Monday, December 29, 2014

Dec | 29 | Vanishing pride

CONFIDENCE

Vanishing pride

Habakkuk 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. NKJV

I have said it before and I shall say it again: I am old enough to remember turning off the old black and white TV set and seeing the picture collapse into a bright dot in the centre of the screen before seeming to diminish and vanish into the infinite distance of the grey-green cathode ray tube. Distance has a vanishing point to our ever-searching eyes. As we stand on our own particular point on the time line and stare either as far back into time as we can see or as far into the future as our dreams or nightmares might carry us, we could also say that we peer from ‘vanishing point to vanishing point’, or as the Hebrew might express it: from everlasting to everlasting.

God is from everlasting. Like a large compass He stretches from the vanishing point to vanishing point and at each point along the line, He is fully present there, all at once, at the same time. Indeed, He is even before the historical eastward appearing vanishing point and after the westward disappearing future one, yes, God encompasses all and is in all. God is from the before beginning. He is from the East. He is the unchanging and ever certain light of the day and Jesus is His bright and morning star! What God has decreed, will come to pass. What God has covenanted shall not be broken. What God has declared will not be found to be a lie. Therefore, Habakkuk bases his incredulous intercession now on the tried and tested, proved and not found wanting, historical revelation of the very person of God Himself: Jehovah. Following this, Habakkuk also immediately testifies regarding the unyielding and holy nature of Jehovah and then wraps it all in the associative cry of his own dear heart. “Are You not from everlasting, O Lord MY God, MY Holy One?” As Matthew Henry intimates, Habakkuk might be saying: “We are an offending people and You are an offended God. Yet, we are still Your offended people and you are still our offended God.” I like that.

The Christian then may offend his heavenly Father, but He is still His heavenly Father to offend! Yes, the son may shame His heavenly Father, but He is still His heavenly Father’s son! Do you see this? So, at all points then, and in any situation and in any land, yes, the blood bought believer, no matter in what shade of darkness he might find himself in, can always say, “Are You not from everlasting, O Lord MY God, MY Holy One?”

We can and more than that, Habakkuk now intercedes with three most certain and fantastic, full faith declarations. Here they are:

  1. We shall not die. O Lord, 
  2. You have appointed them for judgment. 
  3. O Rock, You have marked them for correction.

Habakkuk sees the truth of the situation. God shall preserve a remnant. Israel shall not utterly be wiped from the face of the earth. Further than this, just as the Nazis found out, the proud judgment sword are also appointed themselves for judgment! Unlike Israel, they shall disappear forever! Indeed, in Germany of old, even the Swastika, that emblem of a once all conquering regime, eventually became that very mark of international contempt, which caused both the former wearers and its acceptable use, to be removed from history forever.

So shall God always deal In such a way with the proud people of this planet.

Listen:- The pride of your heart has deceived you, You who dwell in the clefts of the rock, Whose habitation is high; You who say in your heart, 'Who will bring me down to the ground?' Though you ascend as high as the eagle, And though you set your nest among the stars, From there I will bring you down," says the Lord. NKJV Obadiah 3-4

Pray: -  Lord, before you have to humble me, I humble myself before You of King of ages and Lord of all. Father, thank You that You are faithful and despite my waywardness and willfulness, You are still my Father and I am still Your son. So then O Lord might we always say from any pig trough: “I will arise and go to my Father and say, Father….”

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