Sunday, October 14, 2012

From My Secret Garden - Images from Habakkuk


"Awake, O north wind,
And come, O south!
Blow upon my garden, 
That it's spices my flow out."

 - Song of Solomon 4:16
 Circular garden entrance

Welcome to my innermost thoughts from reading the Bible. This is where my imagination begins...

The thoughts I'm sharing don't come from church or preaching, but I'm not trying to communicate anything negative about church or preaching. 

Habakkuk is really fun to say... I like all the strong "k" sounds kind of like that Justin Bieber song that the radio plays every other minute nowadays: "As long as you love me, we could be starving, we could be homeless, we could be broke." I wait to hear that "k" - it's amazing.

Habakkuk reads like a Psalm, full of visual pictures. 

This verse reminds me of all the Presidential debates:
"Therefore the law is powerless,
And justice never goes forth." 1:4
But let's not discuss politics especially on a post with Bible verses. *cough*

I love these descriptions of the bad guys:
"Their horses also are swifter than leopards,
And more fierce than evening wolves." 1:8
"Their faces are set like the east wind.They gather captives like sand." 1:9
I can picture it. Are evening wolves more fierce than morning wolves? They sound like it. Is the east wind immovable?  Isn't this beautiful? Like a moving force that is unstoppable.

I always love words about writing...
"Write the vision
Make it plain on tablets
That he may run who reads it." 2:3
Doesn't this feel like something important is written? That the reader will want to run and know where and how? It's goosebumpy cool.

More fun:
"The stone will cry out from the wall,
And the beam from the timbers will answer it." 2:11
The wall is talking to itself. Ha!
"The mountains... trembled;
The deep uttered its voice." 3:10
"My lips quivered at the voice;
 Rottenness entered my bones." 3:16
"He will make my feet like deer's feet,
And He will make me walk on my high hills." 3:19
There are some great visuals of God, too:
"You are of purer eyes than to behold evil." 1:13
"The LORD is in His holy temple.
Let all the earth keep silence before Him." 2:20
"He had rays flashing from His hand." 3:4
Habakkuk is very short. Three chapters and it's done. His name comes from Hebrew habaq: "embrace", meaning "one who embraces or clings".

Which visual picture do you like best?

I always love the idea of nature talking. The mountains and the "deeps" of the waters. It sounds like it is calling back and forth all around us. I love that.

River and mountain