Tag: Micah

Digging in Deeper: Micah 6:13

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“As a result, I have begun to strike you severely, bringing desolation because of your sins.”‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter)

When I was in college, I read a book that had a profound impact on my views on sin and grace. Of the two, it had the most transformative impact on my thinking about sin. It wasn’t simply that the ideas the author expressed were so profound (although they certainly were), it was that the way he presented them was so compelling. He used imagery that I can still call to mind in detail all these years later. The basic premise was this: Most of the way we think about sin ranges from silly to wrong, and if we don’t think about sin rightly, we won’t be able to understand just how amazing grace really is. I think what we see here in Micah helps to reinforce this important truth.

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Digging in Deeper: Micah 6:9

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“The voice of the Lord calls out to the city (and it is wise to fear your name): ‘Pay attention to the rod and the one who ordained it.’”
— ‭‭Micah‬ ‭6:9‬‬ ( CSB- Read the chapter)

One of the basic assumptions humans have always made about the world is that there’s more to it than we can see with our eyes. The unique phenomenon of modern atheism aside, the general belief about the nature of the world that every human culture has held since there were thinking and reasoning humans walking around on the planet is that there is a spiritual world we cannot see and it has an impact on our daily lives. The exact understanding of the nature of that impact has varied rather widely, but the belief that we are foolish to ignore it has not. And while this largely manifests itself as various superstitions, what we see right here reminds us that it isn’t all superstition.

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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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Morning Musing: Micah 6:6-7

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“What should I bring before the Lord when I come to bow before God on high? Should I come before him with burnt offerings, with year-old calves? Would the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams or with ten thousand streams of oil? Should I give my firstborn for my transgression, the offspring of my body for my own sin?”
— ‭‭Micah‬ ‭6:6-7‬‬ (CSB – Read the chapter)

One of the drawbacks of written words is that they don’t always convey the full nuance of the speaker. They can, to be sure, but in order to convey that nuance, you sometimes have to explain it ahead of time which, in some cases, takes a bit of the punch from the intended message just like explaining a joke strips away all its humor. What we see here in Micah is a great example of this drawback in action.

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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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