Crisis, Chaldeans, COVID | Drive-In Church

Text: Romans 1:16–17 and Habakkuk 2:4 ESV

Introduction

Good morning friends! It is wonderful to see you even if it is through windshields. It will be interesting to see how we all remember this moment years from now. There is one future where we remember it and say, “Remember that odd COVID season where we had to take a break from church and do drive-in church once-a-month? That was weird.” There is another future where intermittent breaks because of viruses becomes normal like has been for seasons throughout some of the last millennium. Where drive-in church becomes a term we are more acquainted with. Where social-distancing is not a passing idea but an enduring periodic concept.

I think that is the oddity of this moment (at least one of them). We have learned some things: there is a new virus that can be deadly for some and asymptomatic for others. We know it will in one fashion or another effect our economy. And yet there is so much we don’t know: Will kids go back to school this fall? Will masks become normal for us during flare-up seasons? When can groups of more than 50 gather, in public, face-to-face again? Will we find a vaccine?

There are intellectual, social, and emotional muscles this season is flexing that for many of us we don’t use very often. And it feels odd, and even makes us “sore” in different ways. Grief counselors can move in-and-out of situations involving death and dying with ease, but for most of us we struggle to find the right words when we think about a disease like COVID taking a life. Financial advisors have thought through how to best steward your money, but seeing your paycheck slowly (or suddenly) get smaller is emotionally and intellectually difficult to solve.

Theologically we can even find seasons like this hard. We recently spent time going through Job together, not to hit every single thought or concept we could find in that book, but to lay groundwork for the idea that God is still sovereign even in suffering. But our situation today is a little different. Yes, some people are sick and some are struggling to find work, but for some it is the difficulty of being at home almost 24/7 now and the family tensions and situations that arise there. For some it is the loneliness of living alone, missing work colleagues, missing friends and family. Some people have jobs that are growing and thriving during this season. COVID isn’t stretching us in just one way, but many. What do you say to these people and remind them about God when these are all the different types of issues going on?

I don’t know if you are like me, but even as a pastor I find myself worried at moments about what I can say that won’t come across as trite, or even worse, that people are offended by God and the fact that he is sovereign today even amidst all these different emotions and situations, and that I would somehow make that worse. Maybe you’re like me and wondering how to discuss and think about this moment with others. Or, perhaps more importantly, you are wondering how to preach and stir your own soul amidst your own struggles, thoughts and concerns this season.

There is a special word in theology for this—theodicy. Theodicy is the “vindication” of God’s goodness in the view of the existence of evil or difficulty. This is a consistent question in Scripture by the prophets and God’s people, and God consistently has an answer. This morning we want to go to Romans chapter one and find that Paul, Habakkuk, and the whole bible has a great answer to any theodicy, no less for us in COVID and any other situation we face. Our heart this morning is that we would come to Romans and Habakkuk and leave unashamed, like Paul:

1. Aware, in all the difficulties that we may face, where our hope lies.

2. Find that it is always, in every circumstance, faith in Jesus Christ alone that is our goal and God’s end.

3. Confidently proclaim this to ourselves and to others.

Romans 1:16–17

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” (Romans 1:16–17 ESV)

Romans is considered Paul’s best explanation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, likely because he knew he was writing to people he didn’t know and wanted to make sure they at least heard the good news. Sure, there are elements that are better described elsewhere, but there is a reason so many people use tools like the “Romans Road” method to share the gospel with people, walking them through Romans 3, 6, 5 and 10 as a great way to help them know the main points of the gospel. If we were to outline the entire book, while there would be many debates along the way, there is no debate that Romans 1:16–17 is Paul’s thesis statement for the entire book.

While that background makes it obvious we are not going to unpack the entirety of the theology of Romans in one sermon, this passage is a great help to us today.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel

Paul starts with this very curious statement—he won’t be ashamed of the gospel. That should make us wonder why he would even consider being ashamed? Other places in Scripture Paul says he glorifies God in the gospel (c.f. Romans 5:2,11; 1 Corinthians 10:17; Galatians 6:14; Philippians 3:7). There is nothing in the earlier parts of Romans one that would hint that Paul is being directly attacked or critiqued by the Romans for his love of the gospel. It is this statement that should signal to me and you that Paul’s summary of the gospel here deals with larger questions than just how someone is saved, justified, and adopted in Jesus Christ.

But we are going to “put a pin” in this question. It is the one that should be ringing in the back our minds this entire sermon. Why would Paul even worry about being ashamed of the gospel? How do you and I get to a place where we are similarly unashamed? 

For it…

As Paul continues, he unpacks for us the various aspects of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

[the gospel] is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes

Paul states that the gospel has very real power, and it is the power to save people. The idea of salvation here in verse 16 is meant to point to all aspects of our salvation in Jesus Christ. Justification (being declared righteous in the sight of God), propitiation (being reconciled to God through the appeasing work of Jesus), sanctification (God’s ongoing work through his Holy Spirit to change and conform us to be more like Jesus Christ)—all of these aspects are in view for Paul here. Paul is not trying to pull out one specific aspect of being saved, but rather point that the entire process is through the power of God in Jesus Christ, to anyone who believes. 

[the gospel has gone] to the Jew first and also to the Greek.

Paul further unpacks the “everyone who believes” by saying that this good news of Jesus has gone to the Jew first and also to the Greek (or gentile). This phrase may mean one of two things: it may point to the historically reality that God has brought news of his plan first to the Jews, then Samaria, then to the ends of the world like Acts 1:8 says. It could also point to Paul’s personal pattern in every city of going first to the Jewish synagogue and sharing about Jesus and then out to the city and teaching in the open spaces. While Paul did have a personal pattern, I think in Romans his primary concern is God’s salvation-historical pattern: God was faithful and gracious for both Jews and for Gentiles. He is going after all people’s to make part of his new man in Jesus Christ.

For in [the gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed

In this power and purpose of God, he has been shown to very righteous. One commentator I read said that righteousness here is a metonymy. I was obviously asleep that day in high school English so I had to consult Google. Metonymy is where one word stands in for another. So, in a bad B-grade movie someone may call someone a “suit” when really they are talking about that person being a business executive. Saying we are going to go “walk around the block” just means a walk around our neighborhood regardless if it is a city block.

This commentator’s point was that saying God’s righteousness is revealed is the same in this sentence as saying that he saves. It’s not trying to claim that salvation and righteousness are identical concepts, but that here Paul is saying that God’s plan of salvation is right and good, and a right and good plan from God had to include the salvation of his people. The former (God’s righteousness) grounds and motivates the latter (salvation). At the least we need to say that these two ideas are very intertwined to Paul and his point in Romans.

For in [the gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith 

Paul continues and says this righteousness of God seen in the gospel of Jesus Christ is “from faith to faith.” This is a tricky statement. The two best options are that Paul means:

1. God’s righteousness is revealed from Christ’s faithfulness to man’s faithfulness, or

2. God’s righteousness is revealed from the faith of the Old Covenant to the faith of the New Covenant.

I personally lean toward the first, from Christ’s faithfulness to man’s faithfulness, but the main points are the same in both. Both show the necessity of Christ in faith, and both emphasize God’s faithfulness, not man’s faithfulness. 

Summary

So, if we were to summarize Paul’s argument in this part of verses 16–17 it is: 

1. We have a good and righteous God who has been faithful to save his people,

2. He is saving all his people, Jews and gentiles, across history and across this entire world,

3. He has done that through faith in Jesus Christ and the good news of the God-man who died for your sins.

Paul is saying that in the gospel God has acted decisively for our salvation in a way that is right and very good.[1] Whatever else we see, whatever other concerns we may have, our God has done a very good and very right thing in Jesus Christ. It is that statement that Paul says encourages him to not be ashamed.

We can begin to see how the gospel message is helping Paul and his concern of being ashamed. If we have a very good God, if God does right for us in Jesus Christ, if God has done this regardless of our situation, then being ashamed not a large worry. The power of the gospel is larger than any momentary circumstance that we live in. But it is the next quote that Paul uses that really helps us understand how this is helpful to Paul, and to us, in our current situation.

Habakkuk 2:4

To sum up his thoughts, Paul says this: “as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’” With this one quote Paul is saying that this thought is not unique to him. With this one quote Paul is inviting us back to Scripture, back into the larger story of God and is saying to us, this is how it has always been, the righteous shall always live by faith.

Paul goes to Habakkuk 2:4 as his proof. And you say, “Obviously, that is exactly where I have gone. That’s why everyone has Habakkuk 2:4 signs at NFL games and my good friends have a Habakkuk 2:4 Hebrew tattoo and there are dorky Christian t-shirts with Habakkuk 2:4 on it.” Said no one, ever. Most of us would say, “Habakkuk is a book of the bible?!”

Which maybe means we should be a little convicted when we realize that Paul goes to Habakkuk 2:4 three times in the New Testament: here in Romans 1:16–17, again in Galatians 3:11 and in Hebrews 10:32­–39. Habakkuk 2:4 could very well be considered Paul’s version of John 3:16—he uses it again and again in his point about how God saves and the goal of faith.

Lucky for us, Habakkuk is a total of 56 verses, split into three chapters. We can summarize it easily this morning. Habakkuk is listed near the very end of our Old Testament and grouped with the minor prophets. Start at the beginning of your New Testament (Matthew) and turn back five books and you are at Habakkuk. Habakkuk is a prophet that lives at the time of King Josiah, the last of the good kings of the kingdom of Judah (2 Kings 22:2; 2 Chronicles 34:2). Remember, the nation of Israel is divided after the reign of Solomon into the Kingdom of Israel in the north and the Kingdom of Judah in the south. The Kingdom of Israel is taken into exile first under King Ahaz around 720 BC, and the Kingdom of Judah has remained for about another 120 years at this point. Josiah is commonly seen as the last real king of Judah, as under his sons they reign for about another 20 years and are progressively taken into exile as well.

As we look to Habakkuk, we are seeing the very end of the downward spiral of bad kings (with intermittent good kings) and a people who chooses to serve idols instead of Yahweh. This is exactly where we come in with Habakkuk’s concerns.

In this book, Habakkuk questions God, God responds, Habakkuk questions God again, God responds again, and finally we have an ending with prayer and praise from Habakkuk for God and his plan. But that isn’t where Habakkuk starts.

In his first questions (1:1–4), Habakkuk wants to know why God isn’t answering him and why he isn’t judging the violence and iniquity that Habakkuk sees in Judah. Torah—the law—doesn’t seem to be effective in restraining wickedness (the law is paralyzed: vs 4; [2]Watts, 6). And he’s right. The law is not able to produce what people really need: a new heart and a new mind. Consequently, they are continuing to walk away from God.

In a style that we see often with God, he doesn’t answer Habakkuk’s question at all the way he was expecting. God answers “not to worry, I am working and doing wondrous things (1:5)” because he is sending the Chaldeans, a “bitter and hasty nation” to bring judgement to the Kingdom of Judah.

To Habakkuk, this initially seems like horrible news. He cries out to God, “why do you look idly at traitors and remain silent when the wicked swallows up the man more righteous than he?” (1:13). This is a theodicy problem—how could God let a very wicked group judge those that Habakkuk views as being, at least, not nearly as bad as the Chaldeans.

God makes a big deal about his reply to Habakkuk. He tells him to write this vision down on stones—a picture of God giving the law to Moses on Mount Sinai. This response is permanent, forever the character of God put into words for Habakkuk and the nation of Judah. It is this response that Paul quotes:

“Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so he may run who reads it. For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay. Behold, his soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him, but the righteous shall live by his faith.” (Habakkuk 2:1–4)

And here we see the connection that makes this the perfect summary for Paul and the thesis of Romans. God’s plan may at times seem slow to come. It may seem like God isn’t solving the problem we have in front of us, but God is indeed solving the ultimate problem we all have—how we can have right relationship with him again. And it happens only through faith! God is in no way lifting up the Chaldeans. Habakkuk 2:6–2:20 is all about the woes that will come to nations like the Chaldeans. But God’s concern is to use even present-day evils and difficulties for his ultimate goal—his people’s salvation through faith alone.

This is why Habakkuk doesn’t question God again, but praises him in chapter three. God has pointed Habakkuk beyond his initial problems to his glorious salvation of his people—not through their work, not through their comfort—but through faith in Jesus Christ alone. This is why Habakkuk can end this book saying:

“Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the field 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 what?] 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 ESV)

Paul can praise God, Habakkuk can praise God because salvation is always by faith and our present circumstance can do nothing to change that. God’s decision to save us is glorious and beautiful, but the fact that it is through faith alone means our salvation and the beauty of Jesus Christ can be seen amidst any type of circumstance. A salvation by any other means would not be nearly so powerful.

This is the great theme of salvation by faith alone throughout Scripture. Abraham had faith in a God who calls him out of his home country. He has faith in the God who hasn’t provided an offspring even in his old age and still follows him amongst all the nations.

Joseph, whose life is one big up and down story, continues to have faith in God to use any evil for his good (Genesis 50:20). He is gifted with a coat, his brothers throw him a pit. He ascends within his masters household, he gets thrown in prison. He ascends again and has a chance to forgive and care for his brothers and all of future Israel. He shows that it is by faith alone in the God who was with him in the well, in his master’s house, and in the dungeon.

Israel is challenged to have faith in the God who secures their release through plagues, who meets them on Mount Sinai with his good word and law, and who provides for them with quail, manna, and water from the rock.

By using Habakkuk 2:4, Paul is reminding us of the enduring truth of God and his purposes amidst a myriad of situations. God is about saving his people through faith—and faith finds its object in Jesus Christ and his work for us on the cross. This is why this statement reminds Paul to not be ashamed in Romans 1:16–17. God’s promise of salvation and the power of the Gospel has always come through the difficulties of this world. And God has never worried about those difficulties. They could not stop his plan, nor is our temporary comfort here on this world his main concern. Faith, wrought by God’s Holy Spirit, ignited in a holy flame that does not stop, cannot be extinguished by any external circumstance.

In Romans, Paul is writing to a people he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know their struggles, their situation, their life. He knows well that Christ can come across as a “stumbling block to the Jews and folly to gentiles” (1 Corinthians 1:23). But he also knows that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the power that all need for salvation regardless and often because of their present circumstances. He will not be ashamed to declare that.

When Paul uses Habakkuk 2:4 in Galatians 3:11, it is to remind his readers that the law is unable to save, and results only in death (3:7). True life comes through faith, as it always, like with Abraham. They should not listen to false teachers trying to woo them back to the law.

When Paul uses it in Hebrews, the Jewish Christians there are having very tangible hardships. I think it is helpful to hear what he says to them at length. Listen to Hebrews 10:32–39:

But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, 33 sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. 34 For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. 35 Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. 36 For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. 37 For,

“Yet a little while,
and the coming one will come and will not delay;
but my righteous one shall live by faith,
and if he shrinks back,
my soul has no pleasure in him.” 

39 But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls. (Hebrews 10:32–39 ESV)

Whether we are being enticed back to the law, whether we are losing property and imprisoned, whether a hoard is bearing down upon us—faith. Crisis, Chaldeans, or COVID—God continually reminds us that he is saving us through faith alone. Difficulties like COVID are indeed, as one writer put it, a thunderclap from God himself.[3] It shocks us into remembering that this world is temporary and filled with sin and ruin. It is a visible picture of the ugliness of sin run amuck and its affront to God and his ways and order. It is often a shaking of settled Christians out of their ruts and expecting them to grasp ahold of a reality that has always been there, but has been hidden behind comfort and complacency.

We don’t need to be ashamed that we go back to the gospel of Jesus Christ and how it points to our salvation by faith alone as trite. It isn’t shallow, it isn’t just a high, over-arching message that misses the specifics or depths of God. That is never how God sees it nor how Paul sees it. The fact that our salvation is secured by faith alone is our greatest hope and comfort especially in times like this. Faith cannot be stripped away by momentary and “light” affliction (2 Corinthians 4:7). This message is applicable to any situation we are meeting today.

Application

• When you are at home with your children, you aren’t judged by how great of a teacher you are or how well your children are doing on their schoolwork. It isn’t about how clean your house stays nor how rarely the television is on. It isn’t based on how Instagram worthy each moment is. You and your kids God’s beloved ones because of Jesus and what he has done for you. It is, rather, a moment instead to realize God has given you some extra time with your kids to point them to Christ: Christ amidst their own worries, Christ amidst their uprooted schedule, Christ as their hope as they are away from their friends. He is their ultimate hope and all they need through their faith in him!

• When you are working remotely from home rather than in an office remember your very near neighbors—your friends, family, roommates, literally the neighbor across the street—and know that what they need in this season more than toilet paper or flour is the hopes and promises they find only in knowing Jesus. They need faith.

• When you feel lonely, use it as a reminder and longing to be face to face with your God again—let it rouse up that Holy flame. And let it be thankful that you are not alone in faith, that you are part of a household of faith, a people. In faith you are never alone.

• When you know someone sick with COVID, you know they are not worrying about their bank account level or their future job—they are wondering about the future if this is God’s moment for them to die. They need to know where their hope can be found—through faith in Jesus Christ.

• When you see those afraid and fearful, when see people angry and belligerent, they need to know the sure and peace filled hope they can find in faith in Jesus.

• Faith in Jesus alone is what your own soul needs when you see your bank account go down or fridge seem emptier than usual.

Conclusion

You, friends, have something to preach. To yourself, to your friends and family, to your neighbors. You have no reason to be ashamed because the gospel of Jesus Christ is power and present even in COVID. Being saved by faith alone in Jesus Christ is the great leveler—no matter what a broken world does, no matter what Satan throws at us, no matter our present situation, the gospel of Jesus Christ and our salvation by nothing else but faith alone is the ever present help we long for in our time of need!

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[1] Morris, Leon. The Epistle to the Romans, PNTC. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1987, 69.

[2] Watts, Rikki E. “‘For I Am Not Ashamed of the Gospel’: Romans 1:16–17 and Habakkuk 2:4.” Pages 3-25 in Romans and the People of God: Essays in Honor of Gordon D Fee on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999, 6.

[3] Piper, John. Coronavirus and Christ. Crossway, 2020, 77