He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?He has shown you, O man, what is good. What does Yahweh require of you, but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth Jehovah require of thee, but to do justly, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with thy God?
4 sermons cite this verse
… that's a mouthful we'll just let's soak in so this language coming straight from god's requirement of his people in the old testament in micah chapter 6 verse 8 to do justice love kindness walk humbly with god clearly echoed in the new testament command from jesus the second of all commandments to love our neighbors as ourselves, Matthew 22, verse 39, even more than ourselves as we look to the interests of others, Philippians chapter 2, verse 4, and lay down our lives for them, 1 John chapter 3, verses 16 through 18. Following the example of the one who, 1 John 3 and Philippians chapter 2 makes clear, emptied himself and gave his life for us. So this is what we're supposed to do for all of these people, for children, for their parents. So it's interesting. Do you know the reasons why people say they abort their babies? When you look at the data, and I want to be really careful not to oversimplify this and certainly not to assume that I know the exact reason going on in any woman or man's heart and mind when it comes to having an abortion, but simply looking at the feedback from those who have abortions, there seem to be two primary reasons. And here's how I would describe them. The first is love of self. And the second is lack of support in no particular order. And I would just say, notice neither of those is because someone thinks the baby in the womb is not a …
… is hesed. And this is a word that shows up hundreds of times in the Old Testament, including one passage of scripture we memorized a few years ago from Micah 6.8. Micah 6.8 says, what does the Lord require of you? And this is a great verse. Like, what does God actually want from you. He wants you to do justice. That's righteousness. He wants you to do justice and to love kindness. That's mercy. Chesed. He wants you to love mercy and to walk humbly with God. What does the Lord want from you? Justice, mercy, and humility. And interestingly enough, if you think about this, which person is happier? The person who is vengeful or resentful or holds everything to themselves and doesn't share with anybody else? The Scrooge, the Ebenezer Scrooge? Or is the person who has open hands, regularly forgiving, and showing mercy to people? And you know the answer to that, right? So we tend to think if I hold on to things, and I hold on to that anger or bitterness, or hold on to my possessions, I'm going to be happy. But really, it's over here when your hands are open and your heart is open that you find the path of happiness. That leads to the pure in heart. Let's say this one together, put it up on the screen. Blessed are the pure in heart, pure in heart. So this is interesting. Our hearts, and by heart, of course, we're talking about our motives, our secret thoughts and our motives, right? And when I think about my heart, …
… there's a better. And here's the scripture, Micah 6, 8. The Bible says this, he has shown you, all mortal, what is good. What does the Lord require of you? To act justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. We are first responders. I'll close with this. I'm ready, guys. I know I'm like two minutes early. We're going to beat the Methodists. They're not eating all the white chicken today. I'm getting a chicken breast. I had to, I do public schools and I had to fly to Ohio. I'm gonna be honest, I hate Ohio. when I landed got in the rental car got to the hotel it's 11 30 at night and I all I want to do is brush my teeth and go to bed and then I realize I'm out of toothpaste so now I got to go to Walmart at midnight and get toothpaste I don't know if you've ever been to Walmart after midnight if you have you know what I'm about to say there's some freaks running around Walmart after midnight I don't know what happens after midnight but I get my toothpaste. I go to self-checkout. They closed self-checkout in Ohio. What is wrong with these people? So I decided I get in line. There's only one lane open. There's a guy checking out. …
… to say amen to humility. Now the passage that we just read holds a verse that many of us know by heart. One that you often hear us quote from the pulpit all the time, Micah 6.8. What does the Lord require of you? To do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God. I feel like this verse does such a good job of defining what it means to live out the Christian life. When Jesus is asked by the teachers of the law, what is the most important commandment? Jesus responds by reciting the Hebrew scripture saying, you must love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. And then Jesus says, and the second is similar, to love your neighbor as yourself. And the teacher that asked him this question in trying to trick him says, well then who is my neighbor? And Jesus tells the parable of the good Samaritan. He tells the story of a man who is beaten, robbed, and left on the side of the road. A priest and a Levite, both religious leaders, walked by without hoping, but a Samaritan, someone considered an outsider and an enemy by many Jews at that time, stopped to care for the man. He bandages his wounds, takes him to safety, and pays for his care. It's interesting, in that parable, Jesus never answers the question, who is my neighbor? And in telling of this parable, Jesus essentially says, it doesn't matter who your …