Middle East: An Existential Threat
"Silence in the face of evil is itself evil; God will not hold us guitless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act" Deitrich Bonhoeffer
"He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God" Micah 6:8
John Piper wrote, “On the far side of risk…..the love of God triumphs. This is the faith that frees us to risk for the cause of God. It is not heroism, or lust for adventure, or courageous self-reliance, or efforts to earn God’s favor. It is child-like faith in the triumph of God’s love – that on the other side of all our risks, for the sake of righteousness, God will still be holding us. We will be eternally satisfied in Him. Nothing will have been wasted.”
Micah, a prophet of the Old Testament, courageously wrote and spoke to the divided nation of Israel and Judah--the very people who were to represent the reality of a covenant-loving, compassionate, and just God. Instead, their character as a nation was selfish, dishonest, and oppressive. To make matters worse, the people thought they could earn or buy God's approval and forgiveness through empty, meaningless offerings (vs. 7-8)--from sacrificing a few calves, or thousands of rams, or even offering up their own firstborn offspring.
Micah responds with a hard-hitting message of what true, worthy worship looks like--a life characterized by three profound things: justice, mishpat in Hebrew; mercy, chesed; and humility. Mishpat emphasizes action--giving people their due, putting things right. In the Old Testament, the doing of misphat was most often toward the widow, the orphan, the foreigner, and the poor--those on the margins of society. Mercy, chesed, is a heart attitude of compassion and grace, out of which flows a life of justice. A life devoid of such virtue and action made any attempt at worship, sacrificial or otherwise, a waste of time.
Ponder: Is there an injustice or a wrong somewhere in your world that God is calling you to put right?
"Silence in the face of evil is itself evil; God will not hold us guitless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act" Deitrich Bonhoeffer
"He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God" Micah 6:8
John Piper wrote, “On the far side of risk…..the love of God triumphs. This is the faith that frees us to risk for the cause of God. It is not heroism, or lust for adventure, or courageous self-reliance, or efforts to earn God’s favor. It is child-like faith in the triumph of God’s love – that on the other side of all our risks, for the sake of righteousness, God will still be holding us. We will be eternally satisfied in Him. Nothing will have been wasted.”
Micah, a prophet of the Old Testament, courageously wrote and spoke to the divided nation of Israel and Judah--the very people who were to represent the reality of a covenant-loving, compassionate, and just God. Instead, their character as a nation was selfish, dishonest, and oppressive. To make matters worse, the people thought they could earn or buy God's approval and forgiveness through empty, meaningless offerings (vs. 7-8)--from sacrificing a few calves, or thousands of rams, or even offering up their own firstborn offspring.
Micah responds with a hard-hitting message of what true, worthy worship looks like--a life characterized by three profound things: justice, mishpat in Hebrew; mercy, chesed; and humility. Mishpat emphasizes action--giving people their due, putting things right. In the Old Testament, the doing of misphat was most often toward the widow, the orphan, the foreigner, and the poor--those on the margins of society. Mercy, chesed, is a heart attitude of compassion and grace, out of which flows a life of justice. A life devoid of such virtue and action made any attempt at worship, sacrificial or otherwise, a waste of time.
Ponder: Is there an injustice or a wrong somewhere in your world that God is calling you to put right?
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