Category: Digging in Deeper

Digging in Deeper: Micah 6:8 (Round two)

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“Mankind, he has told each of you what is good and what it is the Lord requires of you: to act justly, to love faithfulness, and to walk humbly with your God.”
— ‭‭Micah‬ ‭6:8‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter)

So, yesterday we talked about the sarcastic response the people had to God’s case against them. God’s case was that they had left Him without cause. Their response was to sarcastically ask what He wanted from them? Bowed knees? A sacrifice? A thousand sacrifices? Their own children sacrificed? What would make Him happy? From there we talked about the fact that we sometimes feel similarly in our own lives. What does God want from us? What is it we can do that will make Him happy? Today, we get an answer.

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Digging in Deeper: Micah 6:5

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“My people, remember what King Balak of Moab proposed, what Balaam son of Beor answered him, and what happened from the Acacia Grove to Gilgal so that you may acknowledge the Lord’s righteous acts.”‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter)

Have you ever been so angry or perhaps so hurt that you stopped making sense while you were trying to express it? I suspect you have. We all get there from time to time because that’s just how life goes. People we love do things that hurt us, sometimes badly (and, if we’re being honest, we do the same things to them). When we find ourselves in such a place as this it can be difficult to make a single, direct argument that expresses our feelings. It’s easy to jump from idea to idea because our minds are reeling and moving quickly from hurt to hurt. God doesn’t ever lose His mind like that because He’s God and such a loss of control isn’t in His nature. But if there was ever a place in the Scriptures where He seems to come close, this is one of them.

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Digging in Deeper: Micah 5:7

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“Then the remnant of Jacob will be among many peoples like dew from the Lord, like showers on the grass, which do not wait for anyone or linger for mankind.”‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter)

In English classes growing up, every couple of years we did a unit on poetry. Confessedly, I hated those units. Oh, I did fine in them. But I just don’t care for poetry all that much. Now, that’s not universal. I love the poetry of Shel Silverstein, for instance. But he wrote for kids so… I think the real reason I struggled to like it was that I struggled to understand the imagery being used. That same struggle is why many people—including me—stay away from the prophets in the Old Testament. The imagery is hard to understand. Yet if we’ll do the work to get our minds around it, there are riches to be had; riches like we find right here.

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Digging in Deeper: Micah 5:5

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“He will be their peace. When Assyria invades our land, when it marches against our fortresses, we will raise against it seven shepherds, even eight leaders of men.”‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter)

Did you ever try and look at one of those Magic Eye pictures? I remember having a couple of different books of them when I was growing up. The cool thing about them was that if you just looked at them they were kind of cool-looking designs. But if you looked deeper, an entirely new image appeared and in 3D to boot. My trick was always to cross my eyes and slowly uncross them. The first glance was neat, but bland. It was the second, deeper look where things got interesting. Well, we could call this a Magic Eye verse. Let me tell you why.

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Digging in Deeper: Micah 4:10

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“Writhe and cry out, Daughter Zion, like a woman in labor, for now you will leave the city and camp in the open fields. You will go to Babylon; there you will be rescued; there the Lord will redeem you from the grasp of your enemies!”‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter)

I don’t know about you, but I love action movies. I love action movies that are about good guys trying to stop bad guys. The more imaginative the problems, and the more creative the solutions, the better. What works so well about these movies, especially when the good guys get in that situation where it looks like the bad guys are going to win, is that we know how the movie is ultimately going to end. The good guys win. Because we have that hope, we can endure whatever trials we face in the movie to get there. Something like this is what undergirds what Micah has to say here.

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