In his prayer he worships, he adores God: are you not from ancient times Yahweh, my God, my Holy One? And it is while he is adoring God, that he has this stab of reassurance, even though he does not have his problems solved, even though not all the pieces have landed in order at all, but on the basis of that he says—we will not die. Two words in Hebrew—we will not die, and he has this reassurance. But when does it come? It comes when he is adoring God in worship. Now what does that adoration consist of? Notice, he says: are you not from ancient times? That could also be translated as: are you not from eternity? But the term also can sometimes mean ancient times, that is in years past. That is the way it is used, for instance, in Psalm 77:1–20. What Habakkuk may well be saying is: Lord, back when you delivered our people from Egypt and brought them out of bondage and preserved them, you were there then; and if you did that then, then surely you are not going to let go of your people now. He calls him Yahweh, my God. This God who has promised to be God to his people, so that Habakkuk can say: he is my God! And if he is my God and has pledged himself to me, then he will not let go of his people at any point. My Holy One! Notice that he calls him his Rock—O Rock, in the last line of Habakkuk 1:12. Here is their stability. Here is Habakkuk’s stability. The stability of the believing remnant in Judah.

But the thing I want you to see here is that when he engages in this act of adoration and praise in his prayer, the reassurance comes. Just momentary, but it is there—we will not die. Somehow, no matter whether the Babylonians come in and designate Judah and ravage it as they will, God’s believing people will not be eliminated—we will not die. And he finds that when he is worshipping, not when he is attacking his problem directly.¹

Ralph Davis