A Prayer of Habakkuk the prophet upon Shigionoth.
Habakkuk has taken his questions to God, and the answer reached him on his watchtower. Chapter 3 turns from questions to prayer. This prayer carries an odd musical direction, "according to Shigionoth," and it ends with a singer and stringed instruments.
The heading marks a change of posture. God has answered, so Habakkuk stops watching and starts praying. One writer points to the resource he turns to.
Having stood on his watchtower and heard the answer of the LORD to his appeal, the prophet now takes to his knees in prayer. In the middle of all his inner struggles and trials, he uses the unfailing resource we have in the LORD, who is in His holy temple. He draws near to the throne of grace to find help in the time of need.
Another writer describes the same movement as a change of place — down from the lookout and into the house of God.
Having listened to this from his watchtower, the prophet, so to speak, comes down to speak with the Lord. God had graciously visited and answered him on the tower. Now he will enter the sanctuary, with the voice of prayer and praise. He comes in the power of that faith which had accepted God's answer, rejoiced in it, and counted on still further blessing.
The verse calls what follows a prayer. But its subject has shifted, and so has its form.
Habakkuk, however, breaks out in prayer. It is now a question of the righteous, and not of the judgment of the Chaldean. So the last chapter is a most beautiful and lofty outpouring of the prophet... Although it is a prayer, it takes the form of a psalm.
More than one thing is happening at once. This is not just asking, and it does not rest on a hope that God might act.
The prophet had heard all of this from the mouth of the Lord. He summed up the conclusion of it in one prayer. That prayer was at the same time a plea, a thanksgiving, and a psalm of praise. It came out of a faith that was fully assured that the Lord would be faithful to His promises.
The word itself is disputed. Commentators differ on what it means. One reference work follows a note printed in the margin of an older translation.
"Upon Shigionoth" reads in the margin "according to variable songs or tunes," and that meaning seems confirmed by the closing line of the chapter, "To the chief singer on stringed instruments." The prophet realises the presence of God as he reviews His past dealings against Israel's enemies. In them he sees the pledge of the future salvation.
Others take it as a cry, and connect the word to a psalm heading where it also appears.
Shigionoth is the plural of Shiggaion, and is found in the heading of Psalm 7. Its meaning is "loud crying." The connection with the seventh Psalm is interesting. In that Psalm God appeared to David as the God of judgment, the righteous God who must save His righteous people and condemn the wicked.
The prayer begins on one instrument and ends on another. That change is the point.
Habakkuk begins his closing prayer on Shigionoth. That means a selection of variable tunes on the wind instrument, often involving much effort with little music. How often our prayers are like that! But if they lead us to the result he reached, our joy will indeed be full. No one could imagine less favourable conditions than those Habakkuk pictures. Yet he would rejoice in the Lord, and as a result he was made to walk on high places. That corresponds to music on the stringed instruments.
The verse calls this a prayer of Habakkuk the prophet. His plea reaches past his own lifetime.
This was all the more reason to call on God's mercy. Just when He pours out His judgments over the world, we ought to trust His grace. That is as true today as it was in the past. God will answer this prophetic prayer of Habakkuk when Israel is revived. He will answer it especially toward the faithful remnant, which the prophet pictured.
- Heard — Habakkuk prays only after the LORD answers him on the watchtower. His praying starts where God's speaking stopped.
- Knelt — in the middle of his trials the prophet draws near to the throne of grace, to find help in the time of need.
- Sang — though called a prayer, it takes the form of a psalm. It is a plea, a thanksgiving, and a song of praise at once.
- Cried — commentators differ on Shigionoth: some read it as variable tunes, others link it to Psalm 7 and read it as loud crying.
- Answered — the prayer starts with effortful notes and ends on stringed instruments. It looks past Habakkuk's own day to Israel's future deliverance.
Jehovah, I heard the report of thee, [and] I feared. Jehovah, revive thy work in the midst of the years, In the midst of the years make [it] known In wrath remember mercy!
God has just told Habakkuk that He will use the invading Chaldeans to discipline His own people, and the news leaves the prophet shaking. He answers with prayer — a short cry asking God to work again, to make Himself known, and to remember mercy while His anger burns.
Habakkuk admits he is frightened, and the fear drives him to ask:
Yet when he heard these judgments announced, he said, "And I feared." God's judgments are terrible. They must fill the heart with a wholesome fear! Still one thing he wanted to ask: Revive Your work of grace toward Your people! "In the midst of the years," before the end time of which You spoke. Act in mercy toward us!
The prophet's earlier questions came from weak faith. Now something has changed:
So the prophet could say: "I heard"; not: "You have heard," for his question had come out of his weak faith. Now, however, he had knowledge of God's thoughts. The Lord had given this to him, and he did not have to wait for His governmental ways before he could understand them. Through faith he had come to know them already.
Older translations read "revive Thy work" where the ESV has "revive it." Habakkuk asks God to do again what He has already done:
He seeks that there may be "a revival" — that now in the midst of the years God would do the works which so wonderfully marked the beginning of the years. He rehearses those early works of Jehovah for Israel, as in God's presence, with moving beauty and in the broken style of a man whose heart was alive to his subject. He recalls what God did in Egypt, in the wilderness, and in Canaan. He does this so that the Lord might look at those mighty doings of His, and do the same in these present Chaldean times.
The phrase sits between two points: a beginning behind him, an end still ahead:
The deliverance out of Egypt was "the beginning of years," in which the Lord had shown His work of grace on behalf of His people. The prophet wanted God to take it up again. He wanted this before the deliverance at the end of years, which would bring in the Millennium. He knew that he lived in the time of wrath.
Habakkuk also asks God to make the work known. One writer explains what that revival is, and cautions against a common use of the verse:
And now, in the midst of the years, he asks for a revival of this work — for the LORD to step in, so that He may be known in His power. The text is often quoted when pleading for a revival among the dead conditions of Christendom. But it is a revival of the work of the Lord in a very different sense of the word, as we have indicated.
Others draw a direct lesson from it, noting what Habakkuk does not ask for:
He does not pray for a great public revival among the people of God, one that might bring them into prominence. He longs instead to see the LORD working in the midst of their trials. He wants to see the LORD acting in mercy towards those who by their failure have brought the LORD's chastening on themselves.
This last line is not a hope that God will change His mind:
He knows that wrath is on the way. The wrath is not only for the Chaldeans but for his own people. The unbelieving, those who had turned away, would also have to face the judgment. So he pleads, "In wrath remember mercy." Such is the way of God always. Judgment is His strange work, and mercy is mingled with His judgments. The same will be true when this present age winds up: when judgment sweeps over the earth, He will have mercy on His people.
The vision that follows is itself the reply:
The great inspired ode which follows is one of the greatest sections of prophecy. It is a wonderful appearance of God that the Spirit of God describes. Wrath and mercy are both shown, so that it is an answer to the prophet's plea. "In wrath remember mercy."
Commentators differ on how far the verse reaches today. Another writer starts with the believer's own fellowship with God:
This close fellowship of the soul with God results in joy and revival... This very personal encouragement in fellowship with God will strengthen the desire in our hearts that the whole people of God may be revived. So we pray, always keeping our own weakness and failure in view, "O LORD, revive Your work."
- Heard — A report terrified him, and that fear drove him to God instead of away from Him.
- Revive — He asks for nothing new — that God repeat the works of "the beginning of years," which he retells through the rest of the chapter.
- Midst — He stands between a deliverance already given and one still promised, and asks God to act in the gap and make His power known.
- Wrath — Mercy is not an escape from judgment but is mixed into it — God's settled way of working.
- Answered — The song that follows is the reply: wrath and mercy shown together, just as he asked.