spared, them and their livestock. This is grace indeed!

Often times, I hear negative views espoused of the Bible’s warning passages. I am not sure why people either look down on these texts or attempt to use them to promote their twisted and unbiblical positions (i.e. like those who use the warning passages in Hebrews to ay that true believers can fall away from the faith entirely). The warning passages are good and gracious, friends. They are part of the means of grace to us in the Scriptures. They keep us hemmed in, when otherwise we might go far astray. They are the strong voice of God to us, reminding us of both the dangers of sin and the horrors of being left to ourselves. Yet, God will never leave us or forsake us!

“For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.

~ Malachi 3:6

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.

~ James 1:17

Of old you laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you will remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away, but you are the same, and your years have no end.

~ Psalm 102:25-27

Pondering these passages naturally compiles me to give thanks and that is what I aim to do. Here is a brief prayer that may stir your heart to do the same.

Father, when everything around me is changing, You O Lord, change not. Once good, you will always be good. Once holy, forever holy. Once you entered into covenant with me, always will you remain in covenant with me. I am wearing out. Four decades in to living and I am on the way out. You wear not. You faint not. You evolve not. You age not. Blessed be Your unchanging name!