Trinity XVI, Sunday 5th October, A sermon preached at The Charterhouse, by The Rev’d Lucy Newman Cleeve

Habakkuk 1:1–4; 2:1–4
Luke 17:5–10

“How long, O LORD? Must I call for help, but you do not listen? Or cry out to you, ‘Violence!’ but you do not save?”

 These opening words of the prophet Habakkuk were written 2,600 years ago. But they could have been spoken this week in Manchester, where worshippers gathering on Yom Kippur were attacked at their synagogue. Three dead. “How long, O LORD?”

The question echoes from Ukraine, where hundreds of thousands have died since Russia’s invasion. From Sudan, now the world’s largest humanitarian crisis. From Gaza and Israel. From Myanmar’s civil war. From Syria, from Yemen. How long must violence prevail? How long must the wicked surround the righteous?

But we might also hear them closer to home, in our own nation’s divisions, in the weariness of those who see injustice persist and public life corrode through cynicism or greed. “How long, O LORD?”

These are the questions Habakkuk asked about his own broken world. And what makes Habakkuk distinctive among the prophetic books is its structure. While prophets like Jeremiah included complaints to God alongside proclamations to Israel, Habakkuk is largely framed as dialogue between the prophet and God, ending not with proclamation, but with a prayer of worship in chapter 3. From beginning to end, we overhear an intense conversation: the prophet wrestling with God over theodicy, the question of divine justice in a violent and unjust world.

This morning I want to explore Habakkuk’s complaint and God’s response, then see how Jesus addresses the same issue when the disciples cry, “Increase our faith!” Together, these readings give us a theology of faithful living when God’s ways don’t make sense.

Habakkuk lived in Judah’s final decades, a time of injustice and idolatry, with Babylon’s threat looming. His complaint isn’t about foreign enemies but about what he sees at home: violence, corruption, a legal system that protects the wicked. The law is paralysed. Justice never prevails.

And God seems to be doing nothing about it. “Why do you make me look at injustice? Why do you tolerate wrongdoing?”

This is the cry of someone who believes deeply in God’s justice and power. Habakkuk’s faith creates his crisis. If he didn’t believe God was just, he wouldn’t be troubled by injustice. If he didn’t believe God was powerful, he wouldn’t be frustrated by God’s apparent inaction.

Lament is a form of faith, not its opposite. You don’t cry “How long?” to a void. Habakkuk’s complaint assumes God is listening, God cares, and therefore God’s silence requires explanation. The very existence of this book in Scripture validates honest questioning as legitimate prayer. Habakkuk isn’t rebuked for his complaint. God takes his questions seriously and provides an answer, though not the answer Habakkuk expected.

After his complaint, Habakkuk doesn’t storm off in anger. He writes: “I will stand at my watchpost, and station myself on the tower; I will keep watch to see what he will say to me.”

This is the discipline of faithful expectation. Lament doesn’t mean abandoning one’s post. Habakkuk continues to watch, to wait, to expect that God will speak.

God’s response comes in two movements. First, concerning the vision’s timing:

“Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so that a runner may read it. For there is still a vision for the appointed time… If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come.”

God tells Habakkuk to write the vision plainly because the community will need to remember it during difficult times. And God affirms: “There IS still a vision for the appointed time.” God has not abandoned history. Justice is coming. But it’s coming on God’s timetable, not ours.

This is one of Scripture’s hardest words: Wait. Be patient. Trust. The appointed time is coming, but we don’t control the schedule. When we see Manchester, Ukraine, Sudan, Gaza, or when we see corruption at home - we want God to act now. God says: there is an appointed time.

Second, God speaks the phrase that would echo through the ages:

“Look at the proud! Their spirit is not right in them, but the righteous live by their faith.” This single verse became one of the most influential in biblical theology. The Apostle Paul quotes it in Romans and Galatians, making it the foundation of his teaching about justification by faith. Centuries later, Martin Luther called it “the chief text of the whole Bible.”

In its original context, the verse sets up a stark contrast: the proud trust in their own power and schemes; the righteous trust in God. The Hebrew word translated “faith” is emunah, meaning both trust and faithfulness; loyal, covenant-keeping living. The righteous don’t just believe in God; they live faithfully, maintaining their trust through everything.

Notice what God does not say. God doesn’t say, “The righteous live by faith because they understand my plan” or “The righteous live by faith once I’ve explained everything.” Simply: “The righteous live by faith”- full stop.

 So God’s answer to “How long?” is essentially: “As long as it takes. There is an appointed time. The vision will surely come. But meanwhile, here’s how you survive: by faith.”

 Centuries later, the same struggle reappears when the disciples cry, “Lord, increase our faith!”

Jesus has just taught about radical forgiveness, forgiving someone seven times in one day. The apostles respond: “We don’t have enough faith for this. Give us more.”

 This is deeply human. Faced with the kingdom’s demanding ethics - loving enemies, forgiving repeatedly, trusting God when violence strikes - we feel inadequate. We think, “I need more faith.”

But Jesus reframes the question: “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.”

 The mustard seed was the smallest of seeds. Jesus uses hyperbole to make his point: the issue isn’t the quantity of faith but its reality. Even the smallest faith, if it’s real, is sufficient because it connects us to God’s infinite power. Faith is not something we generate more of through willpower. It is God’s gift, a response to divine grace.

 Then Jesus tells a parable: a servant works all day in the field, then prepares the master’s meal. The master doesn’t thank the servant for doing what was commanded. Jesus applies it: “When you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, ‘We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!’”

 The parable breaks our illusion that faithfulness puts God in our debt. Our obedience is not leverage; it’s simply the fitting response to who God is.

 This connects directly back to Habakkuk: “The righteous live by faith,” not “in order to obligate God” or “once we understand everything.” Just: “The righteous live by faith.”

 So what does this mean for us?

 It means we can bring our honest questions and frustrations to God. To continue to ask, “How long, O LORD?” about Manchester, about Ukraine, about Gaza and Sudan, about the moral weariness of our own public life. Habakkuk shows us that lament is legitimate prayer. To cry “How long?” isn’t weak faith, but faith that still turns toward the One who has already turned toward us in love.

 It means trusting not in our capacity to believe, but in God’s faithfulness already revealed. We are not left to conjure trust out of thin air. The cross stands as the once-for-all assurance that God’s love endures every silence, every sorrow, every human cruelty. Faith is our response to that love - a trust that rests on what has already been given.

 It means faithful service without demanding explanations. We pray for peace, support relief work, model reconciliation in our divided communities, refuse to let hatred win - not because we understand how it all fits together, but because it’s the appropriate response to who God is. The servant in Jesus’ parable didn’t need to comprehend the master’s entire strategy before ploughing the field. We don’t need to see the whole plan before we act faithfully.

 And it requires mustard-seed faith maintained daily. Not extraordinary faith, just small, persistent trust that responds to love already proved. Perhaps your faith feels smaller than it once did, less a bonfire than a flickering candle. Yet even that is enough, because what matters is not the strength of our faith, but the strength of the One in whom we trust. The same Christ who stretched out arms on the cross holds us still; divine faithfulness makes our faith possible.

 Notice too that God tells Habakkuk to write the vision for the community, not just for himself. We need each other in the life of faith. When one person’s faith wavers, others hold the vision steady. When the waiting seems unbearable, the community reminds us of God’s appointed time. When violence strikes in Manchester, we stand together. The church is meant to be a “Habakkuk community,” a people who bring honest lament, hold fast to God’s promises, and live by faith together whilst the vision tarries.

We also glimpse, beyond today’s reading, how Habakkuk’s faith is renewed. The book that began with a cry of protest ends with a song of praise. It is in worship that his faith finds its footing again. Nothing in his circumstances has changed, but in turning toward God in praise, his lament is transformed. Worship does not erase the pain, but it reframes it. It anchors faith not in outcomes but in the character of God, whose steadfast love has already been proved. So when we gather to pray, to sing, to share bread and wine, we too are shaped in that same pattern: our faith fed by worship, our trust strengthened by grace.

 Habakkuk’s book ends with extraordinary words:

 “Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines,
though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food,
though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the LORD,
I will be joyful in God my Saviour.”

 That is what it means to live by faith: not because we see the outcome, not because the headlines are good, not because we understand, but because God is faithful.

 This is the faith Jesus calls us to: mustard-seed trust, service without bargaining, worship and perseverance while the vision tarries.

 The vision has an appointed time. It will surely come. It will not prove false. Meanwhile, the righteous live by faith.

 Thanks be to God.

Amen.