Welcome. Is that too close? We are thrilled to have you here today. You know, it's a miracle that God would provide even one person to come here, that he would soften our hearts of stone and create hearts of flesh that would draw us to himself, to hear, to hear his word. We are all blessed. We should celebrate that blessing every day of our lives. Today, we celebrate a special blessing for those who have been blessed to be moms and also to bless the moms of moms and the mothers to be doubly blessed, which is not to take away anything from any other blessings that we have. It's just that this is one special day that we have. We have two collections today. It's the deacon's offering. Most of you guys know the drill. We have the regular offering, which helps to provide for all of this, and then the deacon's offering, which helps us to reach out to others and also to folks within the congregation who are in need. If you are a visitor today, you should be able to find a card here. We actually have new software that will help us organize this better. And there'll be more about that later. We're still working through it, the installation of the software. But it's actually software that does stuff like keep track of emails better than what we've done in the past. Okay, I'm going to try and run through these fast. If you guys are anything like me, if it's printed there, I forget. So I'm going to try and put it in one ear and keep it in the other from getting out the other. May 18th, which is next Sunday, we have a potluck right after church. If you can bring food, great. If you can't, great. Come anyway. There will also be a special table for informal training to care for special needs children in the nursery by Kathy Costello. We seem to be having a need for that, and we want to be able to fulfill that need. June 1st is the last day of Sunday school. It's also the day of the Covered Bridges half marathon. I'm not going to name names, but if you live off in Pomfort or in Barnard, if you want to come to Sunday school, you have to be here before 8. Sunday school is still at 9, but you will have to be here before 8, because that road will be closed. The race starts out on Saskadena at 8 o'clock. If you're coming from almost anywhere else and are planning on coming to Sunday school, you'll have to be here before 8.30. Elm Street will be closed at 8.30. If you're not planning on coming to Sunday school, you're cool. You don't have to worry about it. Everyone will be gone by then. All the racers, anyway. June 8, we start at 930 with a new format. The elements will be the same, but we are partnering with Valley Bible. So the Valley Bible, whoever the preacher is for there, will come here. preach, and then go there. So that is such a special blessing that we have that they are willing to do that. Easter offering. We are now just shy of $10,000 for the Easter offering. Just a couple hundred bucks less than that. We'll be closing off that offering soon. That doesn't mean if you really want to create some havoc within the Board of Christian Missions, you know, a month from now you give to the Easter offering, we'll give it to them to figure out what they're going to do with it. The Pastoral Search Committee is now fully staffed, and they actually are the first ones to have received email from the new software. So if you are one of these names and I'm about to read, and you didn't get the email, I'd like to know. So it's Steve Briggs, Carl, myself, Preston Bristow, Heidi Tucker, Cora Koop, Heidi Gennaro, Paige Gibbs, Ruth Emery, Jen Barnes, Dan Bruce, and Ann Hablitzel. If you heard your name, we are going to have, on June 1st, there will be an installation as a pastoral search committee. If you didn't hear your name, that doesn't mean you're off the hook. As we go through this process, and especially now that we have all these guest pastors like Craig here who is coming for the second time for his second install of Micah, which we thank you very much for, it's important extra important for you to be listening to all these different preachers and how they are preaching and what it is about them that reaches you, that touches the spirit within you. Because some point in time in the future, and it might not be, you're going to forget I said this by the time we get there, but you're going to be called on to vote. on a new pastor. And even though you are not on the committee, you have a responsibility as a church member. So, and we shouldn't take that lightly. I'm getting into really important stuff. Tom Johnston and Robin Huck update. Two hips, one left, one right. Tom was actually here for Sunday school and I think he might be in the library with his leg up. So he's clearly doing well. Robin is doing well as well. She's at home with our daughter right now just because she said she was fine. I didn't want to leave her for three hours all by herself. Something that you may not know, someone you may not know, Anka Stickney had surgery a little more than a week ago. Coming out of anesthesia, she had a mild stroke. So that set her back quite a bit. But she is doing well. She can talk. At this point in time, she's doing physical therapy and occupational therapy. Cards and emails are appreciated, but no visits as of yet. She's got all these people coming in, and in a situation like that, you wind up being really tired out by all the work that you have to go through. But cards and emails are appreciated. Thank you. Oh, oh, I have an extra one. Sorry, Allison. There are new copies of Table Talk Magazine on the table in the Northex, and the Vespers, which was originally scheduled for today, is postponed until next Sunday. Now that's all. Would you please rise for the call to worship? reading from Romans 10 9 if you confess with your mouth Jesus says Lord and believe in your heart God raised him from the dead you will be saved Lord Seems like two easy asks. Just confess and believe. But Lord, we know that without your spirit, without your power, without your grace, without your love, we would be unable to do this. We thank you for the ways that you work in our lives, the ways that you've worked in our church, the ways that you have worked throughout history, Lord. We confess that we just don't celebrate that the way that we should. And we would ask, Lord, that on this day that we would really keep you in focus, that we would really work to listen and to focus in on the word that will be preached today and also let our hearts be continually warmed by it. And we pray these things in Jesus' name, amen. First hymn, number 181, We Come, O Christ, to You. ♪ You are the praise to God ♪ ♪ You are the praise to me ♪ You are the living truth, the wisdom, the teaching, the source of everything. The eternal truth, the great idea, in universal answer to our fear. The Lord abandoned life, never came and went. O praise him, Lord! He, he, he, he, bless his children and kings! You may be seated. You know, I'm standing here right next to all the pipes and I can still hear you guys sing it. So this is great. So this is the part where we do the pastoral prayer. And one of the things that I have noticed is how the Holy Spirit works differently in different people. And that comes out in prayer. So this is partially an apology, because I'm a geek. And you're going to see some of my geekiness in the pastoral prayer. But it all comes from the heart. Dear Lord, here we are. spinning around the Earth at almost 1,000 miles an hour. The Earth is traveling around the Sun at 67,000 miles an hour. And the Sun is traveling around our galaxy at over 440,000 miles an hour. And yet, it is all under your control and your watchful eye. You watch over the cosmos. You watch over us. You watch over the smallest detail. And it is all because of your love, your grace, your power, your compassion, and your will to be in our lives. Not that we deserve it, but that it is all of you. We confess that we take this for granted, that the seasons will change. and the white of snow will give way to the green of spring, and that your spirit has worked that miracle in our hearts to soften them, turning the winter of our cold hearts into the warmth of summer, that you care for us and watch over us. Thank you for all the ways you work. in and through our lives, that we have this place, this day, to set aside to worship you. We thank you for all the ways that you've worked in our lives. And we maybe sometimes grudgingly thank you for the challenges that you give us. We thank you for the blessings as well. We ask that you would strengthen us individually and as a congregation to love you more deeply and to follow you more closely. We pray for discernment on how best to be your people on this earth and to reflect your grace, your compassion, your truth. We pray these things in the name of Jesus Christ, your son, and our risen Lord. Amen. And now we'll collect the tithes and offerings. This is the general collection. Dear Lord, we thank you for the ways that you have worked in this church, in the past, in the present, and in the ways to come, Lord, as we move forward in our walk with you. We thank you for these gifts, Lord, that you would guide us strongly in their use. And we thank you again. In Jesus' name, amen. If you'd all rise for the doxology. It's number 731 in your hymnal. In excelsis Deo, Praised be Thou our new-born Lord, Christ, Lord, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen. And if you remain standing, and if you've got your hymnal open already, it's Psalm 16, page 788 for the responsive reading. One thing that stood out on this when I was reading it ahead of time, I get to do the spoiler alert. And it is fairly far into it, and it says, I will not be shaken. Wouldn't that be great if we could all say that? I will not be shaken. There's just so many things in our lives. It's not our fault that we're shaken, but we are. And we just would reach out and say, wow, wouldn't that be nice if we could all say, I will not be shaken, that my faith would be strong enough that I would not be shaken. So you guys get to read the dark parts, and I get to read the light parts. Keep me safe, O God. I said to the Lord, you are my Lord. Apart from you, I have no good thing. The sorrows of those will increase who run after other gods. Lord, you have assigned me my portion and my cup. You have made my lot secure. I will praise the Lord who counsels me. Even at night, my heart instructs me. Therefore, my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices. My body also will rest secure. You have made known to me the path of life. And if you still remain standing, if you can, hymn number 501, Just As I Am. O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming? Yeah. ♪ I know ♪ ♪ And as I am I know ♪ ♪ That God in heaven is gentle ♪ ♪ And to the end of the world is kind ♪ You may be seated. Scripture reading from Micah 2, 1 through 5 in your Bible, page 776. 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 seize them, and houses and take them away. They oppress a man and his house, a man and his inheritance. Therefore, thus says the Lord, behold, against this family I am devising disaster, from which you cannot remove your necks, and you shall not walk haughtily, for it will be a time of disaster. In that day they shall take up taut song against you and moan bitterly and say, we are utterly ruined. He changes the portion of my people, how he removes it from me. To an apostate he allots our fields. Therefore, you will have none to cast the line by lot in the assembly of the Lord. This is the word of God. And the last thing you'll hear from me is the deacon's collection. And as a reminder, for those who might not know, this is for folks within our community and within our church community who are in need. Lord, prepare me to be a sanctuary Pure and holy, bright and true With thanksgiving I'll be a living sanctuary for you Dear Lord, we ask for guidance as we take up your offering here, Lord. And we ask for wisdom in how this should be distributed amongst our community, our church community, and the community at large. Lord, we thank you for the ability to do that. and for the heart that you have given us to even want to consider it. We thank you for all the ways that you have blessed us and continue to bless us. In Jesus' name, amen. Good morning. Please open your Bibles to Micah chapter 2, where we just read. And I will ask you to pray with me. Let us pray. Our Father in heaven, we confess our dependence upon you for the ministry of your word. We believe that these holy scriptures are the very word of God. We believe they contain the life that is Jesus Christ, and they are able to give us the wisdom that leads to life. We confess that we are unable to lay hold of that unless you, by your Holy Spirit, are also at work. So we pray that you would be at work today. So have your way with us. We invoke your promise that your word does not go out from you and return to you void, but it accomplishes the design for which you sent it. And so we pray that you would fulfill that promise in our midst today. We ask for your blessing in Jesus Christ's name. Amen. I wonder if you've ever seen any movies from the genre that I'm thinking of where You've got a bunch of siblings who are jockeying for position to inherit a fortune from the old man. I've seen a number of movies like that. You've probably seen some. There's a rich dad and you've got some greedy children. And who's going to get to be in charge of the multi-billion dollar empire they all wanted? And so the kids, they all pretend to love dad, but none of them is actually interested in the company that dad built. They don't love the values of his corporation. They don't share his ideals. They just want his money. And in movies of that sort, the kicker usually comes in when dad dies. Everybody shows up for the reading of the will, and the lawyer reveals that dad has left the bulk of his fortune to the butler. Dad wasn't being mean. It was just this, the butler proved to be more of a son to their father than his own children did, his biological children. The children proved themselves disqualified for the inheritance. They weren't true children at all, as you measure true. Well, I think something a little bit like that's going on in Micah this morning, where we've begun to read. There are greedy Israelites who want the land and the blessing of God's covenant. They want the inheritance. But God's prophet is here calling them out to reveal how they are disqualified from inheriting. He calls them out, shows them their sin, and it's a sin that reveals that they're not true children of God at all. They don't understand God. They don't resonate with what God loves and wants. Now I'm sure you know there is an inheritance coming for the children of God. God foreshadowed this very idea when he formed Israel as a nation. He did it to help us understand that God's blessings of grace that he freely gives, they're structured to us as an inheritance. God's salvation is an inheritance. And it turns out that the ones who inherit God's blessings of grace, his salvation, they also prove to be God's true children. They love what the father loves, they want what the father wants, and that validates, verifies that they are in fact his children. Micah's teaching us that the people who are poised to inherit from God also live lives that resonate with what the father loves and what the father wants, and the ones who don't live that way are just proving that they're not children at all. So I'm wondering about you this morning. Do you know what the Father loves and what he wants? Do you resonate with it? Micah's prophecy, I think, can help you to know it and can help you as a Christian to move toward greater resonance with it, to live more and more like a true child of God. I want you to come into Micah chapter 2 with me. Here's how I've characterized the theme of this message. The wicked who listen to false prophets come only to dispossession and ruin. But the upright who take heed of the word of the Lord inherit the kingdom, saved by the shepherd king, Jesus. And we're going to see all that, I think, in Micah's text today. I want to remind you just of the context. We're in an Old Covenant context, but I don't want you to be confused about God's salvation. It is a salvation promise that's in effect in the Old Covenant. Those promises of a land and a nation and of God dwelling in their midst that's all salvation language. It's God saying I'm going to make you my family and it's all premised on the promise of a deliverer which we're going to see in our passage today because the deliverer will be the one who comes and keeps covenant for them and saves them from their sins and reconciles them to the Father. That's the salvation plan. And this promise, this salvation, this deliverer is received by faith. This never was a works righteousness scheme. It was always a grace salvation scheme. And finally, the covenantal obedience that's called for is just the living out of a law-defined family resemblance. This is what God's children look like and you live that out. Now that's the setting that we're in and that helps frame what we're looking at. So we've already read the first five verses in which we hear a cry of woe against those who devise and work evil. He's saying that Israel has become divisors of wickedness. He says they lay awake at night dreaming up ways to grab more for themselves. And they get up in the morning and then they act on it. They take what they want. They do the exact opposite of what covenant faithfulness requires. Because instead of loving your neighbor, instead of doing that and loving your neighbor's family, they steal his house and his land. They take away his inheritance. Now you just need to let the import of that stealing and inheritance sink in on you because as I've said and we understand inheritance really stands for God's blessing and promise. Israel was promised this land as a nation, and each family among them had a specific share, an inheritance laid out for him by lot. And that was supposed to be his forever. They even had a provision in the law that even if you messed up with your, dealing with your property, every 50 years the property all reverts back to the original families, because that's your inheritance forever. You couldn't lose your inheritance that way. So to steal an inheritance, that is a crime of hatred. That's what that is. How does God respond to that? Well, we saw it last week. We see it again today. He responds with a kind of poetic justice. It's where the punishment fits the crime. Because in verses 3 to 5 there, what does he say he's going to do, as Carl already read? He brings a disaster on them if they can't escape. He says their arrogance will be silenced. He says their enemies will sing a taunt against them. They're going to be militarily conquered and carried away into exile, and their enemies are going to be laughing at them, taunting them as they go. And it's a complete reversal of fortunes. That's what that phrase means when it says there, he changes the portion of my people. It means that the people who've been stealing others' inheritances are now going to have their inheritance stolen, you see. I'm going to let these guys take it away from you because you've shown that it doesn't really belong to you. And they said again, to the apostate he allots our fields. And that means God's going to allow these pagan invaders to come in here and take your land. The Assyrians and the Babylonians, they're going to come in and just take your stuff, take your land. And that phrase there, there'll be none to cast the line by lot. That's verse five, none to cast the line by lot in the assembly of the Lord. Casting the line is how you measure out where the land is. It's how you figure out where your property rights are, your property lines. Get a surveyor. And surveying the land, well, casting the lot means drawing names, and casting the line means surveying the ground. So if there's nobody to cast the lot and there's nobody to draw the line, then there's nobody to hand you your inheritance. Yours is gone. You'll never have an inheritance. You're being disinherited. It's a horrible judgment on the very people who like to steal other people's inheritances. How'd they get in such bad shape? Well it's going to turn out he's going to turn his attention to the people they've been listening to that are causing them to live this way and act this way. If you pick it up in verse 6 we're going to read a little more. You follow along as I read. It says do not preach thus they preach. One should not preach such things. Disgrace will not overtake us. Should this be said, O House of Jacob? Has the Lord grown impatient? Are these his deeds? Do not my words do good to him who walks uprightly? 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. The women of my people you drive out from their delightful houses. From their young children you take away my splendor forever. Arise and go, for this is no place to rest because of uncleanness that destroys with a grievous destruction. I think I'm going to stop. I'll read verse 11. If a man should go about and utter wind and lies, saying, I will preach to you of wine and strong drink, he would be the preacher for this people. Now we're going to stop there for a moment. He's still indicting the covenant breakers, the covetous, the stealers, but now he's turning his attention to the false prophets they've been listening to, because he's got words for both. See, if you catch what the false prophets are saying there, where we read, do not preach thus they preach. The false prophets are saying to Micah, don't talk like that. Micah, don't preach like that. Stop prophesying doom and gloom, Micah. In other words, stop calling out sin, Micah. Don't point out sin. Don't preach about sin. And then they say, that none of these bad things are gonna happen. Should this be said, or such disgrace will not overtake us. They're saying none of the bad things that you're talking about, Mike, are gonna happen to us. You hear what that means? Don't preach about sin and don't warn us about judgment. Don't preach about sin and judgment. Just imagine these guys, they do not want their preachers to preach about sin and judgment. That would be impossible for anybody who's preaching the word of the Lord not to preach about sin and judgment. These prophets are twisting up the truth and you can see that in verse 7. Verse 7 is tricky. I read it. It's tricky to interpret because you got people talking you have to ask who is saying this and I think the simplest way and the best way to read verse 7 is you got four Rhetorical questions. You know rhetorical questions. It's the kind of question where it's not really a question at all. The answer is implied and supposed to be obvious. So when you ask a rhetorical question, you're really just making a statement, right? You understand that. Did you make this mess? Means clean it up. You understand what that means. Rhetorical questions. So the first three questions are the false prophets talking to Micah. And the fourth question is Micah answering them. So the question one. is, should this be said, O house of Jacob? That's the prophet saying, that's the false prophet saying, should a prophet speak like you, Micah? You shouldn't preach that way. That's the first thing they're saying. And then they're asking, has God grown impatient? That's their way of saying, Micah, you're wrong. God will never get impatient with us. Because in their minds, you know, God could never contradict the scriptures that say the Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and loving kindness, right? Steadfast love and faithfulness. But see, these guys, they only read the parts of the Bible they like. Because while it says the Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, it also says, but he will by no means clear the guilty. visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation. These guys need that warning. That's the very warning they need. And they're saying, God doesn't talk that way. God doesn't get impatient. And then they ask, are these his deeds? This judgment that you're talking about, that's their way of saying, listen, Micah, God doesn't act that way. That's not what God does, telling us the Assyrians and the Babylonians are coming in here. God's not like that. But Micah's there to say, as the true prophet who was speaking the word of the Lord, you misunderstand. You're wrong. You are false prophets. And so Micah answers them with the fourth question is Micah's answer. It's his statement when he says in verse 7, do not my words do good. to him who walks up rightly. His statement is my message is here to do you good. I'm preaching the way I'm preaching to do you good. My preaching about sin and judgment is for your good because it's that message that leads you to walk up rightly and be blessed and that is good. Because when you heed the truth that I'm preaching, Micah says, so that you wind up walking uprightly before God, good is going to come to you. In other words, Micah's preaching is about their horrible sin. Micah's preaching calls them to repentance. That's what it's designed to do. And so he says the upright person, and who is that? That's somebody who's been converted by God, somebody who's been enabled to practice obedience. The upright person heeds the Word of the Lord. He hears it and he does it. He's a hearer of the Word and a doer of the Word. He listens. God warns him and he's thankful. God warns him. He heeds the word of the Lord and he does the word of the Lord and God blesses his upright children. See, the redeemed person doesn't say, don't talk like that. The redeemed person says, thanks be to God. for correcting me with a word designed to keep me on the path of faithfulness and guard me from the path of straying from life. Thanks be to God. I want to be on the path of life and blessing. Thanks be to God for a word that guides me there. I don't say don't talk like that. I say thank you. So Micah says to the covetous in Israel, if you guys listened to the right prophet, the one who's speaking the word of God, and if you received that word in a heart made right through faith in God's promise, you wouldn't be complaining, you'd be doing well. This word would do you good, he says, And the good it would do you is that you would be doing good instead of doing the evil that you're doing. So he continues with his indictment. Verse eight, instead of loving their neighbors, they make enemies. They make their neighbors into enemies. And in verse 9, it's horrible. They drive women out of delightful houses and take away from their young children God's splendor. This is some more of that language of inheritance stealing. The implication here is that the women are widows and the children are orphans. The husbands and the fathers are either away at war or they're dead from the war or they've already been part of the early exile. Depends on where exactly in the timeline we are. It's hard to know. So these guys led by false prophets, they just steal everything from the most vulnerable members of the covenant community. The widows and orphans are driven to the street so these guys could steal their houses. And what does God say to them through the prophet Micah? It's verse 10. He says, Arise and go, for this is no place to rest because of the uncleanness that destroys with grievous destruction. He says, You guys should just get out of Israel. In fact, I'm going to put you out. I'm going to see that you're out. This is supposed to be a place of covenantal blessing. This is supposed to be a place where everybody lives in my rest and I dwell in their midst and we're all loving each other. But he says your defilement is destroying all that. So rather than let you steal the land and inheritance from widows and orphans whom you ought to love, I'm just going to drive you out into exile. I will disinherit you. you inheritance stealers and so you shall not enter my rest this is no place to rest for you is what that means and then he takes a parting shot at the false prophets just look at verse 11 again if a man should go about and utter wind and lies saying I will preach to you of wine and strong drink he would be the preacher for this people You can hear, well, I don't have to explain blowing wind, do I? That means today what it meant then. Blowing wind and preaching lies. That's pretty straightforward stuff. Preaching of wine and strong drink means I'm preaching good times. I'm preaching let's eat, drink, and be merry. Nothing bad's going to happen to us. So this false prophet, he's just good time Charlie. And all the while Israel's house is on fire. And Micah says, you know, a preacher like that's just the right thing for you people, the way you're living. It's just good enough for you. It's just good enough for you. It's fortunate that the passage doesn't stop there because we finally get a glimmer of light and the hope that's in Micah's message is held forth. It's in those last two verses, verses 12 and 13, because deliverance from judgment and a remedy for their sin is going to come into view in verses 12 and 13. I want you to see it. Follow along with me as I read beginning in verse 12. I will surely assemble all of you, O Jacob. I will gather the remnant of Israel. I will set them together like a sheepfold like sheep in a fold, like a flock in its pasture, a noisy multitude of men. Now this is salvation talk on the part of the prophet. When he says I will assemble you, he's already looking forward to a time in the future. I will assemble you. I will again make you my holy assembly. That's a very rich term to be God's holy assembly. which in our day the church is called. I will gather the remnant, he says. In other words he's promising I'm going to rescue you from the exile into which I'm sending you. There's going to be a restoration. There's going to be a return from that exile. I will gather the remnant And when you hear the word remnant and you think, oh, you mean just a fraction? He says, I will make your noisy throng my sheep. I will make your noisy throng my sheep. Although you're exiled and although you're a remnant, nevertheless, you will again be my flock, the sheep of my hand, and you'll be great in number. That's the noisy multitude that he's talking about. Remnant doesn't equal small in size. This is salvation talk on the part of the Lord. I'm planning your rescue. Now, what we're seeing, as I say, is a kind of prophetic foreshortening. He's seeing some things that are near and some things that are farther away in time. It's all compressed. So we have to sort out what he's talking about. And it turns out, knowing the rest of the story as we do from having read our Old Testaments, we know that in the first instance, Micah is looking forward and seeing the end of what we call the Babylonian exile. Israel, Judah would be in Babylon in exile for 70 years from about 586 to about 516. And then God would gather them and return them to the land of promise. And this prophetic word from Micah speaks to that rescue from exile. He says, I'm sending you away, but I'm bringing you back. So it doesn't mean less than that. But it means more than that. Because when you stop and consider, you understand that the exile of Israel is actually a bigger problem than Babylon. The human condition of exile from the garden, exile from the presence of the Lord, exile from life and into death, that's still in play. That hasn't been remedied yet. Israel remained exiled from God in their hearts even after the Lord brought them back from Babylon and into the promised land. God was always promising more than just that little piece of land. a different land was always in view, a whole new creation was always in view, and a better restoration from exile was always in view, because the rescue from exile that is promised here is looking to the day of Christ Jesus. Jesus Christ is the one who would come and gather the remnant of his people through his saving work on the cross. And these events are a type and a picture that points forward to that saving reality. Jesus is the one who came as the covenant keeper. Jesus obeyed God perfectly in all things. He died on the cross. He rose from the dead in order to call sinful exiles out of the kingdom of darkness and into the kingdom of light. Jesus came to call sinners out of the exile of death and into gathered into life everlasting. Jesus came to bring a remnant back to life with God and he is the one who Micah sees. That's what verse 12 assures us, I mean verse 13 assures us of. Just look at verse 13. He who opens the breach goes up before them. They break through and pass the gate. Going out by it, their king passes on before them, the Lord at their head. So he says, he who opens the breach goes before them. Micah says, I see someone who comes to you who will break open the barrier that's holding you in prison. He'll make a hole in the wall, and he'll turn that wall into a door for you. And he says, they break through and pass the gate. Micah sees the imprisoned exiles break out and go away from that place. They escape that place and they head for a new place, their own place. And their king passes on before them. He sees them led out personally by their own king. And lest there be any doubt about who the king is, he says the Lord at their head. Micah sees Yahweh himself personally lead them in victory from the place of exile. and imprisonment to the land he will give them. The king who Micah sees who breaches the wall and leads them out who is Yahweh himself can be nobody else in the world but Jesus Christ. That's who he is. King Breacher is coming. Micah saw him What did Jesus do? What did Jesus do? He came to us in our exile. He entered into our suffering and alienation from God. He took on flesh to be one of us and to live life under God's covenant for us, on behalf, fulfilling all righteousness. He loved God with all his heart. He loved his neighbor as himself, as we were supposed to. But he did it for us, and he laid his life down for his people. And then, the Bible says, he rose from the grave. Jesus breached the wall of death. that kept us in prison. We were all under the doom of death. We all remained slaves to sin. But Jesus broke in and he broke us out. He entered into death himself, and then he broke out in his resurrection, and he brought us with him. That's what the Bible says. By faith, we died with Christ. By faith, we rose with him to walk in newness of life. His resurrection is the remedy for our sin. His newness of life given to us. King Breacher, Jesus, passed on before us, and now we're following him. We're following him. That's the grand regathering of a remnant that no man can count. He's leading us in triumph while we revel in his victories, because we deserved the curse of exile, but Jesus came to bring us back. I'm wondering if you, yourself in this room, if you are someone, perhaps there's one among us who has not come to faith in Christ. You need to know that Jesus' death answers our deserved judgment and Jesus' life answers our sinfulness. If you have not come to Christ by faith today, I say to you, you are facing the exile of eternity. Without Jesus, you are not a covenant keeper. You don't love God. You don't love God's people, not like you should. Instead, you love yourself and you live for yourself. And if you were honest, you'd admit that to yourself. You live your own life for your own reasons. That's sort of the definition of rejecting God right there. The word of the Lord from Micah to you today says you are facing this doom. The question is will you be one of those people who say don't talk like that. Don't talk about sin and judgment. God's not like that. Or will you be someone who says I hear God's call to repentance and I want it to do me good. His offer is exceedingly gracious. It's very generous because Jesus says to you if you're not a truster of Jesus Christ he says I will take your sins away. I'll pay for your sins through my blood. I will stand for you. My death will be for you. I offer you to share in my inheritance by faith alone. And what's more, I won't even leave you to persist in your covenant breaking. No, I'll make your heart new. I'll put my spirit in you. I'll cause you to walk in my commandments more and more. I'll make you able to do what I command you to do and you won't find it burdensome. You won't be perfect at it, but you'll increase in it. And one day when I return, you will be perfected in it. Listen, I'm saying Christ offers all that to you, my unbelieving friend this morning. And here's how the offer works. You must turn to Christ by faith alone. Put your trust in Christ. He'll make you to repent from your sins. Turn from your sin to Him. Ask the Lord to save you. Trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ. Come to Christ today. I plead with you. I can do that honestly and openly because I don't know hardly any of you. But I'm not taking for granted that every person in this room has put his faith in Jesus Christ. And I call on you to come to Christ. Now, what do we do as believers to make use of what Micah has preached. How does this word do us good? Micah says, do not my words do good? Let's see if they do. I think what we do to make use of this is to live out the new resurrection life. Heed the word of the prophet. Micah has shown us that you can't love God as you ought, you can't love your neighbor as yourself so long as you keep practicing covetousness. Did you hear a theme of covetousness through all that? They're grabby. They're grabby, stealing. These bad guys in Micah 2 were over the top in covetousness and the new life enabled by Christ's resurrection for us means a life of repentance. We turn from that covetousness. We turn from it. I am persuaded that we in the church have not nearly, not nearly enough examined what it means to be covetous. The tenth commandment, if you ever really slow down and think about it, really is the last nail in the coffin of sinners because this commandment more than any other is entirely a matter of the heart. It gets expressed in words and sometimes deeds, but coveting is a hard thing. You understand that, right? In the deepest sense, God here teaches that it is wrong to desire anything other than Him and what He gives you. It's wrong to desire anything that's not Him or from Him, provided by Him, approved by Him. Saint Augustine famously said, Lord, he loves you too little who loves anything beside you or not for your sake. And he was profoundly right. It's wrong to desire even the things that God gives us more than to desire him. It's wrong to love the gifts and not the giver of the gifts. I think today's church would be so much improved if only we were taught that our desires themselves can be wicked. Never mind whether we act on them or not. Covetousness is wrongful desire. It's inordinate desire. We say it's wrongful. It's wrong in its object. I want the wrong thing. Or it's inordinate in its measure. I want it in the wrong way. Jesus told us lust is the same thing as adultery, didn't he? This is why he said that. See, we have not repented well at all if we've not repented from desires of the heart. It's not enough to pat ourselves on the back because we don't steal anymore. For example, if you hold sexual desires in your heart, no matter what sort they are, If they are anything other than desires for the spouse whom God has graciously given you, then those are wicked desires. They're wicked desires. I don't care what sort they are. Doesn't matter whether you cheated on your spouse or not in this sense. It's still wicked. That's why Christ's church has to stay resolved that not only is the practice of any kind of, just as an example, any kind of non-marital sexual activity, which means between a husband and a wife who are in a perpetual union in this life, that the very desire for such is wrong. Suppressing bad actions while holding on to wrongful desire that's behind those actions is still sin. It's at least not thorough repentance. You have to go after those thoughts too. You have to attack those desires. And there's a dangerous current afoot today to divorce talk about sin from talk about desires. You might not be aware of it, but that's a real conversation in supposedly evangelical churches. Well, it's not bad to have a desire to do this long as I don't act on it. The Bible says, are you throwing out the Ten Commandments? The Tenth Commandment? No, of course it's wrong. Covetousness is wrong. And what's more, covetousness is not always as overt as lust, and it applies to a lot more things than sexual desire. Covetousness can be very subtle, because think about it. discontentment with your circumstances is covetousness toward a life that God didn't give you. Well that's a problem isn't it? My discontentment with the life God gave me is covetousness. Discontentment with circumstances is covetousness toward a life God didn't give you. So wishing that your coworker or that your customer or your boss or God forbid your fellow church person would just go away is nothing more than coveting a life that is free from them and God didn't give you that life. If you're moaning that you're single and God hasn't given you a husband, that's just coveting a life that God didn't give you. Not yet, maybe, but he didn't give it to you so far. If you're griping about your husband or your wife or your kids, that's covetousness. You wrongly desire the family that God didn't give you. If you're secretly envious of the house or the boat that your friend has, that's covetous. God didn't give you that. He may give you that one day, but if your contentment requires God to give you that, you're still in the grip of covetousness. Contentment in Christ, contentment with Christ is the antidote for covetousness. He has to be enough for you and whatever else he gives you is more than enough. We as Christians need to examine ourselves and to be honest and we need to repent. Our contentment with God in Christ and in his provision for us is part of what makes us able to love the brothers the way we ought to love them. You see that? Because if I'm content with what God gives me, then it's easy for me to have enough to share some of it with you. But if I feel like I never have enough, I'm pretty sure I don't have enough to share it with you. and the generous love of our brothers shows the world that we're his people. It's part of our witness. So by the grace of God I call on you to repent from covetousness and let Christ be enough for you my brothers and sisters. And there's just one more angle I think that makes good application of what Micah has told us. We need to shun false prophets and heed true ones. There's a couple layers to this. It's right out of the passage. First, just in your life don't go looking for voices that are designed to scratch your itching ears. New Testament speaks of this pretty plainly. It was already true in Micah's day, but 2 Timothy, Paul writes, the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. Does that sound familiar? Sounds just like Micah to me. But this is a sign of the times, but there's nothing new under the sun. The exhortation from Paul to Timothy was not to be one of those ear scratchers, not to be an ear tickler, one Bible translates it. So I want to say to you, don't go out there looking for any of those guys. Ear ticklers are all over the internet. False teachers are pervasive on the evangelical landscape. It's never been easier to accumulate teachers in accordance with your own desires than it now is in the electronic and social media age. They're just everywhere. You shouldn't go looking for them. You shouldn't. But I want to make a pretty specific and bold application. to this first Congregational Church of Woodstock in Vermont in 2025. Your church is in search of a senior pastor. It's a critical moment for you to choose wisely and choose well. The man you call to be your primary shepherd in partnership with your other shepherds and the primary teacher of the word of God to you is extremely important for the sake of your souls. Our world, you should know, is filled with men standing in pulpits who do not know the Lord, men who do not know the word of the Lord, men who value social ministry over spiritual ministry, Men who have not bothered to be trained in the Bible and in theology, doctrine. Men who have not humbled themselves enough to learn from other brothers and older brothers. So I will kindly exhort you as your friend, as your guest, not to call such a man to this pulpit. Do not be as Israel in Micah's day. Do not seek for a man who will not preach about sin and judgment. Ask the Lord to send you a man filled with the Holy Spirit. Seek the Lord for a pastor whose life conforms to Christ, a man who himself bears the family resemblance we're talking about. It's a true child of God. Call a pastor to yourselves who will hold forth the Holy Scriptures to you. and that his doctrine is according to godliness so that the life matches the teaching. Find a man who will preach Jesus Christ and him crucified from the whole Bible because Jesus is in the whole Bible, and install in this pulpit a man of God who knows his Bible, a man who listens to the Lord by listening to the Bible, and who will preach to you what the Bible says and nothing else. Well, my dear brothers and sisters in Woodstock, I believe today Micah has told us good news. Our King Jesus has breached the wall of death. and rescued us from exile. He has brought us back to God. And we now live in his covenant blessing because his resurrection life has answered our sin. May God give us the grace to keep heeding the word of the Lord and to inherit all his blessings for us. Let us pray. Father in heaven, give us grace to heed your word. Work the life of Christ in us. Cause us to stand and we pray for the day of his return and the final inheritance of all your blessing. And until that day we pray we'd be found faithful in Jesus our Lord's name we pray, amen. Please stand and sing with us the 599th Savior of the Shepherd Penance. Yeah. ♪ Come to make us ♪ ♪ See us when we are slain ♪ ♪ Blessed be Jesus ♪ ♪ Blessed be Jesus ♪ ♪ Hear our prayers when we pray ♪ ♪ Blessed be Jesus ♪ ♪ Blessed be Jesus ♪ ♪ Hear our prayers when we pray ♪ Jesus, Jesus Jesus Following this benediction you are invited to remain in a moment of silence to pray, contemplate the word of the Lord and pray for the people who are around you and then in a moment there will be a postlude. Now receive this benediction. Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only God our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority before all time and now and evermore in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Go in peace. It's okay. you