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Now remember, Habakkuk is praying about God’s own covenant people. He is talking about the nation of Israel. I want you to particularly notice in verse 5 where God says, “I will work a work in your days.” Then in verse 6 God says, “Lo, I raise up the Chaldeans.” God responds to Habakkuk and, in effect, says, “I am very much at work, and I am not deaf, blind, or helpless.” Verse 5 is very amusing: God says, “When I tell you what the work is which I am doing, you will not believe me,” and sure enough, when God tells Habakkuk what He was about to do, poor Habakkuk is more upset than he was before. He was first perplexed by God’s apparent inactivity, but now his major problem is with God’s announced activity. God’s purposes seem worse than His silence. Exactly what was God about to do? At that very moment God was strengthening the Chaldean nation and moving them to invade the nation of Israel. The Chaldeans would be God’s instrument of chastisement upon Israel; that is clear from the text. The Chaldeans are coming and God Himself is responsible for sending them.
“The Devil Did It!”
Most TV preachers would have said, “That is a lie because God is a good God and something good is going to happen to you today!” It was true that the invasion by the Chaldeans was going to be used by God for good purposes; in fact, the terrible times would be the means of bringing repentance, and thus, the answer to Habakkuk’s prayers for revival. However, such a God and such methods would never fit into today’s concept of God and His sovereignty. We simply must get into our minds that when the Chaldeans come, it is not “the devil sending them” to mess up our party; it is God, Himself, Who is sending them. It doesn’t matter what the thing is that perplexes us today; if it happens, then God’s hand is in it and over it, or it would not have happened. God sent it to accomplish something. We must seek His face and ask Him for grace to learn whatever lesson He is seeking to teach us through this particular trial, instead of blaming it on the devil.
Blaming all of our difficulties on the devil is a backhanded way of strengthening our own self-righteous conceit: “We really must be super-spiritual Christians to be attacked so strongly by the devil.” Until you see the hand of God in all things, you will fight both God and the very purpose for which He sends the problem. There is nothing so tragic as listening to a sincere, but misguided, believer blame the devil for the fruits of his own stupidity; he then feels the devil did it just because he was so spiritual! It never occurs to him that he was believing and expecting something that God never promised, and at the same time was refusing to accept his circumstances as having been sent by God. His bad theology keeps him from hearing God speak to him in his trials; and worse yet, it hardens him in his false spirituality.
Do you see what the text is saying? “I [not the devil] will work a work,” and this work is going to be a work of judgment. Notice again the emphasis in verse 6, “I [not the devil] raise up the Chaldeans.” God is the One sending that awful nation against His chosen people. Later on in the chapter God shows that He is also going to judge the Chaldeans for what they did, but that comes up just a bit later in another principle.
Because this second principle is so important, and since it is the foundation of everything that follows, let me give you another passage that teaches the same truth. In the tenth chapter of Isaiah we have at least three of the principles we want to discuss. The second principle we have been looking at is found in verses 5 and 6:
“O Assyrian, the rod of mine anger, and the staff in their hand is mine indignation. I will send him against an hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets” (Isa 10:5-6).
Instead of using the Chaldean, God is now using the Assyrian. In verse 5 God declares that the rod in the hand of the Assyrian is really His rod. The Assyrian may be the one who is doing the clubbing (v. 15), but behind the Assyrian is the hand and purpose of God. In verse 6 God says, “I will send him [that is, the Assyrian] against a hypocritical nation, against the people of my wrath, I give him a charge.” God, not the devil, is sending the Assyrian against Israel. God says, “I am giving this charge to the Assyrian.” Now I am sure you see how clearly this passage teaches the second principle that I am discussing. No matter what is going on or who is doing the acting, God is always sovereignly at work. He is in total control and He is working out His own ordained purposes. The most dangerous man to listen to in such times is the “sweet, pious soul” that says, “My God is too loving and kind to do anything like that.” Unfortunately, some of these dear people are probably right. “Their God” would not act like that simply because “their God” grew out of their own emotional imagination instead of out of the words of Scripture.
- From The Sovereignty of God in Providence, by John Reisinger
www.chapellibrary.org
[I can attest, God has often sent stuff my way that is uncomfortable. Sometimes it may actually be the devil, as he was permitted to test Job. However, in most cases it was God moving circumstances about to bring about things that most of us, including myself, do not readily accept. This flies in the face of the name it/claim it prosperity teachings. Always the devil with them: anything bad is the devil. And they'll rant and rave "Get off me Satan, you can't touch me cuz I'm a child of God!"
We need to learn the true Sovereignty of God. He is surely in control, and He reigns in heaven and earth, and will reign until all enemies are put under His feet.]
“The Devil Did It!”
Most TV preachers would have said, “That is a lie because God is a good God and something good is going to happen to you today!” It was true that the invasion by the Chaldeans was going to be used by God for good purposes; in fact, the terrible times would be the means of bringing repentance, and thus, the answer to Habakkuk’s prayers for revival. However, such a God and such methods would never fit into today’s concept of God and His sovereignty. We simply must get into our minds that when the Chaldeans come, it is not “the devil sending them” to mess up our party; it is God, Himself, Who is sending them. It doesn’t matter what the thing is that perplexes us today; if it happens, then God’s hand is in it and over it, or it would not have happened. God sent it to accomplish something. We must seek His face and ask Him for grace to learn whatever lesson He is seeking to teach us through this particular trial, instead of blaming it on the devil.
Blaming all of our difficulties on the devil is a backhanded way of strengthening our own self-righteous conceit: “We really must be super-spiritual Christians to be attacked so strongly by the devil.” Until you see the hand of God in all things, you will fight both God and the very purpose for which He sends the problem. There is nothing so tragic as listening to a sincere, but misguided, believer blame the devil for the fruits of his own stupidity; he then feels the devil did it just because he was so spiritual! It never occurs to him that he was believing and expecting something that God never promised, and at the same time was refusing to accept his circumstances as having been sent by God. His bad theology keeps him from hearing God speak to him in his trials; and worse yet, it hardens him in his false spirituality.
Do you see what the text is saying? “I [not the devil] will work a work,” and this work is going to be a work of judgment. Notice again the emphasis in verse 6, “I [not the devil] raise up the Chaldeans.” God is the One sending that awful nation against His chosen people. Later on in the chapter God shows that He is also going to judge the Chaldeans for what they did, but that comes up just a bit later in another principle.
Because this second principle is so important, and since it is the foundation of everything that follows, let me give you another passage that teaches the same truth. In the tenth chapter of Isaiah we have at least three of the principles we want to discuss. The second principle we have been looking at is found in verses 5 and 6:
“O Assyrian, the rod of mine anger, and the staff in their hand is mine indignation. I will send him against an hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets” (Isa 10:5-6).
Instead of using the Chaldean, God is now using the Assyrian. In verse 5 God declares that the rod in the hand of the Assyrian is really His rod. The Assyrian may be the one who is doing the clubbing (v. 15), but behind the Assyrian is the hand and purpose of God. In verse 6 God says, “I will send him [that is, the Assyrian] against a hypocritical nation, against the people of my wrath, I give him a charge.” God, not the devil, is sending the Assyrian against Israel. God says, “I am giving this charge to the Assyrian.” Now I am sure you see how clearly this passage teaches the second principle that I am discussing. No matter what is going on or who is doing the acting, God is always sovereignly at work. He is in total control and He is working out His own ordained purposes. The most dangerous man to listen to in such times is the “sweet, pious soul” that says, “My God is too loving and kind to do anything like that.” Unfortunately, some of these dear people are probably right. “Their God” would not act like that simply because “their God” grew out of their own emotional imagination instead of out of the words of Scripture.
- From The Sovereignty of God in Providence, by John Reisinger
Chapel Library
[I can attest, God has often sent stuff my way that is uncomfortable. Sometimes it may actually be the devil, as he was permitted to test Job. However, in most cases it was God moving circumstances about to bring about things that most of us, including myself, do not readily accept. This flies in the face of the name it/claim it prosperity teachings. Always the devil with them: anything bad is the devil. And they'll rant and rave "Get off me Satan, you can't touch me cuz I'm a child of God!"
We need to learn the true Sovereignty of God. He is surely in control, and He reigns in heaven and earth, and will reign until all enemies are put under His feet.]
