Up with Righteous Living!
Text: Habakkuk 2:4-5 Theme: How the righteous don’t live Key verses: …his desires are not upright-but the righteous will live by his faith (v. 4) …wine betrays him, he is arrogant and never at rest…greedy as the graves…never satisfied…takes captive all the peoples. (v.5) What God said to me: See what unholy success can bring? When left to your own devices this a picture of what you could become. The King of Babylon may have looked successful on the outside. But in reality he was betrayed, restless, greedy, unsatisfied, and desparate. Dwayne, your heart is deceitfully wicked. Your old nature if in charge would deliver you the same results. The righteous who walk consistently by their holy convictions will live. Notice that word live is never used of the King of Babylon. He was merely existing, waiting for the weekend, desparate for a moment of peace. Get in the righteous line and live. What I said to God: Praise you Lord for loving me despite my frequent stupidity. Forgive me when I want to “get out of line” and run over to the unrighteous group. I never leave there feeling satisfaction and joy. Those feelings only come when I’m with you. You are my peace, my all in all. Help me walk in righteousness. I choose today to live!
The righteous will live by faith, this is a theme that is repeated through out God’s Word but what does that mean?
Habakkuk shows us the unrighteous existence: puffed up, desire that are not up right, arrogant, betrayed by alcohol, greedy and never satisfied. All of these I must buried at my baptism and I must make sure I don’t exhume them again. When I leave these attitudes and actions buried then I take a step towards living by faith. Although I have to die daily to these unrighteous desires I’m amazed at what God gives me – life to the full, abundant, over flowing life, full of the Holy Spirit. When I see God’s provision for me it makes it easy to die to the unrighteous existence.