God's requirements for His people, as outlined by the prophet Micah, are not burdensome rituals but a call to build life and society on divine truth. The sermon emphasizes that God desires His people to "do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God." This involves treating others with fairness and integrity, extending kindness and forgiveness, and maintaining a humble, obedient relationship with God. Ultimately, living according to these principles reflects the transformative power of God's salvation and serves as a witness to the world.
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Well, Ruth and I are delighted to be here for this weekend and for this conference. It's true we've never been out before. There's known to be so many places in life no matter how many you try to be different. I discovered being two places at the same time never makes anybody happy. But we're glad to be here now. It's nice to know that it's the eighth sixth year. That's just one year older than you are, Dan. According to our discussions last night and the minutia that we remembered. If you weren't here last night, you'll have to pick that up from Stefan. He has all his statistics right. You can get the data from him. But we are delighted to be with you. I've been to Waterloo a few times, and I don't mean where Napoleon fell either, but whatever the circumstances are, we're glad to be here now. This morning I'll read a few verses in the eighth chapter, I'm sorry, in the sixth chapter of the book of Micah, the minor prophet book of Micah.
I'll read the first nine verses in chapter six. I'm going to talk in general in three or four of these messages about the Word of God and our public performance. I'm not very good at titles. They've always been a struggle for me. That's why I haven't written any books. I've got lots of manuscript put out, but can't figure out what to call it. So I just have to let it in a pile and my ears can burn it years later from now. What about the Word of God in public performance? The prophets have a lot to say about many things. You must know that. The prophetic literature is full truth about Jesus and his coming and the work and all these things. But the great burden of prophecy was always to teach the people of God how to live in their time where they were. and be ready for what God would do when God would do it.
And sometimes in our study of the prophetic literature, we miss that. We certainly are not wrong to study the messianic aspects of Noah and Bully. We certainly are not wrong to do that. But if we miss the advice that the prophet gives for daily living, then we've really forgotten the purpose that he wrote. He didn't write that the people of Israel would be intellectually sound, but that they would be spiritually moved to serve and to live for God. And that's where I kind of want to I'll treat maybe three of the minor prophets and maybe definitely with a couple of the major prophets too. But I'm working under that general concept of what they, by the word of God, said as far as our public performance and public lifestyles, are concerned. And here we're reading in Micah chapter six.
And I'll kind of read it section by section. You can follow with me. I'm reading in the King James because I'm an Elizabethan scholar. And if you don't know what that means, it's okay with me. I'm not sure that I know either, but it sounds awfully good, don't you think? It has a professional ring to it that suggests authority. But whatever the case is, that's what I'm reading. And these first nine verses, you find a number of different people speaking. You first of all have the prophet speaking in verses one and two. Here's what the prophet says. Hear ye now what the Lord says. Arise, contend thou before the mountains, and let the hills hear thy voice. Hear ye, O mountains, the Lord's controversy, and ye strong foundations of the earth. For the Lord has a controversy with his people, and he will plead with Israel. And then the Lord speaks in verses three through five.
Oh, my people, what have I done unto thee? And wherein have I weary thee? Testify against me. For I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt and redeemed thee out of the house of servants. And I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam. Oh, my people, remember now what Baalek, king of Moab, consulted, and what Baalem, the son of Baor, answered him from Shittim unto Gilgal, that ye may know the righteousness of the Lord. And then the people speak in verses six and seven. Wherewith shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before the High God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body, for the sin of my soul?
And then the prophet speaks. He has showed thee, O man, what is good, and what does the Lord require thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God. The Lord's voice cryeth unto the city. and the man of wisdom shall see thy name, hear ye the rod, and who hath appointed it. It was a striking situation which Micah the prophet writes. The northern kingdom was about to fall completely to Assyria. The southern kingdom was threatened with Assyrian aggression and also with a lot of spiritual defection. We put the time somewhere around seven hundred and twenty-five BC. I never worry much about dates, including my own birthday. But that's about when it was. And the prophet is a critical person in Israel's history. because he's saying to the people of Israel, you still have an opportunity to do what God wants you to do if you'll get with it.
You are the announced people of God. You may not be living like it, but you are the announced people of God, and you still have opportunity to do what God wants done if you will get with it and do it. And the people find lots of reasons for not doing it. They've been politically strong. They've had pretty good success financially. They were in better political financial success than they've been in years. They hardly realized that the doom of judgment was right at the door, but it was right at the door and it would fall pretty soon. But in the meantime, Micah says, I want you to take the word of God and I want you to bring it into your lives and understand how it's practically used. And in chapter six, he points out to us what God gives us requirements for the social order, for the social order of his people.
We're not talking to the world at large. We're talking to people who professedly are the people of God. Now, there's sometimes there's a great gap between the people who are professedly the people of God and the people who really are the people of God. You can't always settle that in one particular meeting, and only God really knows. But he addresses it to the people who professedly are the people of God. My people, he said, brought you out of Egypt, carried you through the wilderness, kept you, blessed you, provided for you, essentially by profession, you're my people. And he said, I want you to put together a societal order that will honor me. And the requirements of God for that social order are pretty simple. It's just the concept that you build life and society on the truth of God. Now, I'm at that age in life where I repeat things a lot.
Some of you are ahead of me. A few of you are right with me, and you'll all catch up in time. So I'll repeat that several times. That you build your life personally and your societal structure group-wise, you build it on the truth of God. We can't really go out and tell it's a pagan nation. They don't know God and don't have the work. But for those who professively know God, whether it's your home or your private life or your assembly or your fellowship, whatever it happens to be, that you build it, your life and society on the truth of God. And that's what Micah says. Build it that way. It's what God wants. When the people speak back to God, these verses six and seven are almost sarcastic. You've got to read them in a nasty, sarcastic way to get it right.
They look up to God and they say, listen, what would it take to please you? I'm not sure. I can talk plenty sarcastic when I need to, but when I can try to say it for other people, it doesn't always come out right. They look up and say, what would it please you? Suppose we gave you a whole river of oil. Maybe ten thousand rivers of oil. Can you imagine such a thing? Suppose we did that. Suppose we started sacrificing our firstborn children. What would it take to please you? And the idea is nothing will please you. That's what they're saying. That's what they're saying. They're saying no matter what we do, it's not good enough for you. And God says, all I want you to do is to build your life and your society on the truth that I give you by my word on the truth of God.
That's all I want you to do to take me seriously and build life and society on the truth of God. And that becomes just a very big challenge to them. And it remains a challenge to us too today, whether you're talking about a home or an assembly or your own private life. We're not living in the theocracy that Israel is living in. We don't think the church and Israel are the same thing. But we think the truth of God is pretty uniform through all time. And whether you take it from the Gospels or take it from here, the idea comes back solidly to us. And we ought to build our lives and our companies on the truth of the Word of God. But people get carried away. They imagine that God can't be pleased. When I was a boy, I was sure my parents couldn't be pleased. My poor parents have gone on.
They're no longer here to defend themselves. They were not that impossible. I was just pretty sure they couldn't be pleased. You have to be born an awkward kid to understand that. If you've been born graceful, you've got a blow coming when you get older. But if you were born graceful, then you can't really understand. But I was the awkward boy. I was the fellow who spilled the milk at the table, preferably when there were twenty people there. It just seems that I would just touch the glass, barely touch it, and it would fall over. Just barely touch and it would fall over. All I had to do was look at the dishes in the sink and one of mother's better dishes. We were poor farmers in western Pennsylvania, so her better dishes were not that great. But all I had to do was look at the sink, and one of the better dishes would break in half right on the spot. It just did it.
And I got used to hearing those phrases. They were good to me. The Lord blessed us in lots of ways. But I used to hearing those phrases. Can't you do anything right? You always have to draw stuff. I could write a book on those phrases, and it would just be repetitive. Line after line after line. No one had heard about bruising the tender ego of a little boy by saying, you clumsy kid. No one had heard about that. It's a wonder that I'm normal today. A lot of it is owed to my wife, who has helped structure me out of normalcy, because when I break things today, she merely looks around and says, you did it again. And doesn't put a lot of invective to it to make me feel bad or diminish my self-ego. But the simple fact of the matter is that Israel stood before God as his people.
And they looked up to God and said, well, we don't think we can do anything that really pleases you. And Micah says, listen, Israel. He goes back to Deuteronomy ten for his citation. He says, listen, Israel. He said, God has not put upon you impossible burdens. Our brother pointed out to us last night pretty emphatically that the law didn't save them. God didn't give them the law to save them. Praise the Lord. He had another mean. But God did give them the law. And without the law, they'd been in a hopeless, ignorant mess. But he says, God hasn't laid on you impossible burdens. God has told you that he wants to build your society on the truth that he's given and your life too. That's all. And when we talk about public performance, that's what's yet required for us today, that life and fellowship in order to be built on the truth of the Word of God.
First of all, to deal right with others. You can see it in verse eight. We have a chorus that we sing about this in some of the places. Not every place is sing the same courses. Choruses, choruses. Not everybody sings the same choruses. We travel a lot, so we know lots of choruses. And the ironic thing is you learn a lot in one place and don't find or sing any place else in the world. So you don't really sing many choruses publicly. But we, back in our fellowship, sometimes sing a chorus. He has showed the O man what is good and what he wants you to do. And we kind of like that thing. But he says what I want you to do is to deal right with others. To do justly. To do justly is a nice way to say it. He's shown you what's good. What does he require? He wants you to do right with others.
Now you can't tell that to the world because the world, well you can tell it, but the world has no moral basis for judging that. The believers and the professed people of God do have that moral basis. It didn't mean that we're wrong to tell it. We ought to shout to everybody who ought to deal fairly and whatnot. But those who profess to be believers have a moral basis on which that advice can be given and strengthened there. And so he says to his people, he doesn't say it to the Babylonians, it would be good for them too. He doesn't say it to the Edomites, he says to his people, he said, I want you to deal right with others. I want you to do that, to deal right with others and whatever you do. If you read through the whole book of Micah, you can quickly find out something of what the problems are. In chapter seven, which is not very far away, he tells us in verse two, how the good man has perished out of the earth, and there's none upright among them.
They all lie and wait for blood. They hunt every man, his brother with a net. They do it, he says in verse three, that they may do evil with both hands earnestly. The prince asks, the judge asks, the great man, All these people are out for bribes and for grass and getting what they can't. The best of them, he says in verse four, is like a briar. The most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge. The day of thy watchman and thy visitation cometh, that'll be their perplexity. In other words, the society was so corrupt that you couldn't really trust anybody. Now, of course, there are bound to be exceptions because God always has people that stand for him and witness for him. But as a basic principle, you couldn't trust anybody. So the books that Pat has back there are to be bought.
You're allowed to read them while you're here. I'll just say this personally. You're allowed to read them while you're here, but if you walk out with them, they're to be paid for. You'd say, you'd say, boy, Thomas, Thomas is what you say if you're speaking me seriously. Tommy is okay, too. You'd say, Thomas, who would do such a thing? I've been in dozens of people's homes and picked up a hymn book with the name of the chapel in the front of it. Do you really think they bought that book? Do you think they bought that book? Sometimes they'd have four assembly hymn books. You think they meant that many assemblies over a period? Well, maybe some did. And of course you can't. But you just kind of do it accidentally. I have some problems like that myself. You know, the hymn book is about the size of the Bible.
When you walk out with it, you don't realize you've got two books instead of one. You got home and it's the assembly hymn book. You know, you get in your car right away and drive back with it. No, you'll take it back next Sunday. Twenty years later, your wife finds it in the piano seat. No, sir. There to be bought. You're allowed to read them while you're here. I usually read one or two just standing around. If I like them, then I buy them. If I don't like them, I put them back in the shelf and don't tell anybody. But whatever the case happens to be, we deal justly. We deal justly. And we deal justly with others. But in that day and age, people gouged each other's right and left. In chapter six, you can see it at verse ten. The treasures of wickedness and the house of the wicked and the scant measure that's above the scant measure is where you sell somebody a pound and it's only eleven ounces.
You have to say eleven ounces so people know you're not talking about Troy weight. You sell them for something that's underweight. That's what you do and you've got to carry it for God. In verse eleven, wicked balances and bag of deceitful weights. So if you're buying a bag of meat and the standard stone for meat, you use that for the person you like. If you hold them to the right measure, when I come in, you have a stone that's two ounces lighter and you sell me less for the same amount. and the writer says God hates that he denounces that sort of thing in Leviticus nineteen he denounces it in Proverbs he denounces it here in a powerful sort of way the expectation of God is that his people would deal right with others not just deal right with his people but deal right with others that's the expectation of God that his people would deal right with others because it's by the righteousness and the sanctified work of the Lord Jesus Christ that we've been brought into this family and marked by that character, it ought to be our delight to deal right with others.
I worked for years for a tree surgery company years ago. You get to an age after a while where everything is years ago. But I did. I worked for them. The longer you're away from it, the better you remember it. You understand that? Yes. Yes, a tree surgery company. I really wanted to give them an honest day's work, but I've never forgotten the day. I think I did most of the time, but I've never forgotten the day. when I had climbed up a very large tree in the Fox Chapel section out of Pittsburgh, a wealthy section, biggest state homes, and saw a squirrel sitting up there, a long way off the ground, long way up. Of course, the squirrels climb trees all the time, but he's a long way off the ground. He's out on a limb, and just for no good reason, working with my safety line, I worked out the limb just to get a better look at him. No good reason.
Had nothing to do with the work, I just did it. While I got out there, I got about two feet from him. The limb was, I had a safety line, giving me support. The limb would never have done it. and the squirrels looking shaky and I'm feeling shaky and suddenly he jumped he proved to be a flying squirrel have you seen them and they have webs between their feet he proved to be a flying squirrel he jumped I thought he committed suicide rather than look at me again so he fell and as he fell he fell several feet then he spread out those feet and he swooped over and landed on it the rest of the morning was spent by the tree surgeons chasing flying squirrels we should have refused any pay for the day I don't remember that we did I've thought many times about that particular incident and thought how easy it is to become distracted and not do the thing that is right with others.
If you say to yourself, where is your boss, that the foreman was climbing trees, grazing, chasing squirrels. And my employer was out looking for more work for this hardworking industrious crew who had been out chasing squirrels. I thought about it a lot of times. I haven't felt it led to send any money back. I was being paid sixty cents an hour at the time, which at that time It wasn't good, but it wasn't bad either. It was better than nothing. But I thought of it many times. I had an illustration with my brother-in-law a number of years ago. My brother-in-law was a large, large man who was embarrassed in public easily. He didn't say anything in public easily, but he wasn't a believer either. But he was under conviction.
And one night in a gospel meeting, the preacher started out by saying there are people here that ought to be saved tonight. And my brother-in-law, who would normally not even sneeze in public, just stood up and said, I'm one of those people. I want to be saved. There was no sermon that night. There were about six other people, too, who said they'd like to be saved. And that night there was just a long evangelistic meeting. But my brother-in-law was wonderfully saved by the grace of God. We know that my sister shouldn't have married him, but that's the way it goes. We know it. But he was saved by the grace of God. He was never a very outspoken fellow, but this is what he said to me a little while later. He worked in a factory where he ran a drill press making little pieces for somebody's arm. He said, I hadn't been saved an hour, he said, before I knew that when I went to work the next day, I'd have to be honest when the time study man came to see how many pieces I could make in an hour.
I guess you have to work in a mill to understand that. But you know they'd stand as a drill press and make the particular pieces. And the fellow would say there and he'd say, well, they'd make fifteen pieces an hour, and then they'd be paid on the basis fifteen. If they made more, then they'd be paid more. But when they saw the time study, man, they'd slow it down. They'd make maybe eight or nine. And then when he was gone, they'd whip it up to twenty-five and make a lot more money. But my brother-in-law said, I hadn't been saved an hour before I knew that when I went to work the next day, I have to be honest with the time study man. See, that's the work of the Spirit of God in his heart. And the Spirit of God showed him that if he really believed in Jesus and was brought into the family of God, it was necessary to deal right with others. Sometimes we've been saved for years and kind of forget that. Not in a total way, but it's easy to do.
But to do justly, it's what God wants of us in our relations. And if you have any doubt about putting it into a New Testament context, you only have to go to Ephesians four, where the writer says the person who stole before shouldn't steal now. But he ought to work with his hands to be able to give to those that have need and strengthen the community of God's people. And you can carry it into First Peter too as well. Where he says, you want to be sure that your conversation, your manner of living before the Gentiles, you want to be sure that it's honest. So that when tragedy comes to them, they may look to God too, because they've seen God revealed in your life and practice. Most of all, we should be circumspect in the manner of living with others to show the fact that the redeemed life is a life of truth. Because it's been touched by the holiness and the redemptive work of Jesus Christ.
No sin in him. and nothing false or fallacious in him. So basically, Micah says, here's what God wants. He doesn't want ten thousand rivers of oil. He doesn't want the sacrifice of your children. He wants you, the professedliest people, to deal right with others. And secondly, in the nature of verse eight, secondly, to be kind and forgiving. The writer simply says to love mercy. Mercy is the concept of not charging the fullness of a debt. It's hard to define sharply between grace and mercy. The Bible dictionaries will do it, but it's hard to define sharply between grace and mercy.
But mercy is the concept of being forgiving and not charging the fullness of a particular debt. Grace is giving what is otherwise undeserved and works for the blessing of others. Mercy is the sort of feeling that you feel in your heart when you feel sorrow for someone. who's caught in a great problem. They'll have to pay a price, and you don't think they shouldn't pay the price, but you'll look to God and ask for help in that particular thing. It's kind of hard to define it. But we have had in our culture today a lot of problems. We've had a lot of the AIDS problems. And it's quite common in evangelical circles to look at the AIDS question and act in, well, in strange ways.
I can't exactly tell you how. But the concept I used to hear, they'd say, well, they brought it on themselves. There's hardly any sin that you don't bring on yourself, except the Adamic sin, which kind of was brought on you by Adam. But there's hardly any. And it is true that people bring sins on themselves by doing wrong and wicked things. But I'm not in a place to judge that. I can say, yes, they bear the punishment of it. But I ought to have a heart that reaches out and say, I'd like to see them saved. And I'd like to see them saved. And I'd like to see them saved. I think they should pay for their crimes by the grace of God and His word. But I'd like to see them saved. which brings people into an everlasting relationship with God in spite of what they were. Our brother said it well last night when he pointed out that you can't transfer one of your sins to God or to Jesus yourself.
God does that. You can't do it. But we can pray for people that are deeply in sin that they'd be saved, that they'd come to know God, not that they would suddenly get out of the penalty that's theirs, but that they'd know God and get out of an everlasting penalty, which we don't wish on anybody to love mercy, to love mercy. I have gone through some tricky circumstances in the last few years myself. You'll forgive me. I use a lot of personal illustrations because I know them better. If you've done any dumb things lately and will tell me, I'd be glad to use you for... I'd be glad to use you for a message. I'd be glad to point them out and say, here's a brother on the right. Let me tell you something stupid he did last week. I'd be glad to, but I've discovered that's a good way not to be invited back.
There are other ways, too, but I've discovered... But I in the last few years had problems with my feet and my knees. I haven't had him all my life. I didn't have hardly anything problematic till sixty-five. My niece have collapsed to a tough degree. But don't feel too sorry. I'm still able to walk and stand. My feet got his head started on them by collapsing first of all through some problem that my father should have had too, except he died young. So whatever case happens to be, it's a genetic problem, the doctor says. And he said, all the men in our family should have it, but I'm one of the longest living in our family in many generations. I'm not quite that old, but I'm one of the longest living in many generations in my branch of the Taylor family.
And so these things collapsed on me. Well, I used to love the jumping games, the running games, the volleyball, and these choruses, you sing in church like Spring Up Oh Well, where everybody jumps off their seats, throws their hands in the air, and makes some explicit gesture for the grace of God. But, you know, after a while, when you don't stand up so well, it's not so much fun. And we were at a place not long ago where the song leader had us standing up. Every other stands upwards. This, that, and the other thing almost doesn't get on your head and kick your feet. And I said to myself, I said, I hope someday he has a bad pair of knees. See, there's no mercy in that. Do you understand that? If I'm thinking mercifully, I'd say, Lord, keep him healthy.
May he not torture me any longer, but keep him healthy. But instead I said, I hope someday he has a bad pair of knees. And I've likewise said that of the people who said, let's all run for an hour before we have lunch. They say, I wish they had a bad pair of feet someday so they stumble every other step they take. But that's not merciful. Mercy forgives. Mercy doesn't want to charge the full debt. And the Lord says that's the concept of being kind and forgiving one with another. You can see it's sketched in this chapter, in this book rather, back in chapter three, where he describes the condition of Israel for the heads of Jacob and the prince of the house. He says in verse two of chapter three, they hate the good and love the evil. They literally pluck off the skin of people and take their skin for themselves.
When he says they eat the flesh of my people, he's not talking about cannibalism. He's talking about the way they gouge and cheat one another, how there's no mercy, no forgiveness. They will take anything they can. If you fall into death to one of them, he'll skin you alive is a particular expression. And the writer says that God will hide himself from people that act like that. You can see a similar passage back in chapter two in verses one and two. They work evil upon their beds. When the morning's light, they practice it because it's in the power of their hands. These are the people who have strength and power over you. They figure out ways to come at what you have and get it by violence. They oppress a man in his house. They will gouge you for everything they can without mercy or without consideration. You may have had to slug it out through the merchant of Venice years ago in high school.
You may have had to do that. On the other hand, you may have missed it. You may have had something lesser or more, whatever the case is. when Shiloch is demanding the pound of flesh, when he's demanding the pound of flesh. You sit there and read and say, who would be that cruel? Well, the Lord says to his people, that's the way it is back in Israel. That's the way it is. They covet and gouge and take and oppress one another. No mercy, no feeling, no care for the poor, no compassion for the unfortunate. None of those things. But God wants us to be kind and forgiving. That's what he says. And he stresses out throughout the book many, many times. You can find it's dressed also in Ephesians four. You can find it's a New Testament teaching that is very, very much part of where we are.
And the Lord gives a sermon on the mountain, talks about the great prayer. He says you'll learn to forgive one another. And the Apostle Paul in Ephesians four says, God has forgiven you. You'll learn those things. And you discover that one of the great blessings of the Christian life is that you don't have to carry grudges. You don't have to carry burdens. You don't have to be mad and irritated with people. You can forgive and love and be kind. And that's what God wants. Now, you're already being just because God is the God of justice, too. So we're not going to dismiss justice. But first of all, you're dealing right with others. And secondly, you're being kind and forgiving to others. Well, that's what he said. And while he says that to the people of God, I think that it goes well beyond the people of God and that the people of God should show it to others too.
They should show it to others too. Ruth and I visited, we chatted for a while for an old friend in Colorado a few days ago. And he told me something that I had never known. There's lots of things I don't know. But this was a personal thing that I didn't know. He reminded me that when I used to come to their assembly years ago, his mother was there. He said, you were the only preacher that my mother would come out to hear. It wasn't because she thought I was good. He said, you were the only preacher my mother would come out to hear. Because he said, you were the only one that made a point of going back to talking to her in her invalid chair. I didn't even give it a second thought to say the truth. It seemed obvious to me I couldn't get by her anyway to get to the door.
It seemed the obvious thing to do was say, hello, madam. Do you mind if I push your chair at one time? It seemed to me that it was the obvious thing to do to speak to someone in that situation. But he told me that. I have to believe him because he's a lot older than I am, and she's gone on. But he said that, and I was glad I'd spoken to her. I don't remember ever making a big point of it. I do remember speaking to every car she sat in the aisle. and shook her hand and said other nice things once in a while, I suppose. But I'll tell you the concept of being kind and loving is something of us that touch all of our hearts of believers because that's what God has been to us. If we had simply been condemned for our sins, we would not have gotten to first base or even off the home plate area.
But God and His mercy and His love has provided grace and forgiveness through us through the Lord Jesus Christ. He didn't do it because we deserved it or earned it or worked for it, but because he was a God of love and compassion and had the program, the salvation that Dan talked about last night. If you know God, God has powerfully loved you. And what God looks out and says, build your life and my truth. Be one who loves and forgives others. So Micah says the children of Israel of his day, he said, it's not so tough. When you say, what does God want us to do, it's not so tough, he says. What God wants you to do is to build your life and society on the truth of God. To deal right with others. And to be kind and forgiving. And in the third place, to walk with God.
To fellowship with God. That's a beautiful thing. To walk humbly with thy God. To humble yourself to walk with God is a possible Hebrew translation. And the idea is to stop being high and mighty, but get down to a low place. Remember the truth of Isaiah, fifty-seven, fifteen. Get down to a low place and walk with God. It's not an honor. I don't know how to say this right. So if it doesn't come out theologically sound, forgive me. It's not an honor for God to walk with you. But it's a great honor for you to walk with God. Then why should any of us not want to do it? I don't know. But I'll tell you something I've seen with children a lot of times. I've seen a child who would hang on to his father or mother's hands.
with dogged determination until he saw something that he wanted that they didn't want him to have. We saw one yesterday in St. Louis in the airplane place. We were just getting ready to walk on the, or to get on the carrier, the thing that moves along the floor and pulls you along. And some little girl darted out of nowhere, headed for that thing, a little girl. My wife, did you touch her? My wife caught her because we could see her father at a distance coming, moving like father's move. We could see he didn't want her on that pathway being set down, but she was determined to get on.
So my wife just reached out and touched her shoulder gently, and she looked up, and by that time her father touched her less gently and took her back. And I said to myself, that's how it is. They'll hang to a father's hand or a mother's hand with dogged determination until something comes up that they really want to do and then let the old goat take care of himself. I'm going to get on that thing and ride it, whatever the case happens to be. You must have seen that, too. You've probably experienced it, but your parents aren't hearing longer to talk about it. The circumstances, he says, what God wants is for you to humble yourself, to walk humbly with him. to look up and say, I thank you, Father, for being my God. Thank you for the salvation you provided. Thank you for the life that you've given.
Thank you for the blessings that are mine. And now I want to walk with you. And the concept of walking with God, maybe after the pattern of Enoch to some extent, but the concept of walking with God is the concept of being yielded to him and doing his will and building those things in the life and his word. In verse seven of chapter two, there's a concept in Micah that touches on it a little bit. He says, are you named the house of Jacob? Is the spirit of Lord straightened? Are these his doings? Do not my words do good to him that walk us uprightly. Do not my words do good to him to walk uprightly, of course, is to walk with God. And he says, my words do good to him. My people, he said, rise up like an enemy. Verse eight, because they don't want to walk with me. They want their independence, their self-will, but to walk with me.
And in chapter three, I've always noted verse five in that connection. Verse five, which I should have memorized years ago, and then I wouldn't have to split these thin-page papers apart to get to it. I've said many times, the guy that invented this thin paper so that we arthritic finger people could, here's mercy for you, the guy that invented this thin paper so that we arthritic finger can't find a place this has got a lot to answer for in heaven someday. Now in verse five in chapter three, he says, here's what the prophets that make my people err, that bite them and cry. They say, peace, and he puteth not in their mouths. They even prepare war against God. That's the way it goes, he said, when you don't walk with me, when you don't walk with me, the things that seem to you to be light will be dark, and the things that they tell you will be bright will be hidden.
You will get no truth if you don't walk with me. You will get no clear concept of guidance if you don't walk with me. I always carry it into Galatians five where we're told about walking with the Spirit and not fulfilling the lust of the flesh and walking in the Spirit, by the Spirit, with the Spirit and knowing the will of God. And I've carried it pretty well at I John one too. The fellowship that we have with him. A fellowship in which we know that he's light and we walk in the light and enjoy the truth of God. Now the requirements of God to be saved are one thing. They are to trust in his son and be born again through faith in Jesus Christ. To confess our need and trust him. Micah is not telling people how to be saved.
Do you understand that? He's telling people who profess to be the people of God how to live. And he says what God wants you to do For the social order in which you find yourself is to build your life and society on the truth of God. And that continues to be a challenge to us if you're ninety-five and have known the Lord Jesus for ninety-three years. That continues to be a challenge to us in the practical realm of every day that for the glory of God and the witness of the truth of his saving message, we would learn to deal right with others, to be kind and forgiving, and to lower ourselves to walk with God. to humble ourselves to walk with him. The goodness of God can't easily be expressed by guys like me.
Some men can do it more eloquently. But I always marvel at it. I marvel at that salvation. I marvel at the joy that comes with it. But I also marvel from time to time at how easy it is to momentarily forget those things and begin to make a lifestyle of your own. I'm not big on playing games. My wife will tell you more about that if you want to know. It's a long background, but anyhow, I play a lot, but I'm not going to, I don't really enjoy them much. But I sat one night in my own house, playing a game with some of my own friends, and suddenly realizing that I could see what my chief opponent had by just looking at the window behind him, because it reflected in the window.
You'll be pleased to know that I did not take advantage of that, although today I still wonder. I said, you know, I said, we've got to pull a blind. Not because we were afraid somebody would see us playing a game and disapprove. This was an honest game. This wasn't something wicked that would be excorciated throughout the country. An honest game. I said, we've got to pull a blind. And someone asked why. And I said, because I can see his hand in a reflection in the mirror. Well, he could have held it like this or something like that. But guys forget and they wave them all around. You look up and say, ah, he's got the old maid. Or whatever it happened to be at that particular time. But you know it's a little private thing.
But the tendency to cheat on a thing like that can be enormous, especially if you're not used to winning and they've been crowing over you for losing. The tendency to cheat can be enormous. And you say to yourself, that's a game, Thomas. Well, the attitudes and games easily crawl over into life. And if you're not careful, you can justify anything you do on some stupid basis. But God doesn't ask us to justify ourselves. He asks us to go back and to build life and society as believers on the truth of God. And while we are not able to change the whole world, we leave that in God's hands and the work of the Spirit. We are able to govern our lives with the help of the Spirit and the guidance of the Word so that they reflect the truth of the fact that we know God.
and that that knowledge has meant everything to us. So that's what I'm working with. I will not come back to that particular subject, but that's what I'm working with in the conference, the concept of the Word of God and our public performances. And this morning I've simply talked about God's requirements for the social order and its requirement basically is that we deal right with others, that we are loving and forgiving, and that we humbly walk day by day with God. Say it's really nice to be with you today. Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for your blessings and mercies to us this morning. We do thank you for your forgiving love and your care and for your great salvation. Help us to live today, God, in the joy and the good of it.
Bless us in the hour that follows with our brother in his ministry and encourage us, Lord, to take from your word by the help of the Spirit what will strengthen and build us today. We give you thanks of Jesus' precious, wonderful name. Amen.