Micah 7:18-

Good morning everyone, I ask that you open your Bibles this morning to Micah, chapter 7, verses 18-20.

As you turn to Micah, I want to say a brief word about the prophet. You probably don’t hear much about him, other than around Christmas time, when we read from chapter five about the Messiah being born in Bethlehem. But that is a prophecy of hope in a book made up mostly of warnings of judgment.

Micah prophesied around the same time as Isaiah in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. The people of God had not been faithful to the Mosaic covenant. They did not fear the Lord or keep His commandments. And God, being faithful to His word, would raise up the Assyrian Empire as His instrument of judgment against a covenant-breaking people who had turned their backs on Him.

Sin was rampant, and the judgment would be great. Yet at the end of this proclamation of judgment comes a doxology—almost a hymn—a hymn of hope for God’s people.

Now, let us read. Thus saith the Lord.

18Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy.

19He will turn again, he will have compassion upon us; he will subdue our iniquities; and thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.

20Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham, which thou hast sworn unto our fathers from the days of old.

(Prayer)

1. “Who is a God like unto thee?” That first line is not a comparison, as though Micah is weighing options. It’s praise. It’s worship in the form of a question.

Remember where we are in the book. Micah has been prophesying the wrath to come—judgment against a covenant-breaking people. He has been announcing what sin deserves. And yet here, at the end, Micah is not merely warning—he is worshiping. He is celebrating God.

Even the prophet’s name preaches. Micahmeans something like, “Who is like Yah?”—“Who is like the LORD?” The man’s name is a confession: there is no God like the true and living God.

So hear the question as it is meant to be heard: What God is like our God? Have you ever really stopped and thought about that?

What idol of bronze or stone compares to Him? The idols of the nations—and the idols Israel flirted with—have eyes, but they do not see; ears, but they do not hear; mouths, but they do not speak. They are nothing. They cannot save. They cannot judge. They cannot forgive.

But our God—He is the God of Abraham, the God of Moses, the God of Israel—the One who is all-powerful, who delivered His people from bondage in Egypt. The One who keeps His covenant, punishes the wicked, and yet saves and delivers His people. That is our God.

So what rival does He have? None.He is incomparable.

And if you want to feel the weight of that word “incomparable,” consider the holiness of God. When was the last time you truly considered it? Our God is holy—holy—holy. And when we say “holy,” we don’t merely mean that He is righteous or just, though He is. We mean He is other. His holiness is not one attribute among many; it is the glory of all His perfections. He is the Creator, not part of creation. He is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. He cannot treat sin as small, because He is holy. And under a holy God, sin must be punished.

And so what sinners we are—how easily the glitter and whims of this world capture our hearts. Our natural hearts, our flesh, are bent against Him. The works we put forward on our own are filthy rags before Him.

And yet—here is the wonder—despite our constant sinning against Him, He is merciful. Not soft mercy. Not sentimental mercy. Holy mercy. Mercy that does not deny justice.

Is there any god as merciful as the LORD? Many religions speak of mercy—but not this mercy. Who would forgive rebellion against himself? Who would pardon sin in a way that actually removes guilt? Who would provide a way for mercy to be real and justice to stand still?

Only the LORD. Only the true God can be both just and the justifier of the ungodly—because He Himself provides what His holiness requires.

There is no God like our God.

He is the one that “that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage?”

How rich is this: our God pardons our iniquity.

The word Micah uses for “iniquity” speaks of something deeper than a single act. It’s not only what we do—it’s what we are apart from God’s grace. It’s crookedness in the heart, guilt that clings, a bentness of soul that twists us toward self and away from God. As Jeremiah tells us, the heart is deceitful above all things. As Paul puts it to the Romans, it is man's innate desire to worship creation rather than the Creator. It is a natural love of things that are not God.

It is that state of sin that we are all born into, as the psalmist puts it. It is the sin that our father Adam brought upon all of his descendants—a sin we are tainted with from birth. It is an affront to God. We are, by nature, His enemies: those who despise holiness and stand against what is right. And if it were not for His grace, we would hate Him. We would hate His mercy and His grace even as He gives them. We would hate the righteous and love the things of the flesh.

And then we have our transgressions. In the Hebrew it is “pe-sha.” It is a willful violation—a knowing breach of what is right. It is breaking the covenant we have with God. It is rebellion: shouting with our fists raised high in defiance against the Lord of all. It is the sin that says, “Not Your will, but mine.” Our Iniquity is the bent within us; transgression is the rebellion that comes out of us.

What sins we commit, even as Christians, not from ignorance but from refusal? Is it covetousness—wanting what isn’t ours and wanting it for ourselves? Do we lust, knowing that God has ordained intimate relations as a sacred act between a married man and woman? Do we steal? Maybe not items from our neighbors (or maybe you do—I don’t know what you do in your private lives), but do you steal time? Are you paid for services not rendered? Do we lie? Do we bend the truth for some status or preference?

How many of our sins are not from weakness, but from defiance—knowing God’s law and choosing ourselves anyway?

Micah says the LORD “pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage.” That phrase matters. Micah has spent much of the book warning of judgment, the real coming wrath against real sin, covenant curses against covenant breakers. And yet, even in the midst of judgment, God speaks of a remnant. Those people that is seen in those who repent and turn to the Lord.  That is to say: the Lord does not merely tear down; He also preserves. He not only scatters, but he also keeps. He brings His people through the fire so that a people remain.

And notice what “remnant” implies. It not “the naturally impressive ones.” It doesn’t mean “the morally elite who earned an exception.” In Scripture, the remnant is often the small, humbled, reduced company—those who, humanly speaking, should not have made it. They are not the remnant because they were strong enough to survive; they are the remnant because God was gracious to them. The remnant is proof that judgment never has the last word for God’s people but mercy does.

Then Micah adds something even sweeter: the remnant is the remnant of His heritage. That means these people belong to God. They are not strangers that He occasionally helps; they are His portion, His possession, His covenant people. “Heritage” language is ownership language. It’s familial language. It’s God saying, “These are Mine.” He has set His name upon them. He has bound Himself to them by promise. So when God pardons, He is not acting on a whim, He is acting in faithfulness to His own covenant love.

And this is where it gets astonishing: God is dealing with people who have sinned against Him, those who have been faithless, who have wandered, who have provoked Him, and yet He still calls them His heritage. That doesn’t excuse their sin; Micah has made it plain that sin is deadly serious. But it does tell you something about the heart of God: His mercy is not the mercy of a detached observer. It is the mercy of the covenant Lord who says, “I will not let My people go. I will not abandon what I have claimed. I will not forsake what is Mine.”

If you are in Christ, you are part of that “heritage” not because you were better, but because God has united you to His Son. Christ is the true Seed, the true Israel, the faithful covenant-keeper, and everyone joined to Him by faith is gathered into the people God calls His own. That means the mercy Micah celebrates is not only ancient history. It is a living reality for every believer: God’s pardoning grace comes to a people He has claimed, a people He keeps, a people He will bring home.

God’s mercy is not random. It is covenant mercy—mercy God truly gives to His people, and He truly keeps His promises.

And that’s why the next words are so breathtaking: this covenant God does not merely tolerate His people—He pardons them. He takes their iniquity away. To pardon is to remove guilt—to cancel the debt and clear the record. To pass by is to withhold the deserved judgment—the punishment that justice could rightly execute.

“Passeth by” does not mean God pretends it didn’t happen. It means God does not immediately strike the sinner as the sinner deserves. He withholds the blow. He restrains the hand of judgment.

And this is one of the most terrifying and tender things about God: the same act can feel like two different things depending on whether you love sin or hate it.

To the hardened, God’s forbearance feels like permission: “He won’t judge me.”

To the humbled, God’s forbearance feels like rescue: “He did not deal with me according to my sins.”

The question is not whether God will be just. He will. The question is where His justice will fall: on you, or on your Substitute.

God is so great that He looks upon us— wretched sinners in a pitiful state of sin—our open defiance, our rebellion, our enmity against Him—and He says, “Your sins are no more. Your transgressions have been passed over.”

This is the act of a merciful God—a God whose mercy runs so deep it knows no bottom. His forgiveness is deliberate. It is active. This is not God ignoring sin. This is God looking at sin and saying, “I forgive you.” This transgression has been struck from your record. I am withholding the punishment that was reserved for you, O sinner, the punishment you deserve, because, as the text says, ‘he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy.”

The wrath of God is real. We see it displayed against His enemies all across the Old Testament. We see His wrath against those who broke the covenant with Him. We see it eschatologically as well—the eternal wrath poured out upon those who reject the Savior, upon those who love their sins more than the Lord.

And yet, He shows mercy, because He is a merciful God. He is not only merciful; He loves to deal out mercy. He delights in it. Mercy is one of His divine attributes—one of the things that makes God God. It is bound up with the love He has for His people: the love He shows them in pardoning their transgressions and their iniquities.

This mercy shows that our God is righteous and a God of love. The fact that God shows mercy to even one sinner—just one fallen, rebellious man, standing with his fist raised, shouting, “I don’t need You, Lord”—and then that person comes to faith and repentance in Christ Jesus… it is incredible. It is a mercy God loves to show, a mercy displayed all across Scripture.

We see His mercy shown to Adam in the garden: immediately after pronouncing the curse of death, God promises a Savior.

Mercy is not God’s backup plan; it is His delight. He is not dragged into forgiving—He rejoices to show mercy. God is never bribed into mercy. He is never shamed into mercy. He is never cornered into mercy.

Often we forgive reluctantly. Or we forgive with conditions. We forgive while still secretly being offended. But God delights in mercy, meaning mercy is not merely something God does; it is something God loves to do.

And that means the sinner who comes to Him does not meet a cold distant God with crossed arms. He meets the LORD who says, “This is what I love to do.” Not because sin is light, we know that sin is deadly. But because His mercy is deeper.

2. He will turn again, he will have compassion upon us; he will subdue our iniquities; and thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.

Immediately after proclaiming the impending judgment against those rebellious Hebrews, Micah announces the hinge upon which this praise rests. He, that is, God, will turn again. That is, the Lord will not remain forever turned toward His people in wrath and chastening. There is coming a time when God will turn His face back upon His remnant, upon those who have broken their covenant with Him, and He will have compassion upon them. Not because they deserve it, but because the God who delights in mercy will show His stubborn, rebellious people a mercy in which He delights.

The mercy is not sentimental. The iniquities of the people will be subdued. Our God not only forgives sin, but He tramples it under His conquering foot. He breaks the rule of sin in their hearts. Those same iniquities that once mastered us are defeated under His rule.

The prophet goes even further by saying, “Thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.” This is not near the shoreline. This is not floating in the surf, waiting to be washed back up on the shore. This sin is cast to the depths, to the bottom of the sea, never to surface again, unrecoverable. They will be forever freed from the guilt of their sins. God will take the sins of His remnant and forever do away with them. This is our reality as Christians.

Now, we do remember our past sins; they haunt us, and Satan will accuse, our consciences will flare, and we will feel the guilt within. Sometimes we keep diving down trying to retrieve what God has cast away. But hold fast to this beautiful meditation; God does not just lessen our record, but totally removes it. It will never be used against his children in God’s court ever again.

Think, O believer, of your sins, for our God loves to extend His mercy and has shown His compassion upon you. Your iniquities have been subdued, paid for, and your sins have been cast into the depths of the sea. How awesome, is this as reality, our union with Jesus Christ. Because God has shown us compassion, our guilt is pardoned, and sin’s dominion is being broken. He is sanctifying you, conforming you further to the image of the Savior. And on that last day, the sin that still clings to our flesh will be cast away entirely. We shall be glorified, and sin will be no more.

3. (HE) wilt perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham, which thou hast sworn unto our fathers from the days of old.

The ground of this promise rests not on the performance of men keeping their covenant to God, but on God remaining faithful to His promise. He is faithful to His word. God is the one who performs the deliverance of His people; He and He alone makes good on what He has promised. The remnant Micah is prophesying—its future is anchored in God’s everlasting reliability, not in any reform Israel could bring about in itself.

God “performs” His truth. This isn’t merely information that has been revealed; it is His faithfulness; God’s firmness and dependability. God always keeps His word; He cannot lie or fail. When God says, “I will,” heaven and earth may pass away before His word breaks.

And mercy, shown here in His love to Abraham, is His steadfast compassion, always extended toward the undeserving. God’s mercy is not a mood; it is pledged love, rooted in the heart of God. It is covenant love: mercy that God Himself initiates, mercy that God Himself sustains, mercy that God Himself guarantees.

Now notice how the text ties this promise to names: “truth to Jacob… mercy to Abraham.” God is not speaking in vague generalities, He is pointing you back into the very bloodstream of the biblical story.

Truth to Jacob…. When we look back at Jacob he is not presented to us as the naturally steady, naturally noble, morally elite man. Jacob is the heel-grabber, the struggler, the weak one, his life exposes how unstable human strength can be. And yet God set His love on him. God bound Himself to him. God renamed him, kept him, and carried him. So when Micah says “truth to Jacob,” he is saying: God will be faithful to a “Jacob-people” to a people who, left to themselves, wobble; a people whose obedience is real but imperfect; a people who are not saved because they are reliable, but because God is.

And then mercy to Abraham… Abraham reminds us of promise. God called him, God made His Covenant with him, a promised pledging blessing; not because Abraham earned it, but because God freely set His love. And that mercy was never meant to terminate on Abraham alone; it was always moving outward, because the promise to Abraham was a promise that blessing would come to the nations through the promised Seed. The mercy shown to Abraham is the mercy of God, beginning salvation by promise and carrying it forward by promise.

Put those together and you get the storyline of redemption in miniature: God will be faithful to weak people (Jacob), and faithful to His world-blessing promise (Abraham). That is why the remnant can have hope. Our hope doesn’t hang on how tightly they can grip God; it hangs on the fact that God has sworn to hold us.

God has sworn this; He has bound Himself by this promise. He swears not because He is uncertain, but to bolster our faith when we struggle. This is owned mercy: God’s mercy pledged to His people, mercy that is guaranteed. And that oath-language is meant to steady shaking hearts; because when your conscience flares, when Satan accuses, when you feel your weakness, the answer is not, “Look at the strength of your grip,” but “Look at the strength of God’s oath.”

Micah is tying all of this back to “the days of old,” showing that God’s saving purpose isn’t improvised or new, but long-standing in God’s unfolding story. The hope of the remnant is as old and as sure as the promise of God—rooted in the Book of Genesis, celebrated again in the Gospel of Luke as God “remembers His holy covenant,” and explained with crystal clarity in the Epistle to the Galatians as promise fulfilled in Christ.

But an oath like that must be accomplished, not merely admired. God swore mercy, and God Himself must provide the ground of that mercy. How does He pardon iniquity and pass by the transgression of His people? How does He show mercy to the sinner? Through Christ—the mercy shown to sinners.

We have all sinned. All of us have, at one point in our lives, been enemies of God; yet while we were still sinners, God made good on His promise to Abraham. God sent the Son—the eternal Son—to stand in the stead of sinners, to be the propitiation, that is, the atoning sacrifice, so that all who believe will be saved. The law of God demands justice, and God is a perfectly just Judge. Sin must be paid for; guilt must be answered; atonement must be made.

This was only made possible by Christ, the Seed promised to Abraham—the One through whom all peoples would be blessed. He alone lived a sinless life. He alone fulfilled all the demands of the law. Christ is the One who bore the cost at Golgotha. At the cross, God does not ignore guilt, nor does He pretend it is a small thing. He judges sin truly and fully—yet He does so by laying it upon the Substitute. God’s law demanded holiness, and God’s love provided the Lamb.

And He not only bore that cost; He secured eternal life for those who are united with Him. How may you gain this union with Him? How can your sins be subdued? How may your transgressions be thrown into the sea before Him? There is only one way: by turning from your sins and placing your faith in Christ, and Christ alone.

O Christian, right now, this morning, take sweet comfort in knowing that your debt was paid by Christ, that you are united with Him, and that His resurrection has guaranteed you new life in Him. Rejoice that His righteousness has been credited to you. Rejoice that one day you will be openly vindicated by him. There is no God like our God. Greatly rejoice that our God remained true to the truth delivered to Jacob, and that the mercy shown to Abraham is mercy shown to you. Your assurance rests solely on the oath of a holy Lord.

To you that see yours sin so clearly that you assume God must be tired of you. Hear Micah: God’s mercy is not a mood. He delights in it. He does not retain His anger forever toward His heritage. Your rest does not stand on your feelings but on the steadiness of God promise.

And to you here this morning, if you are not in Christ, know that you will pay for your sins eternally. Our God is a just God. He demands atonement. The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life. Why would you tarry? This sworn mercy is promised—flee to Christ today.