From “What-If” Fears to the “Even-If” of Christ-Centered Faith
17 "(Even if)1 the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, 18 yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. 19 GOD, the Lord, is my strength; He makes my feet like the deer's; He makes me tread on my high places.
To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments"
— Habakkuk 3:17–18 (ESV)
Anxiety is one of the most common struggles in biblical counseling and human experience because it exposes our fragility, finitude, and deep need for a Shepherd Savior. It feeds on our fears, stirs doubt, and creates inner narratives that convince us that everything depends on us. We see this pattern traced back to Genesis 3, where doubt and the desire to “be like God” disrupted our relationship with God, self, and others. Fear and shame drove Adam and Eve into hiding, prompting God’s probing question: “Where are you?”2 Since then, self-protection, blame-shifting, addictive habits, and hiding have become familiar coping strategies. Liz Edrington wrote, “Anxiety is a signal to be curious about what your heart is trying to protect.” 3 Anxiety invites us to ask where we run, what ways we try to cover ourselves, and whom we trust when we feel fragile and powerless.
We all have an internal sense that the world is not as it was created to be. Yet rather than offering a shallow call to “stop worrying,” God invites us to bring our anxieties to Him, “because He cares.”4 God uses our anxiety to draw us into deeper honesty, dependence, and restored confidence in Him through faith in Christ and by the power of the Spirit. The prophet Habakkuk models this process amid national crisis and looming devastation. Imagining failed crops, empty stalls, and economic collapse, he nonetheless concludes, “Even if… yet I will rejoice in the LORD.” His movement from anxious questioning to settled worship offers us a picture of movement from fear to faith.
The Context of Habakkuk’s “What‑Ifs”
Let’s consider the broader context here. Habakkuk ministered during a season when God revealed that the Chaldeans (i.e. Babylonians)— a “bitter and hasty nation”—would be the instrument of judgment on Judah (Hab. 1:6-11). Standing between despair and faith, a deep tension is formed in Habakkuk: How can God be silent amid such violence and injustice, while also using a brutally sinful nation as an instrument of judgment on His own people? By chapter 3, he is imagining a barren world with no figs, vines, olives, or herds—a complete societal collapse. These were not hypothetical worries or catastrophic conspiracy theories; they were legitimate, devastating possibilities.
However, in the midst of swirling disastrous “what‑ifs,” Habakkuk pivots into a confident “Even if…” and “yet.” His deep tension isn’t resolved by comprehensive answers or promised avoidance of hardship; it is transformed through trust. Let’s look at how framing our anxiety through the lens of God’s redemptive story and work can be a turning point from imagined disasters (“What if”) to anchored hope (“Even if”).
1. Creation: The Design of Finitude
To understand anxiety, we must begin with how we’ve been created. We were designed and created as finite beings. Kelly Kapic notes that "finitude is not the result of the Fall; it is the design of the Creator".5 We were created as limited beings, meant to peacefully embrace our dependence on our glorious and wise Creator, rather than treating those limits as defects. When we refuse to accept that we are not God, the "what-ifs" of anxiety thrive.
We were created for dependence upon God and to be interdependent with one another. Anxiety is a prompting to first, remember and entrust ourselves to the truth of God’s goodness and wisdom in Creation. Dependence has everything to do with trust, which is synonymous with faith. Faith is what moves you and I, as finite creatures, towards our infinite Creator. Our “what‑ifs” begin to quiet when we remember we don’t need to know all the details or the outcomes, because we know the One who holds them and us.6 True rest begins when we admit that God is the only one who doesn't sleep, which allows us to sleep.7
2. The Fall: The Root of the “What‑If”
If Creation teaches the inherent dignity and purpose of our limits, the Fall explains our discontentment with and rebellion against those limits. Since Adam and Eve, humanity has struggled with a subtle but destructive God-complex: the belief that we should be able to control all outcomes and avoid all weakness ourselves. We begin to live like spiritual orphans when we forget or disregard the reality of God’s presence, power, and gracious love.8
The following are a few ways that anxiety can play out:
Perfectionism - In an effort to shield ourselves from feeling limited, needy, or vulnerable, perfectionism becomes a defense mechanism that attempts to control our world. Anxiety feeds off a deep fear of failure in this endeavor.
Performance – This can become our functional god because failure and powerlessness feel more threatening than God feels trustworthy, causing us to rely on achievement rather than His goodness and grace.9 Rather than being exposed as flawed, we create an "actor," a presentable version of ourselves to offer to the world and even to God.
Preoccupation – As we seek to manage life without God, we become increasingly preoccupied with anxious thoughts and concerns.10 Anxiety grows louder than trust, shaping how we see ourselves and we grow more confident in our union with Christ, our Redeemer and Refuge.
Dr. Richard Winter describes anxiety as the sound of our false functional gods failing us.11 Yet in the vulnerable, exposed place—where we finally discover we’re not in control—God often speaks most clearly and is able to show us His nearness and strength in our weakness.12 Scotty Smith once wrote, "Worry is just an 'under-believing' of the Gospel for a few moments."13 We need to see anxiety as an opportunity for the Gospel to keep reshaping our perspective and our lives. The prophet, Habakkuk, comes to grips with his “what if” fears with honest vulnerability before the Lord, which gave opportunity for God to renew him with hope beyond catastrophic forecasts.
3. Redemption: The “How Much More” of Jesus
Jesus expands Habakkuk’s framework into a firm foundation.14 He does not offer blind optimism. He offers reason, promise, and His presence to reorient our anxious hearts. When Jesus addresses anxiety in Matthew 6 and Luke 12,15 He points to birds and flowers to make a theological claim. If the Father sustains creation, how much more will He care for His children? Even if our earthly systems collapse, the Father remains faithful.
Jesus also delivers a reality check—no amount of anxious striving can add a single hour to life. He frees us from the exhausting burden of acting as the CEO of the universe. To the weary, He offers a gentle yoke—a load carried by Himself, but shared in a manner that is not burdensome.16 Where anxiety exaggerates our responsibility; Jesus restores our dependence. Therefore, when anxiety whispers, “It’s all on you,” Jesus reminds us, “You were never meant to carry it alone.”
4. Restoration: Communion, Not Control
God’s aim is not merely to calm, but to commune. Anxiety loosens its grip when our “what ifs” encounter the great “I Am.” In Gethsemane, Jesus faced the ultimate “what if” and prayed, “Nevertheless, not my will, but Yours be done.”17 Assured of the Father’s presence and power, He walked through the lonesome valley of the cross—and now walks with us through ours.
Habakkuk’s vision does not end in fear, finitude, or the limits of fallen humanity. His “Even if… yet” movement anticipates a greater deliverance, one that is fulfilled in Christ, Himself. Faith, then, is not the absence of anxious trembling, but the honest offering of it to the God who saves. In Jesus, we see that this saving God has already stepped toward us. So even when our footing feels unsure, our lives are held by Christ, not by our ability to hold ourselves together.
The answer to our “what ifs” is not found in self‑confidence or careful problem‑solving, but in a Savior who meets us in our fear, speaks peace to our worries, and bears the burdens we cannot. Jesus calls the weary and heavy‑laden to come to Him,18 that we might learn—like the Apostle Paul—that God’s grace is sufficient and His power is made perfect in our weakness.19
Habakkuk’s Thought Map: From Anxiety to Assurance
Habakkuk’s journey gives us a map for our souls, showing how faith moves through fear rather than around it. It begins with acknowledging our “What Ifs”— the imagined futures where God feels distant and everything depends on us. Anxiety feeds on this illusion of control, convincing us that vigilance is the same as trust.
Habakkuk’s “what ifs” are transformed by the “Even if” of God. Lament becomes worship when reality is spoken honestly before a faithful God. The prophet names loss and suffering without denial, but he refuses to let pain redefine God’s character. As a result, the prophet is given a sense of covenantal perspective and courage. As American poet, Karle Wilson Baker once wrote, “Courage is fear that has said its prayers.”20
Habakkuk’s “Even if… Yet” is confidence and hope rooted in the one true God who faithfully provides, secures, and sustains. His faith is made more mature and his security is no longer attached to outcomes but to his identity and belonging to the LORD. The Gospel does not remove hardship, it reframes it through who God is and what Christ has done on our behalf, securing us with lasting hope and joy, regardless of circumstances.
Habakkuk ends with confidence—not in changed circumstances, but in changed perspective and footing. God gives him “deer’s feet”—steady, sure, and formed for high places (v.19). We are not built to conquer fear by force, but to follow the Shepherd who steadies every step, and leads us in an upward ascent.
One Final Note
Habakkuk’s prayer is a song (“To the choirmaster…”)—truth meant to be rehearsed amid anxious days. Anxiety loosens its grip when God tunes our hearts to His truth. Oh Lord come, our Fount of every blessing, and tune our hearts to sing Your grace; streams of mercy never ceasing, call for songs of loudest praise!21
Footnotes
The ESV reads “Though,” but I am using “Even if” as a synonymous alternative for continuity with the focus of this blog.
See Genesis 3:1-10. Ever since the serpent in the Garden introduced doubt into the mind and heart of Adam and Eve, leading them into sinful rebellion, anxiety has plagued humankind as a real temptation and condition. An immediate effect of sin was a shameful awareness of nakedness combined with fear, which led to hiding\withdrawal from God. We also see the Creation itself eager and groaning for the coming restoration of Christ in Romans 8:19-23.
Liz Edrington, Anxiety: Finding the Better Story (New Growth Press, 2023), 14.
See 1 Peter 5:6-7; 2 Corinthians 3:4-5
Kelly M. Kapic, You're Only Human (Brazos Press, 2022), 14.
Kelly M. Kapic, Embodied Hope (IVP Academic, 2017), 182; See also Revelation 22:13.
See Psalm 127:1-2.
Paul David Tripp, A Quest for More: Living for Something Bigger than You (New Growth Press, 2007), 138.
For more on this see, Dr. Richard Winter’s book Perfecting Ourselves to Death (IVP, 2005), 112.
Dan Allender unpacks this theme more in his book, Cry of the Soul (NavPress, 2015), 144.
R. Winter, Perfecting Ourselves to Death (IVP, 2005), 112.
2 Corinthians 12:9-10
Scotty Smith, Everyday Prayers: 365 Days to a Gospel-Centered Faith (Baker Books, 2011), 88.
Jesus even says this much about Himself in Luke 6:48-49.
See Matthew 6:25-34 and Luke 12:22-32.
See Matthew 11:28-30.
Luke 22:42
Matthew 11:28
2 Corinthians 12:9-10
From a short poem titled, "Courage," written by American poet Karle Wilson Baker (1878–1960). First published in Poetrymagazine in October 1921.
Adapted from “Come Thou Fount” (Hymn #457), Trinity Hymnal, 1990 Rev. ed.
