Please turn with me now in your Bibles to the book of Micah and the Old Testament. Micah is one of the minor prophets, comes right after the book of Jonah and before Nahum. We'll consider the second chapter, reading the entire chapter, all 13 verses. Let us now pay careful attention to the reading of God's word. Micah chapter 2, beginning at verse 1. Woe to those who plan iniquity, to those who plot evil on their beds. At morning's light they carry it out, because it is in their power to do it. They covet fields and seize them, and houses and take them. They defraud a man of his home, a fellow man of his inheritance. Therefore, the Lord says, I am planning disaster against this people from which you cannot save yourselves. You will no longer walk proudly, for it will be a time of calamity. In that day, man will ridicule you. They will taunt you with this mournful song. We are utterly ruined. My people's possession is divided up. He takes it from me. He assigns our fields to traitors. Therefore, you will have no one in the assembly of the Lord to divide the land by lot. Do not prophesy, their prophets say. Do not prophesy about these things. Disgrace will not overtake us. Should it be said, a house of Jacob? Is the spirit of the Lord angry? Does he do such things? Do not my words do good to him whose ways are upright? Lately my people have risen up like an enemy. You strip off the rich robe from those who pass by without a care like men returning from battle. You drive the women of my people from their pleasant homes. You take away my blessing from their children forever. Get up, go away, for this is not your resting place because it is defiled. It is ruined beyond all remedy. If a liar and deceiver comes and says, I will prophesy for you plenty of wine and beer. He would be just the prophet for this people. I will surely gather all of you, O Jacob. I will surely bring together the remnant of Israel. I will bring them together like sheep in a pen, like a flock in its pasture. The place will throng with people. One who breaks open the way will go up before them. They will break through the gate and go out. Their king will pass through before them the Lord at their head. So far the reading of God's word. Let us now once again ask God for his blessing on our hearing of his word. Let us pray. Our gracious God and heavenly fathers, we come now to consider your word. And as we've heard it read, we pray that as it is your word, it is holy and it will not return to you void. We pray that you would bless it to us, that we may benefit by what we hear and that we may indeed hear your truth proclaimed and explained. We pray that we would see how it points us to our Savior, Jesus Christ, and may we hear his voice and not merely that of a man. Bless us now, Lord, toward that end, for Christ's sake. Amen. Well, it doesn't happen very often in Germany, unlike in the United States, that police pull someone over on the highway if you are speeding. But one time, a few years ago, this one kind of chase, and the person being pulled over made national headlines. The person was going over 200 miles per hour in a construction zone, which was only a 70-mile zone. And police were trying for a while to get his attention, but the person was just oblivious. Once they finally were able to pull him over, they realized that the reason this person was not paying attention to the sirens, to the flashing lights in the construction zone is because the man was reading a newspaper as he was driving. You see, the man was doing something that he shouldn't have been doing in the first place and because of that was not paying attention to the warning signs that were there clearly for him to see. Our passage that we're considering tonight is a snapshot of the people of Judah just before the judgment. You have been hearing, I trust, the sermons that Pastor Voss has been preaching on Hosea, and now we're considering the southern kingdom. And what I hope you will see from this passage is that the people of Judah, God's people, have been pursuing sin to such an extent that their hearts became hardened to God's warnings. They had been indulging and pursuing sin so much that they had become immune, hardened to God's warnings. Now our passage begins with this short word, woe. Woe signifies that judgment is coming. And the first thing that we will be considering now is why this judgment is coming on the people of Judah, why they are about to be taken into exile. And Micah points out, for us, if we were to summarize it very broadly, it's because of the people's greed and oppression. Let's make sure we understand the historical background of what is going on in this passage. We read about how the rich are taking advantage of the poor and so on. Now, for this to make sense, remember with me that God's people, once they entered the land that God had promised them, they received their inheritance by lot. That means that it was something like a person would pull and have these two sticks and whoever gets the long stick gets the beautiful land west of the river that is nice and green and whoever gets the short stick gets the less nice land. God said that that was a fair way of dividing the land. And what was beautiful about God's provision here and the division of the land is that even if you got the land that was not the best and you became very poor, God said that you could never lose your land. Numbers 36 says, No inheritance in Israel is to pass from tribe to tribe, for every Israelite shall keep the tribal land inherited from his forefathers. It was a beautiful thing. But in Micah's day, the rich and powerful, the wicked rich and powerful were taking advantage of their poor and powerless countrymen. As we read the first two verses, we see that they were taking people's fields and houses by violence. And what's more, they also wanted really expensive stuff, like rich robes, we read in verse 8. And they would attack people who were not suspecting it, like soldiers who would be coming back from war. You normally don't expect to run into trouble when you came back to your homeland after you fought a battle far away. Some of you know people who've been fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq and when they come here, they expect safety. Well, it's somewhat similar with the Israelites, only once they came back, they were not in safety. They were being oppressed by their own countrymen. Again, what's more is these rich oppressors were also taken away, they were not shying away from hurting women, perhaps widows, they were taking away homes from children who had no parents, from orphans. In fact, the oppressors were saying, who cares about God's stupid laws? Who cares about you little people? I want your stuff, and I'm going to take it from you. And what's worse, is it was premeditated oppression. We read that they go to bed and think about it. Instead of going to sleep and meditating, as the psalmist often did on God's goodness, they were falling asleep with the thoughts of getting up early to make sure that they can actually carry out their plan and seize homes from others. But now, how did they rationalize their sin? We read in verse 1 that they do it because it is in their power. They carried out their violence just because they could. They had everything that they needed to do it. They had their brains. They had their strength. They had connections. Well, how can you let such an opportunity slip away? Go ahead and take one more field, one more house. And, of course, they could get away with it at least for a while. There's a German saying that goes, opportunity creates thieves. That if the heart is wicked, then give a person an opportunity and they will make use of it. And they knew, as we said, these people could get away with it for a while. And they knew that there would be immediate reward from what they're doing. You kick someone out of their house and it's yours right there. And there must have been some sort of rush from doing it. You see, seizing people's fields and houses is not like lying. It requires a lot more work. And then once you carried it out, then you could say to yourself at the end, it wasn't easy, but we made it. We did it. Now, these people, as we read their description, they were proud of their sins, proud of what they could do. And in that, there's a warning to us as well. Sadly, when God's people, believers, can become proud of their sins, it's bad enough if we twist the truth at work, at home, as children, with our parents, twist the truth just enough that we won't get in trouble or that we don't look bad. But what's worse is we can be proud of how we're able to get away with it or how we're able to get our way and no one finds out. we need to be on the lookout against such tendencies in our hearts and make sure that we confess it. These people were not doing that. See, as we read again in our chapter about how they were reasoning, it seems that probably at some point in the beginning, their conscience was bothering them, just like it bothers us when we indulge in something we know we shouldn't be doing. Must have been telling them, stop it, that's wicked, don't do it. And they'd be saying to themselves, well, just one more house, one more field. Of course, as long as you're doing that and you're not forsaking it, and you're doing exactly what Satan would ultimately have you do, what your sinful nature wants you to do, eventually their hearts became so callous, so hardened, that they were immune to God's warnings to abandon sin. But still, of course, we have this book of Micah here, and that means that God was not abandoning their people at this point. He was not sending them into exile, though he well could have. Micah is speaking out against this injustice. He says later on in chapter 3, But as for me, I am filled with power, with the Spirit of the Lord, and with justice and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression, to Israel, his sin. And he does it in the first five verses of the chapter that we just read. He tells to his countrymen, you have gone very far, but it's not too late. Repent now. The Lord is kind. Turn to him, or else foreign armies will sweep through the land and you'll be carried off into exile. But now, how do these people respond? We have seen so far why God was about to judge his people. Now we're coming to see their response. What were they thinking? Well, we read it in verses 6 and 7. Do not prophesy, their prophets say. Do not prophesy about these things. Disgrace will not overtake us. And then Micah quotes to them their words. He says, should this be said? They were saying to him, is the spirit of the Lord angry? Does he do such things? except for the promise of deliverance at the end of our chapter. This is the most startling part of the chapter. Basically, these people are saying to Micah, just stop it, cut it out, stop preaching. They're a lot like the people that we read of in the Gospels when Jesus was speaking out against people's sins and the people were offended, but the only thing they could think of is tell Jesus, just don't do it. The lawyers felt insulted when Jesus was condemning the Pharisees. They were saying, stop it. And Jesus, of course, did not stop. And neither did Micah. You get the sense from these people that when Micah is speaking to them, they must be saying to each other, this man is a joke. He won't go away and he's just insulting us. What is this? And Micah, with appropriate sarcasm, He even calls them prophets. You see, they're so devoted in their opposition to Micah that they're like holy prophets in their crusade against this troublemaker, this firebrand, Micah. They were confident that they'd never see bad days, that God's judgment would never come on them. Now, as Christians, you and I also can be confident that God's judgment will not fall upon us, but it's for a very different reason. if our hope is in Christ, that we know that the judgment fell on him. And so we, if we are in Christ Jesus, for us there is no condemnation. But that's not how these people were reasoning that they will never see judgment. Perhaps they thought that they were just, they were not the kind of people to whom bad things happen. For them there would only be good days. And yet the best days that they can imagine, as verse 11 says, is lots of alcohol, plenty of wine and beer. That's the best it will ever get. Now, these people, of course, they were not just ignoring completely everything that God was saying. Well, they were ignoring it in their hearts, but they were trying to justify how they could be doing what they were doing and oppressing others and yet expect that there would be no judgment. and their reason is even a theological one. It has to do with God's nature. No disgrace will overtake them because if it did, if it were to happen, well then that would mean that God's spirit got angry with them. Everybody knows that cannot possibly happen in their reasoning. They were thinking that God would only bless them. It was not a God who would be angry with sin. And if they had an equivalent in those days of inspirational calendars, they would probably love this verse in Exodus 34, verses 6 and 7. The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Of course, that is all true. God is truly merciful for none of our deserving. But these people forgot how that goes on. Exodus 34, 7 goes on to say, yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished. What was wrong with their thinking is that they had completely lost sight of God's holiness. God was no longer a God who will actually punish transgressions, who is holy, and whose justice has to be satisfied, but he was a kind grandpa. His job was always to be nice and to bless with no authority to punish. They turned the tables on who was supposed to serve whom. Now it was God's test, God's responsibility to do whatever they desired. Again, as we think now about Micah's warnings to these people and how they're responding, there are two questions that these verses pose to you and me. And the first one is, do we, do you and I respond humbly when we're being rebuked, when godly rebuke is coming our way? Somebody tells you that they're concerned about the way you spoke to your wife at one time or to your husband or about the way that you are spending your Sundays. or whatever it may be, and what do we do? Well, we try to find fault with the attitude of the person who brings the rebuke, and if there's a tiny bit of pride on the side of that person, well, then we're okay. See what a proud, moralist they are. Of course, and there's still a second question. When it comes to bringing an unpleasant truth to someone, whom do you fear? Whom do you fear more, God or men? Very often when we have to bring something that is unpleasant but necessary to a brother, to a sister, we fear a man instead of God. And perhaps we say, he's not going to listen to me anyway. I know his history. I know how stubborn he is. Nothing's going to help. Or we justify our unwillingness with other excuses. And I wonder if perhaps in our day that could be one of our most serious failings as Christians is that we are very unwilling to speak unpleasant truth in love. It's very easy for us to say, I'm not going to be like that moralist who always tells people how to live. And then it's easy being the moralist if you're speaking from a moral high mountain or a high horse and then you're speaking down to those poor sinners in the valley. Oh, it looks like a great movie for a Christian to watch. And of course, we've fallen into that trap very often. But you see, speaking the truth in love is neither. If you want to, as God calls us, to speak the truth in love, as Micah was attempting to do, means you have to make yourself vulnerable before someone if you show real concern. And that opens yourself up for laughter, just as they did with Micah. Micah, what is your problem? Just stop it. But you see, that's what God has called us to do. And Christian prudence, knowing when to speak and when not to speak, can never be an excuse for worldly cowardice. But now, no matter how angry these people were getting with Micah, was telling them to repent, to turn around, God's judgment was still coming. And it was going to be completely just. We know from Galatians, from the rest of Scripture, Paul uses this brief phrase. He says, a man reaps what he sows. And God's punishment here will be completely just. We read that these oppressors devised evil against their brothers. But God is now devising calamity against these very oppressors. It will now be their turn to be humiliated. When we read in verse 4 of that mournful song that the oppressors will be taunted by, it's these Assyrians who are about to sweep through the land and who are about to take away people's possessions. And as they're taking it away from them, they're saying, Oh, look, he's taken away my possessions. God is giving it to an apostate. It's like beating someone and saying, Oh, please don't hurt me. See, that's how cruel these Assyrians will be. But it will all be just punishment. There's another way where we see that God's punishment will be just and it will be deserved. It's also with the way that these oppressors were treating their poor brothers. We read that they were treating them like God's enemies. They were acting as God's enemies toward their own people. And now God says that he will now treat the rich oppressors like God's enemies. They will have no one in the assembly of the Lord, we read in verse 5, who will stand there. None of their descendants will be there to divide the land by a lot. That means their line will be completely wiped out. There will be no more remembrance of those people. But you see, there's also good news in that. For the wicked, there will be no hope unless they repent. Their line will be wiped out and when the exiles return and there will be, again, a redistribution of the land. They will have no one standing there, but that means that there will be a new distribution of the land. There will be a remnant that will return from exile eventually. And the way that God will bring his people back, these very people upon whom he is bringing this calamity, injustice, people who will be brought back for none of their deserving. The picture of that is absolutely astonishing. And it's probably the kind of picture that writers like Tolkien used when they were inspired to write the Lord of the Rings books. We read about it in verses 12 and 13, and especially in verse 13. Imagine a besieged city. The people of God are now confined to one city or one fortress, there are walls around them and there are enemies on every side and it doesn't look very good for them but they have a warrior king who opens a breach who rides out before them who opens a way and if he is out if he is out safely then that means that their salvation is sure to follow he will ride out kill the enemies disarm them so that they can go out through the gates. And now it's safe. Once he is safe, once he has fought for them, they're now sure to follow. And as they realize this king who's been riding out and who opened the breach so the people can follow him, as they realize the very end of our chapter is saying it's the Lord himself, the God who once brought them out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery, will once again bring them back and make them dwell in safety. Now, a few incidents in Israel's history, as we read the Old Testament, they resemble this a little bit. In the year 701 B.C., when the Assyrians were to sweep through Palestine and get into Judah, the people of Israel, many of them, were preserved within the walls of Jerusalem. God miraculously protected his people. looked bad for them, but they were saved. And yet at that point, there was no divine king who rode out and fought the enemies for them. They simply sustained the siege and eventually the Assyrians had to leave. Then when the exiles came back, it was still somewhat similar. God brought them back from a far country into the land that used to be theirs. But if you read the accounts of what it was like after they came back and they would start for building the temple and so on, it was hardly, like verse 12, that they're going to be dwelling like a flock in its pasture. Eventually, there would be no peace for them left in that land. We must remember at this point what our brother Bill pointed out to us this morning, how throughout the Old Testament, Israel throughout Israel's history, we have these pictures of what the ultimate redemption from sin is going to look like. We saw that with the plentiful harvest that the people will enjoy, they would have these great blessings in the land. They would be so much by way of harvest that they would know what to do with the old. That is a lot like the abundant blessing that we enjoy in Christ and more particular now to our passage, just as we also read and heard in Leviticus 26, there will be peace from enemies. So also this redemption that we enjoy in Christ is often pictured as peace from all of our enemies dwelling safely in the land. And of course, only one incident in history measures up, in fact, exceeds this description. And of course, that's our Savior, Jesus Christ, and his work. Ultimately, only Christ is the ultimate, the only divine warrior king who rides out for his people, fights the enemies. And now, if he is safe, if he went through the journey, then we know that we are sure to follow. Listen with me to how the Apostle Paul talks about this deliverance that Christ, our warrior, our king, our God, the victory that he's won for us. When you were dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code with its regulations that was against us and that stood opposed to us. He took it away, nailing it to the cross and think with me now with the next line how this is Paul's meditation it seems on this passage reading from Colossians 2 Paul says and having disarmed the powers and authorities he made a public spectacle of them triumphing over them by the cross Jesus on the cross suffered that ultimate agony that we were supposed to suffer the defeat by our enemies, our ultimate enemy, Satan, our own sin. Christ suffered that on our behalf and he made a public spectacle of all those powers because he disarmed them. He fought with them and it was not even a battle. One breath and they were destroyed. But Christ also is our warrior, our king, not just in his death, in the way that he disarmed those powers and overcame our enemies, but also in his resurrection. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. And in Jesus' resurrection and his breaking through the enemy lines, we have that guarantee that we're also going to follow through the gates. If Christ is risen, if he's ascended, that means that we're sure to follow. He's the firstfruits. If your hope is in Christ, that is where you will be with your God in heaven, secure from all the enemies. And think with me again of how the New Testament writers talk about this deliverance that Christ has brought to us and this time from Hebrews 10. Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain that is his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith with our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. If tonight your hope is not in Christ and you're sitting here apart from him that know that these warnings of the judgment just as they were to God's people of old that ultimately there will be judgment on sin, there will be consequences. The warning stands to you. Apart from Christ, each one of us here only has one destiny and that is eternal condemnation. It's a serious matter but that is true without the Lord. And so if you hear these warnings and however bad your record or your history of disregarding God's warning signs just like that man on the highway, Turn around and repent. Today is the day of salvation. Christ came to seek and save that which was lost. Trust in him. Trust in this one who broke through the enemy lines, who opened a breach, who will save all who trust in him. And if you are a believer, if your hope is in Christ, then rejoice in the Savior. Trust in him again and remember that that is not the salvation that we enjoy in Christ, perfect righteousness. It is not a license for us to disregard God's warnings. He has called us, as we read from Hebrews, to draw near to God with our conscience being sprinkled from evil deeds and serve him, serve this divine warrior king who has saved us from all our enemies. Amen. Let us now, once again, pray to God. Our gracious Heavenly Father, we praise you for your word and we praise you for the great deliverance that we enjoy in Christ, that for none of our deserving, we have this warrior, this king. In fact, you are God as our Savior. Lord Jesus Christ, we pray that you would magnify yourself in our lives, the lives of everyone who is sitting here, and we pray that we would, as a church, as individuals, put our trust in you. And may we also heed the warnings that you give to us when we want to go our own way. Oh Lord, bring us back. May we be quick to repent, turn to you for forgiveness and trust in your righteousness alone. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.