O LORD, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not hear? Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save? Why do you make me see iniquity, and why do you idly look at wrong? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. So the law is paralyzed, and justice never goes forth. For the wicked surround the righteous; so justice goes forth perverted.

(Habakkuk 1:2-4)

This is the opening of the book of Habakkuk. The time is around the mid to late 7^th century B.C. The northern tribes of Israel have been taken captive by the Assyrians. Judah still remains, but there is a lot of trouble. Probably like many of other people in Judah, Habakkuk appears to wonder if God notices, and if he does, what is he going to do about it.

God responds to Habakkuk’s question. “Look among the nations, and see; wonder and be astounded. For I am doing a work in your days that you would not believe if told. For behold, I am raising up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, who march through the breadth of the earth, to seize dwellings not their own.” (Habakkuk 1: 5-6)

Are you kidding? God’s response to the trouble that is in Judah is to bring the Babylonians to take Judah. Unbelievable! The people of Judah may be bad, but they aren’t nearly as bad as the Babylonians. God goes on in Habakkuk chapter one to describe the Babylonians as dreaded, fearsome, violent, and “guilty men, whose own might is their god.” How could God do this?

It is here that we should stop and point out that God often does the incredible, the unbelievable. God created the world out of nothing. He spoke the world into existence. Unbelievable! Because of the wickedness of humanity in the days of Noah, God destroyed the world with a flood. Unbelievable! God called Abraham and Sarah, promised them a son and delivered on that promise when they were far past their childbearing years. Unbelievable! God rescued a nation of slaves from Egypt, the most powerful nation in the world at the time. Unbelievable! The list could go on and on.

God does the unbelievable. It is an unbelievable thing is that God wants to be with us. As stubborn and rebellious and difficult and wicked as we can be, he still desires to be with us.  As unbelievable as that is, what’s more incredible is the lengths to which God will go to make that possible.

Around 700 years after Habakkuk spoke to God, we find another of God’s people asking questions of a strange new rabbi named Jesus. Nicodemus comes to Jesus looking for answers. Jesus speaks to him about being born again, born from above. Nicodemus wonders how this can happen. Jesus speaks of being born again of water and spirit, of heavenly things, and eternal life. Nicodemus still does not understand. It’s just unbelievable.

Then Jesus says the most unbelievable thing. “For God so loved the world,that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” (John 3:16-17)

We watch as we follow Jesus through the Gospels. We watch as we follow him all the way to the cross. We hear his plea to the Father in the garden of “Let this cup pass from me.” We read of the abuse, the mocking, the beating, the humiliation, the pain and suffering. We listen to him cry out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” We hear him say, “It is finished.” And as we see this and witness the lengths to which God will go so that we can be with him, there is word that comes to mind. “Unbelievable!

 It is truly amazing to see how much Jesus loves us, and how badly he wants to be with us. That kind of love and self sacrifice should elicit a response from us. It demands our love and devotion to him in return. It should result in lives that are marked by our faithful obedience to him, and lives that are transformed into his image. If that is not our reaction to what he has done for us, that’s unbelievable.