Trusting God in the Darkness...Continued from page 1

You see, from a worldly standpoint, there are three ways you can look at negative situations. One way is to resign yourself to the situation, thinking that's just the way it's going to be. The second way to deal with negative situations is detachment. In other words, people distract themselves so they don't have to think about their problems. Detachment doesn't solve anything; it just keeps problems under the surface. The third way people deal with struggles is with bravado, which means you “take it like a man.” You hold your chin up and handle the situation with sheer determination. The only problem with this is that it never lasts-pep talks can only get you so far.

We Believe
So the question we must ask is what do we as Christians do when we face problems or uncertainties, or when it seems that God is taking too long, or our struggles are too big to handle? Habakkuk shows us how he handles it: “I will exult in the LORD” (v. 18). He says, “Even though I have my questions and confusion and I don't see the first solution in sight, I am going to exult in the Lord. I am going to trust in the reliability of God, even when I can't see Him or what He is doing.” Habakkuk chose to trust God, to believe God, even in the darkness.

When you are in the dark, you must trust God by faith based on His character and His works. Faith is only meaningful to the degree that its object has meaning. What is the object of your faith? If it isn't God, your faith is useless. For example, if you say you believe in Santa Claus, your belief is a waste of time because he doesn't exist. Belief only matters if its object has substance.

Every believer has a choice to make. We all face different circumstances, but each of us must decide whether we choose to believe God. We have to believe two things about God in order to have faith in Him as we walk in the dark. We must believe in His character, or what He tells us He is like. That's why theology is so important-it teaches us what to believe when hard times come. We've got to know that He is true, that He has power, that He has presence, and that He is with us. And we've got to believe His works. The Bible is the source; it tells us what God did in the past. Habakkuk spends verses 3-15 of chapter 3 talking about what God has done, alluding to the parting of the Red Sea and David killing Goliath.

Why do we need to know what God did in the past? Why is it important to know what He did in the Bible, in the life of your mother or your friend? Because He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. God is immutable; He does not change. He can still do what He did before. His methods are different with different individuals and situations because God doesn't have a cookie-cutter way of doing things. But He is the same in His purposes, and He will accomplish His plan.

When Habakkuk was walking in the dark, he quit trying to figure it all out for himself, and he left it up to God. Some people look to idols when they get desperate, but Habakkuk remembers, “The LORD is in His holy temple. Let all the earth be silent before Him” (Habakkuk 2:20). God is still on the throne, and no idol can compare to him. We need to be quiet because we know God is with us and working for us. When he wants us to know something, He'll let us know. In the meantime, we need to quit worrying, whining, and fussing and silence our troubled hearts before God. In other words, let God do what He is going to do. Let God be God.

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