A few weeks ago, I was listening to Christian radio. (I don’t always do so, but more lately than previously.) It doesn’t matter which one as we get three, KLove, AirOne, and Spirit 103. I’m not sure why, but all three were doing their fund-raising pitches between songs. We were encouraged, cajoled, and maybe a bit bribed to commit our $30 a month pledge.  As an aside, they all claim to be listener supported (that is no advertisers except themselves). The truth is all radio is listener supported, either directly as these three and many others or indirectly via the support of the advertisers who buy our ears.

A feature of the requests for support was callers who gave testimonies of things God had blessed them with. I remember one, a lady called to tell that their kitten was sick, and they couldn’t afford a vet. So as a family, they prayed for the kitten that night. In the morning the kitten was better and eating on its own. No one used the word miracle though it might have been. The DJ managed to turn this story, and several others I could mention, into an opportunity to say that supporting to their station makes stories like this possible. Story after story, worship and praise were the result of these great God events.

Later, I was at a church gathering where people shared some stories of God events. They were answers to prayers and things God did that made for moments of thanks and praise. Now, let me be clear. I believe in God events, great and small!  I celebrate, praise, and love to hear these stories, these testimonies.

What got me thinking, however, was the devotion we had at the aforementioned gathering. We were looking at Habakuk three. Verses 18 and 19 were the focus, “But I will still be glad in the LORD; I will rejoice in God my Savior. The Lord God is my strength. He makes me like a deer that does not stumble so I can walk on the steep mountains.” And we shared testimonies of God’s working. Yet, as I sat there, I was left thinking about all the times when God events don’t happen. Our little kitty doesn’t recover over-night and is, in fact, dead in the morning. (Personal story here though it was a dog and my birthday.) We all have stories of when God shows up and we have stories we are left wondering why he didn’t. What do we do with the latter?

And that is what the Habakuk passage is really about. The prophet has spent the whole chapter (the whole book really) chronicling how terrible the Babylonians were. And God was sending them to punish Judah. This was not going to be a wonderful God event, but a bowl of his wrath was about to be poured out. So, what does a person do when the ugly happens and not the last-minute reprieve? Verses 17 go with the verses which follow. They are to be taken together as one thought. Verse 17, “Fig trees may not grow figs, and there may be no grapes on the vines. There may be no olives growing and no food growing in the fields. There may be no sheep in the pens and no cattle in the barns.”   Things were going to be bad; No food, no animals, no joy! So, what is the prophet’s response? And that is where the “But” of verse 18 comes in. It is a contrast word. The natural response to verse 17 is not gladness and rejoicing. Yet, that is exactly what the prophet says he will do.

Praise, worship, adoration, testimony, thanks, and any other word one might want to put here is not dependent on circumstances. I worship in good times and bad. I praise God for who he IS not what he DOES. I have found a song that speaks to this idea, and one of my favorite modern worship songs. It is by Brandon Lake, Hard Fought Hallelujah. It is well worth giving a listen. When it does not go the way we want it, God is still there and we still lift our praises, our hallelujahs to him.