Habakkuk 1: Why Does God Do Nothing About Injustice?

Introduction

"We live in a broken world, full of broken and damaged people." True or false? Michael Watson, of Campbelltown Anglican Churches in Australia, opens his message with this statement. Parents at the school gate or on the sideline of a football pitch all agree: the world is in a bad way. They do not agree on the cause or the solution, but nobody denies that injustice exists.

Faced with it, one question keeps coming back: why doesn't God do anything? "If I were God..." how would you finish that sentence? I would end all suffering, punish the guilty, put every wrong right. This is the question the prophet Habakkuk had on his lips.

In this message from his series on Habakkuk, the preacher follows the text of Habakkuk 1:1-11 in three steps: Habakkuk's complaint, God's answer ("look and be astounded"), and then the ultimate surprise, which the book of Acts helps us understand.

Outline of the Message

1. A broken world: does God care about injustice?

You only need to watch social media or the news for a week to find examples of injustice.
The preacher mentions the Australian news of the week: a man who repeatedly drove his 4x4 into a female member of parliament.
He also gives figures: 39 women killed since the start of the year in Australia in domestic violence, 2.2 billion dollars lost by Australians to scams and fraud in 2025, and around 240 unborn children killed every day by abortion in the country.
Faced with such deep injustices, the question arises: why doesn't God do anything? Does he care? "Let's see what God has to say for himself."

2. Habakkuk's complaint

Habakkuk is a prophet during the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah. Unlike his father, Jehoiakim does what is evil in the eyes of the LORD. He despises the word of God and hates the message of prophets like Jeremiah and Habakkuk.
The preacher recalls a revealing episode: in winter, by the fire, the king has Jeremiah's scroll read to him. As it is read, he cuts off pieces and throws them into the fire (Jeremiah 36).
The people follow their king: they worship the false gods of the nations and live in wickedness. By rejecting God and his laws, "might becomes right." The rich exploit the poor, the powerful crush the weak and vulnerable, and corrupt leaders serve only themselves.
Habakkuk sees it with his own eyes: "Why do you show me iniquity, and look at perversity? For destruction and violence are before me" (Habakkuk 1:3). God's good law restrains wickedness and upholds justice. When the people reject it, it becomes powerless: "the law is paralyzed, and justice never prevails" (verse 4).
Habakkuk cries out to God (verses 2 and 3): how long? Why do you make me see iniquity? He knows God: a just God who loves justice, hates evil and does not leave the guilty unpunished. Hence his bewilderment: "You are a God of justice, so why aren't you acting?"
At this point we do not yet know whether Habakkuk is asking honest questions or accusing God. The rest of the book will tell.

3. God can receive your big questions

The preacher pauses on an important point: "God is big enough to receive our big questions." The Psalms, the book of Job and Lamentations show believers who, in faith, say to God: why do you allow this suffering? I thought you loved me.
Many have experienced injustice personally: discrimination because of skin colour, sex or faith, or the abuse of someone who used their position of authority instead of showing love.
Others know the brokenness of grieving a loved one, of the child they carried and never got to meet, of a marriage or children they never had, of relationships that have fallen apart.
"God is not indifferent to your suffering." He does not run a complaints desk with a sign saying "no complaints." He wants you to bring him your questions so much that he has given you the words to do it, in the psalms of lament such as Psalm 13.
In the dark nights of the soul, turn to him in prayer: he can receive your questions and he wants to listen, even if nobody else does.

4. God's answer: look and be astounded

In verse 5, God answers: "Look among the nations, watch, and wonder marvelously; for I am working a work in your days, which you will not believe though it is told you."
At first glance, God seems to miss the point: the problem is in Judah, so why look at the nations? On closer inspection, God picks up Habakkuk's own words from verse 3. The prophet said: why do you make me see, why do you look at injustice? God answers: look, watch what I am about to do.
Habakkuk accused God of doing nothing. God answers: I am going to act "in your days," very soon. It will be astounding, shocking, even horrifying, enough to leave you open-mouthed.
Verse 6: "For, behold, I raise up the Chaldeans," that is, the Babylonians, the new superpower intent on subduing the surrounding nations. They are God's answer to the injustice in Judah.
Over the last 80 years we have seen foreign interventions to stop injustice: UN forces in Rwanda or Bosnia in the 1990s, Australian-led efforts in East Timor in 1999. The preacher stresses that what God is about to do with Babylon is nothing like that.
God himself describes this people: ruthless and impetuous (verse 6), a law to themselves (verse 7), swifter than leopards, fiercer than wolves, swooping like an eagle on its prey (verse 8). They are predators, killers.
As the opposite of the promise made to Abraham of descendants as numerous as the sand of the sea, the Babylonians gather captives like sand (verse 9). They scoff at kings and laugh at fortresses (verse 10). Verse 11 sums it up: "He is indeed guilty, whose strength is his god."
For Habakkuk, it is a shock: he cries out for justice and receives a message of judgment. "It would be as if we asked God to intervene against domestic violence in our country and he sent Russia to conquer us, enslave us and send us to concentration camps in Siberia." God cares deeply about injustice, but his answer can surprise us.

5. God reigns over the nations

How can a good, holy and just God use such an evil nation? This is the question Habakkuk asks in the next section. The preacher will come back to it in the coming weeks.
What is clear is that God can use, and does use, evil nations like Babylon, because he reigns sovereignly over them. Psalm 47 says it: "God reigns over the nations. God sits on his holy throne."
No king or ruler thinks he is at God's command. Yet that is what they are.
The Roman Empire crucified our Lord and was brutal in many ways. Yet God used its roads, the Roman peace and even the persecution of Christians to spread the gospel across Europe and Asia.
Closer to home, the British Empire, with its complex colonial history: God used its ships to send the gospel around the world, with missionaries and chaplains. That is how the gospel reached Australia, with men like Richard Johnson who came on those fleets.

6. The ultimate surprise: God himself bears injustice

In Acts 13, Paul and Barnabas proclaim the gospel in the synagogue of Pisidian Antioch. In verse 40, Paul quotes Habakkuk 1: "Behold, you scoffers, and wonder, and perish; for I work a work in your days, a work which you will in no way believe, if one declares it to you."
What is this astounding work? "God is going to bear the worst injustice of all himself." The people of Jerusalem and their rulers did not recognise Jesus. Though they found no ground for a death sentence, they asked Pilate to have him killed (Acts 13:27-28).
Jesus, who lived a perfect life, innocent of any crime, is condemned to death by evil men. But God raised him from the dead.
Here is what is truly shocking (verses 38 and 39): "Be it known to you therefore, brothers, that through this man is proclaimed to you remission of sins, and by him everyone who believes is justified from all things, from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses."
In Jesus, the perfect, innocent Son of God suffers the ultimate injustice for our justification: "as if you and I had never sinned." Sinners who are guilty before God receive a fresh start to become God's friends again. The terrifying picture of judgment does not have to be your future.
God's great answer to injustice is not to sign petitions, join a social justice movement, protest or give to charities. It is the pouring out of his wrath and judgment on his Son, so that guilty sinners like you and me can be set free and forgiven.
God has set a day when he will judge all things and put the world right. In the meantime, as people are converted and live his way, "Christian after Christian," injustice recedes and society changes, until the return of Jesus, the perfect judge.

7. Neither activism that loses the essential, nor despair that isolates

The preacher sees two dangers for Christians facing injustice: activism on one side, isolation and despair on the other.
God calls us to love our neighbour as ourselves. So it is right to seek change, to denounce injustice, to protest or sign petitions. The danger is losing sight of the essential.
Earlier in the year, a Christian called him a coward because he did not preach enough on a cause close to that person's heart. His answer: "Brothers and sisters, we must keep the main thing the main thing."
Even if every law in the country made these evils illegal, and many already are, there would still be millions of Australians on their way to hell because they have not been reconciled to their Creator. The mission of the Church is to proclaim that Jesus Christ is king, judge and saviour.
At the other extreme, faced with the traumatic images and stories scrolling through our news feeds, we can despair and then withdraw into our bubble to protect ourselves from the evil outside.
Christians do not have to despair: "we know how this ends." God has promised that he will put an end to injustice. And we have a message of hope for a world that believes there is none: Jesus dealt with injustice and evil by dying on the cross so that you can have a fresh start.
The preacher concludes with 2 Peter 3: the day of the Lord will come like a thief, "But, according to his promise, we look for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells."

Key Takeaways

God is not indifferent to injustice or to your suffering. He is big enough to receive your big questions.
God answers, but often in an unexpected way: to Habakkuk, he announces the coming of the Babylonians.
God reigns sovereignly over the nations and can use even evil powers to accomplish his purposes.
The ultimate surprise is the cross: Jesus, innocent, bears the worst injustice so that everyone who believes is forgiven and justified.
Faced with injustice, keep the main thing the main thing, without getting lost in activism or withdrawing into despair.

Personal Application

What injustice or brokenness are you carrying right now without daring to talk to God about it?
How could Psalm 13 help you put words to your complaint this week?
Have you already received the forgiveness God offers in Jesus, this grace "you would not believe if it were told you"?
In your commitment against injustice, does proclaiming the gospel keep first place?
Does the world's news push you to withdraw? Who around you needs to hear your message of hope?

Verses Cited

Frequently Asked Questions

Is it all right to complain to God like Habakkuk?

Yes. For Michael Watson, God is big enough to receive our big questions. The Psalms, Job and Lamentations give many examples, and God even gave us words to do it in the psalms of lament such as Psalm 13. God is not indifferent to your suffering: he wants to hear you.

How can God use an evil nation like Babylon?

Habakkuk himself asks this question in the next section of the book. The preacher reminds us that God reigns sovereignly over the nations (Psalm 47) and uses them for his purposes. In history, God used the Roman Empire, then the British Empire and its fleets, to spread the gospel.

What is the ultimate surprise announced in Habakkuk 1:5?

In Acts 13, Paul quotes Habakkuk 1:5 to announce God's incredible work: Jesus, perfectly innocent, suffers the worst injustice in history so that everyone who believes is justified and forgiven. God's answer to injustice is the cross, until the day when he will judge all things.