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Mhm. >> Good evening. Welcome to worship tonight.

Reminded in the scriptures that as the people of Israel would bring their morning and their evening sacrifices, so we bring our morning and evening sacrifices of praise to the Lord. And thank you for coming out and being a part of this time. Let's take a moment and let's prepare ourselves to worship God.

>> [music] >> Thank you, Michael and Ginger. Our call to worship this evening is from Psalm 96 verses 7 through 9. Ascribe to the Lord, oh families of the peoples, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.

Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name. Bring an offering and come into his courts. Worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness.

Tremble before him, all the earth. Let's pray. Our great God and sovereign king, to your throne of grace we come in all and humble devotion.

We come to worship you for the beauty of your attributes displaying your majestic glory. We come to lift high the name of Jesus, fully God and fully man, the mediator and the surety of the new covenant by which we who were once far off have been brought near by his blood. We come in the power of the Holy Spirit who prompts our praise, who calls us uh to remember again his mighty works and most certainly that work of redemption in Christ Jesus.

He is the one who seals and guarantees our inheritance in heaven. To you our triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we rejoice and give you our devotion. Come now and tune our hearts to sing your praise through Christ our Lord.

Amen. Our first hymn this evening is number 457 in your hymnbook, Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing. Will you please stand.

>> every blessing my heart to sing Thy goodness all the day Teach me some song of praise by Thy glorious angels sung Praise the mount I am fixed upon it mount I am fixed upon it >> You may be seated. Well, over the past several weeks in the shorter catechism, we have worked our way through the 10 Commandments, which is God's moral law. And while some aspects of God's law are no longer binding on us, the moral law is.

We are obligated to keep it perfectly. But as we look at ourselves in light of God's law, we must ask ourselves the question, "How well have I kept God's commandments?" And that brings us to our two questions this evening. So, let's read these responsively.

Is any man able perfectly to keep the commandments of God? No mere man since the fall is able in this life perfectly to keep the commandments of God, but daily breaks them in thought, word, and deed. Are all transgressions of the law equally heinous?

Some sins in themselves and by reason of several aggravations are more heinous in the sight of God than others. Catechism deals a massive blow to our pride and to our self-righteousness. It reminds us that in our fallen condition, we cannot not sin.

It is our daily pattern. Now, the catechism does assure us that not all sins are the same in the sense that not all of them bear the same degree of punishment. Taking your neighbor's rake is not the same as murdering your neighbor.

But, our relief is short-lived when we understand that all of our sins, even those of a lesser degree, are always against God and thus they are more than sufficient to condemn us. This is the bad news that we all must come to terms with before we can appreciate the good news of God's gospel in Christ Jesus. Let's pray.

Oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. Your love, oh Lord, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies. We come to you tonight in worship, God, because you are awesome God, and you are worthy of our praise.

However, all too often, we are prone to wonder. Father, we ask for your forgiveness for the times that we do not seek you first. We confess to you, Father, that we are a selfish people in need of a savior.

God, we ask that you create in us clean hearts and renew a right spirit within us. Lord, we thank you for our country. And as we celebrate the 250th birthday this week, we ask that you would just help us to remember the freedom that we have uh that you have given us to worship without strong persecution.

We pray that you would just be with our nation's leaders. We ask that you would just give them guidance. Um help them to lead our country in the way that you see.

Lord, we pray that you would just be with our church. We thank you for the leadership of our church. We thank you for the leadership of Pastor Matt and Pastor Jordan.

Um we ask that you would just continue to give them guidance. We pray that you would be with them in their studies. Uh we would ask that you would allow them to speak to us um through your word and continue to lead this congregation.

We thank you for the church leaders, the elders, and the deacons, and for how they represent your church. We thank you for um Will as he leads the youth. We pray that you would just continue to be with the youth ministry.

We pray that you would help him to grow in his ministry, Lord. We pray that you'd be with Margaret Kaiser in the children's ministry. And we thank you for uh the drama camp and the VBS and the many ministries and things that we do um with the children.

We thank you for the outreach that it has become to the the neighborhoods around us. Um we pray that you would just continue to allow our church to use that and grow. We pray that you would just be with um, those who have recently had surgeries.

We pray that you would be with those who have um, illnesses. And we ask that you would just continue to, um, be with our church, be with our elders. Allow us to, um, reach out to them.

We pray that you would, um, be with each one of us to >> [clears throat] >> We pray that you would just be with each one of us to, um, make sure that we are reaching out to those who are not able to be here. Um, we ask that you will continue, um, to give us strength. And, um, we pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen. The next hymn is number 94. We'll sing 1 through 3.

>> Amen. Amen. >> I invite you to turn with me in your copies of God's word.

Our scripture passage tonight comes to us from the book of Habakkuk chapter 1 verse 12 through chapter 2 verse 1. It can be found on page 785 of your pew Bible. And again, as we began our look at Habakkuk this past week, it's a reminder here tonight that this is a dialogue, a conversation between the prophet Habakkuk and God.

And the context is in Habakkuk's words, we are shown that Judah is a sinful mess. They have turned away from God, and Habakkuk Habakkuk has asked God, "Where is he? Why God hasn't done anything about their sin?" At this point, God has answered Habakkuk, telling him that he has indeed been working.

That Judah's sin has not gone unnoticed, for during that time he has spent it building up the Babylonian army. He would using them as his instrument to punish Judah and lead them to repentance. In our passage tonight, some time has passed, and we now see Habakkuk's response to this reality of the Babylonian army being sent by God.

Before we see what he says, may we go to our God for his help. Our gracious and merciful God, indeed what a blessing it is to gather together tonight, to come to your perfect and holy word, an errant infallible, the very rule and faith. We pray here tonight that in our sin, your spirit would open our our hearts and our minds that we might be able to truly understand it.

For Lord, we cannot understand it on our own. And so Lord, may you work in each of us here this evening. Help us to see your truth for what it is, to see you for who you are, to see us for who we are, and what these truths then apply then to our life.

And now God, may you be with us in this time. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Again, Habakkuk chapter 1, verse 12 through chapter 2, verse 1. Hear now God's word. Are you not from everlasting, oh Lord my God, my holy one?

We shall not die. Oh Lord, you have ordained them as a judgment, and you, oh rock, have established them for reproof. You are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong.

Why do you idly look at traitors and remain silent when the wicked swallows up the man more righteous than he? You make mankind like the fish of the sea, like crawling things that have no ruler. He brings all of them up with a hook.

He drags them out with his net. He gathers them in his dragnet and so rejoices and is glad. Therefore, he sacrifices to his net and makes offerings to his dragnet, for by them he lives in luxury and his food is rich.

Is he then to keep on emptying his net and mercilessly killing nations forever? I will take my stand at my watch and station myself on the tower. And look out to see what he will say to me.

And what I will answer concerning my complaint. The grass withers, the flower fades, the word of our God endures forever. Amen.

Why do bad things happen to good people? We have heard that question asked again and again. And this leads us to another question, is how do we answer that?

How do you answer this question of why do bad things happen to good people? When you look at the world around us. Now, sure, I know we could say that if somebody is speeding, and they get a ticket, they deserved it.

Especially when they sped right by you, and you kind of smile when you see them pulled over by the cop. Or other times whenever somebody steals something, and they get caught, they deserve the punishment for it. But we live in a world that's filled with so many things and problems and pains that happen to good people.

People we would say don't deserve it. How do we make sense of things like the Holocaust? Mass shootings, human trafficking, rape, murder, cancer, and all sorts of these terrible things that we see on the news or have seen in our lives.

And going even further than that, than just why do bad things happen to good people? Why do bad things happen at all? You know, as believers, we hold to the truth that our God is an all-powerful, all-loving God.

Which which clearly attested time and time again in the Bible. But along with that, evil still exists in the world we have been living in. You don't have to look hard to see it.

And so when you hold up both of those truths, the truth of a good all-powerful God up against the truth of the existence of evil, how can we make sense of them both together? How do these two facts intertwine? How are they compatible with one another in our worldview?

It's a hard and deep question that many have dealt with over the years, and one that author C.S. Lewis, if you're familiar with, has called the problem of pain. Writing a book titled The Problem of Pain.

And he can call it as such because there are many non-Christians in this world that will look at pain and suffering as a problem. Saying that God could not exist because if he was perfect and holy and all-powerful and good and loving, then he would not allow evil to happen. And maybe you yourself have been asked that question.

Maybe you yourself have wrestled with the question. How do I deal with this problem of pain? How How do I understand that God is perfect, all-powerful, and good along with the fact that evil exists?

Well, I think our passage this evening can help us with that. For Habakkuk himself cannot seem to understand why God, who is this perfect holy God, would allow the Babylonians to punish Judah. And yet he also trusts in the Lord even though he he understand God's reasoning.

Last week we looked at how you and I can trust that the Lord is working even if we don't understand what's going on. And tonight we will still see that we still don't understand why God does what he does at times. But our scripture text shows us that although we might not understand we can know that a God who is all powerful and good and the fact that evil exists are compatible.

And this text shows us how we ought to then live in light of this information. For as we go through our text here tonight we'll first see the greatness of God then the existence of evil and finally the anticipation of an answer. And so as is fitting here as we begin this text, Habakkuk starts with a description of God.

Look at verse 12 and the beginning of verse 13. "Are you not from everlasting, oh Lord my God, my holy one? We shall not die.

Oh Lord, you have ordained them as a judgment and you, oh rock, have established them for a proof. You who are of pure eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong." Now as this begins, some time has passed, the Babylonians have begun to invade. And you and I probably would have expected this chapter to begin this section to begin with Habakkuk decrying why God is using Babylon.

However, Habakkuk starts in a very different place in the second complaint because he starts by focusing upon the greatness of God. And what he does here is important for all of us when we go through our own problems. Just as Habakkuk does instead of looking and focusing on our problems, we need to first take a step back and focus upon the Lord, remembering who he is, what he has done.

And who he is is shown here by Habakkuk as he first points to the fact that God is everlasting. Yahweh is not like the other gods of this world. He has always existed.

He has always been here, and he will always be here. You and I, we can't say the same thing for ourselves. We have not always existed.

We are his creation. We all have a point of origin where our lives begun. That the moment of conception.

And yet, God does not have a moment of origin because he is eternal. He has always existed. It is in his very name, Yahweh.

I am who I am. It shows that he is who he is, not who he was, not who he will be. Is, period.

He is eternal. But also Habakkuk remarks on God's holiness. As he calls God his holy one in verse 12.

Also in verse 15, saying that God is a pure eyes. He cannot look at wrong. And this reminds you and I that our God, he is set apart.

He is holy. He is pure. Holy, holy, holy, as Isaiah says.

There is no sin and or imperfection in him. You know, you and I sometimes like to think that we're perfect. We like to think that we're decent human beings.

And often in the moments we face trials, we say, "Well, again, why do bad things happen to good people?" We say that because we think we're good. But amidst all the good things that you and I can do, we still mess up, don't we? We're far from perfect.

And when you and I compare ourselves to God and His holiness, well, it should make us cringe. When we see how great He is and how lowly we are. We are like a finger painting set beside God's Mona Lisa.

We are those that like to think that we are good people, but when you're presented with how holy our God is, it brings us to shame. For He is an everlasting God. He is a holy God, far different than we are.

And because of that though, He deserves our worship. He's a holy God. He's a perfect God who hates sin, who can do no evil.

And you and I can look to Him for encouragement because He is everlasting, because He is holy. And also, we can look to Him with encourage because He is sovereign. When we see that here.

For He is the one that has ordained them, Babylon, as a judgment. And God is the one who has established Babylon for reproof of Judah. He is the one that guides all things, past, present, future according to His perfect will.

And nothing can change that. Nothing can deviate from God's perfect plan. And the reason is because God is all powerful.

Nothing can stand against Him. Nothing can change His plan because He is the almighty God. And we see that here And so Habakkuk refers to him and you, oh rock.

He calls God the rock. For this word rock conveys the idea of strength. Reminding us that our God is the rock.

He is the all powerful one. To whom no one can stand up. And with all these things, that should be an encouragement for us, but the most encouraging part of all that Habakkuk says is that God is a faithful God.

And it's because of God's faithfulness, Habakkuk says, we shall not die. Now, your translation, depending upon what you have, it might say you shall not die, or we shall not die in verse 12. And the Hebrew text most likely is translated here as we.

Because that's what Habakkuk is getting at here. Not that the people of Judah would not die physically, but with an understanding that the people of God, even in the face of this Babylonian horde, would not be extinguished entirely. And the reason for that is because God is faithful.

But you might be wondering, well, he doesn't say the word faithfulness here. But we see how God is faithful in the word my. Again, Habakkuk refers to him as oh Lord, my God, my holy one.

And this serves as a reminder that he is the God of the covenant. At Sinai, he promised the people of Israel that he would be their God, they would be his people. He's a God that has promised to care for his people.

And he is a God that never breaks his word. So, although Babylon Babylon would come, Habakkuk is reminded of these facts of the character of God, of his faithfulness. That encourages both Habakkuk then and you and I here today.

Because our God is the same God now as he was then. He is just as eternal, just as holy, just as all powerful and sovereign, just as faithful to his covenant people. When you and I become so consumed with the problems and pains of life, with what is going on around us, we tend to forget the character of God.

But this is a reminder to you and I that we need to take that step back and remember just who our God is. For we have a God who is faithful to his people. For those that would repent of their sin, they find an assurance of salvation.

Because in our sin we are doomed to eternal judgment, but God has promised that all who would repent of that sin and cling to Christ Jesus in faith would indeed be forgiven and have everlasting life. And because he is a God that is faithful to his promises, not only to Habakkuk and Israel then, but to us now, we can be encouraged even in the midst of the most difficult moments of life because of who he is, because of his character. And that character that led him to send Christ Jesus into this world that you and I, if we have believed, would be certain of our salvation because we can be certain of our God.

No matter what is going on in the world, no matter what is going on in our lives. Yes, our problems may consume us, but when we take a step back and are reminded of the greatness of God, it is something that encourages us and gives us peace. Because of who God is.

Now, that's who God is. So, but I mentioned there are two facts we have to deal with here in this text. And the next point we see has to deal with the existence of evil.

In the light of who God is, this wonderful perfect God, what about the problem of evil? Well, that's what Habakkuk now turns to in the second half of verse 13 through verse 17. "Why do you idly look at traitors and remain silent when the wicked swallows up the man more righteous than he?

You make mankind like the fish of the sea, like crawling things that have no ruler. He brings all of them up with a hook. He drags them out with his with his net.

He gathers them in his dragnet. So, he rejoices and is glad. Therefore, he sacrifices to his net and makes offerings to his dragnet, for by them he lives in luxury and his food is rich.

Is he then to keep on emptying his net and mercilessly killing nations forever?" Now, we see Habakkuk goes to the problem at hand. After he reasserts the reality of who God is, here we see he's trying to make sense of just what God is doing. Asking God, this one who is eternal, holy, sovereign, faithful, why is he sending these wicked men that are worse than Judah to come and punish them?

Again, as he points out in the end of verse 13, sure Judah was bad, but these Babylonians were so bad it makes the people of Judah look like saints. You know, to Habakkuk, it's as if God is using Babylon as an instrument of judgment, like a doctor would administer a cure for a disease, but it's actually the cure is far worse than disease itself. Or one commentator put it like this, it is if you and I, we are worried about the state of the church in America and so God's solution to the problem is to send in communism.

To back it, it just makes no sense. He can't seem to wrap his head around why God would do something like that. A disconnect between who God is and how he is acting.

And to illustrate this even more, he gives us this image of this fisherman who goes out to catch fish with his net, with his dragnet. And Babylon is that fisherman and the people of Judah, they are the ones that are like helpless fish. He says they are like crawling things with no ruler.

The idea of what what God would be protecting them, they'd be fine, but he has seemed to withdrawn himself, so they have no one to guide them. So they are left alone, floundering to be caught with ease in Babylon's net. But unlike a fishing line, if many of you have gone fishing, a fish could potentially break it.

No, these fish in this net, when caught, that was helpless. The fisherman then drew in the net to take them, sell them, to eat them. But one of the things that you notice here again, to just remind us of the Babylonians wickedness, of the evil that is present, is not only it is Babylon coming to conquer Judah, not only is this fisherman catching the fish, but we're told that this fisherman doesn't give God the glory as the one who provided the fish.

Doesn't give God the glory as the one that enabled him to catch the fish. Instead, what does he do? He goes and sacrifices and worships his net.

His dragnet. The instruments used to catch the fish rather than the almighty God. Reminds us of that story that Isaiah tells us about a man who goes out and cuts down a tree and makes an idol out of it.

Only to after it's made bow down to that idol. It makes no sense. And the Babylonians don't make any sense either.

What they are doing is folly by not worshipping God, the one that is everlasting, holy creator, provider, but instead worshipping their own might. Believing it is their might that has allowed them to live in luxury, these good things, this good food. And Habakkuk is saying, "God, you are getting no glory from this.

Why would you do this? Why would you use this awful people?" And as verse 17 says, basically, "How long, God, are you going to allow them to continue doing what they're doing, casting their nets and killing mercilessly?" It doesn't make sense that God would use something so evil if he is good. And while today you and I might not be asking God, "Why are you using Babylon?" the heart of that dilemma is still present.

As you and I have to wrestle with the reality of a good and almighty God that allows evil, that allows bad things to happen. Because our way of thinking often leads us to ask, "Well, if God is able to stop evil, why doesn't he?" Or sometimes maybe you're thinking, "Well, if God truly loved me and cared about me, he wouldn't let me suffer." We become baffled when we see bad people continue to thrive. And yet here you and I, we are Christians.

We're We're good people, right? But it seems like we always have this difficulty in our life that just cannot seem to go away. Maybe on a grander scale again, if God, if you're good, why do you allow terrorism to happen?

Why do you allow great disasters? Why do you allow cancer? God, if you're sovereign, why won't you deal with evil?

And often when we have become so focused on the evil part, many people often then shift to start blaming God. Getting angry at God. As if he is the one that is intentionally trying to hurt and cause us pain and suffering.

And we do have to understand although God does ordain and allow evil, he is not the cause of evil. Because if you take a step back from your current situation and you look at the origin of why bad things happen in the world, well, it starts to make sense. If you go back to Genesis 3, every all these bad things in the world happened not because of God, but because of sin.

God is not the author of sin as 1 John 1:5 says, for in him there is no darkness at all. Sin comes into the world because Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit. Sin was a result of their disobedience.

And the word fell The world fell because of their choice. The world before that was perfect. It was good as God had called it.

No disease, no death, no murder, no violence, no disasters. But when Adam sinned, well, not just Adam, but the entire world was affected by it. All mankind, then, now, and until Jesus returns, has been affected by it.

And we see that man has become immersed in their sin. As Romans 1:28-32 says, "Since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice.

They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them, but give approval to those who practice them." Because of sin, evil runs rampant in this world.

And you and I cannot blame God for evil itself because it's a result of sin. But what God does do, however, is he does use evil according to his purposes. His purposes that are perfect and good.

A wonderful example of this is Pharaoh's heart. If you think about the story of the Exodus, when Moses goes to Pharaoh and says, "Let my people go." We're told that God hardens Pharaoh's heart, and yet he was the one that makes the decision. So, how do we handle that?

Well, I want to give you an embarrassing story of me as a kid. I'm not a fan of fruit. And my sister, when we were kids, knew that very well.

To the point where she would chase me around with a banana. To the point when we were we were at the beach one year, my mom heard me screaming as my sister was chasing me around the condo with it. I didn't want anything to do with it.

The closer it got, the more I wanted to get away because I did not like bananas. And the reality, if you think about Pharaoh, he doesn't like holiness. He does not like God.

And so the more he is presented with who God is as holy and perfect and just as Moses comes before him, it makes him hate God even more. In his sin, Pharaoh did not want to give in to God. He wanted to be the man in charge.

And yet God still uses Pharaoh's hard-heartedness for his purposes. Because when Pharaoh said no, what did God send? Plagues.

And one of the most interesting things, I won't go through it tonight, but I encourage you to go look at it, is that each of the plagues is designed to attack one of the Egyptian gods to show that indeed Yahweh is better. And ultimately that he is greater than Pharaoh who considered himself to be a god. And we see that through that God revealed how great he was and how he freed his people.

But so God can indeed use evil for good. And more importantly here, we can see that with Jesus, can't we? Of all people, we know Jesus did not deserve anything that he got.

The perfect eternal Son of God came into this world to willingly suffer and die not because he deserved it but because God loved us. Because God sought to save sinners like us. And to do that it meant that Christ had to die.

And so God uses the evil hearts of the scribes, the Pharisees, Pilate to put Jesus to death on that cross. And again, he did not have to twist their arm. They chose to do that.

Their acts themselves were evil, but the result that came out of that is the greatest news ever told. That in their evil Jesus Christ, according to God's perfect plan took our punishment upon himself on that cross that you and I deserve because of our sin that we would find salvation. Great good came out of great evil and God in his sovereignty directed the events that happened there for that purpose.

And the same thing is true in our lives today. Our great God in his sovereignty directs all events in our lives according to his perfect purpose. Encouraging us to trust in him for salvation, to turn our hearts over to him that we might understand the reality of who he is and what he has done for us.

So how do we rectify a loving God and evil in the world? Well, evil's a result of our sin, not God's doing and yet God can still use it for his glorious purposes including our salvation as well as our sanctification. How often in our lives does he use disasters and trials and hardship to bring us down to our knees to make us stop relying on ourselves and instead start relying on him?

It is often in the worst possible times that hard-headed, stubborn, self-reliant people as we can be. In these moments when our strength has been sapped, when the burden is crushing us, when we just can't carry on anymore, it's in these moments we see our grand need for God. There's a story of a German mother in World War II who didn't have anything to do with God.

But during the bombing of the city, when it began to happen, when the buildings were crumbling around her, it's then that she did turn to God as the one to save her and her family. And we see evil and problems in the world, it doesn't mean that they are good in themselves. Think about war.

War is a terrible thing. So is violence, injustice, disease, natural disasters. And yet our God, who is perfectly good, can use them for his purposes, ultimately that lead to his glory and our good as well.

For he often brings us to our lowest points that you and I realize we can't do it on our own anymore. Seeing our need for him that we might put our trust in him. You see through the bad things that happen in life, we are driven to the cross.

And as the dust settles or the bombs continue to rain down, we can have a trust in God that does not waver because we know that this evil world will one day be made new. And whatever evil we might face now, whether it be Babylon or anything else, it is well worth trusting in this same God who worked in day that will bring us to glory in the end when he returns. Now, there's much more that can be said on the problem of evil, the problem of pain, but I think from this it it encourages us that yes, God is a perfectly holy and good God and evil can still exist as he uses it for his purposes.

But until the time comes when all is made right in the end the last thing our text shows us tonight is that we are to continue to trust in the Lord and we see that here finally in the anticipation of an answer. Look at chapter 2, verse 1. "I will take my stand at my watch post and station myself on the tower and look out to see what he will say to me and what I will answer concerning my complaint." Now, Habakkuk he doesn't know what's going to happen next, but he turns to God waiting for his response.

And if you look at the language here, he is sure that God indeed will answer his complaint. So, he sits and he waits. He compares himself to a person standing on a watchtower waiting for a messenger and perhaps even he himself actually did go up into a tower during this time.

And sometimes these men in the watchtowers watch for hours or days on end searching for a messenger, but nothing came. And Habakkuk knows that God works in his own time and he doesn't know how long God will take to answer him, but he stands prepared knowing that there will be a time when God does indeed speak to him. But again, that's in God's time.

And so, he sits there and he waits anticipating an answer. But isn't that so hard for you and I? You know, we live in the 21st century.

We have to have it now. We're a microwave generation. Or better yet, we're an Amazon generation.

We want things expediently. Especially when it comes to suffering and pain in our life, right? When and when things don't happen in our time frame, how often do we get frustrated?

Plenty of the time. And if we aren't careful, that frustration can cause a decrease in our faith. Get frustrated and angry at God by not answering us in the way we wish, in the time frame we wish.

And yet, Habakkuk reminds us here that we must patiently wait upon the Lord. Although he does not know why God is using this evil nation for his purposes, we see Habakkuk doesn't give up on God. No.

He instead waits patiently relying upon him to indeed answer his prayer. That's what scripture tells us too as believers. We too are to wait upon the Lord.

Psalm 27:14 says to wait for the Lord. Be strong and let your heart take courage. Wait for the Lord.

Every human instinct in us when things are going wrong tells us to give up on God and to move on without him. How many people have left the faith when they are suffering and dealing with trials and evil because God didn't answer them in the time frame they wished? And yet, it's again why we must remember the end.

We might not know how long the suffering, the pain might last, but we can be sure of the end because of who our God is and what he has promised to us in Christ. And thus, although it is hard, trust me, my wife will tell you, one of my struggles is with patience. But we can be patient and know that God indeed will answer.

And we can wait upon him. Now, this doesn't mean you and I need to sit alone in a room on our hands until God does something about the problems in our lives or in the world, but we need to understand that God is going to work things out in his time. Trusting in and so in that time frame, trusting in him, no matter what we're going through.

Because again, bad things are going to happen. Death is going to happen. Disease is going to happen.

Violence, evil is going to happen. And yet, even in the face of all of these, we can cast all of them off and wait upon God because we are reminded of who he is. That he is in control not only of what's going on right now, but he is also in control of where we'll be in eternity.

And if we can trust that our salvation is secure in Christ, then no matter the problems we might face in this world, no matter the evil we might face in this world, you and I can wait patiently relying on our everlasting, holy, faithful God. The one who is able to use even evil for our good. As we close tonight, there's a story I think that sums up everything we've talked about.

There's a 2-year-old boy who's in need of a major heart surgery. And the process, it's going to be painful. The recovery is going to be long.

It's going to be difficult. But the boy's mother knows that he needs it. And that 2-year-old going into the hospital, he's not able to comprehend what's going on.

The hospital rooms, all the strange people, even afterwards, the the tubes, the pain, the discomfort. But when he sees his mother's face, he knows that she loves him and he trusts that she's going to take care of him. And she is right there beside him every step of the way.

The same is true with us and God. He too is beside us every step of the way. Although we deal with evil, although we deal with pain, because we trust in the Lord and who he is and know that he loves us, we can find assurance even when bad things happen to good people.

Because yes, bad things happen because of sin. We have a God who's able to use these bad things for his glorious purposes. That can encourage us even now to wait upon him.

As Habakkuk does here. Let's pray. Our gracious, merciful God, what a blessing it is to know that you are a God who is over all things.

And Lord, even with the presence of evil in this world, it is difficult to see how that is possible when you are a good God, and yet your scriptures remind us that you use all things according to your good purposes, including the evil actions and pains of this fallen world. But oh God, may this text remind us that even in the midst of the worst troubles and trials in life, we can be assured that you indeed are working. That you are good.

That you love us. And if we need to remind of that, all we must do is think about who you are. Eternal, faithful, holy, all powerful, sovereign.

And that was all on display through the person and work of Jesus Christ. For if we have trusted in him, we can be assured that we are sinners that have been saved by grace, and nothing can take that away. And oh God, may that be our hope even when we are facing evil in this world.

May it be our reminder that you know exactly what you are doing, and you are leading all things to that glorious end, the end that we can be sure of if we have come to you. And so oh God, may you help us. Help us deal with this problem of pain in our lives.

Help us to communicate the reality of the problem of pain to those around us. And above all, even in the face of pain, may you help us to wait patiently upon you because of who you are and the hope that you give by what you've done. Pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen. Family, let's stand together as we sing the last three verses of number 94, verses 4 through 6 of How Firm a Foundation. >> Indeed, we have a firm foundation in our God, even in the troubles and pains of this life.

And so, may you go with that good news and with the benediction of our God. May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, love of God the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be and abide with you all now and forever. Amen and amen.