The 2004 Olympics were noteworthy for Matthew Emin, otherwise known as Matt.
Matt was dominating one of the most critical rifle events.
This is the 50 meter three position event.
And, and for those who don't know, like, like, like me previously,
uh, the reposition event is the most rigorous and the most revered.
Rigorous because you're in three different positions taking 40 shots each, and if
you win this event, this really means that you are the best marksman in the world.
Matt was crushing it.
He was doing so well that when he was preparing to take the final shot, he
was well ahead of any of his competitors to the point that all he had to do was
just hit the target, he would've won.
And so Matt lines up his shot, he prepares.
As everyone in the crowd waited with bated breath, he fires
and he hits a bullseye.
He's relieved a little apprehensive to celebrate so early, but he does
look around for the judges to give him a score, and so he's looking and
realizing where's, where's my score?
What's happening?
Something was wrong.
The judges were silent.
And then the scoreboard showed his points, zero.
Emmonds made a devastating mistake.
He shot at the wrong target.
Oh, talk about a bad day.
Talk about a bad, the poor guy, he was just one lane off, which really,
I mean, it's a lot, but it's not all that much when you think about it.
He's one lane off, 50 yards is a long distance.
By the way, that's half a football field now that's a, you
know, that's a long distance.
We're talking about a long way shoots.
He still hits a bullseye just on the wrong lane.
So after all, couldn't they just show a little grace?
But according, accordingly, they did not.
This is what I'm concerned about for us.
That we're aiming and firing at the wrong thing, that we're gonna shoot at something
that we think is the right target.
But after all, it's the wrong one for us to shoot at.
And I think this is in part what Micah's concern is for us this morning.
We're gonna look at Micah six eight.
We're gonna be bouncing around through the whole book, but Micah
six, eight in particular, he's gonna help us aim at the right goal.
He's gonna help us to see what is good.
And the problem is that the world often offers us lots of good targets to aim at.
There's lots of good things for us to, to pursue, and we might even hit the
target dead on not realizing that it was actually the wrong goal altogether.
Corporate America actually has a very similar understanding of this.
I talk about climbing the corporate ladder, but the ladder's
leaning against the wrong wall.
You know, one of those things.
So we have a sense of this corporately as a, as a people.
Uh, scripture has a.
Understanding of this that you really need to understand personally because it
really impacts everything that you do.
We don't want to fire at the wrong thing and even nail it and
still get a zero score from God.
Spend our whole lives aiming at what we think is really the good life, and
that's what we're gonna talk about.
The good life is ask anybody, what's the good life?
What's the good life to you?
And I'm sure if you ask your neighbors, they're gonna say things like, well,
family and friends, they're gonna say things like, well, maybe a good 401k,
a good retirement account, a wife, a, a house, two kids, a dog, you know,
general, general health in my body, there's lots of things that people
would utilize to define the good life, and they're not entirely wrong.
Those are certainly adjacent, but is that really what God
wants for us as the good life?
Is that what God wants us to pursue?
I was looking up articles about this, and I found one from.
Harvard medicine.
Harvard medicine has a definition of the good life and get this,
this is actually pretty good.
The good life lessons from the world's longest scientific study of happiness.
And here's what they note, the strength of a person's connections
with others can predict, get this, the health of both their body and
their brain as they go through life.
If they've identified through the the longest study that they've ever done,
that a person's health and vitality, at least what someone can observe medically.
Related strongly to their relationships.
The stronger your relationships are, the better your life is, or so they would
suggest, uh, more happiness You have.
The world offers a lot of different happiness options, and again, things
like this aren't necessarily bad.
We wouldn't say this is a bad thing.
You should definitely care for people and build strong relationships.
But again, is this the good life that God wants for us?
Is this what God desires his people to do?
Is this the sum total of it?
And of course I'm asking all these leading questions because I have an
answer for you, and I think Micah's answer is gonna help us navigate what
this should look like for the Christian.
As we look at the book of Micah, we might be thinking, okay, how
does Micah really talk to this?
There's a lot of ways, but first, let's orient ourselves.
Remember we have a divided kingdom.
Micah is talking to the Southern Kingdom primarily.
Micah's book is a short one.
It's only seven chapters long, but he's talking mostly to the southern kingdom,
even though he does mention the northern.
So we talk about the Northern Kingdom, Israel, Southern Kingdom,
Judah, we've been following along on the Daily Bible Podcast.
This is not new for you, but just a quick reminder.
So we have the divided kingdom there and you have the looming threat of Assyria,
and we talked about Nineveh last week.
Remember, Jonah was called to preach to Nineveh, which is the capital
of Assyria, who would later go and overtake the Northern Kingdom Samaria
and also threaten the southern kingdom, which God delivers them from.
This happens in 7 21.
Our prophet this morning, Micah preaches and ministers during this
time of Israel's history, and so Micah is going to see 7 21 happen.
He's preaching during this timeframe.
I.
And then of course, if you remember, Babylon eventually
rises to become a powerful threat and they overtake Jerusalem.
That's gonna happen in about 5 86, 5 87 dc And so that's the immediate
history that we're talking about here.
When Micah is preaching to Israel, primarily Judah, he's
talking about this season of life.
This is what's about to happen.
He knows that it's on the horizon, and so he's calling out to them.
Micah actually is quoted by the prophet Jeremiah and take a look here, and
my and prophet Jeremiah says this.
Micah Amor Sheth prophesied in the days of Hezekiah, king of Judah.
And he said, did Hezekiah, the king of Judah, and all Judah put him to
death, did not He, did he not fear the Lord and entreat the favor of the
Lord and did not the Lord relent of the disaster that he had pronounced
against them, but we are about to bring great disaster upon ourselves.
And so here's something remarkable.
You may not read it as such, but here, this is remarkable.
Not only that Je Jeremiah quotes him about a hundred years
later, but that Jeremiah says.
When Micah preached, the people listened.
King Hezekiah responded to Micah's preaching so much so that God responded
to that and he delayed the inevitable.
So Micah's exceptional in that.
Like Jonah, he's successful, he's successful, he, he reaches his
target audience to some degree.
Obviously it's not complete, it's not sustaining forever, but he reaches
his target audience and Jeremiah uses him to save his own life to say, look.
No one killed Micah and Micah preached a similar message and they responded,
and so he's using him here Really interestingness to note that Micah's
name means who is like the Lord.
It's actually a short name of the, of the name Miah.
Mackay Micah, similar sounding, and they, and they both mean the same thing.
Who was like the Lord.
And that's really a big part of what the book's amount, he's gonna
highlight God's leadership of them.
He's gonna call them, challenge them, and he wants them to see.
Look, the good life is, is not just to go through the motions.
The good life is actually found in a whole heart, holy, devoted to
Yahweh, their covenant keeping God.
That's the good life.
That's what he's calling them to.
And so even though we're gonna start in Micah, chapter six.
We're gonna be referring to the whole book itself as we move along.
So make sure you have your Bibles ready to flip back and forth if
you have your electronic devices, be ready to type and follow along.
We got a lot of territory to cover and not a lot of time to do it, so track with you.
Let's start with Micah chapter six.
This is actually gonna lead us up into our key text this morning, and we're
gonna see what the good life looks like.
We're gonna see what the good life looks like here starting Micah Chapter six.
Actually, lemme go back here.
Mark Micah, chapter six, verse one.
You'll notice that it starts with the word here.
And this might be of note to you, Micah is divided in three sections and each of
those sections begins with the word here.
So here's what he says in verse six.
This is gonna be the last section in Micah chapter six and seven.
This is his third message.
Hear what the Lord Yahweh says.
Arise please your case before the mountains.
And let the hills hear your voice.
Hear you mountains, the indictments of the Lord.
You enduring foundations of the Earth.
For the Lord has an indictment against his people and he will contend with Israel.
God is saying, I have a case to make before you listen to my case.
This is not gonna go well.
Here's what God says.
Verse three, oh my people.
What have I done to you?
How have I weed you?
And through me, I just gotta pause.
Listen to that.
God is pleading with his people.
He's begging them.
To respond to his love.
He's begging them to to repent.
Verse four, he details his end of the bargain.
Verse four, for I brought you up from the land of Egypt and redeemed you
from the house of slavery, and I sent before you Moses, Aaron, and Miriam.
Oh my people remember?
Remember what Bailiff?
The King of Mo devised and Baam, the son of bor, answered him.
What happened from Shain to GI to Gilgal that you may know
the righteous acts of the Lord.
He's saying, remember your Bible.
Remember what I wrote.
Remember what I've done.
Look back into the history that you and I have had, and note all
the ways that I have been faithful.
He's calling them to recall all his covenant keeping responsibilities, and he
is essentially saying, look, am I guilty of not holding up my end of the bargain?
Am I guilty of not taking care of you?
Now, of course the answer is, well, obviously the Lord has cared for me.
Cared for.
Israel, cared for Judah.
He continues.
Verse six.
Micah takes on the role or the part of Israel and Judah, and then he
takes the part of the worshiper and he says this, well then with what?
Shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before God on high?
Shall I come before him with burnt offerings and with calves a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams and with 10
thousands of rivers of oil?
Shall I give my first born for my transgression, the fruit of my
body for, for the sin of my soul.
So you imagine a worshiper kind of throwing his hands up and be like,
well, what does God even want from us?
Always challenging Micah to say, look, we, we get it.
We get it, Micah, but what does God want?
And you know, it's kind of one of those self-destruct patterns where
someone might spiral out of control.
They're saying, well, you want this, you want this?
Well here, take everything.
Here's, here's my wallet, here's my keys.
Take everything.
One might imagine an exasperated worshiper saying, well, Yahweh,
maybe you're asking too much.
Maybe you're, maybe you've not been clear about what you really want from us.
Maybe you're just not articulating things that we need to understand.
Micah responds to this verse eight.
He has told you, oh, man, and and notice here he is saying, oh, man,
just say, oh, Jacob or Israel, he's talking really to a universal audience.
He has told you, oh man, what is good?
And what does the Lord Yahweh require of you, but to do justice
and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.
What you have here is a summary, a succinct summary
of the whole Old Testament.
It's one of those encapsulating phrases that's meant to just boil it down to
a simple distillation of principles.
That's what we have.
Micah says, look, you can't claim ignorance.
You can't say that you didn't know.
Here's what God calls to you.
God doesn't want all of your sacrifices apart from your heart belonging to him.
I wanna point your attention to that first line.
He's told you, oh man, what is good?
If you think about this, the, the idea of understanding goodness is
such a interesting phrase because it's one of the most argued and debated
terms in our conversations today.
Good.
It's goodness.
And yet Micah says he's told you what is good.
God has not been tight lips and silent.
He's given you information about that.
I think that's where we ought to begin.
We ought to be thankful that God tells you what's good.
Let's start with that point.
Number one, let's be thankful that God tells you what's good.
Let's where Micah starts and he makes it obvious.
God tells you what's good, and we have to ask the question,
well, what does he mean by that?
What does he mean by good?
The word itself is a pretty simple word, but obviously he's
carrying some, some weight to it.
But what?
What is good?
And we'll define that, but the world tries to define it before God.
Does you notice this?
I was watching this debate between this atheist, a well known and rising atheist.
He's a young guy, really intelligent, got an accent, so he sounds
even smarter than all of us.
He was debating against this group of Christians, and at one point he
says something to the effect of.
If God is good, why does he allow gratuitous suffering?
Why does God, uh, seem to allow, and not just a humankind, but with animal
kind, if God is so good, why does he allow so much evil and so much suffering?
Certainly, this can't be a good God who oversees all these
things, and I don't, I don't know exactly what the Christian says.
They, they, they said something helpful that was very philosophical and, and
profound, but I, I just wanna point your attention to something on what basis.
Can anybody who doesn't claim a faith or an understanding in God claim
that they understand goodness at all?
How can said atheist make a claim to goodness when they haven't defined it?
You see, when someone says, Christian, is that a good thing?
You and I would say, okay, well what does the Bible say?
What does God say about that?
An atheist can't do that.
When you say, well, sir, what is goodness?
They're gonna say, well, I.
Philosophical consideration, number one, perhaps goodness
is doing no evil to people.
Well define evil.
What is evil?
Uh, philosophical consideration Number two, maybe it's to not
cause unnec unnecessary suffering.
Well, according to who.
According to.
In fact, if you believe in a Darwinian framework, isn't it the
whole idea that it's me against you and we're fighting for resources?
So if I kind of take your stuff and I'm able to do that, you
just gotta lay down and take it.
It's so interesting because our world understands this problem, but they don't
really have a good answer to it except to say, well, your good is your good.
My good is my good.
You ought to pursue the good.
That feels good to you.
In fact, I just read a book for school called The Mountain is You.
It's a New York Time bestseller.
And the idea in the book is that, uh, the thing that stands before you
and the life that you want is you.
You are the mountain and it's your own self sabotage that prevents you from
having the life that you truly want and desire, and you need to understand
what's really happening on the inside.
Uncover your subconscious and, and then help yourself make
progress in life, essentially.
Save yourself to become yourself.
That's, that's goodness.
At least as she defines it.
What is goodness?
And I wanna point out to you, you gotta be thankful.
God has told, told you, God has spoken to us.
He hasn't remained tightlipped.
He's been open about this.
God's goodness has been given to us in his word.
Let me give, let me point out three things about his goodness here.
Now, first of all, God himself defines goodness.
Such a critical idea.
God himself defines goodness.
In other words, when God does good, he's not asking, Hey,
what's a good thing for me to do?
The opposite happens.
What God does is good.
God defines goodness.
He is a source and standard of goodness, which means if God
does it, that's the good thing.
Sometimes we judge God and say, well, did did God do a good thing when
he did A, B, C, or D in the Bible?
And what we're doing here is we're trying to understand goodness
apart from defining it by God.
God is the standard and source of goodness, which means when we
think about goodness, we don't wanna ask so much, is it good?
But does that, is that what God does?
Is that how God acts?
God is a standard of goodness.
The good God is where we begin.
You remember when Jesus was asked, good teacher, what must I do?
And then how did Jesus respond?
He says, why do you call me good?
No one is good except God, and that's your starting place.
Everything that a Christian considers about goodness, justice,
love, righteousness has to start with what does God say about this?
Who is God?
He defines goodness for us.
We have a good God.
When Micah uses the term, he has told you, oh man, what is good?
He's actually referring to something larger than just the concept of good.
He's talking about the goodness of the law.
So we have a good God who gives us the good law.
Micah's talking about the way that God has spoken to them.
He's given them instructions about how to live good.
In fact, this is part of his charge.
Turn to Micah, chapter three.
Uh, if you have a Bible, turn a couple pages back where Micah chapter three,
starting at verse one through verse two.
This is section number two in Micah's book.
Notice it says Here, I said, here you heads of Jacob and
rulers of the house of Israel.
Is it not for you to know justice?
And this is in fact, one of the reasons he writes the book, he's
calling out their injustice.
He says, you who hate the good, same word there and love the evil.
He's telling them, look you, you're doing the opposite of my law.
Therefore, you're doing the opposite of what's good.
You're breaking the covenants by doing evil, and you're cannibalizing people
that you should be loving and protecting.
And so Micah is pointing them to the good law that God has established for them.
The good law.
This is incredibly good for us even today, even though we are not, we're
not under the old covenant law.
We are still under the ethical law that God gives us in his New Testament.
This is a good thing for us because we're not just building
our philosophy of life in thin air, saying, well, what's your preference?
My preference is to live in this way.
Well, your preference is to live in that way, and certainly
God gives lots of freedom.
But the idea is God defines what's good.
You gotta start here and be thankful for that.
Thank you, God for giving us the law.
Thank you for showing us what's right and what's wrong.
What an incredible blessing that is.
The good God gives us the good law, unless you think we believe
that you can be saved by that.
Let me point you to the good news, good law.
Good luck.
Good news, pop quiz, and I want you to answer, okay, this is
a verbal participation part.
Can you be saved by doing good works?
That was really, really uninspired.
I expected like a voracious.
That's still good enough.
You get the point.
Of course not.
And so when Mike is calling them to understand what's good.
They may have understood only impartial.
What we now understand in full.
We understand that our salvation is built on nothing less than Jesus
blood and righteousness, his grace.
It's our faith in him and his good works that have made us good before God.
In fact, this is so important.
We're just gonna, we're gonna take a brief detour.
I want you to turn to Romans three, starting at verse 23.
The good law, the good Lord, has given us the good law.
And it ultimately points to the good news.
We don't want to get this twisted, and before we open up the rest of Micah, I
think it's my responsibility to point out to you things that you already know,
but we need to be reminded of constantly.
Romans 3 23, 1 of the most famous passages in all of scripture, we
usually quote Bree 23, to our kids.
We have the memorize it, but the rest of this text is so good, it's worth us just
pausing for a few moments to see this.
The good Lord has given us the good law.
The good news, verse 23, Romans chapter three, for all of sin, everyone in
all creation, everyone is sinned and everyone falls short of the
glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift how through the
redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
We are made right with God through Christ Jesus and his work on the cross,
verse 25, whom God put forward, God put Jesus forward as a propitiation
by his blood to be received by faith.
That is we are made right with God by Christ's sacrifice, and
we receive that right standing by faith, by trusting in Christ.
This was to show God's righteousness.
Because in his divine forbearance, he passed over
former sins in the Old Testament.
He didn't punish them the way that their sins deserved.
God relented.
He was forbearing passed over former sins, verse 26.
It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just.
And the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus so critical that we understand
the good God has given us the good law in order to point us to the good news
that we are made right by him, not by obeying the law, but by trusting Jesus
Christ to fulfill the law so that we can now by faith live out his just commands.
This is the good news.
This is the good God who has given us the good news.
He is the standard.
He is our righteousness.
He's the one who tells us how to live.
This is so incredible.
Have you ever thought about how good it is to have a God that tells us how to live?
I mean, there's so many confusing ideas and philosophies all
around us, people that purport to say, this is the good life.
We'll talk about some of those things, but I just need you to feel
what I've been feeling this week.
God is so kind of give us leadership in this AR area.
Okay, back to Micah, chapter six, verse eight.
The good life is not a mystery.
God has shown it to us, but he doesn't stop, uh, telling us what's good.
He tells us how to live it, and that's where we go back to Micah six eight Again.
He has told you a man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you?
What does Yahweh desire and require of you?
And the first thing that he notes here is to do justice.
To do justice, biblical justice.
We're not talking about social justice.
We're not talking about the kind of justice that the world offers.
This is.
God's justice, biblical justice.
In fact, tomorrow if you're reading our DBR plan daily Bible
Reading, you're gonna read Second Chronicles 19 with King Jeh Ofat.
One of the most remarkable things that King Jeh Apha does is he tells
the, the judges, and Judah, he says to them, he says, now then let
the fear of the Lord be upon you.
Judges and Judah, be careful what you do for there is no injustice
with the Lord our God, or partiality of taking or taking bribes.
God uses Jeh ofat to install true biblical justice in Judah for at least a season
of time, and he does so through righteous judges, men that know good from bad.
Now, justice, quite simply, justice is this punishing the evil,
rewarding the righteous simple.
There's a lot more we could say about that, but that's a simple framework.
Punishing evil, rewarding righteousness.
Now, that's a true statement as far as it goes, but think about this.
If I'm an unbeliever, if I'm a non-Christian.
I could agree with that, couldn't I could agree with that.
Oh yeah.
I don't wanna punish the evil and reward the good.
I would agree with that.
The problem, again, is not the phrase itself, but how we define the words.
It goes back to that.
It goes back to point number one, God's goodness.
He defines what's good versus evil.
God's the one who tells us what is right versus what is wrong, and so
we have here biblical justice for us.
Amen.
Just a quick perusal through Micah.
God is promising justice against Israel.
And June, in fact, just take a look with me.
Go to chapter one if you're still in Micah, or turn back to
Micah if you're not there yet.
Turn back to Micah.
Let me just show you a few places where God is calling out begging for
justice and demanding that they be just.
And he's gonna say, look, if you don't do it, I'm gonna do it for you,
Micah, chapter one and verse three.
Behold the Lord is coming out of his place and he will come down and tread
upon the high places of the earth.
And the mountains will melt under him, and the valleys will split
open like wax before the fire, like waters poured down in steep place.
All this is for why the transgression of Jacob and for
the sins of the house of Israel.
What is a transgression of Jacob?
Is it not Samaria?
And what is the high place of Judah?
Is it not Jerusalem?
Therefore, I will make Samaria a heap of a heap in the open country,
a place for planting vineyards.
So God is promising justice.
It is in fact their injustice that he's responding to.
If you turn over to chapter two, turn over to chapter two.
Look at this.
Chapter two, starting with the word wo.
Wo is a, is a way to say, it's a way to communicate devastation,
condemnation, woe to those who devise wickedness and work evil on their beds.
When the morning dawns, they perform it because it is in the power of their hand.
They covet fields and they seize them.
They covet houses and they take them away.
They oppress a man in his house and a man in his inheritance.
Therefore, thus, as the Lord behold against this family,
I am devising disaster again.
It is their injustice that provokes God's righteous justice
to take the center stage.
Here he is saying, look, you're not gonna be righteous.
I will punish your wickedness.
This is part of God's justice, his righteousness, demanding satisfaction.
Look at the rest of chapter eight or chapter two with you
could look at chapter three.
We have more evidence of their unrighteousness.
And yet the point is here God wants his people to be.
Just look at chapter three, verse eight.
Micah just described the false prophets and he says in chapter three, verse eight
of Micah, but as for me, I am filled with power and with the spirit of the
Lord, notice what comes with the spirit of the Lord and with justice and might.
To declare to Jacob, his transgression and to Israel his sin.
So in contrast to the false prophets, Micah says, I'm here and I'm bringing the
spirit of the Lord With justice, God's spirit always comes with his justice.
Living the good life is not picking and choosing the things that we like.
This is not cafeteria style Christianity, living the good life.
It's gonna look like point number two, practicing and pursuing biblical justice.
Remember, we're defining good by God.
God is defining good and goodness demands that we pursue biblical justice.
What does that look like today?
Man, there are so many options for us.
I'm afraid that you might only think in terms of the, the large scale evidence,
and that's impor important, appropriate.
In fact, that's, let me just point.
One of the things out here, uh, is June, which means the Supreme Court is
handing down rulings, really important rulings that they've been delaying on.
They usually wait until their summer session to break or summer break.
To release some of their biggest landmark cases, and one of them
that was recently released is their upholding of Tennessee's ban on gender
affirming hormone therapy for minors.
So they have sided with Tennessee to say it is appropriate to make
inaccessible gender affirming hormone therapy for minors.
We all tracking with what that is.
Okay.
There are two parties who are arguing justice in this case.
One party is saying it is wrong.
It is morally wrong for you to say no to a young person whose life
can be threatened if they don't get this life-saving hormone therapy.
That's one way of justice.
If you don't do this, you're wrong.
You're morally reprehensible.
They might even use worse words than that.
The other side of this, the other side of justice, someone is saying,
look, uh, in fact, the, the, the, the side that won this, uh, Tennessee
and the Alliance defending freedom.
They saw this as a matter of justice as well.
In what way?
Well, they're protecting children from irreversible and unproven treatments.
They argued, uh, a minor can't drink alcohol, they can't enlist
in the military, they can't get tattoos, can't buy guns.
There's a reason, there's a reason why we don't allow this, and it
makes perfect sense that we would then limit their access to these
potentially life-changing treatments.
Which are unproven and untested, and so there's two people arguing.
Imagine two parties arguing justice here.
Again, who's wrong?
Well, you have to define that.
God's goodness, God's justice.
We want God to speak in on these situations.
Proverbs 28, 5 says, evil man don't understand justice, but those who seek
the Lord, they understand it completely.
Pursuing biblical justice then for us will mean that we are immersed.
We have to be immersed in our Bibles.
There's no shortcut to this.
If we're gonna live the good life, the good life is in a.
Unable to be experienced, independent of a thorough knowledge of God's word, because
biblical justice requires that we know it.
We have to know God's word.
We should know his case law in the Book of Exodus, how he dealt with
Israel, how he called them to live in a land that was not their own, and
even a land that would be their own.
And Canaan, we have to be the kinda people who know our Bible so well that we could,
we could say we have a good grasp of what biblical justice looks like pursuing it.
Then in your own private life, that doesn't look all that different.
Now, as a rule, Christians are law abiding people.
We're not opposed to, we're not, we're not opposed to picketing and to, you
know, and to promoting righteous causes.
But it doesn't just mean that at the lay level, we are law abiding people.
We uphold the law insofar as a law does not violate anything
that God's word has said.
If the law were to say, Hey, you can't worship Jesus and you can't worship on
Sunday, we would have to violate the law, but all things being equal, we're
gonna say, well, what does God say?
And as long as God's word is not violated, we're gonna do what the,
what the nation says we should do.
We're gonna stop at stop signs, or we're gonna pay our property taxes,
we're gonna obey building codes.
We're going to, uh, do, uh, pay for our vehicle registration.
Um, God's people must be the kind of people who are shaped by
God's justice, which means that there's a constant vigilance in
our part to say what's unjust?
And how do I remedy that?
Can I do anything about that?
Am I in any position to enact God's justice or to
promote that, to pursue that?
And that's, that's a challenging place for us to be because certainly
you can't be involved in everything.
But there are some major things that we could be involved with.
There are places I don't just, I'll try to say, say this in a way that's gentle,
keeping in mind our mixed audience here.
There are places where the weakest and most vulnerable among us
are disposed, could be stronger, but for the sake of our audience,
you know what I'm talking about.
And that's one of the most injust things that we are living through right now.
And not to say that you have to be out there picketing.
You could and not say that you have to give all your money to
that, or some of your money.
You could.
My point is that God wants the people who are pursuing biblical justice
practicing it, and in whatever way you do that, it's important that you feel like
you're following the commands of God.
There are righteous causes for which God has placed us here for the
purpose of defending those things.
It's not just out there, it's, it's in our homes.
It is our job to help our kids, our families, understand what
righteousness is, what justice is.
And this is a big part of what it is to raise a family today, to teach what is
right and true in Contradistinction to everything else that the world teaches.
Back to Micah six, eight,
justice matters.
We should be pursuing biblical justice.
But God said more than that and thankfully so, because if we were
just pursuing biblical justice, that might make us pretty harsh.
He adds something essential to the good life.
Here's what he says.
He has told you, oh man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you?
But to do justice and to love kindness.
To love kindness.
This is amazing.
If I can have a favorite part, this is one of my favorite parts
to love, kindness, to love, and the word kindness there
is the biblical word tested.
Um, if you want to say it the way you're supposed to, you need to
add a ch to the front of this.
Tested.
You probably know this word hassid is the way that we typically pronounce
it, but hassid, hassad is such a rich, powerful word in the Old Testament.
It's, it's translated in a lot of different ways, but it's most often
translated in the ESV as love.
It's, and it is that, it is that, but it's also translated kind or
kindness about 15% of the time.
Um, another 5% of the time it's translated steadfast love.
It is a rich, rich word.
Let me show you where the word appears in Micah, in addition to Micah six, eight.
Turn to Micah chapter seven, looking at verse 18.
Micah chapter seven, looking at verse 18.
This is how Micah closes the book, and I want you to see, uh,
there's a lot of judgment in Micah.
God's promising I'm gonna judge.
I'm gonna deal with you, and he weaves in restoration.
God's going to do something with you Israel.
He's not done yet, but amazingly, he ends the book on a high note, and
here's what it sounds like starting at Micah, chapter seven, verse 18.
Here's what he says.
Who is a God like you?
And by the way, it seems like Micah uses this on purpose 'cause
that's what his name means, right?
Who is a God like you?
So he starts the book with Micah.
He ends the book with Micah.
Really?
Pa Uh, really interesting here.
Verse 18.
Who is a God like you?
Notice what he lists.
Pardoning iniquity.
We just found out in Romans three that God was forbearing about that because he knew
he would, he would forgive them in Christ.
Pardoning iniquity, passing over transgression.
For the remnant of his inheritance.
Who?
Who does that?
What God does that, in fact, you could ask that even today, what
God does that there are none.
All the gods of the people are Gods of goodness.
Do good, do better, try harder, run faster.
If you're a good enough person, maybe you'll make it.
You are the mountain.
The mountain is you.
Get out of your own way.
Save yourself, and maybe you'll live the good life.
Who is a God like our God is what Micah asked.
And hopefully in your mind you're saying, I know that God, I know that's my God.
My God does this.
Here's what he says, and I love this.
He does not retain his anger forever.
Okay, you ready?
You're gonna highlight something in your Bible because he delights
in steadfast love, say law.
Let's think about that for a second.
God delights in PEs.
God loves to show love.
Like my mind is blown here.
Okay, really quick, let's think about this.
God is not begrudging in his love toward you.
He doesn't see you and say with mild toleration, oh, here she's again.
What Now what you want is it time again?
God is not passive and merely tolerant when you approach him.
God delights to show you love.
God loves to show love.
God loves to draw you in.
God delights to love you.
God delights to forgive you.
God delights to save and redeem you.
God delights in you.
In Christ, you are accepted.
In the beloved.
You are someone that God wants in his presence, desires
longs for in his presence.
The God of the universe, the perfect triune.
God invites you to be part of that perfect communion.
He desires you.
Little old you.
He wants you part of his, his, his intimate relation.
This is amazing, amazing.
God delights in steadfast love.
This is who God is.
I love this.
He's worth celebrating and honoring for that alone.
But then he turns the page.
Go back to Micah chapter six again, Micah chapter six.
He says this, what does the Lord require of you?
But to do justice and to love kindness, to love, love, to love steadfast love.
It's the same idea.
So it makes perfect sense that if God himself is a God who loves
to love you, then certainly we should love to love as well.
Point number three, refuse to go through the motions.
Don't allow yourself just to passively do the good things that God calls you to do
without letting your heart follow along.
To love, to love, good to love and appreciate, to have affection for the
good things that God calls you to.
This is what God desires for us.
We're selling ourselves short.
If we just do the thing without loving the Lord, our God with our
heart, soul, mind, and strength.
Scripture says He who finds a wife finds a good thing.
I take issue with that because I found a great thing, guys.
I love my wife.
Thank you.
I'm gonna let her know you did that.
I need to applause for that.
I appreciate that though.
Thank you.
So Kristen and I went to Lala's Tacos recently.
Pastor PJ said they were just okay.
And I'm like, I'm never gonna go then I don't want to go
to a just Okay restaurant.
But we went and I loved it.
I just, I don't know what PPJ ate, but this was good.
And we got the tacos la la style.
If you're gonna do it, do la la style, you want that?
They're, they're good.
Delayed.
Very rich too.
I mean, almost too rich.
Still good now.
Well, Kristen and I, you know, we, we do a date pretty regularly.
Most, most of the time it's on a weekly basis.
And so, you know, we go and Kristen's such a sweet girl.
She'll, she'll, she'll say, thank you for things that are like this.
I'm supposed to do this, this is my, my husbandly duty, but
she, she did it this time.
Thank you for, for taking me on a date.
Something like that, you know, thank you, love one of those things.
And normally I say something profound and romantic in return, and then her
eye, her eyes just turn into doves and.
Like the sparks are flying all over again.
But imagine if instead of responding with something romantic and
affectionate, I said something like, Hey sweetheart, don't mention it.
I'm supposed to do this and give her a fist bump.
Something tells me I, I don't think she would be super stoked about it.
I think she'd be a little irritated.
And probably strongly dishonored by that, and you would understand that, right?
Part of the fun of loving somebody is that they love to do good to you.
That's part of the fun of it.
That's what makes the love so enjoyable is that there is a mutual giving and taking
that demonstrates I'd love to serve you.
If I was just going through the motions and telling Kristen, Hey,
you're welcome, but no thanks necessary just doing my duty, ma'am.
She would be rightly offended.
She would be a little, a little annoyed and and rightly so, because
nobody wants to be loved that way.
Nobody wants to just say, well, you did the thing for
me because I was supposed to.
Nobody wants that, and it's certainly true for us, and it makes sense
that it would be true for God.
God doesn't want us to love him that way.
He doesn't want us just to go through the motions.
He wants us to love to love him.
He wants us to love to love other people.
In fact, the whole idea that it's captured here is basically
the Chick-fil-A mentality.
It's my pleasure, Lord.
I love to serve you.
Now.
Really, I think what he's pointing at here, and this is, that is
actually not love toward him.
We'll get to that in the last point, but love toward others.
Love toward the people of God.
Loving to do good to people, which would include justice, which would
include a whole host of other things, but loving to do good to people.
Jesus said to Saul before he was Paul, Saul.
Saul, why are you persecuting the church?
Remember when he said that?
No, he didn't say that.
Good catch Saul.
Saul, why are you persecuting me?
What that tells us is that Christ so closely identifies with his church
that when you do evil to the church, it's like you're doing evil to him.
He so closely identifies with his church that when you do good to the church.
It's like, you're doing good to him.
This is our Lord.
And he says, you can't.
You can't do good to me.
He's in, he's in heaven right now, but you can do good to
me, as in my church, my body.
He so closely identifies with us that he calls us his body and therefore,
God wants us to love to love the body.
Setting up chairs is no fun unless you're doing it because you love the people that
are about to sit in those chairs, in which case then you're sit, you're sitting in a
chair and you're realize, this is great.
If your husband or your wife or your son or your, your daughter was coming
to sit down and there wasn't enough chairs, you, you would quickly grab a
chair and put it down for them, right?
You wouldn't think twice about it.
You wouldn't bemoan the fact that your back hurts you, his eyes.
You didn't chair.
Lemme get you a chair, right?
You would do it because you love the people there.
God calls us not to feel this way only about our families, but about
the people of God themselves.
Everybody.
He wants us to love the people that he loves, and he wants us to love to love.
Emotions without emotions are, or just duty without delight.
Emotions doing the right thing without the emotions or duty without delights are
going through the things and sometimes we need to, lemme just say this,
sometimes there is a place for that.
Sometimes we're in seasons of dryness and we're just having difficulty
connecting with the Lord like we used to, or quiet times or, or tumultuous
with all sorts of distractions.
I know there's seasons like that.
Better to go through the motions and wait for the emotions to catch up.
I get that.
But if you're going through that, you don't wanna stay there.
You don't wanna be like, oh, I'm okay.
I guess this is the way it is now.
Christianity used to have a honeymoon phase.
It was nice.
It was glorious.
But now I'm just kind of going through the motions and I just, you know, kind
of shrugged my shoulders through it.
Don't allow yourself to do that.
Refuse to go through the emotions.
Love to love, love.
Tested it.
Love to do the things that God wants you to do.
Okay.
Good life isn't just about looking good.
It's not just the outside just going through the motions.
It's about walking right.
This is critical.
Go to Micah chapter six, verse eight again, as we begin to land
the plane on our last point here, I want you to notice something.
If the first few items were about our interactions with
man, the last one is about God.
Let's read Micah six eight again.
He has told you, oh man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you?
But to do justice, to love, kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.
Have you ever walked with kids?
People pay other people to walk their dogs.
I think there's a business opportunity in walking other people's kids.
Same.
Walking my own kids is an experience.
I got one that's like three feet back or 30 feet back sitting on the floor.
I've got one that's way ahead, Carissa.
She's doing whatever she's doing.
I don't know where she's at.
She's walking all over the place.
I got one in the bushes.
Phoebe, chasing a butterfly.
And I, I'm just trying to figure like, Lord, how do I
keep track of all these kids?
And so I got air tags and I taped all of them on an air tag.
Just kidding.
I didn't do that, but I thought about it.
I think sometimes God thinks about us the way that we think
about our kids in that way.
God's trying to walk with us saying, Hey, walk with me.
Walk with me in a certain way, by way walking.
Think about what walking conveys.
There's a relationship, there's intimacy, there's uh, even a
sense, a sense of mutuality.
There is, in our case, a followership of God.
We are walking with him to show that we are doing life with him.
That's what the idea of walking means in the Old Testament, and even in the
new, it conveys the idea I'm doing life with God wants to walk with you.
And yet many times, like my kids, you're all over the place.
We're distracted.
We're chasing butterflies in the bushes.
We're walking ahead of God, telling God to hurry it up.
I got things to do.
I got people to see, or we're walking behind God.
He's saying, obey me.
Follow me, or saying, well, I'm not ready yet.
Can I just sit back here?
I like it.
It's warm, it's happy, and God's just wanting us to walk with him.
Walk with me.
Don't walk ahead.
Don't walk behind to walk beside.
Walk with me.
That's what God wants from us.
This is the good life.
God's not gonna lead us in paths of darkness and death.
Or remember, God's gonna lead us where He wants us, when he wants us.
And that's the good life.
Remember David prays in Psalm 23, you, you know, uh, even though I walk through
the valley of the shadow of death, there's gonna be times that God's gonna walk you
through places that you don't want to go.
You might be in Texas because God's walking you through
places you don't wanna go.
I like it here.
You should too.
Even though I walked through the valley of the shadow of death, oh, fear no evil.
Why?
Because you are with me.
He's walking with God.
I'm walking with God, and therefore I don't have to fear 'cause I'm doing
exactly what God wants me to do, whether that's in North Texas or Chad or some
other place in between, we're walking with God and letting God lead our lives.
This is the good life.
This is the truly good life.
He knows what's best and therefore we don't have to do it alone.
We could do it with God.
Point number four, let me put it like this.
Here we're walking with God, which means I'm living all of my life in His presence.
There's a word for that.
The reformers used it.
It's actually two words.
Latin Corrum Deo, which means before the face of God.
Corrum Deo.
I lived my whole life before the face of God in God's presence.
I put it like that.
Number four, live your whole life.
Korum de live everything, all your life, the waking, your sleeping,
and everything else in between.
Living your life.
Korum Deo means I'm aware that God is.
Presence in all of my life, and I don't wanna walk ahead of him.
I don't wanna walk behind him.
I wanna walk with him.
God wants us to walk with him, but he wants us to walk with humility.
He wants us to walk in a way that conveys, we don't know the right thing he does.
It suggests to us that as we walk, we don't want to tell God what to do.
So appropriate to pray, right?
Ask, seek and knock.
Matthew chapter seven, you should pray to God.
If God says no or God says not yet, our job is not to
say, well then hurry it along.
Let me just, lemme tell you what you need to do for my life.
Walking humbly with your God means acknowledging that He knows better always.
This is a good life.
It is a good life to say, God, not my will, but yours.
This is exactly what Jesus prayed on the night that he was about
to die on the cross for our sins.
Live your whole life Coram.
This will necess necessitate that we think about.
Everything that we do in light of our communion with God.
Imagine you're driving through Starbucks.
You know if, if you're like me, when you're driving through you, you
got your mind, what am I gonna get?
I gotta see it quickly.
I wanna grab it and go, 'cause I got someplace to go.
Usually walking with God might mean that you're driving in that
drive-through with the awareness of the people that are there.
You take your coffee or whatever, it's that you get and you recognize
at the window that there's a, a young man named Tim there.
See his name tag and, and maybe you're silently thinking, Lord, please bless Tim.
Let me show the love of Christ to Tim.
Lord, please make sure Tim is in a good, in a good church.
Lord, I don't know what Tim's going through, but will you
please draw him to yourself?
Lord, help Tim repent of his sin.
I mean, these are all things that you could be thinking and doing.
Excuse me, as you're getting your coffee and getting your, your muffin
or whatever, it's that you're getting.
Walking with God would mean living your whole life in awareness of God's presence
and of God's desires for your life.
So what that would mean as as you drive away after praying for Tim,
you're drinking your coffee or your cookie crumble, mocha, and you're
thanking God for the sweetness of that drink and say, man, this is amazing.
God.
Thank you for taste buds.
What a good God you are to give me taste buds.
Praise the Lord for this.
You're enjoying the fact that God has given you life and not
just life, but a renewed life.
A redeemed life.
God, I'm saved.
Thank you for my salvation.
Thank you that I'm not walking in and disobedience to you.
If you're not.
Walking in His presence means being aware all of your life
of God's ever present reality.
Walking, corrum day, this is the kinda life that you wanna live.
This is a good life.
This is the only good life that is on offer.
The life where you walk with God.
Remember walking with God was what you were designed for.
What was Adam and Eve doing in the garden?
They were walking with God.
That fellowship was broken, of course, because of sin, but through
Christ, we now have a redeemed and ReSTOR ability to walk with God,
and that's what he wants from us.
That's the good life.
Matt Emmonds didn't lose because he failed to shoot.
He shot his shot.
He took his shot.
He did a great job at the shot.
He, he nailed the shot, but he lost because he aimed at the wrong thing.
And I don't want you to do the same thing with your life.
I don't want you to make the mistake of shooting at the wrong thing.
I want you to shoot at the target of a good life that
is walking with God in love.
Love for God, love for his people.
You see, the world's gonna hand you all sorts of targets, comfort, applause,
financial success and security.
A big house acar.
Not that any one of those things all by themselves is bad, but if that's
your goal, if your goal is those things as opposed to the glory of God.
You're shooting at the wrong targets, and I'm sad to say that
you'll be disappointed by that.
Scripture can make, can say nothing other.
You'll be disappointed by walking in that kind of way.
You can hit all his targets perfectly and still miss what God says is good.
He has told you, oh man, what is good?
He doesn't say, Hey, figure it out.
Go to the dark room of the world and just try to figure out what God wants.
He's told you.
He doesn't say, Hey, try your best.
Give it your best shot, or save yourself.
He's told you.
Our good God has given us his good law and the good news.
He calls us to practice and pursue biblical justice.
He calls us not to just go through the emotions or go through the motions, but
to have the emotions, to love, love, and to live all of our lives in his presence.
What's amazing about all this is that this is all in response
to his initiating, saving love.
That's what makes this whole thing so perfect and so beautiful.
It's his love initiative.
We are simply responding.
The life that's pleasing to him.
Okay?
End your life at the right target and God has given you the target.
Let's pray.