“O LORD, revive Your work in the midst of the years”
“LORD, I have heard the report about You and I fear O LORD, revive Your work in the midst of the years, In the midst of the years make it known; In wrath remember mercy.” (Habakkuk 3:2)
What is "revival"? Our church will celebrate its 32nd anniversary of establishment on July 1st, and to mark this, we will be holding a revival service with Pastor Daniel Song as the speaker on June 29th (Friday) and 30th (Saturday). Many churches typically refer to such events as “revival meetings” or “revival services,” but in our church, we call it a “Word meeting.” The reason for this is that we believe the concept of "revival" that is commonly sought, prayed for, and shouted about in churches today has taken on a distorted meaning. That mistaken understanding is that "revival" is often seen as a church growing large, building bigger church buildings, increasing the number of members, and collecting more offerings. It seems that, these days, Christians' perception of revival is closely linked to “growth first,” “results-oriented thinking,” and “economic priorities.” This represents a church that has been influenced by worldly logic and has become secularized (Internet). That is why, in our church, we do not call our event a “revival meeting” or “revival service,” but rather a “Word meeting.” I believe that if we Christians truly desire the true revival that the Bible speaks of, we must return to God's Word. And I believe that we must listen to God’s Word and genuinely repent. The reason is that there is no revival without repentance.
In today’s passage, Habakkuk 3:2, the prophet Habakkuk prays to God: “O Lord, I have heard the report of You, and I fear. O Lord, revive Your work in the midst of the years; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy.” In Habakkuk 3:1, it says, “A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet, according to the Shigionoth,” and in the last part of the final verse, 19, the Bible states, “This song is to be played on my stringed instrument.” What does this mean? In verse 1, it refers to a “prayer,” but in verse 19, it says “song.” So, is the prayer of the prophet Habakkuk a prayer or a song? Another question is, what does the term “Shigionoth” in verse 1 mean? First, the word “Shigionoth” is only mentioned twice in the Bible, once in Habakkuk 3:1 and once in the heading of Psalms 7. Its meaning is unclear, but according to Dr. Yoon-sun Park, the word likely refers to a type of music with an exuberant or passionate character (Park). According to Pastor John MacArthur, this word has a musical-liturgical significance, and Habakkuk 3 was sung (MacArthur). In summary, the prayer of the prophet Habakkuk in today’s passage can be seen as a prayer expressed through his passionate song. Therefore, I want us to meditate on the message of this “song of Habakkuk,” focusing on the second verse and the prayer requests Habakkuk made to God through his song. May we receive the lessons God is teaching us and also offer our own “revival” as a song of prayer, passionately praising God with our prayers.
If we look again at the first half of Habakkuk 3:2, the Bible says, “O Lord, I have heard the report of You, and I fear. O Lord, revive Your work in the midst of the years; in the midst of the years make it known.” What is the report that the prophet Habakkuk heard about the Lord? Why was he astonished when he heard this report? The report was that God was going to judge Judah (1:5-11) and Babylon (2:2-20). Why did God say He was going to judge His people, the people of Judah? The reason was that they were acting with "wickedness," "rebellion," and were committing "injustice and violence," and there were "strife and contention" among them (1:3). In other words, the people of Judah were practicing evil and injustice, so they had no choice but to face God's judgment. To what extent had the people of Judah been acting wickedly? In Habakkuk 1:4, it says, “Therefore the law is paralyzed, and justice never goes forth,” showing how corrupt and unjust they had become. Could this be a reflection of our current situation as Christians? Are we not, like the people of Judah in Habakkuk's time, also committing evil and injustice, and have we not lost our zeal for keeping God's law (His commandments)? And what has been the result? The result is that we, as Christians, are failing to fulfill our role as the salt and light of the world. To be more specific, today we Christians are not practicing justice in society, and instead, we are contributing to an unjust society. Just as, in Habakkuk's time, the wicked surrounded the righteous, today, in this society, there are more Christians living in disobedience to God's commandments than those living by faith. Therefore, the holy and just God spoke to the people of Judah in Habakkuk 1:5, saying: "Look among the nations and see; wonder and be astounded. For I am doing a work in your days that you would not believe if told." What is the great work that God will perform, a work that will astonish the people of Judah? It is that God will raise up the Chaldeans, or the Babylonians (v. 6), a fierce and hasty people, who roam through the earth and seize dwellings that do not belong to them, to judge the people of Judah. However, when the prophet Habakkuk heard this judgment, he understood that it was a punishment from God to warn the people of Judah of their sin (v. 12). He also knew that the holy God of Israel would not completely destroy Israel by the hands of the Babylonians, who were even more wicked than the Israelites (v. 12). In fact, he knew that the eternal God, who existed before the ages, would remember and care for His chosen people, Israel, forever (Park). Therefore, the prophet Habakkuk could not help but stand in awe of God. The reason he was astonished when he heard the report about the Lord was not because God would use the Babylonians to punish the Israelites, but because he expressed "a sense of awe experienced in the presence of God, or worship and praise of God and His mysterious ways" (Martyn Lloyd-Jones). The mysterious way of God, as described in Habakkuk 2, is that after punishing the Jewish people, God would then judge Babylon to save them. In other words, God, who is proud in heart (2:3, 4) and sins against his own soul (v. 10), would punish Babylon, a nation that acted as if drunk (vv. 5, 15), who was unaware of restraint, and who, driven by ambition for territorial expansion, violently invaded nations, shedding blood and committing oppression (v. 8). Habakkuk, hearing of God’s judgment on Babylon, could not help but be in awe of God. In this awe, the prophet Habakkuk prayed through song, saying, “O Lord, revive Your work in the midst of the years” (3:2). What is the “work of the Lord” here? It refers to God saving His people, Israel, by judging Babylon. Habakkuk prayed through song, asking God to bring about this work of the Lord, to revive it in the coming years (3:2).
Why do we come into the presence of God and offer Him thanks, praise, and worship? Why do we approach God's presence with awe and offer praise and worship? Is it not because of God's mysterious ways in saving you and me? How is it that God sent His only Son, Jesus, to be crucified on the cursed tree of the cross, in order to save us—who were bound to perish eternally? When we consider this marvelous work of salvation, how can we, without reverence for God, approach His presence with arrogance and offer praise and worship with pride? What the prophet Habakkuk could do was cry out in praise to God, saying, “O Lord, revive Your work in the midst of the years; in the midst of the years make it known…” (3:2). What does this mean? Pastor Martyn Lloyd-Jones said: “He did not ask for salvation or comfort, he did not ask for the people of Israel to be spared, nor did he ask for a war with the Chaldeans to be avoided. He did not ask to be spared from suffering, nor did he ask for Jerusalem to be saved from being plundered, or for the temple to be spared from complete destruction. He realized that these things must happen, and that they were things that Israel deserved. He did not pray for God to change His plans. The prophet’s one concern was that God’s work and purpose would be accomplished in His kingdom and over the whole world. He simply desired that all things be done rightly. In fact, he came to the point where he could say, ‘No matter what suffering my people and I face, as long as the work of the Lord is revived and carried out in purity, I will not worry about that suffering.’ His one request was that God would revive His work in the coming years” (Lloyd-Jones). What was the "revival" that the prophet Habakkuk longed for? Was it not that the people of Israel, God's people, would repent of all their sins in the midst of the suffering and pain brought on by the judgment of Babylon’s invasion, and return to God, living as His holy people? The Hebrew word for “revival” means “to preserve” or “to make alive,” but it also means “to purify, to correct, and to remove all evil” (Lloyd-Jones). God’s desire was to purify the people of Israel, removing all their sin by raising up the Babylonians to punish them, so that they would become His pure people. Hearing of this, the prophet Habakkuk, filled with awe, cried out to God in song: “O Lord, revive Your work in the midst of the years; in the midst of the years make it known …” (3:2).
In today’s passage, the prophet Habakkuk also prays to God in song in the second half of Habakkuk 3:2: “In wrath, remember mercy.” The prophet understood that if God were to judge the people of Israel according to their sins, they would be completely destroyed. In other words, he knew that the holy and just God, if He poured out all His wrath on the sinful people of Israel, would leave no one alive and they would be utterly annihilated by the invasion of Babylon. Therefore, the prophet Habakkuk humbly pleaded with God, saying, “In wrath, remember mercy” (3:2). The meaning of this plea is that "if God repays according to their sins, the Jewish nation would be destroyed and there would be no survivors, but he is asking God to have mercy and save them even in the midst of judgment" (Park). This prayer is similar to the plea in Psalms 85:2, asking God to “forgive the iniquity of Your people and cover all their sins.” It is also a request like the one in Psalms 85:3, asking God to “take away all Your wrath and turn from Your fierce anger.” The prophet Habakkuk prayed like this: “Lord, turn Your wrath into mercy. We can only ask You to act according to Your nature and to have mercy on us in the midst of Your wrath” (Lloyd-Jones). Shouldn't we, too, be making such a plea to God in our church?
I would like to conclude this meditation on the Word. Personally, I often feel the message of "revival" when singing gospel songs, especially when the lyrics of the songs touch my heart. Particularly when I sing, "Look upon the desolation of this land, O God of heaven, have mercy, O Lord," I sometimes find myself singing with a heart that seeks the mercy of God while observing the desolation of the church. In such moments, I sing with a heart asking God to forgive the sins of our church, and with the desire to devote myself, together with all others, to rebuilding the broken foundation of our church. The truth of God's Word will renew our church. The river of God's grace will flow through the church, and the wind of the Holy Spirit will begin to blow. The Lord will give us a new day, full of His glory. I earnestly pray for God's kingdom to come to this earth.
As I pray that the Lord will revive His work in the coming years,
James Kim
(After praying with the saints on June 24, 2012, for the Korean churches in the U.S. and Korea)