Turn with me in your Bibles to
the book of Habakkuk. Habakkuk is a prophet who lived
in the days that Nahum, which I spoke to you about last week,
prophesied of these coming days. And if I'm not miscalculating,
his prophecy came about 25 years before the Chaldeans, which are
the Babylonians, swept down to take Israel into captivity. This was a powerful, ruthless
king, Nebuchadnezzar. And he had a massive army. And
he was about to rise into power by God's providence. God called
him, my messenger, my servant. And he sends to his prophet Habakkuk
a vision, a vision. Jeremiah, who is his contemporary,
he said, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will punish
all them which are circumcised, talking about the Jews, with
the uncircumcised, talking about the Gentile nations that surrounded
Israel. Egypt and Judah and Edom and
the children of Ammon and Moab and all that are in the utmost
corners that dwell in the wilderness For all these nations are uncircumcised
and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in the heart. Now I'm not, I'm reading to you
now from the book of Ezekiel, okay, or Jeremiah, I'm sorry. Paul tells us in Romans 2 verse
28, for he's not a Jew which is one outwardly, Neither is
that circumcision which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew
which is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit
and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men but of God." So his message was both a message
of great judgment and death and captivity but also
one of mercy and love and grace and assurance. Paul, speaking
to the Gentile philosophers on Mars Hill in Athens, Greece,
said, God commandeth all men everywhere to repent, because
he hath appointed a day in which he'll judge the world in righteousness
by that man whom he hath ordained. whereof he hath given assurance
unto all men, and that he hath raised him from the dead. Now
this is not assurance against judgment, this is assurance of
judgment. If God will not spare his Son
in judgment, he's not gonna spare this world. Now that's just a
gimme. If Christ must die on that cross
for his sins, For those sins that were laid on him, he's our
representative. And he bears our sins and his
own body on the tree. If God will not spare him, he's
not going to spare you and me. He's not going to do it. This
assurance is an assurance of the certainty of that judgment,
which not even the Son of God was spared, who now sits at the
right hand of God. And he's waiting there now, where
all his enemies to be made his footstool. And Paul said this,
we preach in fear because we know we're all gonna stand before
that great white throne. We're gonna stand before the
Lord. And if you're not living in a conscious awareness of the
coming judgment of God and that you'll soon be called to stand
before this God, this God of judgment, you're living in a
fantasy world. And this was the state of Israel
at this time under the prophet of Bacchus. They were all going
about their idolatries and they were all going up to the groves.
We're not going down there to that temple. We're not going
down there and doing all those things and listening to those
priests. We're gonna go up here on the mountain and worship.
That's what that lady from, you remember the Samaritan woman
told Christ? She said, you worship in Jerusalem,
we worship up here on the mountain. Well, that's what they were doing,
worshiping up on the mountain. Christ said, you know not what
you worship. You don't know. You have no idea. But these people
were satisfied. They were going up to their groves
and going about their business and marrying and giving in marriage
and just everyday business, everyday life, just like we live here. But it was a fantasy world. God
had already pronounced judgment. God had already or was in the
process of raising up a man who's going to sweep down and destroy
it all. He's going to take it all. Nebuchadnezzar's
going to burn Jerusalem to the ground. He's going to wreck that
temple. He's going to take all the furnishings
of that temple. And he's going to take them up
and put them in the house of Baal. Judgment. Already determined,
but nobody could see it. And I tell you this, God has
appointed a day in which he'll judge this world in righteousness. And men are just going about
business as usual because they can't see the judgment. Why? Over in the book of 2 Peter,
it said some of them rebuked Peter and they said all things
is continued the same. Huh? Ain't no judgment. Ain't nothing out here. They're
living in a dream world. You're living in a fantasy world.
These things are real. Nothing said in this book has
not come to pass. Everything this book says, in
every detail, has come to pass. And I've showed you that as we
go through these prophets, and I've showed you that all through
the New Testament. This happened to Christ because
it was written, when? A thousand years before he was
born. The exact words that he'd speak. The exact circumstance
of his death. And now here is being pictured
for that coming day and I can show you that and hope to show
you that a little later on in the message. Men's hopes today is in nothing
but dreams and to live in unbelief and contempt of and rebellion
against Christ is according to the Word of God to store up for
yourself wrath against the day of wrath and the righteous judgment
of God. Read that in 2 Corinthians 5,
10 through 11, and Revelation 20, 11 through 15. There is no vacuum. There's no
vacuum. Well, you say, I'm just undecided.
Well, you better decide. There is no vacuum. There's no
neutral area here. You believe or you don't believe.
You know God or you don't know God. And this is the backdrop against
which God's prophet will exhort us to live by faith in this world. And these prophecies that I've
been preaching to you on, they're all just little pictures of the
big picture. And the big picture is that God
has already judged this world in Adam, and that out of this
condemned race, he's purposed to save some for the glory of
his name. And that's what he's doing, that's
why he spared it, that's what's going on. God has a people and
gonna save every one of them. Every one of them. Listen to this, Romans chapter
five, verse 18. Therefore, as by the offense
of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation, even so,
By the righteousness of one, the free gift came upon all men
under justification of life. Everybody represented in our
father Adam, all of them sinned, all of them was judged, all of
them were condemned. Everybody that was represented
in our savior, every one of them, saved by the righteousness of
one and that free gift of God by his grace. In that great and
terrible day, there will be only two classes of people left standing
before God, justified and unjustified. Nothing else. Nothing there. Innocent and guilty. That's it. And this was the reality of Habakkuk's
day and why he calls this a burden. And in the light of these things,
I want to give you four things that I see in our text here in
Habakkuk chapter two, verses one through four. The first thing
that God the Holy Ghost sets before our eyes is something
about a watchman. A watchman, look at this. I will
stand upon my watch and set me upon the tower And I will watch
to see what he will say to me and what I shall answer when
I am reproved." Now he's not talking about being reproved
by God. But God's going to say something to him and he's going
to tell those that he was chosen to speak to, he's going to tell
them of it and they're going to try to reprove him. They're going to try to reprove
him. And now he's studying how he's going to answer them. What
is a watchman? That's not a term we're very
familiar with unless you've been in the military. What is a watchman? Well, in
Ezekiel chapter three, you can read these verses for yourself
or you can turn to them now. In Ezekiel chapter three, verse
17. The Lord said, son of man, I
have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel. Therefore,
hear the word at my mouth and give them warning for me. I'm
gonna tell you what to say and you're gonna tell them. You're
gonna tell them. Now, the first thing about a
watchman is that he receives the word of God concerning your
soul, concerning your circumstance, and he's charged to warn you. It could be God will use that
message to call you, but even if he don't, you've been warned. That's what Paul said, I've preached
the gospel to you, I've left nothing out, and I'm free from
the blood of all men. I've told them the truth. I've
not spared anything. In Ezekiel 3, 18, he said, when
I say unto the wicked, thou shalt surely die, and thou givest him
not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked
way to save his life, that same wicked man shall die in his iniquity. But his blood will I require
of thee." Here's the second thing we're
told about the watchman. He's accountable to God. Paul said, obey them which have
the rule over you, talking about your pastors. They watch for your souls. They're
watchmen. They watch for your souls. As
they who must give account. And that's not talking about
way down the road somewhere. That's talking about right now.
You fail to do what God called you to do, he'll take you out.
And I've seen it in my lifetime. I've seen him set pastors down
overnight. Boom, ministry's gone. Some of
them have even preached from my pulpit. Verse 19 over here in Ezekiel,
he said, yet if thou warn the wicked, and he turn not from
his wickedness, Or from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity,
but thou hast delivered thy soul. And then here's the third thing.
God will honor them that honor him, whether men believe or whether
they don't. Isn't that what Paul said? He
said, my gospel's always, always triumphant. Always, in them that
perish and in them that are given life. I want to give you some advice.
Never use a congregation to judge whether a pastor is God's watchman
or not. Don't look at that congreg- man,
look at that congregation. That's one of the fastest growing
churches in this country. So that pastor has to be God's,
you better not judge that way, I'm telling you. Paul tells us in Hebrews 13,
17, to obey them that have the rule of you, submit yourselves
for them that watch for your souls, as they must give an account
that they might do it with joy and not grief, because that's
unprofitable for you. This watchman, He watches for
your souls, that's his work. It doesn't matter if there's
six or six million, it doesn't make any difference. It doesn't
mean that, you know, here's Paul, he wrote half the New Testament.
Does that mean he's more of an apostle than Peter? Or John? Uh-huh, now come on. No. And here's this man of Bacchus.
He's only got three chapters, hymn and name. They don't even
know where he is, where he's from. They don't know anything
about him. Here's this little man, he's unknown, no reputation,
no nothing, but he's God's prophet. And he preserved his word and
left it in this book for us to look at. And we're to look at
it as though he was a prophet. Because he was. But then you
got Ezekiel, or Jeremiah, and he's He's his contemporary. There's
only three years' difference in him. This man's got 50 chapters. He's only got three. Does that
mean he's more of a prophet than him? No. No. God has a watchman, one Habakkuk
says, who watches to see what God will say to him and what
he shall say then when he's reproved. I preached and had people meet
me back by the door. Pastor, I just don't believe
that. I just don't believe that. That's wrong. That's wrong. And
they reproved me. And I'm hoping when I go back
there, because I know it's coming, somebody's going to say that,
and when they do, I need to know how to answer them. I need to
know how to answer them. And this is what a watchman does. Watch us for your souls. He watches
to see what God's going to say. I hope every time I get up here,
I've got God's message for you. That's my hope. Paul told Timothy, but watch
thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist,
and make full proof of your ministry. All right, back to our text.
In the back of chapter two, look down here at verse two. Now we
know he has a watchman. This is how this whole thing
starts. I've already told you the backdrop. God's gonna judge
Israel and all those surrounding nations. Nebuchadnezzar's gonna
sweep down like a plague and he's just gonna destroy everything
in his path. And everything that's left alive,
he'll take it into captivity. He'll take it up with him in
Babylon. In Habakkuk 2.2, this watchman
is told to write the vision. What is this vision? This vision
is a testimony of God concerning His Son and concerning our souls.
This is the vision. And he's given this vision to
his watchman. And now he tells his watchman
to write the vision, make it plain upon tables, that he may
run that readeth it. Now we're told that the watchman
is commanded to make the vision that God has given to him plain. Plain. Why can't he use wisdom
of words? I read that to you over in the
Corinthians a while ago. Why can't you use wisdom of words? because it's not your words that
convert the soul, it's God's word. That's why. You cannot make the vision believable. I've tried. When I was young,
I'd try. Man, I wanted everybody who heard
me to believe what I said and I'd just keep breaking things
down and keep trying to make it believable. You can't make
it believable. Only God the Holy Spirit can
do that. He said, I have not seen or heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man the things which
God had prepared for them that love him, but he hath revealed
them unto you by spirit. You can't make this vision sweet.
Only the Holy Ghost can do that. But you can make it plain. Call
election, election. Quit trying to hide it. Election
is election. Sovereignty is sovereignty. Grace
is grace. Make the message plain, God said. I'll take care of the results.
Your job is to make it plain. Make it plain. One writer I was
reading on these very verses said that these things were A
colloquy. You ever heard that term? You're
a teacher. Have you ever heard that term? Colloquy? I had to look it up. I had no
idea what he was talking about. Why would you use a word that
nobody else knows what it means except to call attention to yourself? Huh? This is the very thing that
God's telling his prophet. Make it plain. You don't need
to have a thesaurus sitting on your desk to be able to preach. What that word means is conversation.
God was having a conversation with his prophet. Well, why didn't
you just say conversation? Everybody would have known what
you were talking about then. Paul said to the Corinthians,
brethren, when I came to you, I came not with excellency of
speech. He could have. He was a Pharisee
of the Pharisees. He was taught by the best teacher
that the Jews ever had, Gamaliel. This was a well-read man. He
could quote the poets when he went down to Greece, to Athens. He could communicate with anybody
on their level. He was a smart, intelligent man,
but he said, when I came to you, who are known for your wisdom,
I came not with excellency of speech. My speech and my preaching was
not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration
of the spirit and of power. Now how do you do that? You just
preach what God gave you plainly, and then get out of the way.
one old writer. He was a very intelligent man
and he was used often to go down to the college where he got his
degree and he was a minister, a true minister. And he said
it was a beautiful spring day and he was walking to work and
walking over to the college to give his talk over there and
he passed by and they were auctioning off these Paintings these very
valuable expensive paintings and on that real nice day They
had the doors and windows open he could look in and he said
he looked up there and and the auctioneer was talking But he
wasn't standing beside the painting. He was standing behind it And
he said you see this and that all you could see was his fingers
pointing and he said boy, he said I hope when I get over there
to that place I that I can preach the gospel that way. All you
see is where I'm pointing. You see what Paul's saying? My speech and my preaching was
not within time, but in demonstration of the spirit and power. We just
tell you what God said, and God will make it effectual, or you
and your unbelief will walk away from it, one or the other. That's
not in my power to do. Ours is to make it plain. And
then the prophet adds this, that he may run that readeth it. I had to look at that a long
time. Now remember the context. Judgment's coming. Captivity
is just around the corner. Babylonian rule is soon to sweep
down and take everybody under its power. And Habakkuk is to
tell them God's message so that their course in this life, walking
by faith, and we're gonna get to that in just a minute, will
not be interrupted. It's not gonna be interrupted,
so that you can run your course when you read this. They're not even gonna break
their stride. If a man believes God, No matter
what happens in this world, it will not break his stride. They
come down and swept, Nebuchadnezzar did. And he got to looking at
Israel and he said, now wait a minute. I don't need to kill
these men. These men are very intelligent.
And they're very good at what they do. I can see their book
work here. I can see what they did. They're intelligent. They're
versed in communication. They know a couple of languages.
I tell you what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna take them up to Babylon
with me and I'm gonna make them servants. And they're gonna work
in my kingdom and serve me. Who'd he get? Daniel. Huh? Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He got four believers. Four believers. Believers walk honoring in this
world. They honor God. They pay their
bills, they pay their taxes, they honor God in their life.
They're not self-righteous. They don't go around looking
down their noses at people. But they walk believing God.
Believing God. God's gonna handle this. Nothing's
gonna happen in this world that God hasn't ordained. And if he
has ordained it, he's gonna take care of you. Shouldn't even break
your stride. Should it? But boy, it does,
don't it? All you gotta do is watch Fox
News for about 20 minutes. Oh, no. Shouldn't even break
our stride. Shouldn't break our stride. Listen to this. Paul said we
have this treasure, this vision, this word from God, this message
from God, all-powerful, almighty God. And we have it in earthen
vessels. Now watch this. That the excellency
of the power might be of God and not of us. Listen to what he says. We're
troubled on every side, yet we're not distressed. We're perplexed,
but not in despair. We're persecuted, but we're not
forsaken. We're cast down, but we ain't
destroyed. Huh? For we which live are always
delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus
might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. All right, thirdly, back at 2.3,
we're told that the vision of God that he had given to him
was yet for another time. This wasn't going to happen today. Wasn't going to happen right
now. It was for an appointed time. There was something more
to this vision than the invasion of a Babylonian dictator. The natural or immediate meaning
of this verse is that the Babylonians were not on their way yet, but
they would be soon. Nebuchadnezzar. would take the
Jews into captivity. But what this prophet is telling
us is that there was another day when the Messiah himself
would come. To him, Paul said, give all the
prophets witness. It's about the coming king, the
king of kings and Lord of lords, and the vision is about the Lord
Jesus Christ and the believer's faith in him. And then lastly,
Habakkuk sets before us two kinds of people who are hasting under
this judgment of God. The first type of people he sets
before us in verse four are the self-righteous. The man whose
soul is lifted up in him is not upright. And then the just. He says in verse 4, Behold, his
soul, which is lifted up, is not upright in him. What's he talking about here?
He's talking about all these freewill decisionists and the
self-righteous legalists and the worksmonger who thinks he
can sweep out a few cobwebs and make his house clean. That's
what he's talking about. By his so-called good intentions,
he quits a few bad habits and he steers a slightly different,
new course, and he calls that sanctification. Now he's gonna
pay tithes, he never did that before. Now he's gonna keep the
so-called Christian Sabbath, which there is no such thing
ever talked about in the word of God. He's gonna go to church,
he's gonna read his Bible, every so often, and he's gonna do his best to
make proselytes like unto himself. He's gonna try to gather together
some men and make them believe exactly what he believes. Do
exactly what he does. Have exactly the same experience
as his. And by whatever means, and the
list is long, they lift up their souls. They build a refuge. They form some kind of a hope. And how do they do it? Being
deceived, being lied to, and being led astray. And by just
what I said to you, both Israel and Judah were deceived and they'd
soon fall subject to the Babylonian idolatry. Did you know Babylon
is the name that God gives to all false religion? Babylon the
Great. But there's another group spoken
to or spoken of by the prophet here in his vision. And he calls
them the just. The just shall live by his faith. Now let's break this down just
a little bit. The just. Who are the just? Can you look yourself in the
mirror and justify yourself? You can't do it. You can't do
it. The just are a people who've
been tried and found guiltless and just before God. How can that be? Well, let me
show you something over here in 2 Corinthians chapter five.
Turn over there with me. In verse 19, 2 Corinthians chapter
five, Paul's talking about our message of reconciliation. And he said, to wit, here's our
message, this is the vision God given to us, this is the message,
he wants us to make it plain. That God was in Christ Jesus,
reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing, what's that mean? charging, not charging their
trespasses unto them. Is he talking about the whole
world there? No. No, he uses that word in the
light of Jewish prejudice. God has a people in every nation,
tongue, kindred, and tribe under heaven. It's not just Jews, which
is what everybody thought for thousands of years, it's also
Gentiles. Also the Gentiles. And there
was never a time when sin was ever charged to the children
of God. Now I want you to hear me. Some
preachers do not believe in eternal justification, but that would
be to say that God did at one time charge us with sin. Right? And then he'd have to
justify it. No. He never charged us with
sin. Not ever. Not ever. He chose us, Paul says in Ephesians
chapter one, he chose us in Christ that we might be holy. Now you
can't be a sinner and be holy. But he don't stop there. Listen
to this. And without blame. Now if you
have sinned, you're to be blamed, right? God hateth all the workers
of iniquity. But here he says he chose us
in Christ that we might be holy and without blame before him
in love. Wow. He also tells us Having, that
comes next in line there in Ephesians. Having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself according to
the good pleasure of His will when we're accepted in the blood. When were we accepted in the
blood? When God put us in Him. Now is that right? There never
was a time when God charged us with His sins. He charged our sins to Christ. He laid our sins on Him. On Him, that's the message, and
we're to make it plain. Listen to this, 2 Corinthians
5 verse 21, four. Here's the basis of this whole
thing. For he hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin,
that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. Huh? We're sinless by representation. God put us in union with his
son, and in his son, we're as good as God in him. And I ain't
talking about in your person. I'm talking about in God's salvation.
He put you in union with his son and you're justified. You're justified the day he put
you in him. He'll never charge you with sin.
If he could, he couldn't love you without exception. And he
said his love never gonna go anywhere. Never gonna go anywhere,
I don't care. Things present, things to come,
life nor death nor any other creature shall be able to separate
you from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. That's how he could love you
when you was yet an enemy. You was an enemy in your actions
and in the present, enemy, enemy, enemy. You was an enemy when
Christ died. But in him you're perfect. You're
in hell. Habakkuk, his words are quoted
here in the New Testament three times. Verse 4. Quoted three times in the New
Testament. This little book of Habakkuk. In Romans 1, 17, Paul
said, For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power
of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth. to the Jew first
and also to the Greek. And he goes down and he says,
wherefore it's written, the just shall live by faith. What's that mean? That means
that we see Christ And I see life in Him, justification in
Him, righteousness in Him. Of God are you in Christ Jesus,
who of God is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. It's all in Him, and that's what
we see, and this is what Paul's talking about. For therein, in
that gospel, is the righteousness of God revealed. Where? In His Son. and his son. And then Paul quotes Habakkuk
again in Galatians chapter 3 verse 11, teaching us that faith in
and of itself does not make us righteousness, it merely sees
him who is righteous. And no such thing as perfect
faith, but there's a perfect object
to faith, And that perfect object is Christ. And then again in
Hebrews chapter 10 verse 38, and here the apostle's talking
about the perseverance of the saints and his assurance of it. Brother Don said one time, when
the night is the darkest, faith continues to shine in its brightness. And it lights up the night precious
promises of Christ. And faith, as Habakkuk's name
implies, his name means the embracer or to embrace. And faith, as Habakkuk's name
implies, embraces and clings to Christ. Now I hope in the
light of our present calamity that this message will help you.
It'll help you. And I hope also that you'll see
Christ in this. Christ, Christ, Christ, Christ. This book of Romans was Paul's
book, and it's the one epistle in the whole New Testament set
to show and teach justification by faith. And what's he say there? The just shall live by faith. That's it. That's it, that's
the message. I hope I made it fine. Thank
you.