Micah 4: Love That Refused to Give Up

THIS is where it gets exciting.

In the first three chapters of Micah, we see that the heart of God is grieved because His chosen people have rejected Him, chosen to follow other gods instead of Him, and in the process, begun abusing each other. He views their sin not as simply something they've done wrong, but as something that is destroying the people He loves.

We noticed that His desire for the people is the same in the Old and New Testaments. He urges them through Micah to turn from the gods they are following, and repent of their evil deeds toward one another. And He urges them through John to turn from their self-righteous practices, and repent of the evil they have done each other by making it hard to find Him.

Since we (my little bible study) were talking about getting to know God, I pointed out to them that when you are getting to know a person, it helps to see them in different situations. I can talk to someone about lots of things and come to know them really well, but if I see them in a stressful situation, I may come to know a completely different part of them. "In these first three chapters," I told the girls, "we see God doing damage control. He's dealing with a stressful situation."

In Chapter 4, we see another side of God. Instead of dealing with brokenness, He's showing His rebellious people what He wishes. He lays before them His "hopes and dreams," if you will, but they aren't just words of wind, they are a promise. Before we even know what it is that God wants for His people, we can see that He loves them enough to give them promise of hope before they have even begun to repent. We see that He has their good in mind, even while He knows that they are bringing destruction on themselves.

It shall come to pass in the latter days
    that the mountain of the house of the Lord
shall be established as the highest of the mountains,
    and it shall be lifted up above the hills;
and peoples shall flow to it,
2     and many nations shall come, and say:
“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
    to the house of the God of Jacob,
that he may teach us his ways
    and that we may walk in his paths.”
For out of Zion shall go forth the law,
    and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. (Micah 4:1-2)

His idea of a good situation for His people is that HE would be their ruler. Back in 1 Samuel, He made it clear that He never intended for His people to have another king, because He knew that they would inevitably follow their king into a mess like this. 

Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and said to him, “Behold, you are old and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now appoint for us a king to judge us like all the nations.” But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to judge us.” And Samuel prayed to the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, “Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them. According to all the deeds that they have done, from the day I brought them up out of Egypt even to this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are also doing to you. Now then, obey their voice; only you shall solemnly warn them and show them the ways of the king who shall reign over them.” (1 Samuel 8:4-9)

Back to Micah, He starts to describe what sort of king He will be, or, looking at it from the perspective of what He wishes, what sort of ruler He wants to be theirs.

He shall judge between many peoples,
    and shall decide disputes for strong nations far away;
and they shall beat their swords into plowshares,
    and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
    neither shall they learn war anymore;
4 but they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree,
    and no one shall make them afraid,
    for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken. (Micah 4:3-4)

I loved reading this for the first time, and realizing that what He promises to do for them, is address every problem He pointed out earlier.

Micah 1 - What is the transgression of Jacob? Is it not Samaria?
Micah 4 - For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

Micah 1 - Tell it not in Gath; weep not at all; in Beth-le-aphrah roll yourselves in the dust.
Micah 4 - ...and peoples shall flow to it, and many nations shall come and say:
“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord...

Micah 2 - But lately my people have risen up as an enemy; you strip the rich robe from those who pass by trustingly with no thought of war.

Micah 4 - and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore;

Micah 3 - Hear, you heads of Jacob and rulers of the house of Israel! Is it not for you to know justice? you who hate the good and love the evil...

Micah 4 - He shall judge between many peoples, and shall decide disputes for strong nations far away.

The judges and rulers ruling over Israel in the time of Micah were abusing power, violent, creating fear in the hearts of people. God makes sure to point out that when He is their king, people will desire to come to learn from Him. When He is king, they won't even need weapons, because there will be no violence. When He is king, no one will make His people afraid. (there is more in Micah 4 that I am drawing from than what I've cited, so please go look it up.)

Now, there is one verse that doesn't really seem to fit into the narrative very well, which is Micah 4:5. However, I don't really want to talk too much about the fulfillment of this prophecy, since I am looking for the character of God, not what the prophecy is specifically. I do think it's important to address though, so I am going to write a short separate page on that, which you can read HERE, if you're really curious.

In that day, declares the Lord,
    I will assemble the lame
and gather those who have been driven away
    and those whom I have afflicted;
7 and the lame I will make the remnant,
    and those who were cast off, a strong nation;
and the Lord will reign over them in Mount Zion
    from this time forth and forevermore. (Micah 4:6-7)

It seems to me, that God is being very intentional about addressing everything He already said. He's talking about blessing, but He doesn't ignore the fact that He is telling them this right before they are going to be judged. He points out that His Kingdom will be the opposite of everything that was wrong with their rebellious kingdom, and when He says that He will gather them, He makes sure to mention that He was the one who "afflicted" them. The reason they are scattered and crippled is because of the sin that they STILL have a chance to turn from!

Imagine hearing this, and knowing you have a chance to turn away. Imagine you are still too stubborn, which is pretty typical of all of us, and so you don't. Micah's prophecy comes true, and your whole country becomes captives in Babylon, a displaced and disgraced nation. Now, as you experience the hardship and shame that God warned you about, you have His promise that even now, He has not forgotten you. The written words of the prophet you didn't listen to, all those years ago, are still there for you. Reminding you that someday, God will bring you out of captivity, and bind up the wounds that now are open and festering.

Doesn't that, in itself, show us something about God's heart, that loves more deeply than we can? That in the midst of rebellion, He would be thinking about when they are shamed and disgraced, and how they will need hope. So He provides for it.

Now many nations
    are assembled against you,
saying, “Let her be defiled,
    and let our eyes gaze upon Zion.”
12 But they do not know
    the thoughts of the Lord;
they do not understand his plan. (Micah 4:11-12a)

Other nations could "get on God's side," in bringing ruin to the people of Israel, but that is not what was on His heart.

The foresight that His people would be willing to turn back to Him, and the love He had for them that refused to give up, reminds me of another one of God's "prophets," who put it this way:

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. (Romans 5:6-10)

Coming Boldly

I was at a dance camp a few years ago, where at the end of one of our dances, it was supposed to be like us finally finishing the race we're running. Our teacher and choreographer said to us, "Imagine you are entering the throne room of GOD. How would you approach Him?"

I answered her in my mind, "Timidly, humbly, slowly, probably looking at the ground cause I am unworthy to look at His face."

"You're not going to shuffle over to Him looking at the ground," she said, as though we all knew exactly what she meant. "You would run toward Him boldly!"

Run toward Him boldly. Now that is one I hadn't thought of.

I have actually mulled this over in my mind a lot since then, because I have often heard, "Enter His presence with boldness," and on the one hand I agreed, but my mind separated that and that fact that I believed I could not enter His presence boldly.

It's one thing to boldly post bible verses on Facebook, it's quite another to waltz up to God in the flesh as though you deserve it.

I realized quite a while ago now that I was wrong. My mindset that I could only approach God with fear and trembling, it was wrong. God does love me, did adopt me, and does delight in me. I have permission to love Him, to be excited to see Him.

But still, I believed my choreographer was wrong. Running toward Him boldly the way she described it seemed disrespectful. Verses like Hebrews 4:16 didn't make any sense to me.

“Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

THAT we may obtain mercy? Like we're entering His throne room boldly and THEN receiving mercy? Whaaaat....?

A couple days ago though, I was studying Hebrews 4 with my friend, and decided to spend longer than usual on this part. Suddenly, I understood.

“Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews‬ ‭4:14-16‬)

I had to simplify the sentences in order to figure it out for myself, so I'll simplify again so you can read what I was thinking.

Because we have a great High Priest, (Jesus) let us hold fast our profession. (Holy Priesthood)

The High Priest we have understands our weaknesses because He went through the same trials and temptations that we do, even though He never sinned.

Because of this, we don't have to be ashamed of our weakness, as though He didn't know about it when He chose to make us priests, instead we may come boldly to the throne of grace, showing ourselves to be exactly who He already knew us to be, to obtain even more mercy, and grace to help in time of need.

I guess the simplified version is even longer than the original, but you get the point.

We didn't choose to become a Holy Priesthood, and God did not accept us because the facade we put on was so convincing. He CHOSE us for exactly who we are, even less perfect than we even think ourselves to be. THAT is why we may enter boldly, because nothing about our boldness comes from who we are, it ALL has to do with who He is, and the decision HE made.

For Your Name's Sake

I didn't have a new epiphany this week, but I did remember an old one!

Truth: God is holy, and cannot tolerate sin.

Truth: "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."

Truth: God loves His children and dwells with them.

How can those three things be reconciled?

Christ COMPLETELY paid for our sins when He died. There is nothing we can do that will overcome what He did, He said it's finished. Paid in FULL.

Sometimes though, we think that we can somehow go too far. That at a certain point, God's patience and mercy MUST run out.

At least I do.

I tend to think that every time I sin, I must first ask for forgiveness and THEN Christ's sacrifice will have paid for it, but at a certain point, He must want to stop extending the sacrifice out.

Of course we must ask for forgiveness, but if you were to get struck by lightning a moment after you sinned, and didn't have time to confess, what then? Is Christ's sacrifice not great enough to overcome that?

Of course it is. We're back to the simple gospel, it is not about what you do, it's about what He has done.

Sorry, rabbit trailing a bit here.

Anyway, basically, if this is true, that when you sin you are guilty until He forgives you again, (which according to my logic, He may or may not do) then one of the above Truths must be false.

If sin stays on us (if we are guilty) until God forgives it, then either He can tolerate sin, and is not truly holy, (Truth 1 is a lie) we haven't actually sinned, (Truth 2 is a lie) or He cannot dwell with us. (Truth 3 is a lie.)

But those three statements are all true, and we know that the reason they are true is because of Christ's sacrifice, which again, paid for our sin in full. 

So this idea that we are still sinful after we have believed in Him and His sacrifice for us is wrong.

This is the verse which made this come alive again in my mind yesterday:

Help us, O God of our salvation, For the glory of Your name; And deliver us, and provide atonement for our sins, For Your name’s sake! (Psalms 79:9)

I'll add some emphasis so you can sort of see what I was thinking as I read this.

Help us, O God of our salvation, (Why?) For the glory of Your name; And deliver us, and provide atonement for our sins, (Why?) For Your name’s sake! (Psalms 79:9)

We think that God couldn't possibly forgive us any more, because we have really pushed our limits.

But it really isn't all about us. He forgives us because He loves us, so in that sense it is, but why does He love us?

Because of who we are, or because of who He is?

For God to love us beyond all reason says more about Him than it does us, it shows how loving He is, it shows who He is. 

He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. (I John 4:8)

God says throughout the scriptures that He wants to be known, and in showing us love, He is showing us and those around us who He is.

No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” (Jeremiah 31:34)

Psalm 79:9 says that to help us, deliver us, and provide atonement for our sins, it will actually glorify His name! It will show everyone how great He is, that He would love that far.

I wrote in my notebook about this,

"To say that He can't love us because of something we did is to make ourselves stronger than God. It is partially for His sake that we should ask for deliverance, because if we love Him, we should desire His good reputation."

It is not that God needs us, or that somehow we can make or break His reputation, but when we allow Him to shower us with grace and forgiveness, we are not only accepting blessing, but allowing others through us to see the majesty of our Lord, which is also helping Him accomplish His greater purpose, because He wants to be known by men.