Let's open again to the book
of Micah, chapter 6. The prophet Micah prophesied
in Israel at the same time as Isaiah and Hosea. And Micah's
name means poor and humble. And this poor, humble man spoke
of Christ in the Old Testament as clearly as any of the prophets.
The Lord enabled Micah to prophesy the city, the exact city where
Christ would be born. Remember after the Lord was born
and Herod wanted to kill him, where is this one born king of
the Jews? The scholars were able to tell
Herod, well, he's born in Bethlehem. They knew that because they read
the prophecy of Micah. Micah told them that. And just
like all the prophets, Micah's subject is Christ, specifically
his subject. is the abundant grace and mercy
of our God to his people in Christ Jesus. In the face of their rebellion
and their sin that is so bounding, his mercy to his people superabounds
even their sin. God's elect don't deserve any
mercy from God, but Micah tells us God's rich in mercy to his
people. The title of the message this
morning is How Can I Come to God? But before we can answer
that question, how can I come to God? We've got to understand
why there's a separation between God and men in the first place.
So look at verse one of Micah chapter six. Hear ye now what
the Lord saith. 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 hath a controversy with his people. And he'll plead
with Israel. Now look back at Isaiah chapter
50. This is the chapter we looked at Wednesday night. Why does
the Lord have a controversy with this people? Well, it's because
we've left God. God didn't leave us, did he?
We left God. Look here, Isaiah 50 verse one.
Thus saith the Lord, where's the bill of your mother's divorcement
whom I've put away? Or which of my creditors is it
to whom I've sold you? Behold, for your iniquities you
sold yourselves, and for your transgression is your mother
put away. God didn't give us a bill of
divorce, did he? No, in rebellion we left God. And God didn't sell his children
in a bondage to sin and to the law. God owes a debt to no one. There's no debt God can't pay.
So we're in bondage to sin. We're in bondage to the law because
we've sold our own selves. Isn't that right? That's what
this says. We're separated from God because of our sin. And it's
all our fault. Yes, Adam sinned and plunged
all men into death. But my sin is not Adam's fault,
my fault. I'm separated from God because
of my sin. Now God says to his people, I've
got a controversy with you. And the controversy is this.
God's been nothing but good to his people. He'd been nothing
but good, isn't that right? But by nature, his people still
refuse to come to him for mercy and forgiveness. And God's got
a controversy with them. That's what he says in verse
3 in our text of Micah 6. Oh, my people, what have I done
unto thee? And wherein have I wearied thee?
Testify against me. Say, if you can, what I've done
to you and how I've wearied you. Testify against me if you can.
What did I do to drive you from me? Now you left me, but what
did I do to cause it? Did I do anything to drive you
away from me? Did I do anything to make you so weary that you'd
leave me? Not at all. Nothing at all. The sad thing is, the requirements
of the law, weariest. Just absolutely weariest because
the law's demands are never ending. constantly wearies us by being
a burden to us, a burden that we can't bear. But we still won't
come to God that we might have life, that we might have rest.
And that just shows the deadness of our heart. We'd prefer the
work of the law to rest in Christ. And you can't say that about
anything except spiritually. Everybody wants to work so they
can retire and not work anymore. But what do we prefer spiritually?
We prefer the work of the law to rest in Christ. We prefer
the bondage of the law to the freedom of grace because our
nature is bound up and fallen in sin. And what makes it worse
is God's been nothing but good to us. Look at verse four. He
says, for I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. I redeemed
thee out of the house of serpents. I sent before thee Moses, Aaron,
and Miriam. Now Israel knew the story well,
like you do, how God in miraculous power, wonderful grace, delivered
his people, Israel, from bondage in Egypt. They couldn't have
gone free if God didn't do it. And Israel, oh, they were miserable
in Egypt. Oh, they were miserable. Their
cries came up to God. God said, the cries of my people
have come to me. I've heard them. Now I'm going
to deliver them. And he did, didn't he? with a
strong hand, a stretched out arm, Scripture says. He delivered
his people miraculously, wonderfully. I mean, you think how this impoverished
bunch of slaves left Egypt with the wealth and riches of Egypt
because God just made the Egyptians go give them all their gold and
all their silver and all their treasures and told them, get
out of here. And they left Egypt in wild riches. They get to the
Red Sea and they just seem to forget God's blessing. Oh, God
brought us here to kill us. God parted the Red Sea. They
walked through on dry ground. The Red Sea closed up on Pharaoh
and his army. They're free forever. Not two
minutes later, seems like, did they say God brought us in the
wilderness to kill us. They just completely forgot all about God's
blessings to them. Sound like anybody you know? Seems like God blesses us. And
two seconds later, we forget about it and wonder, why don't
God bless me more? God brought them out. God brought
them, despite their murmuring, complaining against Him, He brought
them to the banks of the promised land. The land that God, who
cannot lie, promised. to give to Abraham's seed. Abraham's
seed is looking at the promised land. And they refused to go
in because of unbelief. They refused to go in and have
and enter into God's rest. And God sent Moses and Aaron
to marry him. God sent him a prophet to tell
him about God. God sent him a priest to represent
them to God. And God sent him a singer. All
three of them, what did they do? They witnessed of Christ. They told them of God's power
to redeem. And the people still refuse to
believe. They still refuse to bow and
enter into God's rest, to come to God. And nothing's changed. I mean, I know they were the
Jews, but you and I got the same nature. We Gentiles have the
exact same nature. God sends us prophets to preach
to us. We, you know, we have the completed,
I mean, you talk about Israel's guilt. You and I are more guilty. We've got the completed word
of God. Everything God has to say to
a man, you're holding in your lap right now. How many people
don't believe? God sends us a preacher to open
up the word to us and preach God's word to us. And we refuse
to believe. We refuse to bow. We refuse to
surrender. We refuse to beg God for mercy. That's why I tell you so often,
if we go to hell, we got nobody to blame but ourselves. It's
our fault because we refuse to believe God. Then God says, despite
your sin and your rebellion, I protected you from your enemies.
When your enemies wanted to curse you, you know what I did? I made
them bless you. Verse five. O my people, remember
now what Balak king of Moab consulted, and what Balaam the son of Beor
answered him from Shittim unto Gilgal, that you may know the
righteousness of the Lord. Now you're familiar with this
story. Balak was the king of Moab. He wanted this man Balaam,
a prophet, to curse Israel. And he's gonna pay him a lot
of money to do it. Now Balaam's a false prophet.
He represents false prophets to this day. And Balaam told
Balak, he said, now God said I can't curse the people. But
I tell you what, I'm going to go with you anyway. I'm going
to go see if I can't give it a try because I want the money
that you got. I'll say anything for money.
And Balaam would have gone and cursed Israel if he hadn't been
controlled by God. And God shut his mouth and caused
him not to curse Israel, but to bless Israel. And you know
why God did it? You know the reason that God
did all that? is so that the people would know, he says here,
that you may know the righteousness of the Lord. That's why God did
that, that you might know the righteousness of the Lord. Yet
what did the people do? They still insisted on trying
to earn their own righteousness through the law rather than submit
themselves to the righteousness of Christ. And you and I are guilty of the
same thing. There are people here You've
heard the gospel many times. Many times you've heard the gospel.
And in your head, you know it. If somebody asked you the ABCs
of the gospel, you could tell them. Our children could tell
them. You know in your head, you know the gospel. Yet you refuse to come to Christ. You refuse to surrender to Christ. Even though you have an example
in scripture of others doing what you're doing, you still
refuse to come to Christ. You know why? You have the same
nature as our Jewish brethren. Look at Romans chapter 10. Let's
see if that's not so. Romans 10. Verse one. Brethren, my heart's desire and
prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved. For I bear
them record, they have a zeal of God, but not according to
knowledge. For they being ignorant of God's
righteousness. Now they know the ABCs, they
know the law, they know the scriptures, but what are they ignorant of?
God's righteousness. God's righteousness in Christ.
They're going about to establish their own righteousness and have
not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. Now
that's our problem. The hardest thing in this world
for a man to do is submit, to surrender. We'd rather die than
surrender. We won't submit unless God gives
us a new nature, unless God gives us a new heart. So, here's the
summary of what we've seen. There's a great separation between
God and men, and it's our fault in it. It's our fault because
of our sin. God has a controversy with his
people. What did I do to you? And we
see God's right, and we're wrong. We're under God's judgment, and
if God sends us to hell, that's exactly what we deserve. That's
exactly what he ought to do. I can't argue against it. Well, is there no hope? That's
so, but is there no hope? Is there any hope for a sinner?
Is there anything that I can plead before God and be accepted? Is there any way that I can come
before God and be heard and be accepted and receive mercy? Is there any way that I can come
before God and not get what I deserve? What we deserve is for God to
send us to hell. Is there any way I can receive
mercy and not get what I deserve. Yes, there is. Yes, there is. That's the good news of the gospel.
But friend, listen to me. We're going to come and plead
before God and be accepted. We cannot plead what we think
is valuable. We can't do it. We've got to
come before God the way he's commanded us to come, not the
way we think is right. If you're a sinner and you desire
to have mercy from God, I want you to quit listening to what
men say. I want you to open up this book
and get in it and read it and find out what God says and believe
that. That's what we've got to do.
Because if we follow the way that man has come up with, man
has devised many ways to come to God, many ways. But if we
follow the way a man is devised, we're going to perish. Look at
verse 6 here in our text, Micah 6. Wherewith, how 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? Now, how can I come? There's a word here that's important. How can I come before the high
God? The High God. When we come before
God, here's the first thing we better know. We're not coming
to an equal. No, we're not. We're coming to
the High God. The God who must be referenced.
The God who must be worshipped. It's only right. If you would
come before God, you speak highly of Him and lowly of yourself. He's the High God. He's to be
referenced. He's the Sovereign God. Whatever
He decides to do with me is right. It's His choice, not mine. I'm
coming not to an equal, but to the High God. And when we come,
this is just in the natural man to know, when we come to God,
there's got to be a sacrifice. Something's got to be done to
appease God's anger. Something must be done to pay
for our sin. Man inherently knows that. Now,
we don't know what the payment is. We don't know what the price
is, but we inherently know there's a problem here. Somebody's got
to pay it. Somebody's got to make this right.
So the natural man says, well, will God accept me if I bring
hundreds of calves for a burnt offering? You know, the law requires
one. What if I bring hundreds, hundreds
and hundreds and hundreds? Well, all those burnt sacrifices,
if I bring the best calf from my herd, if I bring my whole
herd, will God accept me if I sacrifice those? Now, to a man, man says,
that's a good idea. Man thinks that because we look
at the Old Testament sacrifices, the sacrifices that the law required,
and we think, oh, well, that's how God's appeased. That's how
sin's paid for. But that's not so. God gave all
those sacrifices in the Old Testament to give us a picture of Christ,
whose one sacrifice put sin away. God doesn't need hundreds and
hundreds of sacrifices. He's looking to one, one sacrifice,
the sacrifice of his son. Look at Hebrews chapter 10. I'll
show you that. He's just looking for one. Rivers and rivers and
rivers of animal blood were shed. That didn't put away sin. It
all pictured the one sacrifice. Hebrews 10, verse one. For the law, having a shadow
of good things to come. See, it's just a picture. It's
just a shadow of Christ, the good thing to come. And not the
very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices,
which they offered year by year continually, make the comers
there unto perfect. For then would they not have
ceased to be offered? If the sacrifice made them perfect and
put away sin, they would quit offering them, right? Because
if the worshippers once purged, should have had no more conscience
of sin. But in those sacrifices, there's a remembrance again made
of sins every year. For it's not possible that the
blood of goats, bulls and of goats should take away sin. Those
animal sacrifices could never take away sin. They offered a
morning, noon and night. They offered the Passover lamb
every year. They had the day of the sacrifices
on the day of atonement every year. because those sacrifices
were just pictures. They could never take away sin.
Read on verse five. Wherefore, when he cometh into
the world, he sayeth, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldst not,
but a body hast thou prepared me. In burnt offerings and sacrifices
for sin thou hast had no pleasure. There was no satisfaction in
those burnt offerings and animal sacrifices. Then said I, then
said the Lord Jesus Christ, lo, I come, In the volume of the
book, it's written of me, to do thy will, O God. Above, when
he said sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offering
for sin, thou wouldst not, neither has pleasure therein which are
offered by the law. Then said he, lo, I come to do
thy will, O God. He taketh away the first, that
he may establish the second, by the which will were sanctified
through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once. It just took His one sacrifice. And every priest, daily ministering
and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can never take
away sins. But this man, the God-man, after
he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on
the right hand of God. He sat down because the work
was finished. There was no more work to do
by that one sacrifice. Sin was put away. So it's not
gonna do us any good to offer hundreds and hundreds of sacrifices,
is it? Because God's looking for one sacrifice. The sacrifice
of his son that will put away sin. We must come to God by him. Not by anything we sacrifice,
but by the sacrifice God provided. Well, next, look back in our
text here. Verse six, he says, Or verse
7, he said, or shall I come with ten thousands of rivers of oil? You know, the natural man says,
okay, well, I can't bring all my cattle. How about I bring
rivers of oil? Now I'll tell you where they
came up with this rivers of oil idea. Oil was required. God required some oil to be offered
as part of the meat offering, as a thank offering. Well, man
thinks if some's good, more is better, right? You know how they
measured wealth in that day? Not like we do today with oil. Oil. So wanting to offer ten
thousands of rivers of oil, you know what that's wanting to do?
It's wanting to buy your way into heaven. And that thought's
still popular in our day. If I just give enough, if I just
tithe enough, if I'm faithful to tithe, God's going to bless
me. Men think that because false prophets tell you that because
they want your money. Your sin is not going to be paid
for that way. A false prophet might buy a mansion
that way, but now your sin is not going to be paid for that
way. The price of redemption is so high, money can't pay it. Look at 1 Peter chapter 1. Sin
is so heinous. Sin is so vile. Sin is such treason
against God. Mere money can never pay the
debt. It's going to take something more precious than money. 1 Peter
1, verse 18. For as much as you know, you're
not redeemed with corruptible things as silver and gold from
your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers.
But how are you redeemed? With the precious blood of Christ,
as of a lamb without blemish and without spot, who verily
was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest
in these last times for you who by him do believe God. that raised
Him up from the dead and gave Him glory, that your faith and
hope might be in God. Your faith and hope might be
not in what you give, not rivers of oil, but in what God gave,
how He gave His Son to put away the sin of His people. And if
you think about it, we ought to give, but why would you give
to put away your sin? Why are you going to give money
to God for who already owns anything anyway? The only way God can
be pleased is with the blood of His Son. Only Christ, with
the blood of God, can pay the purchase price for the redemption
of His people. Christ is the only one with anything
to pay. So He's the only one who can
pay. Then come to God, pleading the blood of Christ. Now when
I tell you, come to God, pleading the blood of Christ, this is
what I mean. Don't just say the words, oh, I'm pleading the blood
of Christ. If I plead the blood of Christ, you know what that
means? It means I admit that I'm a sinner who's so vile, money
can't pay the debt. I'm a sinner that's so vile,
the only way my sin can be put away is through the blood of
God's Son. My sin debt is so large, the
only way it can be paid is with the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now God's pleased with the blood of his son. Then come to him
in that blood. God will accept any sinner that
comes to him in the blood of Christ. Well, next, the natural
man, he still won't submit. Look what he says next. He said,
if God won't accept my money, I need to find something more
precious than money. How about if I sacrifice my children? Verse seven, he says, shall I
give my firstborn for my transgression? The fruit of my body for the
sin of my soul? Now, in our day today, people
actually killing their children and offering them as a, you know,
kill them, slay them as a, to an idol is not all that popular
in our day. I don't know that that goes on
anywhere. But it sure went on in Micah's day. It went on for
thousands of years. People, I read about this idol
that they formed him out of metal and they got him with his hands
out here and they'd heat him up. and they lay an infant in
the hands of that idol and kill that baby. And they do it to
many babies at a time. They called it the Valley of
Drums. They beat drums while they're putting those so that
people wouldn't hear those babies crying. Just last month, we were
in Mexico, stood on a cliff where untold thousands of virgins were
cast off the cliff down into the water to kill them. The water
there around the Yucatan is all underground as it goes through
these aquifers and you don't see stagnant water there because
it's just all these underground aquifers, the water doesn't get
stagnant. There's this, they call it a cenote, it's like a
big sinkhole and there's water down there. It was stagnant. You know what Cody Gruber told
us in White Water Stagnant? They cast so many virgins down
in that thing that it's clogged it up. Killing their children to try
to please God. Killing their children hoping
God would send rain. How vile. How vile is that? That just shows you what man
thinks of the character of God. God's going to be pleased if
I kill my baby? I was going to be pleased if I killed all my
children? What a sick, twisted view of the character of God.
But man's twisted, so they think that. And we think, well, I know
there's got to be death for sin. I see that. There's got to be
blood to appease God. But we're so twisted, even though
it's plainly told us in God's Word we look to the wrong blood.
We think if I just give my blood as a martyr, give the blood of
my children, The most precious blood a man knows of is the blood
of his children. What parent in here wouldn't
do anything for your child? Wouldn't do anything to save
the life of your child? I would gladly give my life that
one of my daughters could live. Gladly. Wouldn't even bat an
eye about it. Because the most precious life
a man knows of is the life of his children. And we esteem that
life so highly, we think, well, surely God will accept the most
precious thing I have. Surely He will. No, sir, He won't. No, He will not. If we could
give our firstborn to God to try to pay for our sin, all we're
doing is giving the fruit of our body. And what's the fruit
of our body? Sin. What do we pass on to our
children? Not just our genetic features
and our DNA, we pass on to them our nature, a sin nature. God's not going to be pleased
with sin. God will only be pleased with the death of one son. His
son, his son, not ours, his son. God's not going to be pleased
with the fruit of our body. He's going to be pleased with
the fruit of his son. Righteousness, holiness, peace, justification. But man thinks surely God will
be pleased if I give Him what I value the most. And man's problem
today is the same as Cain's was 6,000 years ago. We think Cain
thought God will accept the best I have. No, He won't. God's not
going to be pleased with the best you and I can produce. God's
pleased with the best He can produce. Brethren, He produced
Him. The Lord Jesus Christ, the perfect
Lamb, perfect substitute, the perfect savior. God spoke from
heaven, said, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. Now come to God in that one with
whom God's pleased. And he'll be pleased with you
in him. He'll accept you in him. That's
what he says in verse eight. He has showed thee, O man, what
is good. He showed you. What does the Lord require of
thee? But to do justly, To love mercy and to walk humbly with
thy God. Now this doesn't mean that God
requires you. You do good, you deal honestly
and right with people, you love people, at least act like you
love them, show them some kindness every once in a while, you know.
Put on some humility and if you do that, God will accept you.
Now that's not what this is saying. Now we ought to do good. You
ought to be known as a person that deals honestly and kindly
with people when you do business. You ought to be known for that
in the community. We ought to love God. Why wouldn't we? We ought to love one another.
We're commanded to do that. We ought to walk humbly. What
have we got to be proud of? We ought to walk humbly. But
we don't do those things. This scripture is not giving
us something to do to earn salvation or to earn acceptance from God.
You know what this verse is telling us? It's telling us what every
verse of scripture tells us. You come to God in Christ. You
come to Christ for salvation. You find your salvation in Christ. God showed you what's good. What's
good? God. He showed you what's good. God personified the Lord Jesus
Christ. He showed you what's good. Now
look to Him. Come to Him. And that's what
these three things here tell us. Since God showed you what's
good, there's three things God requires of you, and they're
all fulfilled in Christ. First, God showed you what's
good, so you do justly. Now to do justly, I look that
word up. It means to render an accurate verdict. To render an
accurate verdict is to agree with what God says in his word,
to read it and say, that's right, that's so. And the only accurate
verdict that there is, is that I'm a sinner and I deserve eternal
death in hell. That's an accurate verdict. That's
what I deserve. Rendering an accurate verdict
is taking sides with God against yourselves and saying God's just
and holy. and God will still be just and
holy if he sends me to hell. And saying, rendering an accurate
verdict is saying that God's just when he speaks to me. To
do justly, to render an accurate verdict, is to say that I am
guilty. I'm guilty before God. And the
only hope of salvation I have is the Lord Jesus Christ. Now
you read God's word and see if that's not an accurate verdict
of what God says in his word. I'm guilty and my only hope of
salvation is the Lord Jesus Christ. That's to do justly. Lord Jesus
became a man born under the law and he did justly under the law. He did what you and I can't do.
He kept the law perfectly. He's the only just man to ever
live. And the only way I can do justly,
the only way I can be justified and keep God's law perfectly,
and I mean actually do justly, is to be found in the Lord Jesus
Christ. If I'm in Christ, He's my representative,
everything He did, I did in Him. That's the only way I can ever
do justly, is by being in Christ, my representative. So an accurate
verdict is this. My only hope of salvation is
that the Lord Jesus Christ gave me his righteousness. He gave
it to me freely and that he was made sin for me. He traded me
his righteousness for my sin. And when he was made sin for
me, the father gave my substitute absolute justice for my sin. He paid for it with his blood.
Is that your hope? If that's your only hope of salvation,
you've done justly. Secondly, he says, this is what
God's required, to love mercy. Who loves mercy? The only person
who truly loves mercy is a guilty sinner. So to love mercy is to
admit, I'm guilty, I'm guilty. Mercy is not getting what you
do deserve. Well, I know I deserve damnation
for my sin. And I don't want what I deserve.
I don't want it. So mercy is my only hope of salvation. Look here in Genesis chapter
19. This is the kind of mercy that I need. This is the first
time the word mercy is mentioned in Scripture. Brother Henry taught
us so often about the law of first mention. Whatever something
means the first time it's mentioned in Scripture, is what it means
all the way through. Well, here's the first time mercy
is mentioned in scripture. And this is the mercy I need.
Genesis 19 verse 15. This is when the angels had come
to Lot. God was getting ready to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah.
Verse 15, And when the morning arose, then the angels hastened
lot, saying, Arise, take thy wife and thy two daughters which
are here, lest thou be consumed in the iniquity of the city.
Now you'd think he'd heard that and run, just run for the hills,
wouldn't you? And while he lingered, he lingered, the man laid hold
upon his hand, and upon the hand of his wife, and upon the hand
of his two daughters, The Lord being merciful unto them and
brought him forth and set him without the city. That's the
mercy I need. I love mercy. How I love mercy
that lays hold on me in my rebellion and sets me outside the city.
Brings me to safety. That doesn't leave it up to me,
but lays hold on me and sets me in safety. I love mercy. And every believer does love
mercy. I love sovereign mercy. I love that God will have mercy
on whom he will have mercy. I love it. That's my only hope
of mercy. I love the God who delights in
mercy. We looked at that in our class
this morning. God delights in mercy. That's
the Savior I need. That's the mercy that I need.
That's the God I need who delights in mercy. To delight in mercy,
that's to love mercy. It's to be found in Christ. Thirdly,
this is what God requires. To walk humbly with thy God.
This is to walk with God like Enoch walked with God, by faith.
This is to walk humbly is to humiliate yourself before the
Lord. to bow with your face in the
dust and always beg for mercy. To walk humbly is to have the
right estimate of ourselves that we're nothing and Christ is all. If God ever teaches you you're
nothing and Christ is all, you'll walk humbly before him. To walk
humbly is to walk as a sinner before God, a sinner who needs
mercy. To walk humbly is to confess
My only claim to heaven is God's sovereign mercy. He chose me. He did everything for me I required.
He gave me life. He gave me a new nature. I don't
have any claim. My claim to heaven's got nothing
to do with what I've done. I hope I've served Him faithfully,
but that's not my hope. My hope is Christ, what He's
done for me. I can't do anything for myself. That's to walk humbly and to
know it's Christ who saved me. He washed me in His blood. He
gave me His righteousness. He gave me His life. A humble
person says all my hope is Christ. It's all in Him. A humble person
will assume I'm the worst sinner in the room. So I'm not going
to judge you for your sin because I just assume that you're better
than me. I've got a glimpse. But what's
inside my heart? It's ugly. I just assume you're
better than me. That's a humble person. Look
at Philippians chapter two. We'll read this in closing. This
is if you want to see walking humbly. It's like all the gospel
look to Christ. Philippians two verse one. If there be, therefore, any consolation
in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the
Spirit, if any vows and mercies, fulfill ye my joy that ye be
like-minded, having this same love being of one accord, of
one mind. Let nothing be done through strife
or vainglory, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other
better than themselves. Look not every man on his own
things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this
mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in
the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God.
It wasn't robbery. It wasn't wrong for him to say
he's equal with God. He is God. Of course he's equal
with God. But he made himself of no reputation. It took upon him the form of
a servant and was made in the likeness of men. And being found
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself. and became obedient
unto death, even the death of the cross." Now that's walking
humbly. That's walking humbly. And walking
humbly saying this, this is my hope. Verse 9, wherefore God
also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is
above every name, that the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the
earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ
is Lord to the glory. God the Father. That's it. And to do justly, to love mercy,
to walk humbly with thy God is to look to the Lord Jesus Christ,
to depend upon him. Let's bow in prayer. Our Father, how we thank you
for your mercy. How we thank you for your abundant,
rich, sovereign mercy to your people. in our Lord Jesus Christ. How we thank you for the sure
mercies of David. Mercies that were promised to
your people in Christ the son of David before the world began.
Oh, how we thank you for your mercy. How can we render unto
thee the glory and the thanks that's due unto your name. Father,
we thank you. And as you promised to be merciful
to your people, Father, we pray you'd still be merciful. Be merciful
to your people. Be merciful and apply your word
to the hearts of your people that we be comforted and have
assurance in our Lord Jesus Christ. Father, we beg of thee, you'd
be merciful to keep calling out your people through the preaching
of your word. Call out your sheep, Father, we pray. Reveal yourself
to them through the preaching of your word. In all this we
ask and we give thanks in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Father, do this, we pray, not for our glory, but for His glory,
that He get all the glory, all the praise, all the recognition,
for He is the Savior, it all belongs to Him.