Sermons About Micah
The Heresy of the Well-Intended
Judges 17 illustrates God's sovereign hand in the midst of gross immorality. The setting is some 30 to 40 years after the Israelites' entrance to the promised land - a time when "every man did right in his own eyes." The account of Ephram and Micah demonstrates what happens when you overlook sin and ignore God. The steps to gross immorality depend on what you think about God. What we find is that without God, we have no standards and the decay of standards among people often starts with small reductions of God and small elevations of man. But the Bible teaches us that all peoples of the world need a Godly shepherd, and adhering to the truths of God's word is paramount so that we may not be cast unto immorality.
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The Purpose of God's Remnant - Love, Mercy, and Justice Part 5
When I was in college, I didn't have a standard meal plan where you could just go to the college cafeteria and eat. I just couldn't afford one, so I made it through 4 years in the dorm room by cooking all my meals in a toaster oven and a microwave. There was a particular semester, when classes were over, that I was flat out of money. I had $.27 in my bank account and the cupboard or the dorm fridge, if you will, was bare. Since I was an RA in the dorm, I had to stay a couple of days after the semester ended to wrap things up. I was extremely curious as to how I was going to eat. Well as one my residents was leaving, he wished me an enjoyable break and said he would see me next semester. A few minutes late he walked back and said, "Hey I've got 4-5 meals left on this meal card, do you want it?" A similar story happened when Amy and I were engaged. We had absolutely no money for a honeymoon just weeks before the wedding, and we did not know what we were going to do. I got a phone call one night as we were making last minute wedding plans. It was from an insurance adjuster. You see, I had been a passenger in a head on collision about 6 months prior, and the insurance adjuster wanted to know how I was feeling. After a brief conversation, he wanted to know if $700 was adequate for the suffering I had incurred in the wreck. I thought to myself, "$700 is adequate for a honeymoom at the beach." I imagine we all have had those situations where you had a bill and you just did not know how you were going to pay for it. And then, either a friend, or a spouse, or your mom and dad just happened to be setting some money aside in case something like this happened. A good friend of mine calls that J.I.T. – Just in time. Once again this week, I asked for the congregation's help, and they gave me some examples of similar experiences. We came up with some great stories. Let me give you a few examples. · We had one couple who told me about when they first got engaged. One partner brought in some bills and debt to the relationship. It just so happened that her fiancé happened to have the exact amount tucked away for a rainy day and was able to pay the bills. · Another one of our folks talked about being stuck with a huge car payment and all of a sudden getting a new job that exactly covered the payment. Well, the reason I tell these stories is because the idea of sticking aside a little money for a rainy day or saving some money just in case you have an emergency in similar to the idea in scripture called "a remnant" – a remnant is something that is saved for a later time with a specific purpose. We see two explanations of who or what a remnant is in scripture. · Romans 11:5 speaks of God saving a remnant of Jewish people. Through out the biblical days and in the present, the majority Jewish people do not believe in Jesus Christ, but God has promised to specifically choose a remnant of Jewish to believe by His grace and not their by their own doing. But that is not the only description of a remnant in scripture. · Acts 15:17 also describes any that would believe in Jesus from the Gentiles as a remnant. Essentially, if you believe in Jesus you are a remnant chosen out of the world to believe in Christ. This is very important to remember as we look at these next few verses in Micah because the application of the promises found there meant something specifically to the people that first heard it and also something very specific to us. So let’s look at those promises and seek to understand how they apply to them and to us.
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Congratulations, You're Expecting: Love, Mercy, Justice Part 4
Now, many of you may know this, but in case you don’t, Amy and I have 3 children: 3 wonderful girls Meredith, Landry, and Emma. Now I can tell you what my initial reaction was when we found out that Amy was pregnant with each of them. I can tell you what it is like to be in the delivery, and I can even tell you what it is like to cut the cord. What I cannot tell you though is what it is like to find out that there is baby growing in my tummy. I can’t tell you the emotions that occur when that baby begins to grow and move, and I definitively cannot tell you what happens emotionally when you give birth. But scripture sure does speak about the concept of being pregnant or being in labor a whole lot. It is a metaphor that immediately strikes an image in your heart and mind whether or not you have ever been pregnant. Either way, towards that end, for anyone who has difficulty relating to scripture, I’ve enlisted the help of those who do know what scripture is talking about.. Here are a few examples from ladies in our church who shared with me via email what it was like to find out that they were pregnant. Great joy, followed by sadness as the child was miscarried after a only a few weeks into the pregnancy My response was joy, disbelief, amazement, panic, awe, and worry...all mixed together. Then I threw up. You don't want to use those words I'm your sermon! At first I couldn’t believe it when the nurse called & told me that I was pregnant & then I was very emotional & gave thanks to God for blessing me with a child. We even had one mom say that doctor got her due date horribly wrong and it made it look like she had been cheating on her husband. They soon got a new doctor. I must admit reading those responses was entertaining and hopefully they helped all of you to get a picture of what it means to be pregnant. Clearly, finding out you are pregnant and being pregnant are life changing and life altering occurrences. Not everyone person has the opportunity to experience pregnancy and in those situations, we trust that God has some other incredibly amazing experience reserved for us. Well, this week at Sovereign King in the book of Micah, we are going to see the prophet use this pregnancy and labor image to set the minds of God’s people to a sense of expectation. So, whether we have been pregnant, never been pregnant, or even pregnant right now, lets do our best to get in the mindset of waiting for something with expectation. With that, we will ask, what is it that God is asking us to look forward to with similar expectancy as a pregnancy?
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Love, Mercy, and Justice Part 2
The 5th amendment to the US Constitution affirms the right of every American citizen to own land, and it also affirms that no one can take that land from you without compensation…including the government. Owning land is one of the rights that is held dear in America. For the most part, America has been built on a premise that agrees with Delmarr O’Donnell from the movie “Oh Brother Where are Thou†when he says, “"You ain't no kind of man if you ain't got land†There is a general sense in America that you’ve made it once you finally can buy your own plot of dirt – even it is only .17 of an acre in a neighborhood where every house looks the same. Theoretically, if you own land in America, no one can take it away from you. Well in the OT, we see that God had given His people land and it was divided up among the 12 tribes of Israel. The land was theirs and their families and no one could take it away from them. You could sell that land if you wanted to, but every 50 years during the Year of Jubilee, all land returned to its rightful owner, so as you can imagine, not a lot of buying and trading of land occurred. You would imagine that the people of Israel viewed their owning of land a lot like most Americans do. They thought, “This is my land and no one can take it from me. It is my right to own it, and this is especially true because God gave it to me.†This was part of what made up their opinion and view of God. Now last week at Sovereign King, we talked about how the folks of Micah’s time didn’t always think correctly about God. They thought certain things about God that just weren’t true. For example, the people of God trusted their own devices and fortifications for security and they couldn’t imagine God thinking any thing of it. Well, last week, we saw God’s declaration of judgment against the people of God. We saw God saying that He would tear down the stone walls that His people had trusted in because they trusted those walls and not God. The people also engaged in immoral worship and they didn’t think God was going to do anything about that either. Last week, we saw God say that He would burn up all the profit that His people had earned from their illicit and immoral temple prostitution that had been rationalized as worship. Well, imagine what’s going to happen to the people of God when they think that no one can take their land from them. This week as we approach the next sermon in our Love Mercy Justice series, we are going to continue to see people with false presuppositions or ideas about God and we will see scripture expose them. These folks are very slow to change their presuppositions and despite God’s declarations against many of them, they continue to hold them tightly. So, I would like to ask a slightly different question in this sermon this week. The question I want to ask is this, “What hope do we have of changing our false presuppositions about God if we are so blind that we don’t see them?â€
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He Will Be Their Peace
The prophet Micah makes an amazing prediction: But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, our of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient time (Micah 5:2).
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Love, Mercy, and Justice Introduction
An introduction to the sermon series, "Love, Mercy, and Justice", a teaching from the book of Micah.
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Defining, Identifying, and Smashing Our Idols
Answering the question: What is it in my life, if taken away, would make me respond like Micah?
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God's Judgement to bring us to Christ
A sermon looking at the judgement of God on Israel in Micah's time and the application for us today.
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Who's the Boss
While it may seem to be an obscure or possibly irrelevant passage, the story of Micah and the Levite is an important reminder for us that God's word should direct us in all things, and not our desires for comfort and control.
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Finding God In Times Of Emotional Trauma & Confusion
Pastor gives us a guide to staying on the right track amidst some of the difficulties of life.
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