“The Prophet Micah” Micah [1:3-5]; 5:2-5a; 6:6-8

 “And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.” These words from Micah 6:8 were the scripture uplifted time and again by the seminary I attended while pursuing my Masters of Divinity degree. They were written on walls. Handed out on stickers. Found on the school’s website. 

This particular seminary wanted to lift up this verse in so many ways so that the scripture because written on our hearts. Not something that we just know with our heads, but seek to live out with our hearts. I once had a parishioner who would always remind me that the most dangerous place for our faith journey is the foot-or-so between our head and our heart. And the prophet Micah also knew that to be a dangerous place for the people he was trying to speak to. 

Micah prophesied during the 8th century, during a time when things were not well. Things were not well in the world. The people of Israel were living in a time of threats within and threats without. Externally, they were constantly under the threat of the Assyrians attacking them. But to try to mitigate that threat, there was also a threat within - as their own leaders in Jerusalem tried to appease the Assyrians by paying them tributes, but that was passed on to the poor. As a result, they were under threat of losing their homes by the choices their own leaders had made. A gamble that may or may not work. 

But things weren’t just not as they should be in the greater world - constantly under threat of war and oppressing the poor. Things were also not right in the people’s spirits and relationships with God. The people may not be able to control the greater world, but they could be attentive to their own spiritual lives - only they were refusing to do so. And it was noticeable through their very actions - the way they were living their daily lives.

Enter Micah, who is not a happy prophet. But he doesn’t just want to share with the people how they are falling short. He also wants to speak hope into a hopeless people and hopeless world. Micah is telling the people that things are not going to always be as they are now. In fact, God is going to change things by raising up a new leader.

But its a leader who is going to come from a surprising place and rule the people in a surprising way.

By this point in history David has been dead for quite some time. Yet, the people are still looking to have someone in his lineage come and lead them as he once did. Even if at this point none of them would have lived under his rule themselves. They keep looking back to the past to define who they are. 

To which Micah encourages them to look forward in hope to what is to come and to let that define who they are as the people of God. For the old way - that wasn’t working any longer. So God was going to raise up for the people a leader who is not from Jerusalem, but from Bethlehem. 

The season is almost upon us church when we sing with reverence “O Little Town of Bethlehem” but on this side of history and the New Testament we forget that Bethlehem was not a place to be revered during the time. All power was centralized in Jerusalem, the Holy City. So for Micah to speak of the leader who would set the people free coming from Bethlehem - that was unheard of. It would be similar in tenor to Philip’s response in the Gospel of John when Nathaniel tells him that they have seen the Messiah. Do you remember what his response was? “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”

The people may have been wondering, can any leader truly come out of Bethlehem. But Micah isn’t done yet. He also tells them that this new leader would be from humble origins. He wouldn’t come from a place of power and prestige in the world. 

And the way that he would lead them wouldn’t be anything like what the people have experienced before. Because he would not lead with sword or spear or through war. He instead will serve as their shepherd, ushering in peace. 

Micah is frantically trying to get the people to look beyond what they know with their heads in order to see with their spiritual eyes the hope that is to come. In other words, he wants them to look beyond the immediacy of their circumstances, as terrible as they are, in order to claim the hope and promise of God that is yet to come. If the people truly believe that God is trustworthy and that his promises are true, then they would be willing to let their hope rest in him alone. Even if that hope comes from an unlikely place. Even if that hope is shown in unheard of ways. 

But Micah also didn’t want to let the people just passively wait for hope on the sidelines. No they were to be part of the process. First by examining their own hearts and seeing where they may have been swept up in a spirit of idolatry. Church, the things that we make idols of are often good things. Things that God has entrusted us to be stewards over. The problem is instead of being stewards we let them control us. The people have made an idol of the monarchy and Micah is calling them to repent of this, and of anything else they have lifted up above the place of God in their lives. 

Second, Micah wants the people to seek the will of God. Is that not a question that we still ask today, Church? What is the will of God? To which Micah lifts up this oft-quoted verse. To seek justice. To love mercy. And to walk humbly with our God. 

And how do we do those things? By remaining in a vital relationship with God. Lifting up God as first in our lives. And allowing God to direct our steps in a way that brings him honor and glory. 

In other words, Micah is inviting the Israelites, and us by extension, to be living to close to the heartbeat of God that we reflect him in the world. Because - justice and mercy - friends, those are attributes of our God. Justice is part of his nature. So in mercy - expressed in compassion towards us. 

When we walk humbly with God, allowing him to be glorified, we become people shaped by him. Living for him. Daily. 

And when we are living for God daily it makes it a bit easier when God calls us to do things beyond our wildest imagination. Like living for hope. Even in the midst of the heartache of the lack of hope in our world. 

Friends, Micah is still calling us to examine our hearts and lives today to see if we are truly living out what we believe to be true. Asking us if we are clinging to man-made hope or the hope of our Savior who has set us free. And when we are free, are we living like folks who are free-indeed? Amen.