107. Habakkuk Prays In Prospect Of Approaching Trials.

Habakkuk Prays In Prospect Of Approaching Trials. The Prayer as recorded.—Habakkuk 1:12-17. As an Israelite and representing the nation, the prophet addresses God as the everlasting Jehovah, and his Portion forever. He had been full of the hope that God would deal lightly with the people, and his corrections would not be so heavy as God caused him to predict they would be; he is assured by the word of Him who is Truth, that heavy and dire calamities were to be poured out, and in prospect of these he prays. His language is figurative in some degree, and weak and powerless become the people in the hands of the wicked; like the “creeping thing of the earth,” or like the “fish of the sea,” easily taken in the net.

He alludes to the helpless Jews in the hands of the victorious Chaldeans. He shows how the successful in victory would become foolish in prosperity, and make sacrifices to vain, empty, and unsatisfying gods. He asks of God if he will permit all this. This is the theme of the prophet’s prayer; he wonders the Almighty will keep silence in the midst of what seems to him unjust oppression. God worketh by means, and doeth his pleasure in the armies of heaven and among the children of men. “As thy day so shall thy strength be,” he has whispered to his children’s hearts. God will prepare his “own” for every trial however bitter, even heavy as those in prospect of which Habakkuk prayed.