Someone Who Chose To Rejoice

“Even if the fig tree does not bloom
and the vines have no grapes,
even if the olive tree fails to produce
and the fields yield no food,
even if the sheep pen is empty
and the stalls have no cattle –
even then,
I will be happy with the Lord.
I will truly find joy in God, who saves me.
The Lord Almighty is my strength.” Habakkuk 3:17-19 GWT

“Rejoice at all times” (1 Thessalonians 5:16 BSB)

            If anyone had a reason to not find joy in God, it was Habakkuk. He knew a devastating invasion of his country by the Babylonians was imminent, which would result in social collapse, violence, and destruction.

            He was troubled by the why of the invasion. Why would a righteous God allow wickedness to prevail and use a more evil nation to judge a slightly less evil one? When he heard the full revelation of what the Babylonians would do to his people, he wrote, “...my insides churned. My lips quivered...Decay crept into my bones; I stood there shaking” (Habakkuk 3:16 VOICE).

        Despite all this, Habakkuk made a decision to turn from doubt to worship and chose to rejoice in God’s strength and salvation, even if all his earthly security vanished. He would rejoice not in the harvest, or in answered prayer, but in God Himself.

            And that, I think, is the key. We rejoice in God because of who He is – the faithful God, the God who keeps His promises, the God who cannot lie. The God who leads us through the dark valley, who has promised never to abandon us in the middle, but to take us through to the other side.
            To rejoice in the darkness is to trust the One who holds the universe together by the word of His power. “He (the Son) is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power...” (Hebrews 1:3 ESV).

            Habakkuk 3:19 (NIV) says, “...he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to tread on the heights.” In other words, God enables us to navigate life’s most perilous and confusing circumstances without falling.
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            Will you trust Him in the difficult times? And better still, will you rejoice as you go through them?