Micah 7: Waiting on the Lord

Micah 7

Introduction:

Good morning and welcome to this gathering of Hope Bible Fellowship. We are so thankful you have chosen to join us today in worship of our great God. We serve a living God, the Lord Jesus Christ. I want you to know that He has a purpose for you being here today.

As a church we have been walking through the book of the prophet Micah in the Old Testament. Today we will be in the final chapter of Micah, chapter 7. This chapter rounds out the three decade ministry of Micah during the reigns of a few different kings.

MORE HERE... ILLUSTRATION... TENSION BUILDING QUESTION

What is the Christian's response to rampant wickedness around us? In us?

How did Micah deal with it? How did God deal with it? How does God deal with us?

Read:

Micah 7:1–20 ESV

Woe is me! For I have become as when the summer fruit has been gathered, as when the grapes have been gleaned: there is no cluster to eat, no first-ripe fig that my soul desires. The godly has perished from the earth, and there is no one upright among mankind; they all lie in wait for blood, and each hunts the other with a net. Their hands are on what is evil, to do it well; the prince and the judge ask for a bribe, and the great man utters the evil desire of his soul; thus they weave it together. The best of them is like a brier, the most upright of them a thorn hedge. The day of your watchmen, of your punishment, has come; now their confusion is at hand. Put no trust in a neighbor; have no confidence in a friend; guard the doors of your mouth from her who lies in your arms; for the son treats the father with contempt, the daughter rises up against her mother, the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man’s enemies are the men of his own house. But as for me, I will look to the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me. Rejoice not over me, O my enemy; when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord will be a light to me. I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against him, until he pleads my cause and executes judgment for me. He will bring me out to the light; I shall look upon his vindication. Then my enemy will see, and shame will cover her who said to me, “Where is the Lord your God?” My eyes will look upon her; now she will be trampled down like the mire of the streets. A day for the building of your walls! In that day the boundary shall be far extended. In that day they will come to you, from Assyria and the cities of Egypt, and from Egypt to the River, from sea to sea and from mountain to mountain. But the earth will be desolate because of its inhabitants, for the fruit of their deeds. Shepherd your people with your staff, the flock of your inheritance, who dwell alone in a forest in the midst of a garden land; let them graze in Bashan and Gilead as in the days of old. As in the days when you came out of the land of Egypt, I will show them marvelous things. The nations shall see and be ashamed of all their might; they shall lay their hands on their mouths; their ears shall be deaf; they shall lick the dust like a serpent, like the crawling things of the earth; they shall come trembling out of their strongholds; they shall turn in dread to the Lord our God, and they shall be in fear of you. Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance? He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in steadfast love. He will again have compassion on us; he will tread our iniquities underfoot. You will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea. You will show faithfulness to Jacob and steadfast love to Abraham, as you have sworn to our fathers from the days of old.

PRAY

I. Jerusalem had a lacking of godliness.

And it was a glaring absence. The very city where the nation had gathered to worship the Lord in His temple was now rampant with idolatry, injustice, and other ungodliness. Micah sees the wickedness of the people and is grieved. Further, he sees the wickedness of the leaders and the depths of how far they had fallen as a people and he is sorrowful. He is disheartened. The leaders' wicked choices were causing a spiritual breakdown of the society. In the first six verses we see Micah give word to this lament over the condition of the people.

He saw no evidence that people had responded to God's blessing and the covenant with obedience. He saw no faithfulness to the Lord in the society at large. He compares himself to a hungry person who has gone to the field after it had been harvested. Now, we need some context to get the weight of what is meant here. In the law of Israel they were not allowed to go back into a harvested field a second time to pick it clean. They were supposed to leave what remained for the poor to sustain them. So Micah compares himself to someone who shows up famished to get the leftover fruit but when he gets to the field he is devastated to see there is nothing left. He is left longing for sustenance.

THERE WAS NO FRUIT LEFT.

Verse two tells us there was no one upright but Micah was yearning for the fruit of righteousness... but he saw none. This lack of godliness left him bitterly mournful.

He says, "Woe is me," at the beginning. This is translated from the same Hebrew expression that is found in Job 10:15.

Read:

Job 10:15 ESV

If I am guilty, woe to me! If I am in the right, I cannot lift up my head, for I am filled with disgrace and look on my affliction.

For Job it is a cry of agony but for Micah, it is a cry of despair over the spiritual state of the city, Jerusalem. Micah saw bloodshed, evil, bribes, wicked plots, crisis and panic, homes and families destroyed, no man could trust a friend or even his own wife, kids dishonored their parents and rebelled against them. Family members became enemies. This sounds way too familiar to our current day situation! ** The first manifestation of their decline was in personal relationships.

**

Read:

1 Kings 19:10 ESV

He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away.”

Read

Psalm 14:3 ESV

They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one.

Micah's lament shows the heart of God broken over the rebellion of his people.

Jesus quoted verse 6 of Micah 7 many years later in Matthew 10:35-36.

Matthew 10:35–36 ESV

For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.

Verse 7 is a demonstration of Micah's intimacy with God. Micah cries out to God to transform the nation.

Micah shows us how difficult and painful it can be for preachers of God's Word. The servant of God must persevere through trials and suffering.

II. Israel will one day be restored.

Micah looked past the current ungodliness around him and past the coming destruction and defeat to the future day when God would restore Israel. A day was coming when God's Messiah would reign supreme from Jerusalem and all would be set right.

There would be a faithful remnant.

Repentant people will raise up again (v8-9)

Enemies will be defeated.

Israel will be rebuilt.

Exiles will be gathered.

A new exodus would take place.

Because of the promise of God to Abraham, God would forgive those who did not deserve His mercy. God will ALWAYS keep His promises.

In verses 8-10 Micah declared his faith and hope.

In verses 11-13 we find Judah will be rebuilt. Lands will be made a wasteland because of the evil deeds of its inhabitants.

III. The Lord is a Good and Faithful Shepherd.

Among all of the ungodliness around him, Micah saw past it to the hope that is based on the unchanging character of God.

WHY HOPE IN THE UNCHANGING CHARACTER OF GOD.

Holy

Just

Mercy

Lovingkindness

Righteousness

Love

Gospel

Only God can solve the real problem of man, which is SIN. Micah describes the character and forgiveness of God.

Verses 14-17 contain covenant language. Those in covenant relationship with God can rest in Him.

Man was intended to look upward to get his identity.

Read

Psalm 8:5–7 ESV

Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field,

Micah shows us three particular things that result in hope in our lives:

Micah’s hope was a result of keeping his eyes on the Lord.

Micah’s hope was a result of trusting in God’s promise of provision.

Micah’s hope was a result of knowing that God hears our prayers.

Conclusion and Response:

How will the Christian respond?

After the Gospel has been proclaimed to us and God has invested that in us, will there be any fruit?

Philippians 1:9–11 ESV

9 And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, 10 so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.

Waiting on the Lord

David Aikman and Richard D. Phillip recount the story of how these words in memory achieved the gospel restoration of Wang Mingdao in China.

Wang Mingdao was one of the early leaders of the house-church movement in China. In the 1920s and 1930s Wang was one of Beijing’s leading preachers, addressing huge crowds until the Japanese invasion in 1937. Despite his refusal to cooperate with the occupiers, Wang avoided arrest. But after the war, he soon ran afoul of the Chinese Communist authorities. He refused to join the Three-Self Patriotic Movement, the government-sponsored Protestant church, which Wang thought to be compromised. For this, he and his wife were arrested in 1955. In his prison, the Communists inserted cellmates who terrified Wang with tales of torture; isolated and weakened, Wang broke. He promised to sign any statement and to preach any message he was told to preach, so the Communists released him and his wife from prison.

After his release, Wang was a spiritually broken man. He willingly attended meetings at which his confession was read and his support of the state church proclaimed. Disgusted with himself, he wandered the streets of Beijing, muttering, “I am Peter, I am Peter,” referring to the apostle’s denial of Christ. But then suddenly Wang regained his old boldness for Christ. He again refused to cooperate and preached a true faith in Jesus. He explained the change by stating that he had recalled Micah 7:7–9, in which the prophet warns his enemies not to gloat. He saw his sufferings as God’s chastisement for his sins and committed himself to wait for the God of his salvation (Mic. 7:7). He reminded himself and others: “He will bring me out to the light; I shall look upon his vindication” (Mic. 7:9). Desiring only to glorify his gracious God, Wang published a written withdrawal of all his confessions and agreements. He was arrested again and imprisoned for another twenty-two years, during which he provided a strong example that emboldened many other persecuted Christians.4

Wang Mingdao had imbibed not merely the words of Micah, but also the prophet’s faith and spirit. “He will bring me out to the light,” Micah declares. “I shall look upon his vindication” (Mic. 7:9). God’s honor was bound up in his salvation, Micah knew, and he fully trusted that God would fulfill his promises and publicly demonstrate his faithfulness to those who call upon his name. This is the same hope that every Christian shares, taking our guilt and shame to the blood of Christ. Remembering that God will not abandon his people, we, like Wang Mingdao, may be emboldened to face persecution and inspired to overcome our own weakness and sin.

The response of the Christian:

Trust and Obey

Repent and Believe

Cry out to the Lord for restoration.

Find our hope only in Him.

Look to His return with an expectancy.

Like Micah:

Keep your eyes on the Lord and hope will be the result.

Trust in the promise of God’s provision and hope will be the result.

Know that God hears the prayers of His people and hope will be the result.