If you would open your Bibles this morning to the prophecy of Habakkuk, this will be our last occasion with this text. It's on page 911 in the Pew Bible, or close to that. We'll be turning to chapter 3. We began last time to consider the last chapter of this oracle given to Habakkuk, his prayer of response to all the Lord had revealed to him. Our text today is the third part of Habakkuk's prayer, his declaration of faith, his creed, a creed that is scripture and which was sung in the temple of God, we learn from the heading and the footing to this prayer, a creed for the Lord's remnant on the eve of their exile into Babylon, a creed for the people of God today, A creed that many consider to be one of the most powerful and beautiful expressions of faith in the Scripture. We will read the entire chapter today because the prayer stands as a unit, but our text will be verses 16 through 19. That's a change on your bulletin, 16 through 19. Hear the Word of God. A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet on Shigeonoth. Lord, I have heard of your fame. I stand in awe of your deeds, O Lord. Renew them in our day and in our time and make them known. In wrath, remember mercy. God came from Taman, the Holy One from Mount Peron. His glory covered the heavens and His praise filled the earth. His splendor was like the sunrise. Rays flashed from His hand where His power was hidden. Plague went before Him. Pestilence followed His steps. He stood and shook the earth. He looked and made the nations tremble. The ancient mountains crumbled and the age-old hills collapsed. His ways are eternal. I saw the tents of Kishon in distress, the dwellings of Midian in anguish. Were you angry with the rivers, O Lord? Was your wrath against the streams? Did you rage against the sea when you rode with your horses and your victorious chariots? You uncovered your bow. You called for many arrows. You split the earth with rivers. The mountains saw you and writhed. Torrents of water swept by it. The deep roared and lifted its waves on high. Sun and moon stood still in the heavens at the glint of your flying arrows, at the lightning of your flashing spear. In wrath you strode through the earth, and in anger you threshed the nations. You came out to deliver your people, to save your anointed one. You crushed the leader of the land of wickedness. You stripped him from head to foot. With his own spear you pierced his head when his warrior stormed out to scatter us, gloating as though about to devour the wretched who were in hiding. You trampled the sea with your horses, churning the great waters. And our text for today. I heard, and my heart pounded. My lips quivered at the sound. Decay crept into my bones and my legs trembled. Yet I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us. Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will be joyful in God, my Savior. The Sovereign Lord is my strength. He makes my feet like the feet of a deer. He enables me to go on the heights for the director of music on my stringed instruments. Here ends the reading of God's Word. This final message from Habakkuk, taken from chapter 3, verses 16 to 19, is entitled, Rejoicing by Faith. And contains two points, first, in the day of calamity, and secondly, in God my Savior. Verse 16 speaks of the day of calamity. Children, you may not know what calamity means. Some of your parents grew up with stories like I did of a Wild West woman named Calamity Jane. She was a crack shot and an expert horse rider who promised calamity to any man who offended her. That meant she'd give him a lot of trouble. That meant she'd cause him a lot of pain. Today we might call her Disaster Jane. Children, you know what disaster means. You've heard stories and you've studied about what the world calls natural disasters. When God makes earthquakes to shake and hurricanes to blow or wildfires to blaze or floodwaters to flow, they cause disaster. They destroy homes. They devastate trees and crops and animals and people may die. They bring calamity. And Habakkuk knew that calamity was coming. Now most understand this day of calamity to be the coming of the day of judgment upon Babylon. Hence the NIV in verse 16 translates it, the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us. Now this interpretation considers this creed that we're going to look at today, verses 16 to 19, as a response to what was seen in verses 3 through 15, which we talked about last time, the coming of God to judge Babylon. And that is a picture of the final judgment on all the wicked. And certainly the Lord's judgment on Babylon was a terrible day, a day of calamity. But in that day, there was no calamity for God's people. They were the victors. And the day in which it pictures the final judgment of all the wicked, In that day, there is no calamity for the people of God. I believe we miss a great blessing if we consider the day of calamity in this way as being upon Babylon. Rather, with the translators of the King James Version, I believe that this day of calamity was for Judah, for God's people. When God brought Babylon against her, and as the New King James translates the last part of verse 16 in the day of trouble, You see, this day of calamity, this day of judgment on Judah, doesn't point to the final end. It points ahead to our age, this present evil age. And it pictures and points to that which God is doing now, purifying His church. In 1 Peter chapter 4, we hear an echo of this language. Apostle Peter wrote, Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you, for it is time for judgment to begin with the family of God. And if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God? You see, Habakkuk had seen clearly in verses 3 through 15 the end of all things. And he saw how in the end the Holy One of Judah would put all things right. And in that faith, he turns his attention in verse 16 back to Judah. In effect, this whole prophecy has gone full circle. He begins verse 16 with the words, I heard. Just as he began verse 2 of chapter 3, I heard. I heard your report. I heard what you're going to do. In both places, Habakkuk has in mind the answers the Lord gave him to his complaints. I heard. Remember how this whole oracle began. It's been several months. Going through this once a month, it stretches it out a little bit. But in the beginning, Habakkuk's first complaint. How long, O Lord, must I call for help? But you do not listen. I cry out to you violence, but you do not say. And remember how the Lord answered him. Chapter 1, verse 5. He says, look, look to the nations and be utterly amazed. For I'm going to do something in your days that you would not believe. And as we saw it unfold, he was saying, in other words, by my use of wicked Babylon as my instrument of judgment upon you will leave you dumbstruck and overwhelmed. And this is exactly what the Lord's report did to Habakkuk in our text today. Look at verse 16 with me. I heard and my heart pounded. My lips quivered at the sound. Decay crept into my bones and my legs trembled. The prophet was undone. He literally lost control of his body. His heart pounded in his chest. He could feel it in his throat and he could hear it in his ears. Decay crept into his bones. Like a candle melted by the heat of the sun, He lost all his strength and he just literally went limp. He was completely undone. Shaking like a leaf from top to bottom. His lips quivered and his legs trembled. You and I know this feeling. Some of us had known it like Habakkuk knew it. Knowing the threat and the actuality of an attack. Some in this congregation remember war. and they remember waiting for the advance of the enemy to show up at their door. And they remember having their possessions plundered and their family taken away or killed. Or perhaps some of you have been victims of a crime in which you were either injured or your property was stolen and there was nothing you could do about it. But even if you've never known war or been victimized by a crime, you've known this feeling. We've received the pink slip from our employer when we needed that job desperately. We've heard the doctor say, it's cancer. And we can't remember anything else he said. We've known the crushing blow of betrayal. And we've had our legs give out when we've received bad news. We know the feeling that Habakkuk describes. We know the calamities we face. Habakkuk described the calamity he faced in verse 17. As the Lord had told him in chapter 1, he says, Babylon is sweeping across the whole earth, advancing like a desert wind and swooping like a vulture to devour Judah. The promised land that once flowed with milk and honey would be made barren and desolate in the wake of their war machine. The covenant blessing of rest, which depicts which the scripture describes as every man sitting under his own vine and under his own fig tree was going to be undone. No longer would Judah live in safety. No longer would the Lord give her rest from all her enemies. Prosperous Judah would be made destitute. Her economy would completely fail and no longer would the people enjoy bounty, but they would suffer under barrenness. Read with me chapter 3, verse 17. Beautiful poetry, but an ugly picture. Though the fig tree does not bud, and there are no grapes on the vines. Though the olive crop fails, and the fields produce no food. Though there are no sheep in the pen, and no cattle in the stalls. Barrenness and ruin. Calamity. We might describe such a reversal today in this way, in this place. There's no water in the land. The avocado trees bear no fruit. Our cows give no milk. Our chicken lays no eggs. The money is worthless. The real estate market's gone to pot and the markets have collapsed. Habakkuk spoke for the remnant of Judah in this creed. He spoke of his distress that was their distress. His distress is our distress. Now, the circumstances are different, to be sure, but the truth remains that there is calamity in this world for the people of God until the return of Christ. We know how it feels. But the distress that Habakkuk felt in his calamity and the distress that we know in our calamity is nothing compared to the calamity we deserve for our sins against the Holy One of Israel. You see, the greater trouble for the prophet Habakkuk was not the outward desecration of the land. It was the inward desecration of the heart. The sin of God's people that merited God's judgment. And just as the wicked in Judah merited the judgment of God by Babylon, so too do our sins merit the judgment of God in hell. This is a preparatory Sunday, and we've been charged to examine ourselves this week. Our first charge is to consider, each of us is to consider his sin and guilt against which the wrath of God is so great that he has punished it in his beloved son with the bitter and shameful death of the cross. And let him examine whether his heart accordingly is filled with that godly sorrow that works repentance unto salvation. In the picture of this text, we're asked to examine ourselves to see if we feel the distress, like we do of these worldly things. We feel the distress that Habakkuk describes for our own sin. The offense it is to God. And the calamity which it deserves. But at the same time, people of God. We're asked to search our hearts to see whether he truly believes in Jesus Christ as his only Savior and accepts the gracious promise of God that for the sake of the passion and death of Christ all his sins are now forgiven him and he is clothed with the perfect righteousness of the Son of God. You see, we can examine that as well because the calamity, the judgment deserved for our sin has already been born. He was born for the people of God by our faithful Savior, Jesus Christ. He who had no sin but was made sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. But not only has Jesus Christ, our Lord, borne our sin, He's borne our judgment, our calamity for sin. He's borne the judgment of hell that we deserve. But also as our compassionate Savior, He also partook of our distress. In the Garden of Gethsemane, on the eve of the cross, in His humanity, Jesus Christ was undone. He told His disciples, My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. And being in anguish, He prayed more earnestly, and His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground. He was truly like us in every way, you see, except for sin. And in that anguish, people of God, take comfort. For there is no distress to which you are subjected in this life that our Savior has not borne. He's known the threat of an approaching enemy. He has known betrayal. He has known injustice. He has known rejection and scorn. He's known the loss of a loved one. He wept over Lazarus. And he knows what it means to face death. He has known it all and he has borne it all for his people. Therefore, people of God, beware in your distress, in your self-evaluation, that you don't fall into the snare of the enemy when he tells you that no one could understand your situation. Jesus Christ does. And likely some of his people. And beware of the lie that says to you that somehow you've been separated from the love of Jesus Christ. Even though Habakkuk, in our text today, was stripped of everything, material comfort was gone. Rest was gone. And even his self-control was gone. As a child of God, he knew he could never be separated from his covenant God. As God promised Joshua on the threshold of the promised land, as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will never leave you or forsake you. So Jesus Christ promised His church. Surely I'm with you always to the very end of the age. And therefore Paul, in his great doxology, says, neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor demons, neither the present or the future, nor any powers, nor height or depth, nor anything else in creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Therefore, like Habakkuk in our text, like Paul, like the saints of all the ages before us, we can say in the midst of our calamity, we can continue to rejoice in God, rejoice by faith in God, my Savior. How is this possible? when we're so undone? How is this possible when we're overwhelmed with calamity and distress? Because in our weakness, God is strong. Verse 19, Habakkuk declares, The sovereign Lord is my strength. He makes my feet like the feet of a deer. He enables me to go on the heights. Now you hunters, you know this image all too well. When the deer bolts from the brush and it heads for the rocky crags and it heads up that hill that you can't climb. Even if you took a shot, you couldn't retrieve your prize, so you stand there helpless. Watch. In your weakness, all you can do is watch. And it's like this in our calamities, the calamities of our flesh, the calamities of our circumstances, and the calamity of our sin. The ground is too high and too difficult and too dangerous for us. And it seems an insurmountable obstacle in our way as we look at it. And it is impossible to overcome in our own strength. But with God, all things are possible. He can make us climb the mountains of calamity and walk there as on a sidewalk. There are no obstacles that cannot be overcome in the strength of the Lord. That which is dangerous and difficult is made into safe and simple. You see, walking on the heights is a biblical picture of victory, of overcoming. But as this picture shows us, though this strength is found within us, and though this strength is used by us, still it is God who gives it, and it is God who guides it, And it is He who makes us to have victory. It is by His strength alone that we can endure the trials that come in this life. It's by His strength alone that we can overcome the sin in our life. So I ask you the question, how was the prophet sustained when Babylon actually did arrive and began to tear down the city? How is the faithful remnant sustained when apparently everything was lost? How are you sustained in the midst of your calamity? And how are you sustained in the face of your ongoing sin? Are you resigned to fate? Well, what will be, will be. You can't cry over spilt milk. Or are you quick to seek a distraction so that you don't have to think about it? You get busy with things or activities. You know, the therapist says the best thing to do is not to think about it. Or are you quick to conjure up your own strength? You know, get control of yourself, man. Pull yourself together. Be a man. The prophet didn't do that in our text, did he? And neither should we as the people of God. In his weakness, he knew his dependence upon God. His sovereign Lord, he says. As Jesus revealed to Paul in 2 Corinthians chapter 12, my grace is sufficient for you. My power is made perfect in weakness, your weakness. Because our God is strong and His grace is sufficient for His people, the prophet repeats twice in this text a little word that we must not miss. In the end of verse 16 and the beginning of verse 18, he uses the little word yet, yet, contrast. In verse 16 he says, I was undone, yet, he says. And in verse 18 he says, The land is devastated, yet, he says. Let's look at verse 16 first here. I have to agree with the King James Version on this entire verse where the prophet says, Yet I will rest in the day of calamity. I will rest in the day of calamity. Instead of the NIV, which speaks of waiting patiently for it. As I've tried to point out to you, I think this is speaking of calamity for Judah and is promising rest in that day. If we understand the day of calamity as being for Judah, it makes much more sense to read the Hebrew just as it's written. It says rest. I will rest. Now it's true that God acts on behalf of those who wait for Him. That is not an untruth. Psalm 3320 says, we wait in hope for the Lord. He is our help and our shield. That's true. But even though it's true, I don't think it's the truth of this text. As we have seen, the day of calamity spoken of here brought with it the reversal, the undoing of rest and security in the land. And if we understand that, we can see that Habakkuk using the word rest here just highlights the contrast he's trying to make. In the midst of unrest in the land, I will have rest in my covenant-keeping God. In other words, though my flesh trembles and is out of control, my spirit will have rest in the Lord my God, God my Savior. What a profession of faith. In the midst of calamity, I will rest. Is that yours? Our covenant-keeping God gives rest to His people in the midst of calamity. Nahum the prophet declared, The Lord is good, a refuge in the day of calamity. And the Lord promised His people in Psalm 50, verse 15, Call upon me in the day of calamity. I will deliver you, and you will honor me. And God's chosen people can say with David in Psalm 86, In the day of calamity I will call to you, for you will answer me. I've seen it over and over again in the life of God's people. In the face of calamity, there is rest. On the eve of a major surgery, there is rest. On a sickbed from which one will never recover, there is rest. At the approach of death, there is rest. When undone by calamity, whether it be political turmoil, criminal offense, relational problems, financial problems, For the people of God, there's rest. When struggling with the besetting sin, there's rest. This is true for all who know the calamity of their sins, the calamity of their sin deserves, and have answered Jesus' call in Matthew 11. He says, Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. And this rest, this grace, can't be stored up, can't be banked, can't be planned ahead for. It's given. And it's given in your weakness. So that as you look around the body of Christ and you see people and you look at their circumstance and you just wonder, how in the world do they handle this? They don't know. They just know they have rest because God gives them rest in their calamity. But because this rest will not be fully realized until Christ returns, our experience of it now is uneven. Yes, the people of God are saints. And we are redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, but we are still sinners. Hounded by the sin that clings to us and so easily entangles our steps. so that we cry out with Paul in Romans 7, When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. What a wretched man I am. Who will rescue me from this body of death? And yet, and yet, because our rest is sealed to us by grace through the work of the Holy Spirit, we can cry out with Paul, Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Is that your cry? Is that your rest? We would be mistaken to think of the rest given to us by our Savior as a passive experience. We're not talking about sleeping through life. We must consider the other yet in our text, which is in verse 18. He says, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will be joyful in God, my Savior. Now, in our day of psychology, we are prone to limit this joy as some kind of internal state. Only. And I misunderstand an important aspect of our faith. The prophet declared that he would rejoice and be joyful. Which does not necessarily mean that he was happy. These two words, rejoice and be joyful, in the Hebrew are set right next to each other. The only place in all of the Bible. And it is for a reason. to emphasize the greatness of this joy. Taken together, we understand the prophet to be expressing jubilant joy. Jubilant. What's that mean? Jubilant joy. Well, for you soccer fans, you have jubilant joy when your team scores a goal in the World Cup. Yeah, that's jubilant joy. Jubilant joy is breaking out in the doxology to God when you consider this week the great salvation He has given you in Jesus Christ instead of the calamity that you deserve. Now, I don't know how far to push the illustrations of jubilant joy. I don't know exactly what it means in every situation. But I do know this. It is a joyfulness, an exultation, a rejoicing that is more than just a private inner experience for our prayer closet at home. And it's more than something we share with just our family around the table. This joy, this jubilant joy, is evident to all. It's displayed. Jubilant joy in biblical terms involves shouting for joy or singing for joy. And the point is that those who hear you know that you're joyful. And those that see you know that you're joyful. And that is the point here. Just as the calamity brought by Babylon was evident to everyone, there was no denying the circumstance. There was also no denying the jubilant joy of this prophet whose joy was evident to all. On this preparatory Sunday, our last charge is for each of us to examine his conscience, to see whether he resolves in all sincerity and gratitude to serve Jesus Christ as Lord, And in all things to live by His commandment, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself. As you consider this, this week, is your obedience because you have to? Or is it because you want to? Are you dragging your feet as you connect the dots of what you think might look like a good Christian life? Or is there a skip in your step and a song on your lips as you live in joy for the salvation that's yours? You see, the jubilant joy of Habakkuk was the joy of the remnant of Judah. His jubilant joy is our joy today. And it's with this joy that we should come to the table next week. And it should characterize our lives every day. Rejoicing in what God has done for us in Christ Jesus, our Lord. The victory that we have in Him. The rest that we have in Him. It's as the Apostle Peter says in 1 Peter chapter 1, beginning in verse 3, he says, Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. In His great mercy He has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil, or fade. In this, you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. Let us rejoice by faith in the Lord our God. Let us be joyful in God our Savior. God, my salvation. God, my Jesus. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, We are quick to relate to the depiction of Habakkuk in this text. We know what it's like to be undone. We know what it's like to be overwhelmed. We know what it's like to face calamity and to lose our self-control. I pray, Lord, that we, as your people, would have that right sense about our sin and its offense to you. that it would distress us and that we would know that it merits your calamity at the end of the age when the wicked will pay. Help us, Lord, to know our sinfulness and our misery. And also, Lord, help us to know our Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, who because of His strength in our weakness, we are plucked from death and given life. and because of His work for us on the cross and His bearing our load in Gethsemane, Lord, that we have rest today and tomorrow and for eternity. And that we find our strength in Him and not in ourselves. And that we don't avoid our distresses and we don't seek distraction and we don't buck ourselves up but we submit to our God our Sovereign Lord and look to Him as our strength thank you for Jesus Christ our only Savior our only Lord in whose name we pray Amen