Friday after the Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity Sunday
Posted on August 30, 2024 by under
Scripture: Habakkuk 1:12—2:4 (NKJV)
1:12 Are You not from everlasting, O Lord my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O Lord, You have appointed them for judgment; O Rock, You have marked them for correction.
13 You are of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on wickedness. Why do You look on those who deal treacherously, and hold Your tongue when the wicked devours a person more righteous than he?
14 Why do You make men like fish of the sea, like creeping things that have no ruler over them?
15 They take up all of them with a hook, they catch them in their net, and gather them in their dragnet. Therefore they rejoice and are glad.
16 Therefore they sacrifice to their net, and burn incense to their dragnet; Because by them their share is sumptuous and their food plentiful.
17 Shall they therefore empty their net, and continue to slay nations without pity?
2:1 I will stand my watch and set myself on the rampart, and watch to see what He will say to me, and what I will answer when I am corrected.
2 Then the Lord answered me and said:
“Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it.
3 “For the vision is yet for an appointed time; But at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it; Because it will surely come, it will not tarry.
4 “Behold the proud, his soul is not upright in him; But the just shall live by his faith.”
Devotion
“I will stand my watch and set myself on the rampart, and watch to see what He will say to me, and what I will answer when I am corrected.”
The watchman had to be alert and constantly on his guard. The enemy might appear when he least expected it. Or, a messenger might come with important news, and he had to be ready to receive it. He also had to be patient. If the news the city was waiting for was delayed or didn’t come as expected, the watchman still had to stay alert. He had to watch for the messenger and be ready to communicate the news to the rest of the city the minute the messenger came.
But all of this goes against our grain. For sinful man, life centers on the self. To ignore his Creator and rebel against God’s will is his sovereign right, or so he claims. He thinks he is accountable to no one but himself. In sharp contrast to the arrogant, boastfully self-reliant Babylonian, the Lord now describes the righteous man of faith. As the text continues: “But the just shall live by his faith.” Although the Hebrew word often means “to act in a faithful or loyal way,” the focus here is not on doing, but on depending. Faith is holding firm to the God who can be trusted. Faith believes the visions and revelations God gives to His prophets, trusts in God’s promises, and in the face of trouble finds its assurance in God alone.
Collect: Almighty and Everlasting God, give unto us the increase of faith, hope, and charity; and that we may obtain that which Thou dost promise, make us to love that which Thou dost command; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
