The Earth Melts

Habakkuk 2:20, Psalm 46:6, Psalm 122:1

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Towards the end of the Old Testament, there’s a little book by the Prophet Habakkuk. I’m going to read chapter two, verse 20,

But the Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him. (Habakkuk 2:20)

If you’ve ever been in a courtroom, you might have experienced this phenomenon before the court is in session. You hear kind of a susurrous of sound as people are having all sorts of conversations. The lawyer’s speaking with their clients, family members and friends, speaking to one another. People are talking all throughout. Even the jury members might be speaking to one another. But then all of that comes to a halt at a certain moment when the door opens and the judge is ushered in, the bailiff might say, All rise. And you hear that sound like a rushing wave of water as people stand up. And then there’s silence as everyone waits to hear what the judge is going to say. Usually the next words out of the judge’s mouth are ‘you may be seated.’ And then he calls the court to order.

We hear something similar about this from the Prophet Habakkuk, who tells us that God is in court holding session. He is in his holy temple and all the earth keep silence before and we wait to hear what God is going to say. In Psalm 46, we hear that

He [the Lord] utters his voice, the earth melts. (Psalm 46:6)

How powerful is the Word of God which created the world? And that word of God, which is described by Saint John, it’s also the Son of God, Jesus, how powerful that is. And how strong God’s Word is to create miracles and how strong that word is to create faith in your heart as well. And we might wish how nice wouldn’t it be to just hear that powerful word of God? To know for certain. Here’s God’s word. Putting a period on everything we know. We can hear it and we are certain.

But the thing is, when we hear this, this word of God coming in this context, as well as a judge, we wonder what his judgment might be and when he utters that voice and the earth melts. Might I not be one of those that melts along with it because of my sin? Because of what I have done against God’s law? He has to condemn me for that. So when this court is in session, I might stand in terror before this awful judge.

But we hear in Psalm 122, the psalmist prays and says,

I was glad when they said to me, “Let us go to the house of the Lord!” (Psalm 122:1)

Why might we rejoice to go into the house of the Lord? If you look at the altar in your church, many altars are constructed this way that they are shaped and look rather like a throne on which a king or perhaps a judge might sit and hold session and announce his judgments. And we can think of ourselves that way when we come into God’s house, into the church, we are standing and sitting before that judge on his throne. But then you look at what we often have on those altars in our churches. There’s a cross or perhaps a crucifix where you see Jesus dying on the cross to pay for exactly those sins.

So when the judge comes in session before he can take a seat, he has to see that your sins are already paid for. The crime has already been punished. So when he takes that seat, the only word that he’s going to announce to you. Take heart. Your sins are forgiven. That’s certainly why we can rejoice to go into the house of the Lord. And when we go and when we keep silence to hear what God is going to say to us, we can be assured, because of His promise, He’s going to announce us forgiven and innocent and righteous, for Jesus sake.