Please open your Bibles this morning to the prophecy given to Habakkuk. If you're using the Pew Bible, you'll find it on about page 910. 910. As you're turning, if you remember, this oracle from God, Habakkuk began with his cry of, How long until you save your people from oppression? To which the Lord replied, I have appointed Babylon to judge and punish the wicked among my people. And Habakkuk submitted by faith and we were called to submit by faith as well as we remain in the crucible of this world. And last time we considered how Habakkuk's faith was tested by God's choice of wicked Babylon to accomplish his saving purpose. Habakkuk cried out again asking, Why do you, the holy and just Lord of all, use wicked means to accomplish your good purpose? Then he waited by faith on God's answer. And he waited on the horns of a dilemma that for us and for all mankind will continue until the end of time. The problem of evil. And God's answer to Habakkuk was given immediately and was later accomplished by the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. But it still awaits its consummation at an appointed time, the end. And we were reminded to patiently wait by faith in the crucible of the world because God himself is patient in bringing in the fullness of Christ's church. Today we consider the body of God's actual answer to Habakkuk. We'll be reading the entirety of chapter 2 to get us into it. The answer itself begins in verse 4. Hear the word of God from Habakkuk chapter 2, beginning in verse 1. I will stand at my watch and station myself at the ramparts. I will look to see what he will say to me and what answer I am to give to this complaint. Then the Lord replied, Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it. For the revelation awaits an appointed time. It speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it. It will certainly come and will not delay. See, he is puffed up. His desires are not upright. But the righteous will live by his faith. Indeed, wine betrays him. He is arrogant and never at rest. Because he is as greedy as the grave and like death is never satisfied. He gathers to himself all the nations and takes captive all the peoples. Will not all of them taunt him with ridicule and scorn, saying, Woe to him who piles up stolen goods and makes himself wealthy by extortion. How long must this go on? Will not your debtors suddenly arise? Will they not wake up and make you tremble? Then you will become their victim. Because you have plundered many nations, the people who are left will plunder you. For you have shed man's blood. You have destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them. Woe to him who builds his realm by unjust gain, to set his nest on high to escape the clutches of ruin. You have plotted the ruin of many peoples, shaming your own house and forfeiting your life. The stones of the wall will cry out and the beams of the woodwork will echo it. Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and establishes a town by crime. Has not the Lord Almighty determined that the people's labor is only fuel for the fire? That the nations exhaust themselves for nothing? For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the water covers the sea. Woe to him who gives drink to his neighbors. pouring it from the wineskin till they are drunk so that he can gaze on their naked bodies. You will be filled with shame instead of glory. Now it is your turn. Drink and be exposed. The cup from the Lord's right hand is coming around to you and disgrace will cover your glory. The violence you have done to Lebanon will overwhelm you and your destruction of animals will terrify you. For you have shed man's blood. You have destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them. Of what value is an idol since a man has carved it? Or an image that teaches lies? For he who makes it trusts in his own creation. He makes idols that cannot speak. Woe to him who says to wood, come to life or to a life of stone. Wake up. Can it give guidance? It is covered with gold and silver. There is no breath in it. But the Lord is in his holy temple. Let all the earth be silent before him. Here ends the reading of God's word this morning. As we consider the body of God's answer to Habakkuk's question of why, we begin with verse 4, where he introduces it with C. Behold, and in it the wicked Babylon is presented as a proverb that applies to all the wicked. just as on this written page we read a full chapter the wickedness of Babylon is presented in an overwhelming way that surrounds and literally surrounds the righteous it was so in history that's how Babylon approached Judah in this proverb we will see the promise of coming judgment God's covenant justice by which those who trust in themselves will die and those who trust in him will live. It's God's double-edged sword of justice that will divide between the righteous, those upright in heart, and the unrighteous, the crooked, who are not upright in heart. And as it cuts the fabric of history and slices to make this division, the gospel shines through as it does in this passage in a single phrase. this single phrase illumines not only this whole book of Habakkuk it illumines the whole of scripture and all of God's working throughout history with profound simplicity the Lord declares here that the righteous will live by his faith and as we consider God's covenant justice we will begin with the judgment to come upon the unrighteous because living by faith is refused to the proud he begins see he's puffed up Babylon is proud verses 4 and 5 in a concentrated way show us what makes Babylon tick the he here speaks of Babylon as a man perhaps referring to Nebuchadnezzar the king and he is pictured here as the epitome of blind ambition he's been appointed to do God's bidding and yet he has his own agenda and his agenda is not upright. He was driven by greed, we're told in verse 5. He was never at rest. He desired for more was insatiable. He wanted more cities, verse 6. More plunder, more loot, more luxuries, more slaves. More, more, and more. And no matter how much he conquered, he couldn't get enough. He's like the toddler who can't get enough of other children's toys. or the Wall Street trader, inside trader, who can't get enough of other people's money. Or like death itself, the scripture tells us, like the grave, Babylon was never satisfied. He was arrogant. He denied and he despised the one true God who had granted him success in everything he did. And rather, he gave the credit to himself. He worshipped the means by which he gained victory. His cunning, his wealth, his power, his strength. In fact, it says he worshipped his strength as his God. And he denied God's authority. He was a law unto himself. He did whatever he pleased. Like a drunk full of wine, he was drunk on his success and he was so full of himself, he was like a peacock strutting in full array. We have a graphic depiction here of the wickedness of Babylon. However, we must remember this is a parable as well. It pictures more than Babylon. It pictures more than Nebuchadnezzar. Rather, it pictures each and every natural man and woman. For this is what proceeds out of the human heart as we are born. Each and every one of us is born a natural-born fool who says there is no God. And apart from the work of Christ, applied by His Spirit, we are like Babylon. We're unwilling and we're unable to acknowledge God, to worship God, or to depend on God. And like Babylon, we're greedy and we're self-seeking, we're arrogant and we're proud. We're worshipers of self and not of the true God. You see, Babylon embodied this nature that is driven to succeed by greed and arrogance. But as we're told here, his arrogance would be betrayed. His success would be turned over. Those whom he had undone would undo him. The world might say, well, what goes around comes around. Or they might say, well, a little bit of bad karma. But to speak in this way is to deny the very personal justice of God and to describe it in an impersonal way. The answer to Habakkuk's question of why is answered in this vision. And though it often seems that the wicked prevail in history, even as it seemed that Babylon would prevail, God's covenant justice will one day put everything right. The wicked will be judged. And they will die because of their pride. And the righteous will live because of their faith. Now to be sure, this vision speaks of what actually did happen to Babylon. The Medes and the Persians were raised up. They turned over Babylon. They burned her down. And they sent Israel back to the promised land. But we read in verse 3 that the revelation awaits an appointed time. And it speaks of the end. There is a greater judgment coming. Babylon's judgment is announced starting in verse 6. In the form of a song. In the form of a dirge. A song that will be sung to taunt and to ridicule and to scorn them. It will be sung without fear by Babylon's former victims who will one day be the victors. And the first four stanzas apply what Paul taught in Galatians 6-7. God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. And these four stanzas stand together, verses 6-17, with each stanza opening with a woe, an announcement, And enlists the deeds deserving judgment. And then announces the judgment that God will apply to that sin. So briefly I want to orient you to this. We're not going to spend a lot of detail here. But these kind of woe passages can make us confused. So I just want to help you see what's happening. First we see Babylon as the plunderer. Verses 6 to 8. He who took what was not his by robbery or by fraud. and who would be plundered himself by the remnant of those he plundered. Next, we have Babylon the plotter, who plotted his own gain at other people's expense, who plotted to make his family high and secure from all the things he was doing to other people. For him, there would be shame on his own household, and his own household would rise up and speak against him. Third, we have Babylon the promoter of violence. Verses 12 to 14. Who built up Babylon with the blood of his people. People he used and he abused and he threw away for his own glory. He would be one to see his work go up in smoke, the scripture says. It would all be in vain. As the scripture says, the labor of the people was but fuel for the fire. And finally, we see in verses 15 to 17, Babylon, the profaner of others. He sought to glorify himself by shaming other people. He sought to build himself up by putting other people down. But God promised that he would drink the cup of God's wrath. It would come full circle. And that he would stagger. And that he would be ashamed. And his own nakedness would be exposed. And these four stanzas hold together and are bracketed by a refrain in verses 8 and 17. A refrain that gives a basis for the Lord's judgment. For the blood of man and violence to the land, to the town and all who dwell in it. Now the fifth stanza, the final stanza, stands apart and it's unique. The woe is no longer in the beginning, it has shifted to the middle. And it has shifted because the violation has shifted. The first four dealt with offenses against the command to love your neighbor as yourself. And we see four pictures of how Babylon did that. But in this one, the focus has shifted to a violation of the first and the greatest commandment. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. And this vision closes with Babylon the pagan. who with voice raised would call upon these deaf and dumb idols and who one day would be silenced before the speaking and ever-living God. See, this song was sung to Babylon, but it applies to all who would trust in themselves. Therefore, it applies to any who hears this word today that is trusting in himself or herself to make their way in this world or to make their way into the next world. you will be undone by God's justice. You see, this song is just but one instance laid out for us of the work of the Lord who searches the heart and who examines the mind to reward a man according to his conduct, according to his deeds, what they deserve. It's just as Job observed, those who plow evil and those who sow trouble, reap it. It is this work of the Lord in history that pictures his work yet to come at the end of history. When, as Paul writes in 2 Corinthians chapter 5, we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad. And it's to this end that this parable points us with two verses. Verse 14 in the middle. Right in the middle. Stands a verse that points us from the particulars of Babylon, which has taken so much ink here, and points us to the appointed time, the end. When the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. And at the end of this song stands verse 20 that points us again from the particulars of Babylon, this time to the universal and eternal reign of the one true God. The Lord is in His temple. Let all the earth be silent before Him. It is as David professed in Psalm 11, the Lord is in His holy temple. The Lord is on His heavenly throne. He observes the sons of men. His eyes examine them. The Lord examines the righteous, but the wicked and those who love violence, His soul hates. On the wicked He will rain fiery coals and burning sulfur. for a scorching wind will be their lot. For the Lord is righteous. He loves justice. Upright men will see His face. I went to visit Balboa Park a couple weeks ago and went to the museum and saw a Rembrandt for the first time in my life. A stunning piece. And what I came away from more than anything else, because I'm not a real art aficionado, is just the way in which so much darkness served to illumine a very important focus of the picture. And God's prophecy to Habakkuk has done much the same here. We've seen much darkness. The judgment that awaits the proud. The judgment that awaits the wicked. And it's against that backdrop that we can see the shining truth, the shining focus of this chapter. For you see, the living by faith that's mentioned in chapter 2, verse 4 has been denied or refused to the proud, but it has been promised to the righteous. It's been promised to the righteous. This promise is explained in the New Testament because as we read here in Habakkuk chapter 2, out of all this judgment, we have one phrase. The righteous will live by faith and there's no context, there's seemingly no explanation. In the Hebrew that stands behind our text today that we translate, but the righteous shall live by his faith is somewhat ambiguous and reads more strictly as the righteous by his faith, his faithfulness will live. And when we read it that way it raises the question, whose faithfulness, whose faith is being spoken of here. Does his refer to God so that we're talking about God's faithfulness to his people? This is how the Greek translators of the Hebrew Bible into the Greek Old Testament understood it. And they substituted his with my so that they say, but the righteous by my faithfulness will live. And that is certainly true. That is a true statement. The Lord said of David, But while that's true, that's not what it says here. When we get into difficulties like this of understanding, we have to let Scripture interpret Scripture. The other option is that the His here refers to the righteous, and that the righteous will live by His faith. This is the most straightforward meaning, and it's what Paul the Apostle used in his understanding if you look in the New Testament. See, Paul clears things up for us in his application of this verse in two very key places. He uses it to support his teaching that righteousness or justification before God comes only by faith. In Romans chapter 1, he uses Habakkuk 2.4 as a witness to the fact that in the gospel, a righteousness from God is revealed. A righteousness that is from faith to faith or by faith from first to last. Just as it is written, the righteous will live by faith. His point being that the elect are justified through faith. And in Galatians chapter 3, he argues that the reason that no one is justified before God by the law is because the righteous will live by faith. Again, his point being that the elect are justified by faith in Christ. Paul was very clear. And in his clarity, he informed a monk by the name of Martin Luther that recovered the gospel. And through the reformers after him, and on out to us today, we've come to understand that we're saved by grace through faith alone. so we understand here that this is referring to the believer's faith and this promise to the righteous is one of inescapable grace it could not be otherwise for we have already seen the proverb of Babylon applies to all the wicked and by nature we are all conceived and born wicked we're all sinful by nature and the wages of sin is death and therefore we do deserve to die. Therefore, living by faith is refused to us in our natural state. But the Gospel, the Gospel comes and lets us know that because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive in Christ even when we were dead in our trespasses. This life, this eternal life, this gift of God and it is by grace alone because of God's love and mercy to his people by the gospel. It is as Jesus said in John 5, 24, I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned. He has crossed over from death into life. We could say he's crossed over from being refused to being promised. And this promise to the righteous forms a beautiful knot. A knot that is tied so tightly together that it can't be untied. It ties together righteousness, faith, and life. Now we can certainly distinguish these three things one from another. They are different things, but they stand tied together so that we cannot separate them. God has tied together the gift of faith with imputed righteousness of Christ and the imparted life of Christ. He has tied them all together in Jesus Christ our Lord in His person. Just as the one trespass imputed sinfulness and death that it brought to everyone because of Adam. So also and more so the gift of faith imputed righteousness and imparted life are all bound together in Christ so that each and every believer can say with Paul, I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. You see, each and every person that's ever been born belongs to one of two groups. They either belong to the proud or to the righteous. Now all of us were born proud and therefore deserve the judgment that Babylon got, deserve the judgment that's waiting eternal death. And only one was born righteous, Jesus Christ, the righteous one. Many, if not most, are content to stay here in their pride. Ignoring the wrath of God to come or despising Him for requiring righteousness of them. But by grace, through faith, others hear the gospel and repent of their sins and they turn to Christ in the desire to be righteous instead of proud and trusting that because of God's great love for them, the unlovable the unrighteous the proud God sent Jesus Christ to endure his judgment for them on the cross and he sent him to satisfy righteousness by living his perfect life that they may have it and God placed their sins on him that he may pay the penalty and God raised him to life on the third day that death would be conquered and according to his good pleasure by grace God grants to his people faith. Faith through which they are imputed Christ's righteousness and they are granted Christ's life. So that in the end to which all this points they will stand in him as God's justice is satisfied against the proud. I ask you this day each and every one where do you stand? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, this morning we're reminded that your justice will be satisfied. That those that rise up against you, who deny you, who ridicule you, who do not submit to you, who trust in themselves for this life and the next, Lord, that they will be found out and they will be judged. We've seen a dark picture this morning of the fate of Babylon. And as pointed by them to all the wicked, your justice will be meted out. And yet, Lord, in the midst of that darkness, we saw the bright light of the gospel, That sinners, by your grace, can be saved through faith. And by faith, and by their faith, can have life instead of death. Life in Christ. Life eternal. Life that carries them through the hardships of this world, looking forward to the next. We pray, Lord, that each one here would have this life. And that they would have it abundantly. Thank you for the gospel of Jesus Christ, our Lord, by whom men can be saved from the coming judgment. In his name we pray. Amen.