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.
Habakkuk 1:5
Habakkuk 1 [1.] The revelation which Habakkuk the prophet saw. Yahweh, how long will I cry, and you will not hear? I cry out to you “Violence!” and will you not save? Why do you show me iniquity, and look at perversity? For destruction and violence are before me. There is strife, and contention rises up. Therefore the law is paralyzed, and justice never prevails; for the wicked surround the righteous; therefore justice comes out perverted.
Habakkuk 1 [5.] “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. For, behold, I raise up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, that march through the width of the earth, to possess dwelling places that are not theirs. They are feared and dreaded. Their judgment and their dignity proceed from themselves. Their horses also are swifter than leopards, and are more fierce than the evening wolves. Their horsemen press proudly on. Yes, their horsemen come from afar. They fly as an eagle that hurries to devour. All of them come for violence. Their hordes face the desert. He gathers prisoners like sand.
Habakkuk 1 [10.] Yes, he scoffs at kings, and princes are a derision to him. He laughs at every stronghold, for he builds up an earthen ramp, and takes it. Then he sweeps by like the wind, and goes on. He is indeed guilty, whose strength is his god.”
Meaning:
Habakkuk prophesied in Judah in the years before the Babylonian invasion, probably near the end of the seventh century BC. His book is unusual: instead of speaking God’s word to the people, he speaks to God about the people, and records God’s answers. It opens with a complaint: “Yahweh, how long will I cry, and you will not hear?” Violence, strife and injustice filled the land, “the law is paralyzed, and justice never prevails.” Verse 5 begins God’s reply.
- “Look among the nations, watch”
Habakkuk had been looking at the corruption within Judah. God tells him to look further, out among the nations. The answer to Judah’s sin would come from outside its borders. God rules the nations as well as his own people.
- “Wonder marvelously”
The Hebrew repeats the verb for emphasis: be astonished, be utterly amazed. What God was about to do would shock everyone who heard of it.
- “I am working a work in your days”
The work would happen within the lifetime of Habakkuk’s hearers. God explains: “For, behold, I raise up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation.” The Chaldeans, or Babylonians, would sweep through the land like a swift and fierce army. Within a few years Nebuchadnezzar’s forces came, and in the end they burned “Yahweh’s house, the king’s house, and all the houses of Jerusalem” (2 Kings 25:9).
- “Which you will not believe though it is told you”
Judah could not imagine that God would use a pagan empire to judge his own people and his own city. Even Habakkuk struggled with it, asking how a holy God, whose eyes are too pure to look on evil, could use people more wicked than Judah (Habakkuk 1:13). God’s answer was to wait for the vision and trust him: “the righteous will live by his faith” (Habakkuk 2:4). By the end of the book Habakkuk could rejoice in Yahweh even if the harvest failed (Habakkuk 3:17-18).
- Quoted by Paul
At the end of his sermon in Pisidian Antioch, Paul warned his hearers with this verse: “Behold, you scoffers, and wonder, and perish; for I work a work in your days, a work which you will in no way believe” (Acts 13:41). Paul followed the Greek translation used in the synagogues, which reads “scoffers” where the Hebrew has “among the nations.” He applied the principle to a new astonishing work of God: the death and resurrection of Jesus and the offer of forgiveness to all who believe. As in Habakkuk’s day, those who refused to believe God’s work would face judgment.
The Significance of Habakkuk 1:5
- God is at work even when it is hard to see
Habakkuk thought God was silent, but God was already working. When injustice seems to go unanswered, believers can trust that God sees and will act in his time.
- Believing what seems unbelievable
God’s ways often surprise. Faith accepts what God says even when it goes beyond human expectations, as Habakkuk learned to do.
Cross-References:
Habakkuk 2:4: "Behold, his soul is puffed up. It is not upright in him, but the righteous will live by his faith." God’s answer to Habakkuk’s questions.
Acts 13:41: "Behold, you scoffers, and wonder, and perish; for I work a work in your days," Paul’s warning based on this verse.
Habakkuk 3:18: "yet I will rejoice in Yahweh. I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!" The prophet’s final trust.
Conclusion: In Habakkuk 1:5 God answers the prophet’s complaint about injustice in Judah by announcing an astonishing work: he would raise up the Babylonians to bring judgment, something the people would not believe even when told. Paul later used the verse to warn those who scoffed at God’s new work in Jesus. God’s work may surprise, but it calls for faith, not scorn.
PIB Scriptures are derived from the World English Bible