“What profit is an idol when its maker has shaped it, a metal image, a teacher of lies? For its maker trusts in his own creation when he makes speechless idols! Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake; to a silent stone, Arise! Can this teach? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in it. But the LORD is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.” (Habakkuk 2:18-20 ESV)
Actions are the overflow of the heart. What one does is the clearest evidence of what he believes. For the majority of the second chapter of Habakkuk, the Lord has pronounced a series of woes against Babylon. They were a greedy and violent people who had no regard for human life or the world that God created. As we come to the close of these woes, we get a glimpse beneath their actions to the root issues of the heart that motivated Babylon to the depths of their wickedness. As God reveals in this passage, the cause of Babylon’s wicked actions was idolatrous worship.
As Babylon had no regard for God’s creation or God’s creatures, neither did they have regard for God himself—an error that is not only foolish, but eternally hazardous. The Lord says, “What profit is an idol when its maker has shaped it[?]” The way in which this question is phrased communicates a taunting tone. Not only will the nations who have endured the wrath of the Babylonians soon taunt and scoff (2:6), but the God whom they have profaned will do the same. Those who scoffed at rulers, laughed at fortresses, and whose “own might is their god” (1:10-11) would find that those gods in whom they trusted were deaf, dumb, and useless pieces of wood and stone.
Habakkuk’s mind, as he considered these words, likely would have recalled the confrontation between Elijah and the prophets of Baal: “At noon Elijah mocked them, saying, ‘Cry aloud, for he is a god. Either he is musing, or he is relieving himself, or he is on a journey, or perhaps he is asleep and must be awakened’” (1 Kings 18:27). Though the 450 prophets were committed to their rituals, and even brought great harm to themselves, their cries were unanswered because they were crying to a god who neither existed nor held power. Similarly, the Babylonians trusted in their own creation. They were worshipping and serving “speechless idols.” It should be no wonder when a kingdom of self-worshippers finds their gods powerless to resist the omnipotent advance of Yahweh.
During Habakkuk’s time, Babylon was like those of whom Asaph wrote,
For they have no pangs until death;
their bodies are fat and sleek.
They are not in trouble as others are;
they are not stricken like the rest of mankind.
Therefore pride is their necklace;
violence covers them as a garment.
Their eyes swell out through fatness;
their hearts overflow with follies.
They scoff and speak with malice;
loftily they threaten oppression.
They set their mouths against the heavens,
and their tongue struts through the earth.
Therefore his people turn back to them,
and find no fault in them.
And they say, “How can God know?
Is there knowledge in the Most High?”
Behold, these are the wicked;
always at ease, they increase in riches. (Psalm 73:4-12)
But soon Habakkuk would be able to join with Asaph in saying to the Lord,
Truly you set them in slippery places;
you make them fall to ruin.
How they are destroyed in a moment,
swept away utterly by terrors!
Like a dream when one awakes,
O Lord, when you rouse yourself, you despise them as phantoms. (Psalm 73:18-20)
Idolatry is the epitome of stupidity. In these idols, “there is no breath at all.” The voice of the Lord, however, is powerful and full of majesty (Psalm 29:4). It “breaks the cedars of Lebanon” (Psalm 29:5) and “shakes the wilderness (Psalm 29:8). Whereas the idols have no living presence, “the LORD is in his holy temple.” The contrast could not be starker, nor could the basis for the confidence of their respective worshippers. Babylon’s loud and violent conquest was foundationless. They heedlessly raged and conquered the nations without thought of consequence or retribution, but of the Lord it says, “let all the earth keep silence before him.”
Undoubtedly, Habakkuk was compelled to ask, with Moses, “Who is like you, O LORD, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?” (Exodus 15:11). In these closing verses of Habakkuk 2, the Lord resoundingly answers, “I am the LORD, and there is no other, besides me there is no God” (Isaiah 45:5).
Habakkuk’s complaints and questions had found their answer in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The power of Babylon paled to insignificance before the Lord, and their worthless idols would find a similar fate as the god of the Philistines, who had “fallen face downward on the ground before the ark of the LORD” (1 Samuel 5:4).
“The earth is the LORD’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein,” (Psalm 24:1). The Lord would soon manifest that sovereign rule through the destruction of these rebellious idolators.
Prayer:
Heavenly Father,
We pray that you would humble us before the majesty of your divine power. May the example of Babylon’s idolatry be a warning to us to keep ourselves from idols, lest we, like them, place our confidence where there is no foundation.
In Jesus’ name, amen.
Prayer Requests:
- Tuesday: Pray for continued support and provision for frontline missionaries.
- Wednesday: Pray for missionaries meeting critical needs through well drilling in Togo.
- Thursday: Pray for missionaries serving in aviation ministry in South Asia.
- Friday: Pray for missionaries providing education and training in Moldova.
- Saturday: Pray for the college ministry at The Hangout coffee shop in Brazil.
- Sunday: Pray for missionaries engaged in church planting.
- Monday: Pray for missionaries serving in Portugal.
