First Question

April 13, 2026·39 min·2 clips

Habakkuk and Jesus both ask, "How long, O Lord?" while refusing to question God's goodness.

1. Shorebreak Church begins a six-to-seven-week study in Habakkuk 1:1-4, placing the book near Zephaniah and inside the late Old Testament. 2. The speaker cites Ephesians 2:18-20, where Christ is the cornerstone and the apostles and prophets are the church's foundation. 3. The core hook is that Habakkuk speaks to the New Testament church because the prophets expose Israel's failure and point toward Jesus Christ. 4. Habakkuk is described as writing before the Babylonian exile of Judah, with the Assyrians declining and the Babylonians, also called Chaldeans, rising. 5. The sermon says the speaker does not know much about Habakkuk personally, because Habakkuk is not mentioned elsewhere in Scripture and gives few biographical details. 6. Judah is portrayed as a place of "destruction and violence," where "the law is paralyzed" and "justice never goes forth." 7. Jeremiah is used to fill in the details, including Baal worship, child sacrifice, social injustice, corrupt kings, priests, prophets, and judges. 8. Habakkuk 2:3, "the righteous shall live by his faith," is said to become central to Romans and Galatians and to the doctrine of justification by faith. 9. Martin Luther's Habakkuk sermon series is mentioned alongside his complaint that the medieval church abandoned regular reading and singing of Habakkuk 3. 10. Listeners who want biblical lament, prophetic background, and faith under pressure.

As heard by us

A steady opening study turns Habakkuk's question into an honest act of lament and faith.

This opening study in Habakkuk treats the prophet's burden as a lens for seeing Judah's suffering with spiritual seriousness. It gives real weight to the cry, "How long shall I cry for help?" and sets that question against a fractured kingdom, the fall of the northern tribes,…

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Why you'd press play

Press play when "How long, O Lord?" feels less like a quotation than a live question.

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