Habakkuk 2:15-20 - And still more woe

2:15-17

The next woe is for Babylon intoxicating her neighbours and then taking advantage of them. This is done in a very literal way in society. There are many industries which exploit people’s vices, making them dependent upon some vice or other, then fleecing the. Drugs are perhaps the most obvious, but pornography, gambling and drink all do the same some degree. We need to be aware of the spirit that is behind these things. The devil seeks to entice people and then humiliate and destroy them. Babylon would herself become drunk and be put to shame, she would receive justice for her evil ways. The same principle will apply to all society today. Her evil ways would rebound on to herself. We need to be fully aware that judgement is real.

2:18-20

The Bible is sometimes mocked as being superstitious, but the Bible is brutally honest about the utter uselessness of idols. The chapter closes with a mocking of those who trust in idols, for they are utter fools. They are trusting in their own creation, how can their own creation help them? The idol is lifeless, so how can it give any guidance? So instead of facing up to the truth the cover it in gold and silver, as if that will magically bring the thing to life. But of course, we are so much more sophisticated now. Or perhaps we aren’t? What is the dominant worldview in the West? It is that life came from nothing. But science keeps proving that atheistic notions are wrong. The fact that the universe had a beginning had an awful hard job getting accepted, it was resisted because if it had a beginning, then maybe there was a creator who began it! The fine-tuning arguments show how finely tuned so many aspects of the universe are, so scientists come up with multiverse theories. We cannot see or detect, or interact, with any of these other universes, but we must do something to avoid there being a God! In the media you will hear that evolution is a “fact”. It isn’t, there are many holes in the theory and it cannot explain all it purports to explain. But people are desperate for there not to be a God, for if there is a God there is One to whom we are answerable.

The truth is that there is a God and there are times when the wisest thing is to be silent before Him, waiting to hear what He has to say.