Uncertainties in our current times can lead to seasons of doubt. How do we deal with our fears and doubts when we are constantly burdened by one trial after the next? There’s nothing inappropriate about seeking honest answers from God; our role is to accept His response.
The book of Habakkuk in the Old Testament teaches us the importance of facing our doubts and perplexities by surrendering them to the Lord in prayer. We should ask questions honestly, not demanding answers but waiting patiently for God to teach and guide us as we spend time talking with Him and reading His word. These two practices go hand in hand and are crucial in times of waiting on the Lord. However, God may choose to respond in ways least expected. Isaiah 55:8-9 the Lord says, “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts”. God can choose not to give us our heart desires at the present moment because He has a greater purpose in mind. Our understanding is so limited that we can only see what’s right before us. But the Lord sees past, present, and future simultaneously. He has perfect knowledge of all things and, in His perfect love and wisdom, will respond as He deems best.
Habakkuk could not understand why God would choose to use a nation more wicked than Israel to bring judgment upon them. He desired to make sense of it all. Perhaps you are having difficulty understanding God’s purpose in your suffering. God has a plan known to Him alone, and desires that you trust Him in this season. He is doing a greater work even when you cannot see it. The apostle Paul stated in 2 Corinthians 4:17-18 (ESV) - “So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.” God is using what you are enduring today to work in you a far greater glory, beyond all comparison, which will be revealed in you on the day of His return for His church.
Habakkuk decided to trust God and His word and praised God even when He could not fully understand God’s plan. It is part of our nature to pull away from God when we can’t see Him work as we had hoped, but Habakkuk pressed into God even when he was most perplexed. Choosing to trust God is the path to surrendering to His will. Yielding to the Lord is a work He does in us through the Holy Spirit; therefore, do not resist what He desires to teach you. But humbly accept what He lovingly allows in your life, whether that work is to show you to walk in humility, depending on Him for everything, or how to trust His love and wisdom in the dark seasons of your life.
Surrender is not resignation; resignation reluctantly accepts something inescapable and beyond our control. It can turn to resentment toward God, but surrender is trusting God even when we can’t understand what He is accomplishing in us. We can rejoice knowing that God has a greater purpose and, in the end, is working all things out for our good and for His glory. Surrendering to the Lord is a daily choice in every struggle we encounter. When we have come to a place of surrender, we can say with Habakkuk, “Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail, and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold, and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. God, the Lord, is my strength; He makes my feet like the deer’s; He makes me tread on my high places.” (Habakkuk 3:17-19)