Now turn with me to the book
of Micah chapter 7. We're going to be looking at
the last three verses of this chapter talking about the subject of
a saving revelation of God. A saving revelation of God. That's what sinners need. a saving revelation of God. And
this passage, these last three verses are just so rich. It's one of those things when
you see a lot of the language of this prophet and you see so
much of what we might call negative in the judgments of God and His
wrath against sin, And then he launches forth to close out this
book by inspiration of the Holy Spirit by setting forth three
things. First of all, he sets forth the
God of salvation. Who is a God like unto thee? The God of salvation, the God
of all grace, the one true and living God. There's no other
God, and there's certainly none like him. None like him. And
then the second thing that he sets forth is the way of salvation. You know, as he's bringing out
the wrath of God against sin, we of all people should be so
eternally joyous that that's not the end of the story. There
is a way of salvation, but it's God's way. And it's only one
way, one way of salvation. And of course that's by his grace
through the Lord Jesus Christ. And then thirdly, he brings out
here in these verses, the people of salvation. Who is God going
to save? You know, he tells us. You know,
this notion that people have today and you know, that he's
out here trying to save everybody if they'll just let him. That's
not what the Bible teaches. That's not what Micah believed.
He's gonna save some people, and anybody who wants salvation,
wants this salvation, can have it now. God, it says here, he
delights to show mercy. He doesn't turn mercy beggars
away. He turned Cain away. He turned
any sinner away who comes to him expecting salvation by his
works. but here's the people of salvation
so let's look at this first of all in verse eighteen he starts
off showing how god reveals himself for this purpose to save his
people from their sins to incite from them worship and obedience
to him he's the god of salvation we read in the opening there
first peter chapter three in verse fifteen where Peter wrote,
sanctify the Lord God in your hearts. That means you are, we
are, to set God apart in our hearts, in our minds, our affections,
our will. We're to recognize Him and glorify
Him and honor Him and see Him for who He is, in His intrinsic
value, His uniqueness. And we're not to compare Him
to anything or anyone. We can't make any likeness of
God over in the Ten Commandments, you remember, over there in Exodus
chapter 20. Let me just read this to you. It starts off, you
know, when he was revealing himself to Israel, the nation, in the
Old Covenant. Listen to what he says in Exodus
20 and verse 1. It says, And God spoke all these
words, saying, I am the Lord thy God, which hath brought thee
out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou
shalt have no other gods before me. and then he goes on now listen
to this he says thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image
or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is
in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth
thou shalt not bow down thyself to them he's not forbidding art
here he's just simply saying you're not to worship any icon
or anything or say that anything has a likeness of god You know,
he's saying don't use visual aids in worship as if that would
incite worship. He says, nor serve them for I
the Lord thy God am a jealous God. You're going to see that
in the book of Nahum. What's he jealous over? He's
jealous over his glory. That's what he's jealous of.
He will not share his glory. Not with anyone. Now, we'll share
it, that's what we are by nature, that's why we're sinful, but
God won't share it. You know, that's why we won't
readily and joyfully side with God against ourselves and against
others, especially our loved ones. But you see, God's a jealous
God. And he says, visiting the iniquity
of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation,
of them that hate me." That's his judgment against sin. In
verse 6 he says, "...and showing mercy unto thousands of them
that love me and keep my commandments." And of course those commandments
are those same commandments that are meant to expose the sinfulness
of the people and drive them to Christ for salvation. Nobody ever kept the commandments
under that old covenant. who was trying to be saved by
their works. Did you know that? Nobody ever
did. In fact, the very efforts of
self-righteous, unbelieving sinners to be saved by their works under
that covenant was forbidden by that covenant and misrepresented
God. Here's a sinner trying to be
saved by their works. They don't sanctify God. Actually,
what they're doing is saying, well, God's just like any other
God, because all false gods do that, except that. But look back
here at Micah 7. God reveals Himself as the God
of salvation. And He says in verse 18, Who
is like unto thee? Who is a God like unto thee?
This is the prophet sanctifying the Lord God in his heart. There
is no God like thee. Isaiah said that over and over
again. Who can you compare to God? Job said that. You can't
compare God to anyone. He said, I am the Lord God. There's
none like me, none beside me. Who will you compare to me? It's
blasphemy to try to compare anything, anyone to God. How many ways
can we describe the uniqueness of God? We could talk about each
one of his attributes. There are books about that. We
could talk about His holiness. That means more than simply that
God is a morally perfect existent being. It means that He's one
of a kind. There's none other like Him.
Remember we read last time in Isaiah chapter 45, He identified
Himself as a just God and a Savior. This is the God of salvation.
And there is none like him. Over there in Ezekiel chapter
36 that Brother Aaron read, that's what he was talking about. See,
it was Israel's task as the covenant people of God to worship him
and serve him and set themselves apart and to sanctify the Lord
as the people of God and not to blend in with the idolatrous,
ignorant, unbelieving nations. And whenever they disobeyed God
and disbelieved God, what did he say? Well, you profaned my
name. That's what he said in verse
21 of Ezekiel 36. I had pity for mine holy name,
that which identifies and distinguishes God, which the house of Israel
had profaned. You see, profanity is not just
simply cussing as we hear it today. Profanity is misrepresenting
God. Saying things about God that
aren't true. You can be a preacher behind
a pulpit. If you say things about the true and living God that
don't fit with His revelation of Himself in the Word, you're
speaking profanity. It's what it is. Or when you
say things about God that aren't true. And he says, which Israel
had profaned among the heathen. And he says in verse 23, I will
sanctify my great name, which was profaned among the heathen,
which you have profaned in the midst of them. I will sanctify. God's going to sanctify. So that's
what Micah's talking about. This is the God of salvation.
Now, now think about it. Now look, look back at Micah
seven. Here's the second thing. Here's the way of salvation.
How does God sanctify his great name? How does God reveal himself? and set himself apart. He does
so in the salvation of his people by grace through the Lord Jesus
Christ. If you want to know God, you
must look to Christ. And if you want to know Christ,
you must look to His Word and the power of the Holy Spirit.
God reveals himself in his way of saving sinners. Look at it
in verse 18. Who is a god like unto thee?
And what's the first thing he said? He doesn't say who is a
god like unto thee that created the world. Now that is, that
is something, isn't it? God does reveal himself in creation. He doesn't even say, who is a
God like unto thee? You're in control of all things.
God is in control of all things. He's the God of providence. He's
the governor of this world. He's the sovereign of this world.
He works all things after the counsel of his own will. But
how does he reveal himself to his people in salvation? Look
what he says, the first thing, that pardoneth iniquity. You see that? This is the way
of salvation. He pardons iniquity. and passeth
by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage." Who's that?
That's his elect people. The remnant of his heritage.
He retaineth not his anger forever because he delighteth in mercy. He delights to show mercy. He's
not a reluctant God to show mercy. He will turn again and he will
have compassion upon us He will subdue our iniquities, He subdues
them, and thou will cast all their sins into the depths of
the sea. That's symbolic language, showing
how God will not impute our sins to us. He charged them to Christ. Now what's He talking about?
Well, worship and obedience, salvation itself does not come
from preaching the law. It doesn't come from preaching
rules and regulations. But it's motivated and guided
by the preaching of Christ and Him crucified. Listen to what
he says. He starts off, he says, that
pardoneth iniquity. You know what that speaks of?
It speaks of propitiation. That word that's used three or
four times in the New Testament, that's related back to the Old
Testament word for mercy-seek, which has to do with a substitutionary
sacrifice who brings satisfaction to the law, Christ, the Lord
of glory, who is our mercy seat. The shedding of his blood is
the complete payment for all the sins of all his people. The
good shepherd laying his life down for the sheep, giving his
life as payment for the sins of his people that were imputed,
charged to him. Dying under the damnation of
the curse of the law in order that we would not have to die
eternally. Suffering that full measure of
God's wrath against our sins, the sins of his people, and bringing
forth righteousness. That pardoning iniquity there
doesn't mean that God just simply says something. It's not just,
it's not like God just waves a magic wand and it happens.
It has to do with a satisfaction of his demands, the demands of
his holiness, the demands of his justice, the demands of his
law for my sin. That's what pardon means. It
means he lifts it up and takes it away. That's the language.
Now he doesn't literally lift up sin and take it from here
and put it over there, that's not what sin is. But it's language
that shows us that he lifts sin up off of us and lays it on Christ.
It's the language of substitution. Christ is our substitute. He's
our representative, he's our high priest, but he not only
represents us before God, but he takes our place. And God imputed,
charged, accounted the guilt of our sins to him. So he took
them off us and laid them on Christ. Christ bore our sins,
just like that scapegoat back in the Old Covenant that bore
the sins of the people. There wasn't anything literal
on that goat when they led him out into the wilderness. There
wasn't a knapsack on him full of sin or anything. No, that
was all symbolic. But when Christ went under the
wrath of God on the cross, that wasn't symbolic, that was real. He was guilty. He was cursed,
the Bible says. He was made a curse for us because
he took the full responsibility of our sins. And he imputed his
righteousness to us. Now he goes on, he says in verse
18, it says, he passeth by the transgression of the remnant
of his heritage. What does that mean, he passes
by them? It means he doesn't see them. Well, what does that
mean? Well, look over at Hebrews chapter
10 with me. Now, God is omniscient. He knows
all things. God is omnipresent. He's not
contained by geographical space or time. He's infinite. Somebody
said, well, God doesn't see me when I sin. You better back up
and punt on that one. Oh, yes, He does. I remember
when Nathan the prophet, reading in 2 Samuel chapter 12, he told
David, he said, you've done this evil in God's sight. Yes, God
does see. But what does that mean when
it talks about he passeth by our transgressions? Well, look
at verse 17. Now, this whole passage, well,
let's look back up at verse 14. He's talking about the death
of Christ on the cross to put away the sins of his people.
And he says, for by one offering he, Christ, hath perfected forever
them that are sanctified. In other words, those who were
chosen of God and given to Christ were set apart by him, he took
their sins, he perfected them, he completed the work, he finished
the transgression, he brought in righteousness forever for
them. And he set apart. And he says
in verse 15, whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us,
for after that he had said before, this is the covenant that I will
make with them after those days, said the Lord. I will put my
laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them,
and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. That's
what that means when it says he passes by our transgressions.
He doesn't remember them. That doesn't mean he forgets
them. It means he doesn't hold them against us. It means that
in God's books, and I've read this before, but it is just so
good. It means this, it means God sees
no sin in us as a matter of divine justice. He does not charge us
with our sins. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord imputeth not iniquity. Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? It's God that justifies. Who
can condemn us? It's Christ that died. The record
books of heaven record no iniquity, no sin, no transgression against
God's elect people in Christ. The books are wiped clean, that's
what that means. God will not charge sin to his
saints or require satisfaction from us because our sins were
made Christ. They belong to him. and they
were justly imputed to him. And he was made sin for us. He
paid for those sins. Our sins have been forever erased
from the law books of God's offended justice, and it was erased by
the blood of the Savior. That's what it means. So think
about that. Now look at Hebrews 10, let's
read on. He says, their sins and iniquities will I remember
no more. He won't hold them again. He
passes by the transgressors. When he passed over Israel, before
they were brought out of the land of Egypt, it was because
there was blood on the door. When I see the blood, I'll pass
over you. And he says in verse 18, now where remission of these
is, there is no more offering for sin. In other words, it's
completed. Don't bring God any more offerings
for that reason, for sin. Somebody says, well, I've done
a great sin, therefore I've got to offer God something to pay
for that. No, where sins have been pardoned,
that's what he's talking about here back in Micah, turn back
there. When God passes by the transgression, that means it's
done. It's finished. There's no more offering for
sin. So having put away sin by the
sacrifice of his son, God passes by it. He can do so justly. Doesn't
mean he ignores it. Doesn't mean it's not dealt with.
Doesn't mean it's not paid for. Doesn't mean law and justice
is not satisfied. It means all of that. But Christ
did it for us. And God will not charge us or
call us unto account for it. Through the blood of Christ,
it's covered. It's atoned for, it's washed away. And then look
on in verse 18, it says, he did this for the remnant of his heritage. Now hold on to that thought,
we'll deal with that in just a minute. But look here, he says,
he retaineth not his anger forever, because he delighteth in mercy.
He delights to show mercy, that's his glory. And his mercy here,
his glory, listen, only sinners need mercy. Only sinners get
mercy, and God's plenteous in mercy. God's anger and wrath
and justice being fully satisfied in the sufferings and death of
Christ are turned away from His people, and God's reasons for
showing mercy to His people are in Himself, not in us. It's His
glory. He's a just God and a Savior.
He's a righteous judge and a merciful Father. He shows mercy at the
mercy seat. Nowhere else. That's why there's
no mercy without Christ. There's no compassion. Look at
verse 19. He says, He will turn again.
He will have compassion on us. When it says He will turn again,
it's not saying that God is always turning and always changing in
His mind or in His nature or in His sovereign providence. As we are sinners, saved by the
grace of God, God will always forever have mercy upon us in
Christ. And when we say He will turn
again, that's for our benefit to show that as we're continually
convicted of sin, Christ is always our advocate. It's like to us
that God's turning again and again and again. How many times
has God been merciful to you? What would you answer to that
question? I'll tell you how I would answer that. I'd say thousands upon
thousands upon thousands, millions upon millions. Now technically,
and that's okay. We're human. You know how many
times God's been merciful to you? One time. That's all it takes. But that
mercy, you remember the psalm that keeps saying what? For his
mercy what? endure it forever. It never stops. In other words, there's never
a time that God has stopped being merciful to me. It's just one
time forever and ever. But from my own viewpoint, you
know, when I wake up every day and I go to bed every night and
I go through my day and I have my moments, it looks to me like
God's turning again and again and again and again, doesn't
it? A thousand times a day. No, it's just one time. But it's
forever and ever and ever and ever. He's never stopped. And
He never will. He never will. It's for our benefit. Christ is our advocate. When
we sin, we have an advocate with the Father. Jesus Christ the
right. When has Christ ever stopped being your advocate? He never
has. You reckon He'd stop tomorrow
morning? Or tomorrow afternoon? Well, if He does, He never started.
He never stops. He's our advocate. He's our surety. He's the Lord, my righteousness
forever and ever. And He never stops. He never
stops. And then He says here, He says
He will subdue our iniquities. That literally means tread underfoot. He will tread our iniquities
underfoot. Now there's two facets of that.
First of all, legally, Christ did that by himself as our representative
and substitute on the cross. He made an end of sin. He finished the transgression.
He took away all our iniquities and he subdued them. He put them
down. He made an end of them. But subjectively, He subdues
our iniquities within us by the power of the Holy Spirit in bringing
us to faith in Christ and repentance of dead works. Now hold on to that thought.
I want to come back to that. But look on. He says, "...and
thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea."
That means they'll never be brought up again. God will never bring
them up again. He's not like us, is He? Who
is a God like our God? Who is a god like unto them?
He'll never bring them up again. You ever had somebody you hadn't
talked to in a while call you up or talk to you and they bring
up something in the past that you did wrong? God's not like
that. He'll never bring... That's symbolic. He'll cast all their sin into
the depths of the sea. They'll never be found again.
They're gone. That's what He means. They're
gone. Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. That's
what he's talking about. Now, in verse 26, he begins to
talk about the people of salvation, the elect of God. Back up in
verse 18, he identifies them as the remnant of his heritage. These are the people God chose
before the foundation of the world and gave to Christ. These
are the ones for whom Christ died. For whom did Christ die? He died for the remnant of His
heritage. He died for those who are the
people of the covenant. Verse 20 is covenant language. Micah 7, 20 is covenant language. Thou will perform the truth to
Jacob. Who's Jacob? Well, he goes on,
he says, and the mercy to Abraham. Who's Abraham? See, those are
the covenant patriarchs. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob,
symbolic of sinners saved by the grace of God. I am the Lord,
I change not, therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed. Abraham, the father of the faithful,
the archetype. of a sinner saved and justified
by the grace of God through the blood and righteousness of Christ."
And so he says, "...which thou hast sworn." God swore an oath,
a covenant oath to His Son. He engaged Himself in everything
that He is to perform all the stipulations and requirements
and promises of this covenant and he swore it unto our fathers
from the days of old. He gave the same promise to Abraham
and to Isaac and to Jacob. Christ said, Abraham rejoiced
to see my day and he sought and was glad. This is the people
of salvation. This is the people of the covenant.
This is God's elect. These are the ones for whom Christ
died. These are people of the promise,
children of the promise. That's what he's talking about
here. And what does he say? He says he's going to subdue
our iniquities. Now, as I said, there are two
facets of that. Legally, Christ accomplished that as our representative
and substitute on the cross. That's the ground of salvation.
That's sin put away. That's righteousness established,
which is imputed to every one of his people. But subjectively,
within ourselves, in our experience of it, The Holy Spirit comes
and brings us under the preaching of the gospel, and there He subdues
our iniquities. Now, how does He do that? Now,
how does He do that? That's what I want to just get,
let me give you several things here. On this matter, somebody
asked me one time, said, how are we delivered from the power
of sin? How are we to, now we know who
we are. One of the things that God does
when He reveals Himself to us in salvation, is he gives us
a real knowledge, sense of who he is, his holiness, his justice. And he gives us a real knowledge
and sense of who we are as sinners who deserve nothing but wrath
and judgment. But how does he deliver us from
the power of sin? Well, again, certainly on the
cross, Christ delivered us from the power of sin to condemn us.
Who can condemn us? It's Christ that died. Sin cannot
condemn us. But there are many areas in which
we're delivered from the power of sin within us when we're born
again by the Spirit in our regeneration and conversion. There's some
ways sin no longer has dominion or rule within us due to the
new birth. Now obviously being delivered
from the power of sin, our sins being subdued, our iniquities
being subdued doesn't mean that we're delivered from sinning
because we're still sinners. In fact, Paul wrote about it
in Romans 7 and verse 14. He said, I'm carnal, sold under
sin. He was speaking as a believer,
as a sinner saved by grace. I'm a slave to sin in that way. In other words, I'm still a sinner,
I still have the flesh, that wars against the Spirit, that
keeps me from going the fullness of my desire to be totally and
completely and perfectly like Christ. Sin still contaminates
everything I think, say, and do. Can't get away from it. Paul,
in fact, in Romans chapter 7 there, if you read verses 14 through
25, he makes this statement. He said, how to do what I want
to do, which is to be perfectly like Christ. I don't even know
how to do that. Do you? There's not one person
in here tonight, and there's not one person on the face of
God's green earth here who can tell me how to do that. And anybody
that imagines that they know how to do that, they're lying
to themselves. That's why John said, Beloved,
it doth not yet appear what we shall be. We'll be perfect. Listen,
in glory, we'll be perfectly conformed to the image of Christ. Our thoughts, our motives, our
views will be unhindered and uncontaminated by sin. And there's
not one of us who can describe what that's going to be like.
The closest that we can get to a view of that is by keeping
our eyes fixed on Christ. And that's it. So when he talks
about subduing our iniquities, if we're going to talk about
the work of the Spirit in us, we can't talk about sinless perfection
within us. You can't do that scripturally.
Now, you might have a circle of friends that just love to
lap that stuff up, but it's not scriptural. So how can we say he subdues
our iniquities? Well, let me give you this much.
First of all, before you were born again, if you're born again
tonight, sin once deceived you and kept you under its deception
in darkness. Know what the scripture says?
But now sin has no more power to deceive you as to your sinfulness
and to the wickedness of your best efforts to keep the law.
You know Saul of Tarsus, before he was enlightened, By the Holy
Spirit, he imagined himself to be righteous by his works. Sin deceived me, he said. But
now, that's been subdued. The Holy Spirit has come along
and turned on the light. And he's been translated. That's
what it is. We've been translated from the
kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his dear son. Paul
said, you're children of light. Walk as the light. You've come
to the light, the light of God's grace. Now we have a right knowledge
of God. It may be an incomplete knowledge
in ourselves, but it's still a right knowledge. We have a
right knowledge of ourselves, we have a right knowledge of
Christ. Look over at Jeremiah 31. This is what he's saying. He says in Jeremiah 31 and verse
33, he says, but this shall be the covenant that I will make
with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord. I
will put my law in their inward parts. I'm gonna write the law
on their hearts. And write it in their hearts.
And will be their God and they shall be my people. And they
shall teach no more every man his neighbor and every man his
brother, saying, know the Lord, for they shall all know me. You
know things you didn't know before. Why didn't you know Him? Because
of the darkness of sin. But now the Holy Spirit has enlightened
your mind and your heart. You know God. This is life eternal,
that they might know Thee, the only true God in Jesus Christ,
whom Thou sent. How do you know God? Through
Christ. And Him crucified and risen again. There's been a resurrection
within us. The Spirit of God has given us
life. We were born dead in trespasses and sins. Sin kept us dead. But now that's been subdued by
the Holy Spirit who's given us life from Christ. And now you
know what? You can hear things you couldn't
hear before. That's why Christ said, blessed are your ears for
they hear. What kept you from hearing them before? Sin, self-righteousness,
self-love, ignorance, darkness, That's what kept me from hearing
the gospel before. That's what kept me from coming
to Christ. But that's been subdued. The
Holy Spirit has brought me to Christ. And I hear things I didn't
hear before. We see things we didn't see before.
I see things in this book I didn't see before. Before, this book
was a book of contradictions to me. Some of it I thought was actually
silly. I really did. And I thought a lot of it was
just flat fable, untrue. And so I set out to disprove
it. What made me do that? Sin did. Darkness, ignorance,
self-righteousness, self-love, unbelief, all of those things.
Now I'm standing up here preaching this book as the Word of God.
What's been subdued? Am I now sinlessly perfect? Oh,
no. I started to say, just watch
me throughout the day. You can watch me up here. I'll mess up somewhere. No, I'm not sinlessly perfect
now. I don't have a sinless perfection
in me. But this iniquity has been subdued. I now see the glory of God in
the face of Jesus Christ. Sin once overpowered us in that
it kept our wills in total bondage and kept us in unbelief, kept
us from faith in Christ. true repentance, but now it can't
do that. You cannot, and I cannot, be
perfectly sinless like we want to be. But I'll tell you something
we can do, and it's not by our power now that we do this. It's
by the power of God and His grace. We can look to Christ. You couldn't
do that before. You couldn't do that, could you?
Because sin wasn't subdued. Now you can. Now we live our
lives looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.
Micah back here, he made this statement, look at it. He said
back there in Micah chapter seven, he said in verse seven, therefore
I will look unto the Lord. Look unto me and be ye saved.
There was a time he couldn't do that. He didn't have eyes
to see and ears to hear, didn't have a heart, that new heart
that Ezekiel spoke of. He said, I'll put my spirit within
you, I'll give you a new heart, I'll take away the stony heart
and give you a heart of flesh. Flesh there not being sin but
being something that's pliable, submissive to the will of God,
that's what that means. He says, I will wait for the
God of my salvation. That's another way of the Old
Testament prophets saying, I'm looking to Christ to come. I'm
looking forward and I'm looking to the future. God's going to
send a savior. He's going to send one who will
bear my sins and put them away and give me his righteousness.
Now, do you think he did that just on his own, of his own free
will? No. He did that because iniquities within him were subdued. He says in verse 9, in the last
part of that, he said, I will behold his righteousness. You know why you behold his righteousness?
Because God the Holy Spirit has turned the light on. The light
of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
That's what he's talking about. Sin once kept us from seeing
the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, but now it cannot
keep me from seeing and resting in Christ as my Savior, my Lord. I may lose sight of it for a
while, but God's grace will not let me go. He will not let me
go. We now by the power of the spirit
look unto Christ. Sin once kept us in the bondage
of legalism, but now after being born again and enlightened by
the spirit, we've received the spirit of adoption and liberty.
We can now serve, we couldn't do this before because sin subdued
us, but now because iniquity's been subdued, we can now serve
God as free people, bond slaves. motivated by love and grace and
gratitude, which we couldn't do before. We have new motives
now that we didn't have before. It was all legalism before. We
have new desires that we hadn't had before. We desire to some
degree to obey God as we're motivated by grace. Sin once kept us under
the bondage of condemnation and guilt in our consciences. But
our consciences have now been cleansed by the blood of Christ,
haven't they? Sin once kept us bringing forth dead works and
evil fruit, but now after being born again by the Spirit and
enlightened by the truth of Christ and His glory, we bear fruit
unto God from the vine who is Christ. He's the vine, we're
the branches. And we can cultivate this fruit
by using the means of grace. We still sin in all that we do. We still have the flesh worn
against the spirit so that we cannot do what we desire to do
in being perfectly conformed to Christ in every way. But iniquity
has been subdued. Well, look at verse 26 of Micah
7 and I'll close. Listen to how he puts this. Thou
wilt perform the truth to Jacob. That's the covenant of grace.
Now, how are you gonna perform the truth to Jacob and the mercy
to Abraham? Well, this performance of the
truth has to do, first of all, with sending Christ into the
world to do what the Father sent him to do, according to the covenant.
That's the performance of the truth. Christ, who is the truth,
he said, I'm the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto
the Father but by me. So he performed the truth, he
completed it. He's the embodiment of truth.
But secondly, he performs the truth in the preaching of the
gospel, as Christ, who died for us, must be revealed to us and
in us. by the power of the Spirit. And
what he's talking about in the covenant here is gospel language,
because the gospel, the preaching of the gospel, which is the power
of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first
and to the Gentile also, for therein is the righteousness
of God revealed, because therein is Christ revealed. that preaching
of the gospel is the setting forth the communication of the
spirit of god through a man through a through a broken vessel through
a clay pot it's the testimony of the spirit of god of the terms
of the everlasting covenant of grace fulfilled in christ and
so that when we preach the gospel we're preaching an eternal message
of salvation from this God who is like no other and none other
like Him, this God of salvation. We're preaching His way of salvation
to the people of salvation. And He performs the truth to
them. That means He brings them to faith in Christ and repentance.
You see, God's not out here trying to reveal himself to everybody
if they'll just let him, or if they'll just let him in. No,
sir. It says here he's gonna perform the truth to Jacob. To
who? Sinners who need Christ. Sinners who need mercy. Sinners
who are in need of a righteousness they cannot produce. Sinners
who can't bring themselves out from the bondage of sin, not
even their own wills, but that which is performed by Christ. it shows us that the place to
obtain mercy and the only place is at the throne of mercy at
the feet of King Jesus the Son of God the one and only mercy
seat and if we preach the gospel alright we proclaim God's mercy
to sinners in Christ for he delights to show mercy never forget that
God delights to show mercy and he will to any sinner who comes
seeking mercy in Christ. All right.