Key Scripture: Habakkuk 2:4b 
Key Thought:

Living By Faith in God is the ONLY real way to live.  
 
Background to the Text 
The book of Habakkuk was set against a background of times that were very challenging for Isreal and personally challenging for Habakkuk. As Habakkuk, a righteous man, looks at the situation within Isreal he sees that there is no commitment to justice and he complains to the Lord saying: 
 
How long, O LORD, must I call for help? 
But you do not listen! 
“Violence is everywhere!” I cry, but you do not come to save. 
Must I forever see these evil deeds? 
Why must I watch all this misery? 
 
God’s response to Habakkuk is to say don’t worry-I am sending the Babylonians to execute my judgment on Israel. This sounded like a good idea except the Babylonians themselves were not a righteous nation. In fact, they are merciless in war proud and arrogant. So Habakkuk utters a second complaint to the Lord: 
 
O LORD, our Rock, you have sent these Babylonians to correct us, to punish us for our many sins. 
But you are pure and cannot stand the sight of evil. 
Will you wink at their treachery? Should you be silent while the wicked swallow up people more righteous than they? 
 
It is from God’s response to this second complaint of Habakkuk, that we get our key verse that we have read today. To put the full quote in context, Then the LORD answered me and said: 
“Write the vision 
And make it plain on tablets, 
That he may run who reads it. 
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. 
“Behold the proud, 
His soul is not upright in him; 
But the just shall live by his faith.

Habakkuk 2:4b 
  
The Just shall live by faith. 
Why have we taken the time on this beautiful Sunday morning to tell the story of Habakkuk? Because Habakkuk’s world is our world. Brothers and sisters, the reality of life is that it is full of uncertainties and unknowns. Faith is the only way to go.  
One of the key dynamics that we see at work in the life of Habakkuk is his capacity to ask questions. For Habakkuk questions are a valuable part of his faith walk. We have this book because Habakkuk was willing to go to God with his questions. 
From this story and from Habakuks faith journey we want to ask 3 key questions about faith so that we can learn from him and emulate his faith 
 
QUESTION 1-What Does It Mean When It Says the Just Shall Live By Faith? 

• Its Means Saving Faith Through Promises in the Messiah Jesus-The Gospel 
• This is the sense that is highlighted so powerfully in the New Testament. Such as: Romans 1:16–17 (ESV) 
• The Righteous Shall Live by Faith 
• Verse 16  "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
• Verse 17  "For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” 
• Galatians 3:11 (ESV) 
•  Verse 11 " Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.” 
• So God uses Habakkuk to introduce this verse highlighting the reality that there is no one made right with God apart from faith in the messiah. No good works. No effort. No weighing good deeds vs bad deeds. But by faith alone in Jesus the power of his cross. The just shall live by faith. This is the most important and indeed foundational understanding.  
• Brothers and sisters this faith journey that we began is nit sustained by our effort it is his work.   
• It Means that the Life/Living of The Righteous Will Be Sustained by Faith 
• Life will be sustained by faith in God. You consider what Habakkuk, is confronted with. He’s in a space of loneliness and isolation very few people seem to care about the thing that he is interested in. God has given him a revelation of military conquest that is coming. There is economic calamity on the horizon. His life is about to be turned upside, in the midst of the turmoil the confusion the uncertainty the word of the Lord, is that life of his righteous will be sustained by faith. 

QUESTION 2-WHAT ARE WE TO HAVE FAITH IN? 

• Perhaps a better question is who are we to have faith in?
• Habakkuk is a worshiper of Yahweh, but yet at the same time he was living in a season when Yahweh wasn’t making sense at all, when one who was of purer eyes than to behold evil seemed to be allowing evil to flourish, where Habakkuk goes back to God and says do you really know what you are doing? 
• Its against this background that Habakkuk prays in Chapter 3, and in prayer he places his trust in God. What is happening here, Habakkuk is recounting the redemptive acts of God over history. He says when I consider what God has done across time, how he has judged the nations, how he has saved his people, Israel. When I consider the faithfulness of God, and his track record across time I choose to trust in him.  
• Friends, faith is more than faith in a set of processes. 
• Faith isn’t simply trust in a formula. 
• Faith is faith in THE ONE who can be trusted. 

QUESTION 3-WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE APPLY FAITH IN OUR LIVES? 

• Habakkuk was living in the in-between times. In between the promise of help from God and the manifestation of that help. In this period, he makes a resolution-he says I will wait quietly for the Lord. He says: Habakkuk Rejoices in the LORD 
• Verse 17    Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail  and the fields yield no food,  the flock be cut off from the fold  and there be no herd in the stalls,  
• Verse 18    yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation.  
• Verse 19    GOD, the Lord, is my strength;  he makes my feet like the deer’s;he makes me tread on my high places.  
• What happens when we apply faith?  
• We experience stability. We experience joy. We experience divine strength.  

CONCLUSION
You could be confronted with a challenge today. The word of the Lord to Habakkuk was the just shall live by faith. Will you trust him even in the in between times? Will you place your faith in him?