Why You Shouldn’t Skip Habakkuk in Youth Ministry
“What’s a 20-year-old Bible college student supposed to say to a church that just lost their pastor to cancer?”
That’s the question I wrestled with when I heard that one of our Bible college’s professors had gone to be with the Lord. Several pastoral ministry majors helped fill his church’s pulpit that spring, and it just so happened that I was slated to speak the Sunday after his death.
Though I was certainly no expert on the book of Habakkuk (and still am not), this somewhat obscure minor prophet helped make sense of a situation that, for many, didn’t make sense. Years later, I’ve come to realize that Habakkuk isn’t just a great book for adults in anguish, but is also helpful for students who are struggling.
Highlights of Habakkuk
The book of Habakkuk was written over 2,600 years ago, at a time when God’s people were in a season of chaos. The northern kingdom of Israel had already been captured by the Assyrians. Later, Babylon turned its attention to what remained of Judah. The prophet, Habakkuk, begins by expressing his frustrations with God over His allowance of “in-house” injustices (1:2-4): why did God seem to be neglecting those who were trying to be faithful in Judah? Why was He silent toward those in Judah who had been plagued by the faithless among them?
The thing is, God wasn’t. He was there, organizing an “unbelievable” work (1:5). Sounds encouraging, right? When we come to God for requests, our hope is that He answers according to our terms, often in the form of deliverance from difficulty. Now, in Habakkuk’s case, God does answer, but in a way Habakkuk wouldn’t have hoped. God’s plan was to raise up a truly horrendous empire, the Babylonians, to strike His own people.
Hold on, what? That isn’t exactly a pep talk. This is… weird. Thankfully, Habakkuk has a great deal of wisdom to help reorient us. In Habakkuk 1:12, he recognizes, “Are you not from everlasting, O LORD my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O LORD, you have ordained them as a judgment, and you, O Rock, have established them for reproof” (ESV). In spite of the truths he states, Habakkuk also knows that same “feeling” of unfairness as we do. Why would God choose Babylon, a nation spiritually worse off than Judah, to provide correction in a land that at least has “some” godly people? Why would the faithful be swept away with the faithless?
Habakkuk trusts that God will answer His questions—in fact, he likens himself to a tower guard, waiting to hear God speak (2:1). And God does answer, both with encouragement to the faithful remnant and in a promise of justice to the Babylonians. In other words, God is both “just” and the “justifier” (Romans 3:26). Those who hope in God will “live by faith.” While some of these truths act as a hard pill to swallow for Habakkuk, he responds in worship through song (chapter 3). He moves forward in faith, trusting that God will fulfill the promises He made to them.
We often express our gratitude to God when life is easy. But can we, like Habakkuk, praise God, “Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines…the fields yield no food…and there be no herd in the stalls”? Not all students will relate to the specifics of a fig tree or a herd of animals, but the sense of being in need and coming up empty is not far off for many. Will we trust God if everything in our lives seems to fall apart, if His promises are all we have?
Gospel Applications of Habakkuk
I would argue that the greatest way students can benefit from the book of Habakkuk is by applying three gospel truths that arise from this ancient text.
1. God is the answer to our greatest problem
Suffering and hardships are real. We don’t want to discount those things in the lives of students. But as we address how the effects of sin outside of us influence our lives (natural disasters, sickness, freak accidents, betrayal, gossiping, etc.), we also must look at the sin inside of us. That’s why the words of Romans 6:23 are so powerful: “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” God is our only hope. His ability to save us from our sin is the guarantee of His ability to save from the other difficulties of life.
2. God will turn all “bad news” into “good news”
The biblical framework of Creation / Fall / Redemption / Restoration helps students to understand their biggest questions (and even complaints) in context. God not only promises good things for Judah’s future: God assures Habakkuk that He will enact justice on evildoers. The “good news” of the gospel must be understood in the context of the “bad news” of our own sin against a holy and righteous God. Romans 5:8 should come as a beautiful contrast between the “bad news” of our own sin and the “good news” of what Jesus has done for us: “but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
This redemption has eternal consequences. Revelation 21:3-4 prophesies our future existence as believers: “And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.’” I love how J.R.R. Tolkien mirrors this in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Samwise Gamgee declares, “Gandalf! I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself. Is everything sad going to come untrue?” What a great question! And the gospel provides the affirmative answer: God is working ALL things together for our good and His glory.
3. God provides ultimate security in our suffering
Assurance of salvation is a common struggle for students. How do we know if we are right with God? Ultimately, we trust in what God says and has done. When the Apostle Paul wrote about the hope of believers in Romans 1:16-17, he quoted from Habakkuk 2:4, “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. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith’.” He rightly understood this message from Habakkuk to be gospel truth, pointing us forward to what Jesus accomplished on the cross and in His resurrection: that those who have faith in Him have an unshakeable hope.
If a student is unsure of their condition before God, especially if it feels like the world is falling apart around them, give them gospel hope from Habakkuk. Their salvation, though still to be fully realized, is guaranteed now. The same God who promised Judah that they would see deliverance and justice has made the same promises to us. Christ will come to accomplish things that Habakkuk probably wouldn’t believe, even if God told Him.
Habakkuk will help us call teenagers into faith that endures. Don’t skip it in youth ministry. Let it steep in your own heart, and then share it with your students.