我们看到神的作为其中一个最令人感到惊讶的特点，就是祂有时会使用最奇怪的工具来管教祂的百姓。这事实不单在哈巴谷的生命中出现，它也显明在人类的整个历史里面。所以我们不能不注意，祂也许会在我们的生命中做类似的工作。

让我们一起来思考一下教会当前的境况。虽然某些国家或某些地区有属灵复兴的证据，但总的来说，教会一般的情况都很糟糕，它们呆滞、怠惰、缺乏祷告、不悔改并且抗拒圣灵的管治。

神可以做些甚么让教会能符合祂的旨意呢？唔，神可以做的事情很多，但是最能够令教会留意祂的其中一个方法，就是容许教会受到敌对力量的压迫。这说法听起来令人难过，可是教会确实是在奋力作战的时候，才能够处于最好的状态。

我们现在要问一个较为深入和尖锐的问题：如果神认为需要借着敌对力量压迫教会，来作为对教会的管教，那么神会采用甚么管道？无神论的共产主义是其中的一个可能；人本主义是另一个可能。不过现在世界上最敌对基督教的力量是伊斯兰教。我不是先知，但是我认为除非教会愿意迅速悔改，否则伊斯兰教也许便是主用以教导祂的百姓的其中一种工具。

We are seeing that one of the surprising features of God's ways with us is that He sometimes uses the strangest instruments to discipline His people. This is a fact which is illustrated not just in the life and times of Habakkuk but throughout the whole of history. And we must not miss the point that He might well be doing the same in our own day and age.

Consider with me for a moment the state of the Church right now. Though there are evidences of spiritual advance in certain quarters and in certain countries, generally speaking, the Church is in a bad way. It is lethargic, indolent, prayerless, unrepentant and resistant to the Holy Spirit's control.

What can God do to bring it to the place of conformity to His will? Well, He can do many things, but one sure way of getting the Church's attention is to allow it to come under pressure from hostile forces. It is a sad admission to have to make, but the Church has always been at its best when fighting with its back to the wall.

We must now ask ourselves this piercing and pointed question: If God saw it necessary to discipline His Church by allowing hostile forces to put it under pressure, what could He use? Atheistic communism could be one possibility; humanism another. But one of the most hostile forces to Christianity in the world at the moment is that of Islam. I am not a prophet, but I suspect that this is one of the instruments the Lord will use to refine His people unless the Church moves quickly to repentance.