The Book of Micah, Part 4

Today we want to conclude a series I've been going through on the book of Micah. Today I use the Bible Knowledge Commentary, the Expositor's Bible Commentary, as well as the Life Application Commentary for background research for the sermon. Just a very brief review. We've gone through this the last number of times. Just the briefest of reviews. Micah was a contemporary with Isaiah and Amos. Hosea. Micah lived at a time when Israel and Judah were about as wealthy and influential as they were under the times of Solomon.

Of course, during the times of Solomon, they were at their zenith. They weren't quite there, but they were close to being there. It was a time of great richness for both countries, military soundness for both countries. But as good as they were doing, both militarily and economically, they were doing just that bad in terms of their morals. The country was strong externally, but very weak, actually decaying internally in terms of the social fabric of the country, in terms of their not following God, following other false gods, in terms of their moral standing.

It was also at this time that Assyria, which was basically kind of a neutral in terms of where their power was, is now really growing in their power. They're flexing their muscles. They're starting to use their power in the region. And of course, Micah is going to live at the time when the northern kingdom goes into national captivity. His nation, he was from the Jerusalem area, south of Jerusalem, but his nation Judah would not be going into slavery for some time. But during Micah's life, as he was proclaiming the truth of God and his prophecies, Assyria was coming up against Israel, also came up against Judah. They took 46 cities in Judah as trophies.

One of the cities they took in Judah was Micah's hometown. Micah very much felt the pain of what was happening in the northern kingdom and certainly in the southern kingdom when they took his own city as a prize. The book is divided roughly into three parts. The first prophecy, or the first oracle, is chapters 1 and 2. And those chapters, Micah deals very solidly with the sins of the leadership of the nation. In the second oracle, or the second prophecy, the second section, which would be chapters 3, 4, and 5, chapter 3, you have more about the sins of the leaders of the nation.

And chapters 4 and 5, though, very much talks about the coming kingdom of God. What you see in chapters 4 and 5, as opposed to chapters 1, 2, and 3, is very typical for Micah, because even when he's talking about the good things that will be happening in the kingdom, he always wants to strongly contrast that with the evils of the day. And he does that when he's talking about the evils.

He'll talk about the good that's coming, when he's talking about the good that's coming, he'll contrast that with the present evils. And so he does that continually throughout the whole of his book. We see a lot of that in the second portion. The third portion is chapters 6 and 7, the third oracle, or the third prophecy. Basically, in chapter 6, which we covered last time, God sets himself in kind of a courtroom setting.

He asks the hills, the mountains, the work of his hands to be witnesses, that he's been a good father to Israel and Judah. And he basically asks the rhetorical question, what more could I have done? What more could I have done than have been a loving father to all of you? Of course, there's nothing more he could have done. The problem was not God, the problem was the people.

Okay, that brings us now to chapter 7. So if you're not there yet, let's turn to Micah chapter 7. Once again, in Micah 7, we're going to see a tremendous contrast. The first part of the chapter, there's going to be a lot of negativism. But the last three verses, verses 18, 19, and 20, they are some of the most encouraging words in all of the Bible. And we're going to take that and spend a great deal of time on those last three verses. So not as much time on the previous verses, but we'll go through those verse by verse. But I really want to spend some time at the very end.

Okay? Okay, let's take a look at chapter 7 in Micah verses 1 and 2. Woe is me, for I am like those who gather summer fruits, like those who glean vintage grapes. There is no cluster to eat of the first ripe fruit which my soul desires. The faithful man is perished from the earth, and there is no one upright among men. They all lie and wait for blood. Every man hunts his brother with a net. Micah uses an analogy here dealing with fruit. The analogy, the fruit represents godly people.

And basically what Micah is saying here is, you know, he longs for fellowship with people of God. People who believe in God, people who follow God's way of life, people who make that a part of their life. He feels barren of that. He just can't get that. Times are so bad. Now, you and I need to think about this because we are living at a time where we may well feel the very same way in a few years.

Right now we've got one another, but who knows what will happen down the road. We do know that prophetically this nation is going to get very cold. We do know that persecution is coming our way. A lot of negative things are coming our way. And we are going to just long for the time. It's like we have right now. These are the good days. These are the good days when we can come to services, we have fellowship after services, we've got food, we talk, we enjoy one another. But there may well come the day that we have to meet in secret and maybe meet different places from week to week, making phone calls among ourselves as to where we are meeting because of persecution.

So let's understand this. As I was remarking earlier today over in Ann Arbor, here you've got Micah and he's talking about how he wished he had spiritual fellowship. Just last week I was watching a TV show. It was supposed to talk about Noah and the flood. It was a two-parter.

Each segment was 90 minutes. John Voight, which was interesting, John Voight played Noah. So if you can, you know who John Voight is. If you can picture him playing Noah, that was kind of wild all to itself. But at the very beginning of the movie he said, now we've changed some things for dramatic license. I said, oh, now this is good.

Now what are they going to change here in the story of Noah and the Ark? Right off the bat I thought, this is wild. I mean, the production was really class B or class C. It was not a good production, but it was just almost comical because you got Noah living in Sodom and his best friend is a guy named Lot. Lot is an awful character in this movie. He's a liar and he's a bragger and he's not a good person in this movie.

But you've got God telling Noah that he's going to destroy the world and then the next thing you know God is saying, well, you know, maybe I shouldn't kill everybody. And he says, Noah, if you can give me 50 good men or 50 good people, I'm taking myself, well, I got that wrong, and they've got, you know, Abraham had that call with talk with God, not Noah, and Abraham initiated the conversation with God, not the other way around. Over and over throughout the course of the movie, of course, they were showing the three sons of Noah, and our belief is that all three of those sons represented three different races and that's why we have our human family the way we have it today.

But in the movie, all three guys were white guys. Well, that doesn't ring true either. And then, of course, when you're having these biblical movies, you've got to have biblical names. So I forget what the one wife's name, but the other two wives were named Esther and Ruth. So, you know, when you're ever having these religious shows, you've got to have Noah, and you've got to have Lot, and you've got to have Esther and Ruth, and we'll just kind of stack them all together here.

But, you know, we live in an age where your average American can't name the first four books of the New Testament. They can't name the four Gospels. They may not even know there are four Gospels. If you were to ask them how many Gospel writers were either, they may not even know there were four. That's how bad it is.

And so, obviously, it's going to get worse and worse and worse, and here you've got Micah talking about how he longs for fellowship. I would just say, brethren, as we're looking at verse 1 and 2, we need to make sure that our fellowship is primarily with God the Father and Jesus Christ. If there's nothing else the book of Micah teaches us, and we'll see it more as we go through chapter 7, is that people can't always be relied upon.

We are we, we are fallible, even the best among us. And we're going to see that in just a few moments here. But we can always rely upon God. We can always rely upon Jesus Christ. We can always have that relationship with them, and we need to make sure that we are there. Put a marker here. Let's go to something we quoted last week, but I want to quote it again. It's so important.

Ezekiel 14, where it says, verse 12, The word of the Lord came to me, saying, Son, a man, when a land sins against me by persistent unfaithfulness. Now, is our land in persistent unfaithfulness?

Yes, it is. I mean, we've got marriage ceremonies now that are standard marriage ceremonies. When it doesn't refer to husband and wife, it refers to partner number one and partner number two. When a land sins against me by persistent unfaithfulness, I will stretch out my hand against it. I will cough a supply of breads and famine on it, cut off man and beast from it.

Even if these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they would deliver only themselves by their righteousness, says the Lord God. No coattails here. We don't get into God's kingdom because of mom or dad or brother or sister or who we know in church or our pastor or the deacon or the deaconess or anybody that we know. We don't get into church because we come to church or because we go to the feast or because we write a tithe check.

These three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were considered the three most righteous men who ever lived, obviously apart from Jesus Christ. He was perfect. Among the rest of us, these three men were very righteous. But it doesn't say their wives get in by Noah's faithfulness or their children or anybody else. And so we have to have a relationship with God that is strong and fellowship with God that is strong. Four times in Ezekiel 14, this idea is conveyed. That it's only by the righteousness that we have that our righteousness is through God. Let's make sure we understand that.

Pull yourself up by your bootstraps. But we can't get in just because we know somebody. We have to have a personal relationship with God the Father and Jesus Christ. We go back now to Micah. Micah 7, verse 3. But they may successfully do evil with both hands. Here it shows the way society has gotten where it's not good enough just to do evil with one hand.

We really need to get into it. Evil with both hands. The prince asks for gifts, talking about our political leaders. The judge seeks for a bribe, talking about the judiciary. And the great man utters evil desires. So they scheme together. We've got the various elements of society. Various levels of society.

All of it is trashy. All of it is evil. Of course, this is referring to the leadership of society. This is very much going to be the case at the end of the age. Prophecies dual. Verse 4. The best of them is like a brier. The most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge. The Bible talks about, as in the days of Noah, and we understand what those days represent, when people couldn't think of a decent thought, that times are going to be even worse.

When the best of them is like a brier. When the most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge. The day of your watchman and your punishment comes. Now that phrase, the day of your watchman and your punishment comes, and now shall be their perplexity, that's talking about how God gives people a lot of rope. He gives people a lot of opportunity for repentance. But then there comes a time when God is going to act.

And we see here, this is the time where not only did Israel go into national captivity, but so will our peoples. Verse 5 and 6. Again, he's escalating as we're going through the narrative here. Do not trust in a friend. Do not put your confidence in a companion.

Guard the doors of your mouth from her who lies in your bosom. For son dishonors father, daughter rises against her mother, daughter-in-law against mother-in-law, a man's enemies are the men of his own household. Brethren, Jesus Christ talked about this himself in Matthew 10 and Luke 12. In other words, so thoroughly is a general witness of society that your closest personal friend, you're going to look at with the question mark on your eye.

People who are of your own blood, your own family, you're going to wonder, where are they? Will they turn me into the authorities because I keep the Sabbath and I honor God and those sorts of things? You know, you talk about a dog-eat-dog society. So here we see tremendous negativism in terms of what the future holds. But, because Micah likes the contrast in verses 7, 8, and 9, he begins to discuss some things that the righteous should take great encouragement in.

All news is not bleak. All is not black. Verse 7, Therefore I will look to the LORD, I will wait for the God of my salvation, my God will hear me. Now let's break that verse down into three parts. Part A, part B, part C. Part A, Therefore I will look to the LORD. So here we see that regardless of people in society, the princes, the judges, the great people, trusted friends, confidence, confidants, relatives, we can always look to God. And again, Micah can't stress this enough in how this is a positive. How this is a positive.

He says, I will look to the LORD. And when we're looking, we're looking carefully. We're looking at everything that God does. We meditate on what He does. We think on what He does. We want to emulate and follow what God does. Paul talked about imitate me as I imitate Christ. This is what we're looking at here in this section of Scripture.

Let her be here. I will wait for the God of my salvation. That's area B that I want to discuss here in this verse. Micah realized God has to be waited upon. God has His own timetable. You and I, we've got our timetables. There are things we want to have done. God hears the way it is. On this date, on that time schedule, I want to be healed. I want to have this job. I want to have this, that, the other thing. But God has His own timetable. He says here, I will wait for the God of my salvation. So He realizes that waiting is something that we as Christians, that we as the people of God need to do, and that God will be our salvation.

Now, that doesn't mean that whatever trial we happen to be in, that we are waiting for God on, that it will just disappear. Sometimes we're not rescued from our trials, we're rescued in and during our trials. Some of the greatest men and women of God who have ever lived had to experience that. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were thrown into the fiery furnace. The furnaces didn't quit working. When they showed they were going to be true to God no matter what, the furnaces didn't break down and the guys, well, we've got to call Sears.

The furnace broke down. It's not working anymore. No. They were thrown in. But when they were thrown in, what did Nebuchadnezzar say? He said, you know, we threw three guys in there. I see four walking around. This is an example of somebody, of a trial that God walks through that trial with you.

Daniel. He was thrown into the lion's den. It wasn't like, well, the lions are all dead now. No, he was thrown in. As he was walking up to that pit, he had the opportunity of recanting or doing whatever. He walked right up and looked inside. There we go. Nothing happens.

God many times will take us right to the brink. The Bible talks about how, you know, no temptation will overtake us. It's greater than we can bear.

1 Corinthians 10, 13. But what does that mean? Well, that means it's nothing's going to overtake us that we have God help us with. But if we don't allow God to help us, yes, we can be broken by various trials in life. And sometimes you hear Christians say, well, I did all this and I just couldn't stand it. God said he was going to be there for many years. And, well, God was there.

But this person didn't reach out his hand and ask for God. They were trying to put everything on their own shoulders. And the reason they snapped is because they were trying to handle the load on their own and they snapped. They couldn't handle the load. We'll talk more about that a little bit as well. But it says here, I will wait for the God of my salvation.

The Apostle Paul asked three times to be healed. He wasn't healed.

You've got the people there in Hebrews 11. Isaiah was sawn in half. You've got people who had to wander around in ghost skins and fur skins. They were living in caves. Why? Because they were dispossessed from their homes. They faced financial ruin. God didn't take all that away from them. No, they had to go and live through all that. They were being delivered in their trials.

So here's something that Micah really understands. I will wait for the God of my salvation.

And only God knows the timetable you personally are on. Sometimes, brethren, in my life, I know that sometimes I'm just really dense. God's got to run things through me and pass me and around me and on top of me until I find, oh yeah, that's what he's trying to help me see.

But then I see it and then things start to ease off when I finally see it and then respond positively. Okay, here's what I see this. Now, here's what I need to do. Part A is seeing it. Part B is, okay, you want me to respond in a certain way. Not just respond in any old way, but in a certain way. Okay, fine. I'll do that. And let her see here in verse 7 is, my God will hear me. Sometimes I think God's not hearing our prayers because all these things that are troubling us don't just vanish away. Well, we've already discussed the things that help the people of God have had to go walk day by day, moment by moment, with, you know, hand in hand with God. And that's what we're seeing here in verse 7. My God will hear me. He will be there for me. I have to be there with Him. I have to allow Him to carry me. I've got to allow Him to take care of me. I've got to be humble enough to know what's going on there. Okay, let's move on here in chapter 7, verse 8. Do not rejoice over me, my enemy. When I fall, I will arise. Now, we're going to see again this contrast here a lot in verse 8. When I sit in darkness, the Lord will be a light to me. So, during the trials we go through, and we're going to go through quite a few, God says, I will be there now. You're going to go through some hard times. Let's add verse 9 to this. I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against Him until He pleads my case and executes justice for me. He will bring me forth to the light, and I will see His righteousness. Now, when you take verse 8 and 9 together, what you're seeing is a lot of, like, what Israel went through prior to leading Egypt. Israel had to experience the first three plagues. They thought they wanted out of slavery. You would have asked any Israel, oh yeah, for sure, we want out of slavery.

But their hearts were still into Egypt. They didn't want to be slaves, but the idea of leading Egypt and things that were comfortable, you know, a food supply and some of these other things, they weren't quite sure that they wanted to take that step. So, God had to allow Israel to go through the first three of those ten plagues. When this nation is going down and collapsing, as this nation starts hearing and experiencing things, you know, the famines, the droughts, and so forth, I read this and I see, we're going to go through that too. We're not going to get a free pass. We're going to understand the plight of this nation, and that's going to help us. That's going to tenderize our hearts as we see our neighbors, our family members, people at work, people who we value. We see them going through things and we'll be going through some of the same things. That will be good for us. But notice it also says, when those things, those hard times are coming, it says, verse 8, I will arise. God will be a light to me. So, yes, I will arise in a resurrection. I will be a being of light at the time of the resurrection. Yes, I have sinned. So, nothing wrong with me having a little bit of what's happening to this nation. I've sinned too.

Basically, it's the thought here. Mike is saying about himself, and it's certainly true for us. We're not, none of us in this room are perfect. We deserve some chastising. We're going to get our chastising. But then it says, he will bring forth to the light. I will see his righteousness. We'll be resurrected. So, we want to take all these things under careful consideration about what's going to happen to this nation in the future. Verse 10, we believe, is talking about false church, false churches. Verse 10, Micah 7, 10. Then she who is my enemy will see, and shame will cover her, who says to me, Where is the Lord your God? My eyes will see her, and now she will be trampled down like mud in the streets. You know, the word she is indicative there of something, and many times in the Bible, a she is a church. Of course, we're thinking we know that there's going to come a time we see in Revelation, where Revelation says that those false churches will come and worship before us. Not worship in a sense of worshiping God, but worship in a sense that they will acknowledge that we were right in terms of what we believed. Sabbath-keeping was right. Taifeng is right. The holy days are right. They were wrong. Keeping Sunday and all those things were wrong. And so they are going to be deeply humbled by that. Verses 11 through 15. I'm not going to spend a lot of time here, because these verses talk again about the second great captivity and the second great exodus. Again, I've spent enough time with that when I went through Isaiah and so far in this book. Let's just kind of read through this. In the day when your walls are about to be built, in that day the decree shall go far and wide, and that they shall come to you from Assyria, from fortified cities, from the fortress to the river, from sea to sea, mountain to mountain. So again, we're talking about peoples coming out of captivity. Yet the land shall be desolate. Verse 13, the reason the land is desolate is because this land will have gone through a warfare, because those who dwell on it and for the fruit of their deeds shepherd your people with your staff, the flock of your heritage who dwells solitarily in a woodland, in the midst of Carmel, Lotham, Feen, and Bayshen, and Gilead is in the days of old. So better times are coming. Verse 15, as in the days when you came up out of the land in Egypt, I will show them wonders.

And so we're talking here about a time of a second exodus. Now, I want to quote something to you.

This is from Expositor's Bible commentary. Expositor's is one of the best that you can get.

If you ever get your hands on a set, I've got a set on my shelf at home, and I've got it also on my computer. Even these people understand a second exodus is coming. Now, they don't know geographically where this is going to be taking place, and when they think of Israel in a second exodus, they're thinking about people over in the Mediterranean nation state of Israel. So they don't know who Israel is, but they know a second exodus is going to take place in the future. Listen to this, and I'm quoting now from Expositor's. The exodus would occur again, but in a new and even greater way. To the prophets, the exodus was an event of more historical interest, of more than historical interest. It revealed such attributes of God as his might, his sovereignty over the nations, his love for his own people. Because God is unchanging in his attributes, timeless as people could expect his acts to be repeated again and again in history. For this reason, Hosea could view the impending captivity as a repetition of the Egyptian bondage. They quote here Hosea chapter 9 and Hosea chapter 11. So they see in that chapter, remember Hosea and Micah are contemporaries, they see that second exodus that Hosea talks about is happening in our day-to-day. Interesting, isn't it? And the exodus is a pattern of their release from impending captivity, and he quotes the section of Micah. They quote the section of Micah. So even people in the world see this. But we've been teaching this for generations. Okay, Micah chapter 7 verses 16 and 17. Again, I want to spend quite a bit of time in the last three verses here. The nations shall see and be ashamed of all of their might, that they shall put their hand over their mouth, their ears shall be deaf, they shall lick the dust like a serpent, they shall crawl away from their holes, crawl from their holes like snakes of the earth. Now, we understand from the book of Revelation, we've covered this on a number of occasions over the years, how the nations are going to line up to fight Christ at his return. And Christ, when he returns, is going to humble the nations. He's going to subdue the nations. And that's what verses 16 and 17 is talking about. Now, in ending this book, Micah wants to end. He knows that he's used a lot of negativism, or maybe that's not the proper way of phrasing that. He's talked about these prophecies that are really dire, really black, really dark, really dark prophecies. But he wants to end in a very positive tone in the last three verses.

And in these last three verses, we see six major positive things that Isaiah wants his listeners to get from what he's writing here. Let's take, let me read through verses 18, 19, and 20. And I'll enumerate these six points as we go through. Then I want to spend time and actually tear these verses apart and look at what's being said, because it's very, very positive, very uplifting. Okay, Micah 7, verse 18, who is a god like you? Okay, number one, pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of his heritage. So that's part number one. Point number one, stolen at same verse, verse 18, number two, point two, he does not retain his anger forever.

That's the second point. And before we finish verse 18, there's a third point, because he delights in mercy. So three positive points about God in relation to his people in verse 18. He's going to pardon their iniquity. He's not going to, number one, number two, he's not going to retain his anger. And number three, he delights in mercy. Verse four, we see two more points. I mean, verse 19, we see two more points. At the very beginning of the verse, he will again have compassion on us. That's point number four. God is going to be compassionate. Number five, he will subdue our iniquities and cast all of our sins into the depths of the sea. So here we're seeing to make it a vital point where God is going to deal with our sins. That was the very first point he made. He's going to pardon iniquity. But since this is so much on the minds of the people, and since sin and iniquity have robbed us of the beauties of the things of God, you know, we can't really enjoy the beauties and the things of God until sin is dealt with. And so twice here for emphasis, this point is made. Last part of verse nine, he will subdue our iniquities, cast our sins into the depths of the sea. Beautiful symbolism there. And then verse 20 is that sixth point about the whole verse. You will give truth to Jacob and mercy to Abraham, which you have sworn to our father some days of old. So that sixth point is God is going to be true to the covenant that he made with the fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And for all of us in this room, this should mean a great deal. A great deal. Okay, now from this point on, I'm not going to turn to Micah anymore, but let's turn to Psalm 103. And I would advise you, since we will be coming in and out of this psalm on a number of occasions in the next few minutes, you might want to put a marker here in Psalm 103. From now on, I'll just refer, I'll read to you what was back there in Micah as we go through the six points. But let's take a look at this first point. Point number one was that God will pardon our iniquities, passing over the transgressions. We understand this idea of Passover, don't we? Once a year, we've got the Passover. Once a year, we talk about our sins being pardoned. Of course, we know that every time you and I repent of a sin, God pardons it and forgives it right there and then in the spot. But Passover is symbolic of the fact of, you know, we as a people have accepted the shed blood and the body of Jesus Christ, and that we have the attitude of washing feet. But notice here this idea of sin being forgiven. Psalm 103, it's a psalm of David. It's a powerful psalm of David. Psalm 103, verse 1, Bless the Lord, O my soul, and bless all that is within me. Bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all of his benefits. What does he list as the very first benefit? Who forgives all, not some, but who forgives all your iniquities, who heals all your diseases.

It is sin that robs us from a relationship with God that we need to have. Whenever we're sinning, we're walking, we're taking steps away from God. Whenever we're sinning, we rob ourselves from the blessings God can give us until we stop sinning, then God can bless us. So getting rid of sin is something that needs to be done so we can be blessed. And God says, I want to bless my people.

Get rid of the sin, and he certainly will forgive so that that sin can be gotten rid of, and we can go forward and have great lives. Isaiah chapter 1, put a marker there, Psalm 103. Let's go to the book of Isaiah. Isaiah chapter 1.

Isaiah chapter 1, we're going to go with verses 16, 17, and 18. Verses 16 and 17 help set up verse 18, and I want to spend some time in verse 18. But let's take a look at verse 16 and 17. You know, God is always willing to forgive.

But God wants his people before forgiveness is extended. God has got to grant us repentance, and we have to repent. Before God can forgive, we must repent. And notice what verse 16 and 17 says, Wash yourselves. Make yourselves clean. Put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes. Cease to do evil. Learn to do good. Seek justice. Rebuke the oppressor. Defend the followers. Plead for the widow. So basically in verse 16 and 17, there are certain things we need to stop doing. It's like the days of unleavened bread. We need to get the love and out of our lives and allow God's righteousness to come into our lives. So we see that here in verses 16 and 17. We're in partnership with God. We can't do this on our own. It's not our righteousness, it's God's righteousness. God has to open our hearts and minds for repentance. We've got to accept that repentance.

But then, as free moral agents, we've got to actually put the, you know, like I've used the analogy where it's like driving a car. You've got to, if you want to move forward, you've got to put it in gear. Now notice verse 18. Come now and let us reason together, says the Lord, though your sins are like scarlet. We're going to talk for a little bit about scarlet. I'll get to that in just a moment. Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

I want to read to you from a couple of commentaries here that I think really capture the essence of what Isaiah is trying to get across. The first is a section from the James and Thossel and Brown commentary. I'm quoting, Though your sins be a scarlet. In JFB note that the color of Jesus Christ's robe when he was bearing our sins, as you see in Matthew 27-28, the color of his robe was scarlet. Right? Rahab, when she was helping the spies, she used a thread, a piece of cloth, a ribbon of some type, and that was also scarlet. When a leper, that's in Joshua chapter 2, when a leper came for cleansing, a leper had to bring something that was scarlet. We see that in Leviticus chapter 14. So this whole concept of scarlet shows the wholeness of sin. We see it in the sacrifice of Christ. We see it in the life that Rahab used to live before God was converting her. We see it in the fact of the leper. And for our sermonette, fellas, you might want to someday give a sermonette the analogy between sin and leprosy. Leprosy goes into the flesh. It is of the flesh. It goes deep into the flesh. It's the sin that goes deep into us. Leprosy destroys and distorts and decays. Sin does the same thing. But just as leprosy can be healed, sin can be dealt with as well.

And so we see these analogies. But this is something that I was reading here in James in Folsom and Brown. I had not heard before. I just want to, for what it's worth, read this to you.

The rabbis say that when they took the scapegoat, they put this scarlet ribbon on the scapegoat.

They took the scapegoat into the wilderness. They confessed the people's sin on the scapegoat.

And after the prayer was done, the rabbis say the scarlet ribbon turned white.

Oh, I'm not making this up. This is from James in Folsom and Brown. And that happened every year that they did that until the year Jesus Christ was crucified. And then that stopped taking place.

According to James in Folsom and Brown quoting the rabbis. Now, I don't know. I wasn't there to watch that, but I thought it was interesting. But if that did take place, that when Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ became our sin. He became scarlet in that nature for us.

Now, going on with this idea about scarlet from Barnes notes, another notable commentary.

Barnes says, there's another idea here, talking about scarlet. This was a fast or a fixed color. Neither dune or rain or washing or long usage would remove it. And so it was used to represent the fixedness and the permanency of sin in the heart. No human means will wash them out. No effort of man, no external rights, no tears, no sacrifices, no prayers are of themselves sufficient to take them away. They are deeply fixed in a heart as the scarlet color was in the web of cloth. And an almighty power is an evil to remove them. God's power removes sin. Yes, we do pray, but we pray in the power of God and with the power of God and with God's Holy Spirit.

So the idea here in verse 18, that their sins are like scarlet, deep. This is not some pastel color. This is deeply embedded. And yet, even though it's deeply embedded, it can become as white as snow, like wool. This powerful analogy there when God writes the scriptures. I think it's good for us to understand some of the powerful analogy that is there.

Let's move on to point number two. Point number one is the pardoning of iniquity.

The second in Micah 7, verse 18, it says, he does not retain his anger forever. That's point number two. God doesn't retain his anger forever. Now with that in mind, let's go back to Isaiah Psalm 103. Go back to Psalm 103. Psalm 103, verse 8 and 9, where it says, the Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. He will not always strive with us, nor will he keep his anger forever. Aren't you and I glad that God is not man? Mankind, we hold grudges.

We can hold grudges for a long time. God doesn't hold grudges. He wants his people to be better than that, so he sets a good example for us. He doesn't hold grudges. He will not retain his anger forever. It's just like when you had your kids, those of us who are parents, or I guess any of us in this room who deal with children, there are times when children need to be disciplined, and we have various means of disciplining children. We can spank them. We can deny them privileges or whatever. But after they know they have been disciplined and they are crying, what do we do? We take them up into our arms. We hug them. We let them know how much we love them. The same idea with God. You know, God is upset with our sin. He's angry with our sin. But when we repent, it says he's not going to strive with us. He's not going to keep his anger forever. There's no point in that. He wants to show us how much he loves us. Hosea 14. After the book of Daniel, you've got the beginning of the minor prophets, and Hosea is the first one. Hosea 14 and verse 4.

Hosea 14.4. Remember, Hosea is a contemporary of Micah. They were preaching about the same time.

Hosea 14.4. I will heal their backsliding. I will love them freely, for my anger has turned away from him. I will love them freely.

I'd like to read you what it says from the Adam Clark commentary on this section of scripture, this particular phrase, I will love them freely. Adam Clark says this, I will love them so as to do them incessant good. It shall not be a love of affection merely, but it shall be a beneficial love. A love that not only feels delight in itself, but fills them with delight where it's objects, by making them unutterably and supremely happy.

I don't know about you. That sounds good to me. Would you like to be unutterably and supremely happy right now? I think I can be dished a little bit of that. I think I could thrive with some of that right now, if God wants to give that to me right now. But, you know, in the future, people will all begin as a millennium, the last great day.

We move on to the third point that is made. This is chapter 7 of Micah, verse 18, the very last part of verse 18. It says, because God delights in mercy. That's point number three. God delights in mercy. Number one is, he pardons our sins. Number two, he's not going to stay angry forever.

Number three, he loves to show mercy. We go back to Psalm 103. Again, this is a tremendous psalm for us to study. Psalm 103, verses 10 through 12. Psalm 103, verse 10, he has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor punished us according to our iniquities.

It would be a pretty empty room here if God did that. I would not be speaking to you, and you would not be hearing somebody speak to you. We would all be out of here. We'd all be little briquettes, and we would be beamed away someplace. No, God has not dealt with us according to our sins. If he did, we'd all be dead. For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward those who fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far as he removed our transgressions from us. And here you've got the concept, the idea, that our God is an eternal God. Our sins have been cast out into eternity. As far as the east is from the west, it's like opposite ends of infinity. You've got this line that goes out in either direction into infinity, and our sins are the other end of the line, from where we're at.

And so, you know, this idea that God is a God who forgives sin, a God who won't retain his anger. He's a God who will deal with our iniquities, and he will show tremendous mercy to us.

Okay, now we move to verse 19 of Micah 7. Beginning of verse 19, this is the fourth thing. He will again have compassion on us. He will again have compassion on us. We're here in Psalm 103. Let's stay in Psalm 103. Let's look at verse 4 of Psalm 103. Verse 4, who redeems your life from destruction, who crowns you with loving kindness and tender mercies, who crowns you with loving kindness and tender mercies.

I think we all enjoy those thoughts when we hear them.

Loving kindness from God, tender mercies from God. We drop down. Verse 13. As a father, pitys his children, so the Lord pity those who fear him.

Now, brethren, God knows that we're clay. He knows what we're made of.

I don't know how many of you, when you were growing up, I know as I was coming through school, we would have, especially in the early stages of elementary school, kindergarten, first grade, we would have a teacher would come in and we would do these various projects.

Sometimes there were vocal things we would do, and sometimes there were artsy things we would do. I always enjoyed the artsy things. I'm not terribly artsy, but I enjoyed them.

So many times they would bring in modeling clay, and they would ask us to make some sort of a pot or something. And of course, I enjoyed that. It wasn't regular schoolwork, which I hated at that point in my life. So any time we could get the teacher talking about, let's not do book work, let's do something with our hands, I was all for that. And we would make these little dishes or things. And of course, being a guy, a little guy, when it comes time, they want you to take that home, so I'd stick that in my pocket as a little fella. Those things never made it home in one piece. As a little guy, on the way home you're having the fight with this guy, or you're jumping this fence, or you stop and play some ball somewhere, you tackle. All these things, by the time you get home, what do you have in your pocket? Well, there's dust in there.

God understands we're just like that. We're like that little dish of clay.

He understands our weaknesses. So we read here, As a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear Him. For He knows our frame. He remembers that we are dust. As for man, his days are like the grass, that flower of the field, so he flourishes. For the wind passes over it, and it's gone. It's placed, remember no more.

God knows how fragile we are. But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting, on those who fear Him, and His righteousness to children's children. To such as keep His covenant, and to those who remember His commandments to do them. The Lord has established His throne in heaven, and His kingdom rules over all. God is compassionate. And though you think you're going through a trial now, or you have been going through other trials in your life, and you think, boy, God is just insensitive to what I'm going through. God is not insensitive to what you're going through. He understands, again, our weaknesses. And He realizes that if He puts too much of a load on us, we will snap. Now again, people say, well, God doesn't dare for me during my trial, and I snapped. He said, you know, 1 Corinthians 10, 13, it won't put anything on us that we can't bear. But you know, we as Christians are supposed to be pillars, aren't we? What does a pillar do?

A pillar takes the weight that's on top of it, it goes through the pillar, and is transferred to the foundation. Our foundation is Jesus Christ. The weight on top of it is our trials in life. And as those trials weigh on us, we are to allow those to go down to our foundation of Jesus Christ, and we allow that foundation to strengthen us. It's when people don't have a foundation, make their sand down there. And they wonder why it is they break. Well, because they don't have that sand. They're not on the rock. They're not on Jesus Christ.

If you and I have failed in the past, it's not God who's failed us, it's us failing God.

Let's look at Psalm 145. You've got to keep a marker here on this, but let's get Psalm 145.

And again, this is another Psalm I could have used the whole Psalm, but for lack of time, I just simply can't go through it. But we'll take one verse out of this. Psalm 145 and verse 8.

Psalm 145 and verse 8.

Where it says, The Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger, and great in mercy.

Let's tear this verse apart. Again, our sermonette, fellas, you don't need to have five and six and eight scriptures. One scripture, you go through it. There's four portions to this scripture, part A, B, C, and D, that we want to look at. Part A, the Lord is gracious. In other words, our God is a God of grace. And he extends that grace to his children. Everything that we touch in life, we touch as an aspect of his grace. It's by the grace of God that you and I right now are breathing. It's by the grace of God that we are being able to use our eyes and our ears. It's by the grace of God that we can turn pages in our Bible. The grace of God is not just about salvation. We are totally dependent upon God's graciousness. Part B, it says, he is full of compassion. Full of compassion. I remember reading someplace, I don't know where I read it, but a man made the point, I thought it was a very good point, and I wrote it down. It says, whenever God sees misery, his eye affects his heart. I think that's a great point.

God's eye affects his heart. What God sees, that affects him. He loves us all so much that when he sees what we're going through, it does affect him. Now, you may think God is oblivious. You may think God is just out there and he doesn't really care. He's detached. That you couldn't be further from the truth. He's a God full of compassion. Letter C, it says he's slow to anger. We certainly provoke God, but we're, we've not been, God doesn't write us off. When we were baptized, our names are put in the Lamb's Book of Life, and even though you and I may not have been the kind of Christians we should be, God doesn't say, well, let's take their name out for a time being until they straighten up. Now, your name's still in there. Your name's still in there. You're slow to anger. It says here, great in mercy. Letter D, great in mercy. Think about that for a while. The greatness of God's mercy. It's great because it's on a great scale. All of mankind, all of mankind will be, will feel the graciousness, the compassion, the mercy of God. The Adolf Hitler's, the Mussolini's, the Stalin's, when God begins to work in their lives and open up their hearts and minds, great is His mercy.

It's great in terms of we as sinners. Think about the men I just made mention of. Mussolini, Stalin, Hitler, the millions of people whose lives were destroyed by those people, and yet God's mercy is greater than their acts. The greatness of Christ's sacrifice. In so many different ways, we look at verse 8 and we think about how God is great in mercy. The greatness of the completion and the completeness with which we are forgiven. The Bible says over and over again that God forgives us for all of our sins, all of our iniquities, not just the big ones, all. That's great.

Okay, we move to the very last, well next to last, the fifth area which is in verse 19.

This is kind of a repetitious thought. Number five, last part of verse 19, Micah 7, and we'll subdue our iniquities. You will cast all of our sins into the depths of the sea.

Cast all of our sins into the depths of the sea. You know, we've already seen in Psalm 103, verse 12, that God said He would remove our sins as far as the east is from the west.

God knows that sin and guilt plague mankind. So God uses these various things to try to get across to us how great His mercy is. You know, our sins will be removed as far as the east is from the west. Our sins will be thrown into the midst of the sea, the depths of the sea.

But there's something here we want to look at in Isaiah chapter 38 that I mentioned on numerous occasions. But let's turn there. Isaiah chapter 38. Isaiah chapter 38 verse 17.

Indeed, it was for my own peace that I had great bitterness.

We have times of bitterness. We've got times of trial. Why do we have those times of bitterness?

Because those times, if we respond to them properly in a godly fashion, those times of great bitterness will yield a time of peace. Peace with God.

Middle of verse 17. But you have lovingly delivered my soul from the pit of corruption, for you have cast all my sins behind your back. When something is behind our back, we can't see it anymore. When our sins are behind God's back, God doesn't see them anymore.

They're cast into the sea. They're behind His back. They're as far as the east is from the west.

But, brethren, let's look at this. Let's take a page out of Micah's book, and let's contrast this. I'm going to read a number of scriptures to you.

You don't need to turn there. You don't want to wear off your little fingers. But Psalm 90 verse 8. Just listen as I say these, quote these scriptures to you. Now, this is a way of contrast. Psalm 90 verse 8 says, You have set our iniquities before you. There's a time when God sets our sins in front of God, not behind His back. They're fully in full view of God the Father. You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your continents. We don't hide anything from God. First Kings chapter 14 verse 9. This is written to evil King Jeroboam, who was the first king of the northern kingdom when the kingdom split. Verse 9 says, But you have done more evil than all that were before you, for you have gone and made yourself other gods, molded images to provoke me to anger, and you have cast me, you have cast me God behind your back, Jeroboam. Again, by way of contrast. Nehemiah chapter 9 verse 26, which says, Nevertheless, they were disobedient and rebelled against you, and cast your law behind their backs.

Psalm 50 verse 17, saying, You hate instruction and cast my words behind you.

So notice the contrast in the scriptures about something that's behind the back, where it can't be seen or thought of. God said, You have cast me behind your back, you have cast my law behind your back, you have cast my words behind your back. But God says, I am so loving to you, I am going to cast your sins behind my back. Those are powerful images. Lastly, area number 6, we see in the last verse of Micah, Micah chapter 7 verse 20, where it says, You will give truth to Jacob and mercy to Abraham, which you have sworn to our Father from days of old.

And here we see point number 6, that God is going to be faithful to his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God doesn't lie. He's going to be true and loyal to his word, to his commitments, to his oath. And Micah had great confidence in this, as he faced some very dark times. His own town went into captivity. Now, you and I, we hear those words, that, brethren, what if the Iranians marched into the Detroit metro area, and we no longer had mayors, we no longer had a governor, we no longer had state senators or U.S. senators, and we were under Sharia law. And if you did something that was wrong, your head literally was chopped off, or your arm, or whatever, you would think twice about what it's like to live under somebody else's rule. There weren't a lot of human rights back in those days. When Micah's city went into captivity to the Assyrians, that's the kind of situation that his people he knew and loved faced. All of the teachers he had growing up, all of the family he had there in town, all the people he knew and loved. There are now subjective people. If they didn't do what the powers wanted them to do, they would lose their life. But in times such as that, that Micah lived in, the heartache, the Micah experience, he realized that even in those dark days, the promises God made to the fathers will come true. Let's take a look at Hebrews chapter 8. We've only got three more scriptures I want to read to you. This is one of them. Hebrews chapter 8 verses 10 through 12.

Hebrews chapter 8. Let's just read the section and then we'll discuss it, analyze it. Hebrews chapter 8 verse 10. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their mind, write them on their hearts. I will be their God, they shall be my people. None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, know the Lord. For all shall know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins, and their lawless deeds. I will remember no more. So as you and I look at verse 10, a couple of important thoughts that we see here. God says he's going to put his laws in our hearts and in our minds. It's not something that's mechanical. It's something that is vibrant. The people have a new heart, the opportunity for a personal relationship with God himself. This is something that mankind just never even began to know or experience, until there were a few in the Old Testament and the New Testament Church. But in general, mankind just simply had billions of people live and die, never knowing the joy of having God's laws in their hearts and in their minds. They gave them that opportunity. And we also see there in verse 10 where it says, I will be their God and they shall be my people. We're not talking about a relationship with somebody's next-door neighbor. We're not talking about a relationship with an aunt or an uncle or a cousin. We're talking about an intimate relationship with God himself. With God himself.

The apostles, they were called the disciples at the time, but they knew what it was like to walk with Jesus. Can you imagine living in a world where if you wanted to go knock on the door, you're a human being, so you've got to knock on doors. You can't just walk through walls. But you go knock on a door and you want to see your Christ, or you just ask for Him, and He disappears there, or a spirit being, and they appear there, and they begin talking with you. Can you imagine having those sorts of relationships with people who are only there to help you and to shepherd you and be there for you? Verse 11. None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none of his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. All shall know.

You know, we've got the prophecy in Zephaniah that says that the knowledge of God will be like the waters of the ocean covering the land.

Just tremendous opportunities here to know, you really know God. And then lastly, in verse 12, For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins, and their lawless deeds, I will remember no more. We've talked a lot today about the forgiveness of sin. And certainly this is what these people are going to experience in the world tomorrow. And my God took great encouragement of that fact. And you and I can as well. There's a really a great deal of darkness coming. But when you look past that, we've got a great deal of hope. Two more scriptures and we're done. Let's turn to Deuteronomy chapter 30. Deuteronomy chapter 30 and verse 19.

Earlier on, in the beginning of these messages, I've done four of these now in the book of Micah.

Early on, I talked about what the purpose of prophecy was. The purpose of prophecy is to motivate you and I to live our life the way God would want us to live our lives. That's why God gives us prophecy. It's not so we could have a jump on the stock market. It's not so we know more than our neighbor. We're kind of the in-crowd, no? God gives us prophecy to motivate us.

Are you and I motivated by what we've heard these last four messages? Deuteronomy chapter 30 and verse 19. We need to take this you and I personally. For God says to you and I personally, I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you. And you and I can both put our names there. That I have said before you life and death, blessing and cursing, therefore choose life that both you and your descendants may live. Now, I've got no doubt that those of you in front of me are Christians. No doubt of that at all. But, brother, let's be honest. All of us in this room have feet of clay. There are portions of our life for all of us in this room that need to be changed.

There are portions of our lives where we need to recommit ourselves to crushing those things in our life that are not of God. And if we don't, if we coexist with sin, then you and I are going to pay a hefty price. A hefty price. And so we need to take each of us take this verse 19 personally.

Then we go to the last scripture for today's order in Ezekiel chapter 33.

Ezekiel chapter 33 and verse 11. Ezekiel 33 and verse 11.

Say to them, As I live, said the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways, for why should you die, O house of Israel? And again, brethren, we need to make that a personal statement to us.

I'm positive that none of you live a simple way of life, and that's all you do. I'm trying to intimate that, but I know that all of us have things we need to change. There are portions of all of our lives where we need to work on, and we do all of us need to turn from the portions of our life that are evil. Otherwise, we will die. I think the very first time, the very first day that I began this series in Micah, I made mention that as our peoples are taken into captivity, there will be long lines of our people waiting to board ships, and they won't be carnival cruise line ships. They will be ships that will take our people to the ends of the earth because we are slaves. We have no more rights, and those that are oppressing our people want to dismantle this country, so it never ever rebounds, and it won't. Let's make it a point where you and I aren't standing in those lines waiting to board a slave ship. Let's make it a point that we are the true Church of God, the salt of the earth, the light of the world. Let's make sure that we are the example that God has called us to be.