The Three Commands

Your hands were freed from the basket in distress. You called and I delivered you. I answered you in the secret place of thunder. I tested you at the waters of Meribah. Here are my people while I admonish you.

Oh Israel if you would but listen to me. There shall be no strange God among you. You shall not bow down to a foreign God. I am the Lord your God who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide and I will fill it.

But my people did not listen to my voice. Israel would not submit to me. So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts to follow their own counsels. Oh that my people would listen to me. That Israel would walk in my ways.

I would soon subdue their enemies and turn my hand against their foes. Those who hate the Lord would cringe toward him and their fate would last forever. But he would feed you with the finest of the wheat and with the honey from the rock.

I would satisfy you. That's the word of the Lord. Turn to hymn number 400, please. And they're 400. You may remain seated as we open with. Come thou fount of every blessing.

Call for songs of loudest praise. Teach me some melodious sonnet sung by flaming tongues above. If their bosses sought me wandering from straight to be. Let that grace now like a feather bind my watcher prone to wander prone to leave God.

Please stand for the reading of God God's Word in Micah.

The Lord's Indictment Against His People

Chapter 6 our text will be verses 1 through 8 prophet Micah. Chapter 6. Beginning of verse 1. Hear what the Lord says. Arise plead your case before the mountains and let the hills hear your voice. Hear you mountains the indictment of the Lord and you enduring foundations of the earth.

For the Lord has an indictment against his people and he will contend with Israel. Oh My people what have I done to you? And how have I wearied you answer me? 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 what Bala king of Moab devised and what Balaam the son of Beor? Answered him and what happened from Shittim to Gilgal that you may know the righteousness. Excuse me the righteous acts of the Lord.

With what shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams with ten thousands of rivers of oil?

Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has told you old man What is good and what does the Lord require of you? But to do justice to love kindness and walk humbly with your God.

God bless the reading and now the preaching of his word, please be seated you know the way we live as Christians as proclaimers of Christ as confessors of Jesus Christ as Savior. Communicates something.

Now we know that it communicates something on the horizontal level. It says something to a watching world the world as we know in Scripture is Convicted by the holiness and the faithfulness of God's people to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Read in Acts chapter 5 how that was a conviction to many and the church grew by their holiness. It also communicates something vertically our behavior. Our faithfulness to Christ who said you shall do all that.

I have commanded you. Our faithfulness to him Says something to the Lord God it communicates from us to him and this is the case with Israel that I just read to you. The first five chapters of Micah are Basically an indictment of their sin.

It's telling them what they have done wrong where they have gone astray the prophet Micah preaching to them and calling them to repentance interspersed with oracles of judgment to come. Micah was a contemporary of the prophet Isaiah so he preached during Jotham Ahaz and Hezekiah's reigns as did as did Isaiah.

He preached and probably saw the Assyrians come in and besieged Jerusalem in 722 BC and you recall he then would also have seen in one night 185 ,000 Assyrians slain. All that to say that Micah was there in the milieu of the prophet Isaiah with whom usually we're a little bit more familiar.

Micah was a contemporary of his though. We have no evidence that they actually worked together as partners in ministry, but they had much the same kind of message here after five chapters of a litany of their sins with these oracles of judgment interspersed we come to chapter 6 and The Lord as it were the Lord God Yahweh Intervenes, it's like he stops.

I'm so okay. We've had enough. We've shown them where they're wrong. Let's go to court and Let's see what the verdict really is. Now, of course God's verdict is his to make and he doesn't need a court or a judge or a jury or anything else to confirm his conclusions and Yet we do have this courtroom scene where Israel is called to plead their case.

They've communicated something to God. And as I explain verse 3 to you a little bit I want us to think in terms of for example with the Apostle Paul says because of you the Lord's name is Blasphemed all the day.

There's something communicated to the Lord of what we think of him in our obedience to his claims on our life. In verse 3. Oh my people. What have I done to you? Now he's answering a charge that they have communicated to him by their lifestyle.

He's saying what have I done to you? And what they're saying is what he's answering is a lifestyle that says you haven't done enough or what you have done is not good or what you've done is not what we needed and The Lord is answering a charge if you can imagine it against him.

Which is implicit in the lifestyle and the Lord says what have I done to you? Let's think about that a minute before we go to that though he says and how have I wearied you and then emphasis scripture.

Answer me. He's in court and there will be given an answer How have I wearied you? Again by their lifestyle by their constant sin by their idolatry by their setting aside the covenant law of Moses. By which they were constituted as a nation and in which God promised to bring them good and blessing and victory and all those positive things.

By having set that aside and disobeyed it at nearly every point. They have said to God they have communicated to the Lord. That you're a wearisome God. That you're a burden to us. That Lord God and this word means this you've done us wrong.

This is the same word this word wearied that is used in Isaiah 118. Where the Lord through the Prophet Isaiah Micah's contemporary the Lord says through him in verse 118 I am wearied of your new moons and your festivals.

Now we keep going to more detail, but we won't basically because there's no faith. There's no love of God behind them. It's just a procedure. It's just a custom. It's just something they do because they have to a drudgery.

But when God says I am wearied by them and uses the same word that we have in Micah 6 3 where he asks Israel How have I wearied you? If God's saying I'm wearied of those they are burdened to me. They are sin.

They are iniquity. I pause for a moment because I want us to think of this because this is what Israel was communicating to God. And this is the word used here. It's essentially Israel saying God. You're a burden God.

This is too much God. We don't get any benefit from this what you say. We will achieve or you will do in us. We're not seeing we're just not satisfied and God we charge you implicitly by our life with wrongdoing.

Can you imagine that? This is what's happening in that courtroom scene. This is what God is answering it's almost as he put himself up as a defendant and he's going to. He's going to defend himself by reminding them what he has done for them.

Your lifestyle is a child of God by faith in Christ. It communicates something to God. And we need to be so careful to understand this now. We live by the Spirit. We live in the power of the Spirit we live look into God's Word and Submitting to him and calling upon him to give us that strength and that power and that wherewithal that the Spirit does give us As he indwells us.

Yet we can never Forget that it is by him and through him and for his glory that we're able to do that. What we do in our lives Says something to how we feel about God. It says to him here is our attitude towards your commands your requirements what you Impose upon us if you will.

So all rise not you. Court is now in session. There's going to come a time when every person is going to stand before the judgment seat of Christ. Judah's time was here. Now Micah prophesied in the late mid to late 600s with Isaiah as I keep saying about a century before the great judgment of 586 BC when Babylon came when the Lord released their savagery and the city was taken the temple was desecrated.

So the Lord ever patient Yahweh ever soaked in steadfast love ever giving warning and chance to acknowledge our sin and repent before that great and final day. He calls court in session. He begins with the indictment and he calls upon Israel a Rise plead your case before the mountains and let the hills hear your voice hear you mountains the indictment of the Lord and you enduring foundations of the earth for the Lord has an indictment against his people and He will contend with Israel.

Creation as Witness and the Charge of Weariness

So what is it with mountains and hills and the enduring foundations of the of the earth? He's calling to witness History, it's as if the hills and the mountains they're inanimate. We know that. It's a picture.

It's like a a parable where he's calling them because they were witness of all the good that God had done. The mountains the hills all that saw. The idea here is that they existed a long time ago and they were there when Israel agreed to the Covenant.

So let's ask again about inanimate objects. Can inanimate parts of creation actually convict people. Can they actually deliberate? Well, they can in a sense if you open your eyes if the Lord gives you real vision if he removes the scales and even we who love the Lord Jesus Christ and by faith know That we're saved because of him.

Clear vision. So we don't need contacts anymore. We don't need corrective lenses. Clear 2020 vision if the Lord should so deign. Paul writes of inanimate objects bringing conviction to people in Romans chapter 1.

He says what could be known of God is plain because God has shown it to them in what he has made. What he has made shows forth that he is a holy God. That he's an orderly God. His eternal attributes. The Apostle Paul says you can see them.

Now that won't bring you to Jesus Christ that will not bring you to salvation. But if you look clearly at it if you look sensibly. With your eyes open. It could bring you to repentance. It could bring you to say there must be something beyond there must be a God.

To whom is owed Repentance. Because I'm not holy like him he being holy because he made these things. So this is the idea behind mountains and hills and enduring foundation being brought to witness. Like Romans chapter 1 the creation itself can give you Witness of God can convey to you his attributes.

What are the charges we mentioned that was already? What have I done to you? I haven't done enough. How have I wearied you. I've burned you with all these Requirements all these laws. 613 rules by rabbinical count.

But by their sinful lives. They said that the Lord has not done them much any of any good and more than that the Lord's their life said to God. That he was for them nothing, but weariness. But they just went through the motions.

They're seeing the festivals. They're going to the new moon festivals and such. They're going to the temple for the three pilgrimages a year and all that they're saying. What kind of God are we following that would require us to do this?

Why do we have to walk on this path? What I have to leave my business behind for all these weeks and go just to celebrate a Passover Drudgery and that communicated that to God. Now they never said that explicitly.

No one would ever say to Jesus Christ. Well, this is all too much. I'm not getting any benefit from you. I don't want to obey you anymore. I'll just go to church and look good and you know sing the hymns loudly and such like that, but really Christ.

You're a big burden to me and really in my soul. I'm tired of it and sometimes we're so tired of it. But we're ashamed because of other people. Fearing man if you will and so we keep doing it that communicates to God pretty much.

What the Israelites here were? Communicating. And again, you wouldn't say this explicitly any more than Israel would. But two things are arrayed here. First the old saying fits that actions speak louder than words.

Don't we teach our children that? What you do means more than what you say and sometimes we hear that from our children. When we are a little inconsistent with what we teach them and we hear back from hey dad mom.

Didn't you teach me this? It's a good little quip. Actions speak louder than words. Actions say something and. Even though they would never say explicitly God you have done wrong. You have burdened us unduly.

No one would ever say that but who is saying that that is what was said. No less than truth itself. God Yahweh is saying that he peels away all the holy sounding words all the sanctimonious prayers. This is like Jesus exposing the hypocritical prayers of the Pharisees.

You remember that it says don't pray like the Pharisees where they pray on the streets to be seen by men. They got the long for up phylacteries as almost as if they're waiting for that crowd as soon as the crowd comes.

Then their Hebrew becomes perfect and in tone just right and every syllable is correct. And the prayers are just wonderful and they're flipping their phylacteries around so you can see just how holy they are.

How much they've invested in it all for show as Jesus says they have their reward looking good as the epitome of holiness and yet Whitewashed tombs as Christ would later say so whatever else they thought they said by going to temple whatever else We think we say by coming to church.

When they brought their sacrifices and we thank God in word for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ when they bring their offerings. And we bring our tithes. Is it all for man? Is it that drudgery or is it for God?

Is it for his honor. The other aspect of this is that by considering God be a weary obligation they've charged him with wrongdoing. The Hebrew word is to be grieved to be offended. To literally say to God if you can't stand to hear this.

You've sinned against me and God is holy. For it is impossible says the Apostle for God to lie. But that's the incredible thing that is being said here so he says What have I done to you? Against you.

What have I done? Let's talk about what I've done. Not what you saying I've done which is you say I'm not done enough. You're saying the cross is not enough for me. It just brings me into this drudgery.

It is constant giving up of my weekends the prayer meetings of the church and such like that. What have I done to you? For I brought you up from the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of slavery if ever there was a paradigm in Old Testament history that Reflects the slavery that we were in and the redemption that we have by Jesus Christ.

It is the Exodus 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 Balaam the king of Moab and what he devised and how Balaam the son of Beor answered him and what happened from Shittim to Gogol that you may know the righteous acts of the Lord.

So what's he done? He redeemed you with a mighty outstretched arm. He redeemed them from slavery to men and he reached out his arm and he set a cross on Golgotha and His son went willingly to it for the joy set before him.

And we're redeemed by that by that cross that ultimate meaning of this Exodus that they're reminded of here. I Redeemed you from slavery. I gave you the law by Moses. I gave you church the very Word of God in the beginning was the Word that's Jesus and the Word was with God.

He is eternal always been the Son of God. And the Word was God. Was is and ever shall be God. I gave you the Word of God. I gave you Moses Aaron and Miriam. I gave you intercession for your sins through Aaron.

I gave you Jesus Christ who fulfills all that Aaron and those sacrifices those endless sacrifices the constant procession of the blood of bulls and goats. Could only picture. And I gave you Jesus Christ forgiveness of sins by his cross.

Songs of worship through Miriam and he turned Balaam's demonic attack against him into a blessing. Something that could have done them great harm and God turned it to blessing in order to protect his people.

Just as God has by his son Jesus Christ in his cross defeated death. Which is how the devil keeps people captive by their fear of death. If you don't know the Lord Jesus Christ if you're here visiting and you're not by faith in him you haven't gone to him in trust and Seeking salvation by him.

Let me tell you. Your end your greatest fear is that end is death, but death is defeated by the Lord Jesus Christ. So the demonic attack against you this fear of death. Just as Balaam's curse was turned to blessing God has turned to life.

Life in the Lord Jesus Christ now and eternal life when he returns. I forgave your simit Shatim when you consorted with the daughters of Moab and then at Gilgal I rolled away the reproach of Egypt because that's where they were circumcised.

That's where they recommitted and that's when they went on the west side of the Jordan and began the conquest of Canaan. He forgave their sin. He forgave their consorting. He forgave them for what they did just after a huge blessing.

Just as for us. When our lives were in such a mess. And we come to him in repentance not saying oh how weary this is but trusting God to forgive not the burden of God who says get down on your knees and pray.

And if we confess our sins He is faithful just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Oh, what a weary duty. No. It's not. He says you do that. You come to me by faith. And I will forgive your sins because of the Lord Jesus Christ and remove them as far as East is from the West.

So what have I done? There's weird you so that you should charge me with wrong. You see the Lord's commands are not burdensome says the Apostle John. We do remember that. There are different views of the law and how it how it impinges upon the church or we're supposed to just collect the commands of Jesus Christ and I think sometimes this debate gets so heated and we of course in this place we hold to the law of God.

We hold to the law as it's commonly understood. That is our position. Not a wearisome task though. Not counting up the laws 613 and so I can say okay. I did this when I did that when I did the next one and I've only got 612 and 12 to go or whatever it is.

See God has not worried wearied us. He's not giving you a task of repentance that is meant to be a drudgery. It's freedom. It's freedom from whatever sin is confessed to him and remove few as far as East is from the West and Israel Defense here, it's just all too much if you've done all this for us Lord and you have okay, we'll agree.

We're in court. We will concede the argument. You've done all this for us and Still too much because we can never repay it with what shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before God on high. Shall I come with them with burnt offerings as required?

Expensive. And a drudgery. Yes, you have to bring them if they don't bring them you have to buy them when you get there. I'll bring burnt offerings with calves a year old the best of the herd. Calves a year old I know so they don't say I'm blemished but calves a year old the best.

Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams. Upon who I laid my hand over and over and confessed my sin and the ram dies in my place with ten thousands of rivers of oil the greatest the most expensive Commodity of the day like Parmesan cheese there where it's made in Italy and those huge rounds weigh hundreds of pounds and the bankers will come and examine them and that's their collateral for the next loan to keep them going until they sell and pay back.

The bank of the Bank comes when he inspects the Parmesan and the rivers of oil. The olive oil was like that then. It was the most valuable commodity. Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?

It's saying there shall I do as I as Abraham did with Isaac and raised the knife over my son on the altar and Slay him for the Lord and give him to God except I won't stop like Abraham did. What do you want Lord?

It's all too much. They're still being so cynical here. We can't repay so why try? Do you ever feel like that? You ever look at the cross and say well Jesus Christ died on my sin for my sins. He suffered the eternal wrath of God in my place.

How can I ever replay that? So why should I ever try? Do you ever feel like the why should I ever try part? That's not why should I ever try is I should look at that and realize that God doesn't tell you to try because you could never.

What does he call for? Faith in that cross. Faith in his son. Reliance upon the Spirit whom Jesus Christ gave us. No, not our firstborn. He would never ask. He didn't do that with Abraham. He tested Abraham's obedience.

Not our firstborn. His firstborn Jesus Christ. Given in our place. Now he doesn't ask for such a burden. He took the burden upon himself. Israel's defense. We can't repay it. And so we're not going to try and the whole point of the church is we're not supposed to try.

We can't. It's a free gift. Romans 6 23 for the wages of sin is death. But the free gift of God free. Not paid for not you have to give your firstborn for it. Not you have to give up your wealth. Not you have to give up your rivers of oil your rams, whatever.

The free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Now God doesn't call us to repay that which can never be repaid. It was not intended to be repaid. When I was a little kid, I don't know if you're.

Well, nobody's even close to my age. We used to get these little passbook savings books and I take parents would teach us I got one nodded head. Terry parents would teach us how to save and so every week I'd take like a dime or a quarter.

I don't remember what it was out of my allowance and I would go to the bank and I would give them my quarter or My dime or whatever it was and they would stamp a little book. And I might have had like three and a half bucks in it by the time I Was moving out of the house or something like that.

You compare that bit that I had in that same discount to someone like Elon Musk. Who I just read has something close to two hundred and fifty billion dollars. He's the richest man on earth that's a quarter of a trillion and yet my Passbook savings as a little kid.

Compared to his fortune today. Wouldn't come close to what God has done for you in Jesus Christ eternal life in him. Was he require in return. And here Micah picks up as God's advocate if you will in this courtroom scene and the way I view this God's had enough.

He doesn't want to listen anymore and he's departed. The Lord has left the room and Micah picks up his defense for God. He has told you emphasis mine. He's told you oh man, what is good? And what does the Lord require of you but to do justice?

To love kindness and walk humbly with your God. He's told you he's made prominent. He is lifted up some translations say it very well. He has shown you. Oh man, it has God not shown us in the Lord. Jesus Christ has not Christ's life shown what God requires.

Have that the Gospels laid it out for us so we can understand it not a burden. How long would it take to read all four Gospels if you read them from the beginning of Matthew to the end of John? Hour and a half.

An hour and a half of your whole life to read and understand and see the example of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's shown you What he requires? Justice. God's justice fairness and all our transactions balance scales.

Imitating God because of our love for him. To love kindness. Chesed in the Hebrew to love kindness because God is kind. Sometimes God is wrathful and yet even as wrath. It's a kindness because it shows us what we have been forgiven because those upon whom wrath is is brought did not repent and We can look to say there but by the grace of God.

Go I to love kindness because God is kind therefore be kind to one another. Ephesians 432. Forgiving one another as God and Christ forgave you. Kindness this is what he requires of you as an act as a work.

No as a loving response to the kindness God showed in you when he gave you faith to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and to walk Humbly with your God. How do we walk humbly with God? We know that he is sovereign.

We treat him as the sovereign creator of all that he is. How do we walk humbly with God look to the cross? Look to the cross of Jesus Christ. Trace Jesus Christ from Genesis to Revelation and See the Lord Jesus Christ who said I came to do your will.

Do you want to be humble? Here's humility. Read the garden of Gethsemane incident or that that that part of the narrative in the book of Luke. When Jesus Christ fell on his knees and three times begged God as it were take this cup from me and his sweat became like drops of blood in agony and Then went and did what no one else could do.

He gave himself for your sins for my sins and The Lord God in his justice because justice was satisfied in Jesus Christ. The justice that would have been our punishment in his mercy to give you faith to believe in Humility Christ walked read Philippians chapter 2.

He humbled himself to the point of death even death on the cross. All of us have a problem with humility. All of us need to walk humbly and more humbly and ever more humbly with God. Look to the cross.

Think of the man Jesus Christ who was God never stopped being God never stopped being man the two together never confused the man Jesus Christ. There's one mediator between man and God the man Jesus Christ and look to him.

And consider his cross and then ask yourself if my is my message to God by my life. The same do I communicate what Israel did that your awareness to me that you've done me wrong? May it never be Church.

May we always look to the cross and there find the fulfillment and the communication to God of What would honor his name and exalt the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Heavenly father. Thank you for this day and thank you for just this reminder in Micah of What our lifestyles mean and what they actually communicate to God.

I pray father that you would help us to be ever more humble and walk ever more Closely to the requirements to the commandments of the Lord Jesus Christ because of his cross. And we will thank you for all this in Jesus name.

Amen.