If you have a Bible, you can turn in the New Testament to John chapter 16. John chapter 16, we'll read verses 16 through the end of the chapter. Lend your attention, this is the very word of God. A little while and you will see me no longer. And again, a little while and you will see me. So some of his disciples said to one another, what is this that he says to us? A little while and you will not see me. And again, a little while and you will see me. And because I am going to the father. So they were saying, what does he mean by a little while? We do not know what he is talking about. Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, is this what you are asking yourselves? What I mean by saying a little while and you will not see me? And again, a little while and you will see me? Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy. When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come. But when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish for joy that a human being has been born into the world. So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice and no one will take your joy from you. In that day, you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask and you will receive, that your joy may be full. I have said these things to you in figures of speech. The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures of speech, but will tell you plainly about the Father. In that day you will ask in my name, and I do not say to you that I will ask the Father on your behalf, for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. I came from the Father, and I have come into the world, and now I am leaving the world and going to the Father. His disciples said, ah, now you are speaking plainly and not using figurative speech. Now we know that you know all things and do not need anyone to question you. This is why we believe that you came from God. Jesus answered them, do you now believe? Behold, the hour is coming. Indeed, it has come when you will be scattered, each one to his own home and will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me. I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation, but take heart, I have overcome the world. Thus far the reading of God's word. You could turn in the Old Testament to the book of Micah. I mentioned that. Micah is made up of three cycles of oracles. The Book of Micah is kind of a collection of sermons. We said that Micah ministered over a significant period of time, 30, 40 years, somewhere in that range, best guess. And so what we have in the Book of Micah is basically a collection of his oracles from that ministry arranged in this book. And so the way the book works is there are three cycles of oracles, and the first cycle takes place over chapters one and two. And the progression in each cycle is from a very dark landscape of God's judgment, moving to the salvation that he is inexplicably going to bring forth through the judgment that he is working. And so in this first cycle, you get two oracles of judgment in chapter one, one against Samaria in the north, and then one against Judah in the south. And then chapter two elaborates on the reason for that judgment, and then closes with a brief light of hope at the end of chapter two. So this section of scripture that I'm about to read is the first oracle of judgment, and it is against Samaria explicitly, though the sins of God's people are in view as a whole. So lend your attention, this is the very word of God. Hear you peoples, all of you. Pay attention, O earth, and all that is in it, and let the Lord God be a witness against you, the Lord from his holy temple. For behold, the Lord is coming out of his place and will come down and tread upon the high places of the earth. And the mountains will melt under him and the valleys will be split open like wax before the fire, like waters poured down a steep place. All this is for the transgression of Jacob and for the sins of the house of Israel. What is the 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 in the open country, a place for planting vineyards, and I will pour down her stones into the valley and uncover her foundations. All her carved images shall be beaten to pieces. All her wages shall be burned with fire. All her idols I will lay waste, for from the fee of a prostitute she gathered them, and to the fee of a prostitute they shall return. Thus ends the reading of God's holy word. May he add his blessing to it. Join me in prayer. How blessed is your word, O Lord. How weighty it is. Even in these weighty portions, Father, uphold us and sustain us that we may rightly hear them and not sink down under their weight. Give us the eyes to see and the ears to hear. Attend your word with the gracious influence of the Holy Spirit that we might not be those who are dull of heart, dull of hearing. May we heed and respond appropriately to this portion of scripture, Lord. Setting before us the the terrible truth of sin, idolatry, and the human heart's seemingly unbreakable tendency to only build upon such corrupt and foul foundations, and the terrible truth that you will call all to account Father, sober us in the face of this, that we might be rightly directed to the only true foundation of the Lord Jesus Christ and the work which will endure, the temple that you are building upon him as you are gathering living stones. We pray all these things in Christ's name, amen. That was a real wake-up call. Have you ever heard people talk like that? Have you ever used those words? That was a real wake-up call. I remember when I was in college, my uncle was in a terrible accident. It nearly cost him his life. It was rather a wonder that he walked away from it at all, that he survived. And after he recovered, I can't remember if he used those exact words, but That was the sense that I got from him. That was a real wake-up call for me. That was what his words communicated. Something incredibly weighty had happened, and it forced him to see things in an entirely different light, in a way that he hadn't previously, prior to the wake-up call. Micah opens with a wake-up call. a call. It's a wake-up event. His book opens with an oracle of judgment against God's people, against God's people, the kingdom of Israel. And it focuses here specifically on that capital of the kingdom, Samaria, one which would have been renowned for wealth, strength, power, pleasure, all of that accoutrement which attends an incredibly prosperous society. And God here opens his word against Samaria saying, it's over. It's over. I'm going to destroy you. Your wealth cannot stop this. Your high walls cannot stop this. Your political allegiances cannot stop this. Your so-called gods cannot stop this. Nothing can stop this. It's over. You're going to fall and great will be its collapse. In some ways, this is not all that surprising if you're familiar with biblical history. If you read the story of the northern kingdom of Israel, you see that she was on a terrible trajectory from the very start. She found the inception of her kingdom essentially in the establishment of golden calf worship, both in the northernmost extreme and the southernmost extreme of her boundaries. And from then on, it was essentially what you would expect. It was a kingdom of remarkable prosperity, but one of remarkable hard heartedness towards God's word. The fall here is tragic, but in some ways it's not that surprising. They were headed towards judgment from the beginning because they failed to grapple with the word of the Lord. They failed to heed the word of the Lord. The fall is tragic, yes. Surprising? Not really. The more surprising component of this opening of Micah's book is the fact that God sets forth Samaria's fall and then tells the world, wake up. Look at this episode and take note. This is how it's going to end for every idolater, everyone who puts their trust in wealth, everyone who puts their trust in power, everyone who rests secure in a political allegiance, anyone who's yoked themselves to anything other than the true and living God and his very great and precious promises. Wake up. This morning, we're forced to grapple with a wake-up call. It's a weighty text. There's not a ton of light in this oracle, is there? But there is some. It's a weighty wake-up call. But we're also invited to consider God's kindness in extending it. That he would call to those who are slumbering obtusely. to the disaster on the horizon if they do not change course. The fact that he says, wake up, disaster is at the end of this road is yet another indication of his great kindness, graciousness, and gentleness. So let's consider this wake-up call this morning and how he would have us respond. Consider first that the Lord summons Consider second, that the Lord marches, and consider third, that the Lord warns. First, the Lord summons. As the Lord of all the earth, God calls to everyone to listen, to hear his word. Verse two. Listen, all you peoples, pay attention. Earth, everyone in it, the Lord will be a witness against you. The Lord from his holy temple. I'm reading in The Once and Future King. Anyone read this book, The Once and Future King? It's a classic. It's the story of King Arthur, how he came to be king and established his knights of the round table perhaps greatest reign in the history of England. And in the Once and Future King, the former king of England, Uther Pendragon, sends word to one of the nobles in his land, Sir Ector. He says, I'm sending my chief huntsman to you. He's going to visit your estate. My huntsman's going to hunt and you're going to accommodate him. You're going to give him lodging. You're going to give him welcome. Signed, the King of England. Sir Hector knows he has no choice but to heed this word or be found guilty of the highest treason. God addresses everyone as the uncontested sovereign Lord. You can notice twice he uses that title in the opening line. The Lord God, the Lord from his holy place. The word is Adonai, Master. Lord, proper and uncontested sovereign over all, like the King of England to his subject, Sir Ector. Only here, the subjects are everyone. All peoples, the earth, all of its inhabitants. The God of Israel, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, he's no local deity. He addresses the nations. In Amos, in Isaiah, in Jeremiah, through his holy prophets, he tells people what will be and what he demands from them. In Jonah, he sends his prophet to Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, and he calls them to repent. There is no one, there is nothing that is not subject to this sovereign and awesome God. And what does he say? Listen, listen, all you peoples, pay attention, earth and everyone in it. Twice you get those parallel imperatives. Listen, heed, or hear, pay attention. You would think that the simple fact that God speaks would be enough to gain an audience. The book opens, this is the word of the Lord. And wouldn't any sane person be quick to hear, quick to listen? This is the Lord God. This is the God of heaven and earth. Any sane person would be stumbling over themselves to hear this word. and not just hear this word, to obey this word, whatever it calls for. If it says repent of sin, wouldn't sanity be like, yes, whatever you say, I'll go where you tell me to go. If it says wait for my salvation, sanity would say, of course, your King, your God, I'll do what you say. You made me, you give me everything. Consider how dim of sight we are. Consider how proud and how hard of heart we are, how it is only with great difficulty that God's word penetrates to the heart. We must be told, listen. Look, you have to listen, pay attention, obey. And not only must we be told, we must be given the ears to hear. Isn't that what the Lord Jesus Christ consistently says throughout his earthly ministry? Let those with ears to hear, hear. He would speak and he knew that everyone was hearing him, but not everyone was hearing him. He wasn't saying, let everyone with literal ears hear me. He was saying, let those whose ears have been opened by my Father, let those whose eyes have been opened by my Father, listen and heed these words. We need not only the command to hear, we need the strength to heed this command. And above all, we need the eyes to see that God has spoken many times and in many ways through his servants, the prophets, but in these last days, he has spoken to us in his son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And what does the Lord Jesus say? Matthew 7, 24 and 25. Everyone who hears my words and acts on them is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain fell, the rivers rose, and the winds blew and pounded that house, yet it didn't collapse because its foundation was on the rock. May the Lord grant to us the ears to hear and the hearts to build only upon Christ and his holy word. It's such a fitting prayer, isn't it? Let me commend it to you. Whenever you sit down to read God's word by yourself or with your family, or even as you prepare to sit under God's word in public worship, how fitting is the prayer of Psalm 119 verse 18, Lord, open my eyes so that I may see wondrous things from your word. We need to be given the eyes to see, the ears to hear, and this the Lord is pleased to give to those who ask. And those who do not heed the word, terrifyingly, the Lord marches against them, beginning with his own people. So we consider next, the Lord marches. The consolation of the wicked is constantly, the Lord does not see. Or if he does see, he does not act. Here, God announces that he does see and he does act. Verses three and four. Behold, the Lord is about to go forth from his place. He will descend and tread upon the heights of the earth. The mountains will melt beneath him and the valleys will split apart like wax near a fire, like water cascading down the descents. In the two towers, the second Lord of the Rings, Mary and Pippin, meet the Ents, who are an ancient race of trees. And when the leader of the Ents sees the destruction and the wickedness of Isengard and its master, he calls the Ents to march. And they move like an unstoppable force, likened only to the destructive powers on display in nature itself. And they destroy this pitiful work of man, this dark war engine, leaving it a watery wasteland. Yahweh is pictured here as an unstoppable king marching against earth, striding easily across and atop the highest places of earth, those supposedly that are most fortified, those hardest to breach, Yahweh treads upon them as this unstoppable king who is going to war. And the imagery is incredibly vivid. Those most stable elements in nature are reduced to instability. They're reduced to liquid. The mountains will melt beneath him. The valleys will split apart like wax before a fire, like water cascading down a mountainside. Who can stand before the Almighty? Who can oppose him? Human beings talk a big talk under the delusion of the absent God or the God who does not act. But when he shows up, when the true and living God marches actively against those who defy him, his creatures who set their mouth and heart against heaven, what takes place? Every mouth will be stopped. Every hand raised against heaven will tremble like a leaf. There's nowhere to run. His power reaches to the mountaintop and to the valley floor. It's a comprehensive image, Amos 9, 1 through 3. None who flee will get away. None of the fugitives will escape. If they dig to Sheol, from there my hand will take them. If they climb up to heaven, from there I'll bring them down. If they hide on the top of Mount Carmel, from there I will track them down and seize them. If they conceal themselves from my sight on the sea floor, from there I will command the sea monster to bite them. So he was talking to Jonah. the places that appear most stable, most likely to provide some sort of refuge, some sort of bastion against this marching God that reduced to nothing, mountains melting like wax, valley floors turning into a watery instability. Will anyone be able to hide if God truly sets himself against that person, that place? Of course not. Thinking that way is like a child thinking that if they pull the covers over their heads, they're completely safe. And what's the reason for this destructive march? Verse 5, all this is against the iniquity of Jacob and the sins of the house of Israel. Who is the iniquity of Jacob? Is it not Samaria? Who is the high place of Judah? Is it not Jerusalem? Israel loved to hear about Yahweh going to war. Why wouldn't she? Her history was littered with Yahweh marching to war for her salvation. Yahweh marched to war and wicked Egypt was drowned in the Red Sea. You can read about it in Exodus 15. Yahweh marched to war and evil Sisera and his seemingly unbeatable host of chariots was reduced to nothing. You can read about it in Judges 5. So Israel started saying, Yahweh's marching to war against those sinners. Get them. They're a rotten lot. Let's watch them fall. Is the church vulnerable to thinking that way? Get them. They're a bunch of rotten sinners. Let's watch them fall. You tell me, as you see the world moving from bad to worse, what's your response? It's oh so near at hand to see the chaos unfolding in our culture and think how terrible the sins of others. Let's take a quick inventory of the church vis-a-vis the world, shall we? The world, how rampant sexual immorality is, how rampant broken marriages, broken families are. How's the church doing? The world, how divided, how cruel, how quick to judge and assume the worst. How's the church doing? How greedy for gain, how materialistic, how vain the world is. Don't we love our Amazon Prime, our Netflix, our smartphones? Some might say we're addicted. How selfish and childish the world is in its constant victimization, its constant disrespect of authority. Don't we constantly justify our sinful actions as legitimate responses to wrongs done against us? Isn't that claiming victimhood? Isn't that playing the victim? Aren't we slow to give honor to whom honor is due? Children dishonoring parents. Wives dishonoring husbands. Husbands dishonoring magistrates. It's a cottage industry at this point. How corrupt our world leaders are, using their positions and power for personal gain. Aren't we constantly using our own authority for our own agendas? Husbands treating wives cruelly because their little wills are crossed. Mothers treating children crossly because their little wills are crossed. Is no one quick to turn on someone who gets in their way? Isn't that the same thing? Using your authority, your power to realize your will, burning down anyone who gets in the way? Micah says the world is burning down because the sins of my people. When was the last time you looked upon the dissolution all around us and thought, what have I done? Father, forgive me. The world is ablaze and we're all holding kerosene and matches pointing at the other guy. It's a humbling picture of us. It's supposed to be humbling. It's supposed to pull the rug out from under us. It's supposed to punch God's people in the face. It's supposed to put the world in a different perspective, one that we're not accustomed to entertaining all the time. May the Lord grant us the eyes and the ears to hear it. May He grant us that perspective that sees the work of my hands as heinous and contributing to the blaze. Your hands as heinous and contributing to the blaze and responding appropriately with abject humility. What have I done? Father, forgive me. For it's against the high places that he marches. It's against that which is raised up that he sets himself. And so the good effect of the laying low is the posturing of one in the position of favor and grace and mercy. For he graciously warns that everything raised up is going to be brought low. The last consideration. The Lord graciously warns. Verses six and seven closes with the historical specifics of this brief oracle. Therefore, I will make Samaria a heap of ruins in the field, a planting area for a vineyard. I will roll her stones into the valley and expose her foundations. All her carved images will be smashed to pieces. All her wages will be burned by fire, and I will destroy all her idols. Since she collected a harlot's wages, unto the wages of a harlot they shall be returned. God promises a thorough destruction of this city, from walls to foundation. You can hear it in this threefold repetition of all in verse seven. All, all, all destroyed. Samaria was an impressive city. Samaria had impressive walls, impressive palaces, signs of significant wealth, a wealth that had become her confidence. But it's a wealth here that's derisively called the wages of a harlot. All her considerable wealth came to her as she yoked herself to foreign gods, to foreign nations, and hardened herself towards her true husband's call to return unto him. This was flagrant adultery and of the worst kind conceivable. The most terrible scene in Anna Karenina is when Anna invites Vronsky, her lover, into her husband's home. And there, Alexei, Anna's husband, is forced to watch as his wife welcomes her illicit lover into his home. And more grotesque still, Anna then begins to mock her husband before her lover. It's a heartbreaking scene. It's probably the most terrible scene in the novel, but this is more terrible still. For God's people have committed an infidelity that is worse than Anna's in her husband's house. As heartbreaking as Anna's infidelity was, this is an infidelity purely for material gain. That's what the image of a harlot's wages evokes. Israel didn't abandon Yahweh for love, so to speak. She did it for wealth. She did it for the riches of this world, exchanging the glory of the invisible God for stuff. It's the foulest betrayal conceivable. And she persisted in this foul adultery against all warnings, against all pleadings to the contrary. And so it was in 722 that Shalmaneser V besieged Samaria and sent her population into exile. And the northern kingdom of Israel came to a dreadful end. The oracle ends on a dark note. I hear it as an even darker echo of the curse of the garden. From dust you are, unto dust you shall return. Verse seven closes, she gathered from a harlot's wage and unto a harlot's wage they return. From one idolater into the arms of another. The picture here is that wealth that Israel had gained in her idolatrous and sinful ways is now taken to fuel another idolatrous and sinful nation, providing the wealth that's going to continue to subsidize Assyria's dreadful regime. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, and in a way, the ways of God are wonderful because Assyria was no blameless instrument. And he gives her exactly what her heart wants, preparing her for the day of judgment. If there's any hope to be had in this oracle, it's called from the word that we're all invited to hear. Samaria is God's gracious warning to all. It would have been tempting to understand the events that took place in Samaria from a purely political point of view. Well, of course, Samaria fell. Shalmaneser V was an unstoppable force engaged in a purely imperialistic campaign. He destroyed almost everyone in that region of the world. Well, of course, Samaria fell as well. Or, of course, Samaria fell. Israel's king, Hosea, was a fool. He treacherously withheld the tribute that he was bound to pay to Assyria, and he tried to strike an alliance with Egypt at the last hour to stand against Assyria. Of course, Samaria fell. This was just foolish politics. Hosea, Amos, 2 Kings 17, Micah, all say plainly, Samaria fell because God judged her. Samaria was destroyed because God is not silent. because God judges wickedness. Hear all peoples, give attention earth and all its inhabitants, for the Lord will stand as witness against you. Let everyone hear and tremble. God will judge the world in righteousness. Those who put their trust in wealth or might or so-called gods and their idols will come to the same end, indeed worse. Those who would stand before this God purely upon the foundation of the work of man's hands, you know what their end will be. God is bearing witness against all who would take that course. The fall of Samaria in 722, as God's terrible word of judgment calls the nations to wake up. to hear and to act. And in that sense, it is a weighty word, one that is sealed in blood, but it is gracious to those who remain. It is gracious to those who still have breath and life in their body, because if God hears to, if God calls to hear this word, then it suggests the possibility of a different end. It suggests that this need not be the fate that everyone comes to. And indeed, this is the different end that opens up when we truly hear his word concerning the truth of our sin, the truth of his holiness. And when we truly hear his word concerning the truth of his utterly bewildering provision for sinners in the Lord Jesus Christ. In the fullness of time, God did visit the earth. He went forth from his holy palace. And he didn't use a proxy, Shalmaneser, like he did in 722. He visited the earth, he came to the earth in the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal son. And perhaps even more surprising is that he didn't visit the earth in judgment. He visited the earth to bring salvation. Salvation not just to Jews who knew the true and living God, but to idolaters of the grossest pagan iterations. In other words, us, Gentiles. Jesus Christ visited the earth to bring salvation to those who have no proper claim to it. And so what does the Father say now? On the Mount of Transfiguration, the Father declares, this is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him. hear him. And what does the son say? Anyone who believes in me is not condemned. Anyone who does not believe is already condemned because he has not believed in the name of the one and only Son of God. The one who believes in me has eternal life, but the one who rejects the Son will not see life. Instead, the wrath of God remains upon him. One pastor makes the particular poignant and simple plea, here, listen, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. We've seen the condemnation. We've seen the wrath of God. Mountains cannot stand before it. Fortified cities cannot stand before it. What hope does an individual sinner have of standing before it? And this is the same wrath that the Son will bring when he visits the earth a second time. 2 Thessalonians 1.8. He will come in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Hear that sobering word. Know that it is a true and faithful witness. Make sure that you flee to the Son and make certain that He alone is the foundation that you are building upon. For blessed are all who take refuge in Him. Let's pray. Father, a weighty word. Use it to jar our hearts appropriately, for we are so prone to take comfort in the things of this world. We're so prone to put our confidence in the things of this world. We're so prone, Father, to deceive ourselves into thinking that you will not act, you do not see. Father, these words disabuse us of any folly. May they be pressed home upon our hearts. May we appropriately tremble at Scripture's warning that we may be appropriately sent fleeing into the arms of the Lord Jesus Christ who welcomes sinners, who is the only foundation which will stand. We thank you that you are pleased to do these things and use these weighty words to accomplish your good and glorious purposes. And we pray in Christ's name, amen.