Last week we ended with the verse that set Martin Luther off! The just shall live by faith! The righteous, the correct, the lawful, the approved of God, the just…shall live by faith. Why? Because that is the person that is no longer trusting in self or works or the flesh or the mind or the heart but this person now trusts only in the relationship they have with the Father through the righteousness of the Son!

That’s freedom, man! To come to your senses that every detail and aspect of life, every rhyme and reason why you and I exist, is to be in fellowship with God. Our purpose is entirely wrapped up in Jesus’ statement, that we are to, “Love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and in that we will love each other as ourselves.” Until we realize that and begin to walk with God through the application of His word in our lives, well, we don’t live…because it is the just that live…and it is by His faith we find that life…

And so it begins by laying down self for the sake of the Savior. Being born again into the image of a citizen of heaven like Jesus said in John Chapter 3. Laying down our humanity in favor of godliness and relationship with the Father. Then we walk. Learning the word of God. Not learning life and navigating by experiences…learning the word of God and allowing it authority in our lives to dictate our very thoughts and decisions…that is the essence of what it means to follow Christ and to acknowledge God in all your ways…

But the soul of the proud is not upright in him. In other words it is fallen down and unable to stand, So simple and yet we so often humanize that word…to be proud is simply to not regard the Creator in your lives…to find yourself out of conformity to truth, to the word of God and in that you prevent life…

So now God will answer Habakkuk regarding the wicked that surround the righteous and this is striking. God is going to spend 15 verses, verses 5 – 19 addressing the wicked heart. How many verses does he spend addressing the just heart? Not even one. 8 words. A fraction of a verse…why? Here’s why. The just accept the simple. God says move, we move. God says wait, we wait. God says serve, we serve. We need not more and our reward is intimacy with God.

It is not so with the wicked. The same problem, issue, circumstance, attitude, year over year, day over day…like a dog returning to its own vomit so a fool repeats his folly. Proverbs 26:11. And so more words, more reasoning, more counsel and more counsel and more counsel…15 verses, 439 words…when the just simply need 8 words. Translate that into days…how long have you been struggling with bitterness? How long have you been how you are? Not able to receive correction but stiff-necked and not willing to be obedient to the counsel of God’s heart? What if I told you that in 8 days you can be completely different…changed more into the image of Christ?

Would you do it? Would you believe? If you would deny yourself, take up your cross and follow God to the “t,” I tell you now you’d be freed in less than 8 days…one day, one word, Jesus! But so many are on the 439 plan…and some even have translated that to months. 37 years is what 439 months are…and then when you come to your senses…when you change its too late…

I run with the one-worders. God help me to reject self. You are worthy. You are my Creator. My Father. My Redeemer and My life eternal. All to You I owe and I realize that…and so all to You I surrender. Make me Your servant. I’m so tired of serving myself because not only am I a cruel master, but I’m never satisfied…look at these verses…

Habakkuk Chapter 2 Verse 5

• Death cannot be satisfied. Jesus did not satisfy death when He rose from the grave…He defeated it! Death always wants more…more nations gathered and more people heaped up…so too is the heart of the proud. They want more people… more people involved, more men to listen, more women to help them…but Jesus looked down at the man that had been laying by the pool of Bethesda for 38 years…wow, how close that is to 439 verses…and Jesus said to him, “Do you want to be made well? Take up your own bed, and you walk!”
• There are embedded signs in this chapter to help us identify if there is a proud way in our own heart…if we are leaning upon the flesh and not upon God…here in this first verse…are you looking to man for help or to God? Are you filling your flesh with some sort of distraction to escape what’s become of your life? Wine? Relationships and social status? Social Media? Shopping? Selling? Material things or money…all that does is increase your desire…when God waits on the sideline wanting to satisfy you…there’s more…

Habakkuk Chapter 2 Verses 6 – 8

• Ultimately, pride brings woe. Regret and sorrow. Pride makes you feel as if you are on the offense, advancing and gaining but man ultimately, pride puts you on the defense! Defense and retreat are close friends…It’s so interesting and so humanly counter-intuitive but humility, true humility, advances you! Constantly taking the lower seat, constantly serving, constantly giving preference to others and not thinking or even wanting to think too highly of yourself…it’s amazing, because that is what puts you in a position of advancement…so few pursue this…so few advance…so few are doers of the word…

Habakkuk Chapter 2 Verse 9

• “Woe to him who covets evil gain!” So it is biblical that you should use “Tide.” HA! For realz though, the proud, the evil scramble because disaster is the smell in the air for them and yet they won’t face it…they build and work to deliver themselves but in the end it comes to nothing…

Habakkuk Chapter 2 Verses 10 – 11

• This is a huge point as we close this first portion of God’s most powerful and important response to Habakkuk…He says the counsel of the proud is straight up shameful…Remember when Peter counseled Jesus? Matthew 16. Jesus began to prepare His disciples regarding Him going to Jerusalem and being killed but then being raised from the dead. And Peter took Him aside and said to Him, “Far be it from You, Lord; this shall not happen to You!”

• He meant well. His thought and statement was logical and linear and rational! It made sense and it seemed like the best thing. “Hey Jesus, if You’re going to be betrayed and die, don’t go there!” Remember what was the response of God? The Word of God made flesh…, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are an offense to Me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.” Pride defined…
• How about you? Are you an intellectual? A problem solver? A life coach…HA, I think that is a funny term…but is that you? Let me ask you. Do you default to and counsel only in accordance with the word of God? I hope so…because one sentence, one thought, one line of worldly counsel, even counsel to yourself, (they call that a decision),…shameful. And check it out…the stone walls and timber beams of your life declare it…
• The writing is so remarkably clear on the walls of the lives that are built by pride…I wonder can you see your own…time for a little remodeling maybe…no more words, time to be a one-worder!!