2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah

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2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah [PRAYER] We want to worship You. We want to respond to You. Our hearts are so distracted, our minds are distracted, but we want to put our attention on You right now. So Lord God, I pray that You would just minister in ways that we need touched this morning. Lord, You know where we're hurting. You know where we're wandering. You know the joys in our lives. You know the things that need to change. So, Lord, I pray that You would use Your Book to just touch us where we need to be touched today. For those who are hurting in this room today, for those who are sick today, we would ask for healing, for comfort, for strength. Do your work in our midst today, we ask in Jesus' Name. Amen. Hey, while you're sitting down [the worship team], thank you. You guys are awesome. I loved having you up here today. [applause] Well, good morning! [Congregation: "Good morning."] Let me see some smiles. Can you get happy, Church? Yeah! All right, good. Love it. Good to be with you this morning. I hope that you grabbed one of these programs on the way in. Next week we're going to have a big celebration for those of you going back to school's a good thing. I'm not sure if I like that thing. Next week is our big going back to school week because the day after, a week from tomorrow, life goes into the old groove again and so we just hit the ground running on next Sunday and so everything starts to just click into full gear here at Calvary next week. And, in fact, there's going to be fun, cool stuff going on in each of the ministries next week so you've got to be here for it. You've got to have your kids here; I hear they have some cool stuff going on in there, the youth have some different things going on, so a lot of stuff going on. We'll be praying for the teachers next week and just launching into the school year and all that God has going on in here at Calvary next week. Service times change next week. They will change to 9:30 and 11 a.m. Here's the good thing: Those of you who are always late, whatever time you normally come, just come and you might still be late but not as late. Some people say, "Why do you only do a 15-minute service?" That's because you came 45 minutes late! So that's starting next week. We love having you with us. Thanks so much for being here. As many of you know we're in the book of Micah. We're going through every book of the Bible this year and so we've made it through our Old Testament to the book of Micah. Some of you have been really pleased this summer the books have been a lot shorter and I hope that you're reading them. I hope that you're picking up the verse cards out in the Café; they're available for you. Just keep on memorizing them or if you can't memorize just meditating on them and reading them through sitting in the doctor's office waiting for an appointment, just thumb through them and read them and allow God's Word to just move through your hearts. Here's what we're sure of here at Calvary: That this Book changes lives. That's why we come here every week and talk about it. We claim to be a people of The Book so as you let that Book just continue to roll through your hearts and minds it's going to change you. It's going to impact you. God has a way of just having that right verse ready for you at the right time. So today we're going to be in the book of Micah. It's a prophetic book. Micah is a prophet of God and these books begin with a statement that says hey, God came to this guy, came to Micah, and He says I want you to go prophesy to my people and I want you to tell them something. And normally it starts out as a message of judgment. The great thing about these messages of judgment each time God says it is –1–

2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah because what He's doing as a loving God is trying to pull His people back from the brink of the direction that they're heading that's going to just destroy them and bring them back to Himself. And so He's trying to get their attention and He does that through Micah. The simple background of this little book and what's going on here can be found in 2 Chronicles chapter 28. I'm not going to tell you to turn there right now, but if you're taking notes you might want to write that down. If you're a researcher you may want to go back and look at that. Basically what's taken place in 2 Chronicles chapter 28, it is God's people attacking each other. Many of these other prophets, these people from other countries coming into God's people and attacking them, now it's God's people attacking each other. In fact, in 2 Chronicles 28 it talks about on one day 120,000 men from the Southern Kingdom are killed as they attack each other and turn on each other. And God says to His people I don't want you attacking each other. I don't want you coming up against each other. And so what we'll find as we study these things is that God uses His people Israel as a lesson, as a story of something that actually happened and how God dealt with them so as to be able to teach us so that we can apply it to our lives. As you begin to read through this book and you get to chapter 3 what you find is that there are certain situations going on where you find certain people in society have gone totally wicked and astray. And these certain people in society have failed you. In fact, what we're going to find as we read through this book, and I'll just show you these real quickly here in a minute, is that it appears by the time you're done reading through this book that everyone has failed you. It's just like you look at this group of people, you look at this person and you look at this person and you look at this person—they've failed you. And you step back and you go—here's the question, we ask it all the time: "Who can you trust these days?" It just seems like when you just think there's someone you can trust they fail you. Can you relate with that comment? And so he starts in chapter 3 and I'm just going to fly by these. Chapter 3, verse 1, it says: 1

. . . [the] rulers of the house of Israel! Is it not for you to know justice?—

What he says is these rulers of Israel, the political class, has failed the people. In fact, in verse 11 of chapter 3, he describes it a little bit more where it says: 11

"Its heads"

— heads of state and all — "give judgment for a bribe." So in other words, they were being bribed to do what they do. They're paying money under the table to get this done and God through Micah says we can't even trust our leaders. And if you come up to our time nothing's changed. You can go home and turn on the TV to any news network and you're going to find that the same thing's the case today. We don't need to go into that much more. If you just glance down to chapter 3, verse 5: 5

Thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who lead my people astray,

— and again in verse 11 of the same chapter he gives a little more description of this— 11

its priests teach for a price; its prophets practice divination for money; yet they lean on the Lord and say, “Is not the Lord in the midst of us? — MICAH 3: 1, 11, 5, 11

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2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah And so they're calling out God's name and yet it's all about money and it's all about what they can get and so they, too, are not trustworthy. The New Testament talks a lot about false prophets and false teachers, those who would claim to be speaking on behalf of God and yet not be so, but you and I know that even beyond those who are false prophets and false teachers, every human being that speaks on behalf of God is a sinner and they let you down. And even in this room you have examples of people who have been in that place of spiritual leadership in your life who you trusted who let you down. And God, He's speaking up against them. No one is going to be left out of this list, really, by the time it's done. If you want to see the list continue on, look at chapter 7, just over a page or two to chapter 7. Chapter 7, verse 5, it says: 5

Put no trust in a neighbor;

Remember, they're coming up against each other in civil war. They get this. They understand this. They are at risk even to the person that lives next door. The next phrase says: have no confidence in a friend; — MICAH 7:5

Why, the one I ought to be able to trust is my friend. I had this great moment this week. I was in Portland, Oregon, teaching at Western Seminary and the first night that I got there, or the next morning I got there, I was supposed to meet with one of the other teachers in the lobby of the hotel for breakfast and so I went and grabbed my breakfast, you know, the hotel breakfast program. I grabbed my breakfast and sat down at the table and I saw this other teacher come in and he was coming in to grab breakfast and sit down with me. So he came in and he laid his stuff down on a table, but not my table. There was another guy that was sitting at the table. I thought, "That's odd." He was just like in a rush, he just laid it down on that table and as he walks by the guy at that table he pats him on the shoulder and he says, "I'll be right back, buddy." And I'm looking over going, "You've got the wrong guy." And the guy sort of, you can just picture him just sort of looking like that was weird. I was sitting there just sort of going, "This is going to be fun. This is going to be fun to see what happens." But I could have never guessed what was going to happen next. So this other teacher he grabs his food and he comes over and sets it down and I could tell he wasn't paying attention to anything. He was just focused, so he sits down at the food in front of him and he sits down and he puts his hands out in front of him, bows his head and he starts to pray, "Dear God, thank you that we can come here and have breakfast this morning. Thank you for my brother in front of me. Thank you that he has come this far to be in this place for this moment. Lord God, I pray that you'll bless all of the works of his hands today." I'm sitting over at the other table and he's praying for this guy and I'm watching it. At this point, I love a good laugh but there's nothing better than a good laugh when all of a sudden the tears start flowing because I had to suppress it. And when you suppress a laugh it has to come out the eyeballs, so now I'm crying. I mean, the tears are flowing down and I'm watching this guy. This is the best part. This guy that's sitting at the table, he's sort of going putting his head down, lifting it up. He doesn't know if he should pray; he doesn't know if this is some angel that has come and sat in front of him. At one point I sensed he was sort of squirming like maybe I ought to just get up and disappear. And finally he says, "Amen." And he doesn't even look up still. He starts just shoveling food into his mouth and I'm losing it and the guy is looking at him like, "This is weird!" And finally this teacher friend of mine looks up. So he's sitting in front of a gray-haired guy in a blue shirt he assumes is Lee Wiggins and he looks up and he goes—and I'm watching—he goes, "Lee?" [laughter] He told me –3–

2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah afterwards, "I was so confused." He goes, "I'm looking at a guy in the face that I'm sure is you but it doesn't look like you." He said, "I'm wondering if I had a stroke. I don't recognize this guy." And then he says—and this, I just lost it—he goes, "Is it you, Lee?" And just then he looks both ways and he sees me and he goes, "Oh, no! Oh, no." That night we walked back into the hotel after we were teaching all day and there we are face to face with this guy again at the elevator. It's like he wanted to slink away and go away, and we're like, "Hi." [extends hand to shake hands] "I'm Lee." And he goes, "I'm Chuck." [laughter] My friend says, he goes, "What did you think when I did that to you this morning?" He says, "I don't know. I just thought you were a friendly guy, but I was a little freaked out." When he said friendly guy it hit me, what kind of friend am I? I should have right away gone, "Hey, Tom! Over here." So even his friend blows him off for a good laugh, you know? You can't even trust our friends. It goes on to chapter 7, verse 5, it says: guard the doors of your mouth from her who lies in your arms; Oh, my! You've got to even be careful what you say to your spouse? How painful is that that they were in that kind of a spot, and yet some of you could tell us stories right now and go, "Oh, yeah." Then it says this: or the son treats the father with contempt, the daughter rises up against her mother, the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and then it says this: a man's enemies are the men of his own house. — MICAH 7:5

You know, part of me wants to say is that true? I think it's a goofy question because probably one of the things that occupies much of your mind energy is a person who should be your friend, who should be trusted, who you should know has your best interests in heart, but they've proven themselves untrustworthy. They have failed you. They have let you down. And unfortunately, and I think I speak for all of us when I say this, that person that's let you down that you would have never expected to do so just occupies a ton of your mind. It's really draining you, exhausting you, and it won't stop. So what's God's answer to that? I mean, God's saying to Micah I'm coming in judgment because this isn't how it's supposed to be. But then he gives some directions. Chapter 7, verse 7 is a verse I think we just need to grab onto today, and if there's something I wish you would just take with you today it's found in this verse: 7

But as for me, I will look to the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me. — MICAH 7:7

It says this, hey listen, here's what describes our life right now. Our attention is on a person that has let us down. We think about it constantly. We can't get over it. And what he wants to do here is redirect our attention to the Lord. This word look, he says, "I will look to the Lord"—that's awfully tough when you have a real person sitting in front of you or near you or should be sitting in front of you that you just can't take your eyes off of. That word look there is the Hebrew word shaqaph and it means to basically reach up and peer out and strain your eyes to see something that is out there. It's as if in the midst of this time when this person or persons have become so big and frustrating that he says I want you to stretch –4–

2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah over them, I want you to put on your glasses, I want you to take your binoculars and I want you to look out there for the Lord because He is your only hope. A lot of the reason a lot of us are struggling with our spiritual things in our lives right now is because we're so focused in on a person, and he wants to redirect our focus from that person to God Himself. And I believe when he uses this word to stretch, to peer out there as a watchman at the top of a tower looking out would be sort of the word picture that is being drawn here. He's making it clear. That's tough for most of us; it's not the easiest thing to do. When he says here, "I will wait for the God of my salvation," I don't know about you but when you're waiting the clock just seems to go really, really slow. I got my last leg of the air flight back from teaching this week coming out of Dallas and I was in one of those rows with three other men at least as big as me and the seat in front of me was right here [see FIGURE 1] and it was hot on the plane. We're flying for quite a while and I look at my watch and I thought it said 6:20 and I just waited and waited and waited and finally I looked at it again and I thought it said 6:30. Oh, my. Ten minutes went really, really slow. What I learned later on is I broke my watch in the airport and it had stopped, so I'd gotten the wrong time. But I was like wow, I could swear it was an hour since the last time I looked at it and it was like ten minutes. Time goes slow when you're waiting! And for some of us we're waiting for God to reveal Himself. Yeah, we're peering out looking for God. We're looking for that hope. We're looking for that salvation, which he's going to talk [about] next and time is just dragging along. He says: 7b

FIGURE 1.

"I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me." — MICAH 7:7b

Here's the key: Somehow I've got to find a way to take my eyes off of all those people that are disappointing me, discouraging me, hurting me, letting me down, and put my attention on God. Here's why that is so incredibly difficult: We have this built-in sense of personal righteousness and we have been harmed, that's why we can look around and say, "Is there anyone who is any good these days?" Is there anyone that doesn't let us down? Because what that does is make this big statement about ourselves: I've got it dialed in. I don't hurt people. I don't do things wrong. I'm sort of like the model person—and everyone else messes it up every time! So I stand alone as the one righteous man of God in the world. And we build ourselves up to a place that we actually become God, and he's saying here hey listen, it's exhausting you. You're at the end of your rope with that. It's not working. You know it's not true. You're not God. You may try to be putting yourself there, but it's not working. I want you to look, I want you to look beyond here, I want you to peer out there and I want you to watch for God and put your eyes on Him. That's going to be an incredibly difficult thing for us, but he redirects us to that. In a place where people are fighting against each other in civil war and the war is raging hot, God will through the prophet Micah try to redirect our attention to the very last thing in that verse: Our salvation. As he directs our attention towards our salvation, he focuses ahead—this is 600 years before the birth of Jesus and if you'll turn to chapter 5 of Micah, just one page back, and verse 2, you'll see a verse that oftentimes we only mention at Christmastime. It's a verse written 600 years before the birth of Christ that predicts the very place of the birth of Jesus. It says this:

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2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah 2

But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah,

There were two Ephrathahs at the time. There was Bethlehem up near Galilee, there's a little place called that up in the northern part of Israel; and here in the southern part of Israel near Jerusalem was this Bethlehem of Ephrathath, and it was a tiny, little dot dot on the map. I mean, for us it probably would have been nothing more than a rest stop along the turnpike. Of all the places that 600 years before you could say where can we be pretty sure that there was going to be someone born that we could put our finger on and He places his finger on this place, a place that no one could have suspected; it was barely a pull-off on the road. And He says: 2

from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days. Here he pictures Jesus. He's predicting and prophesying that Jesus the Savior will come for their salvation. Okay, so this One that we're to keep our eyes on that will bring our salvation, he's predicting He will come. He'll come to this tiny place. He mentions this—He is from ancient of old, He is eternal, He has existed for eternity past, and he goes on to say in verse 4 of chapter 5: 4

And he shall stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. John chapter 10 describes Jesus as the good shepherd. It's He who we call upon to just help us through the day; to shepherd us through life. And then in [Micah] chapter 5, verse 5, it says this: 5

And he shall be their peace. — MICAH 5:2, 4, 5

Now for a group of people who are fighting against each other, for a group of people who struggled because there are those in our lives that aren't living up to what we had expected out of them, as we are a people peering out looking for our God, our hope, our salvation, the prophet points us forward always to our salvation in Jesus. And he says here He will be our peace. Is that not what we're, as a group of people, looking for? I mean, is it not that we're in a place of turmoil just being ripped apart, torn apart inside? Is it not that we wish that could be resolved so that we could have that peace inside? And we know that it's not just a matter of wars stopping and everything getting all better. We've lived long enough now to see that when one war stops another one starts. We've lived long enough to realize that in this world things aren't going to just all be perfect. The New Living Translation (NLT) really, I think, grabs the meaning of this word peace in this very verse and it says: 5

And he will be the source of peace. — MICAH 5:5 (NLT)

That Jesus Himself, when He moves into our lives, He is what brings us peace—not these outward things all being okay. Not the fact that everything around us is just dialed in and everyone likes us and we're happy with everyone, but that we reach inside and we can find that peace in Jesus. There's a verse at the very end of this book that when we start talking about Jesus, and it's just amazing when you look at a book that was written so many years before Christ that God is so clear at just pointing and being so straight up with us about our salvation being found in Jesus. In chapter 7, verse 18, it says this:

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2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah 18

Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance?

In a book that speaks of God's judgment, of a people that are coming up against each other, it says in these next words: 18b

He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in steadfast love.

This is what God is offering to you. It says: 19

He will again have compassion on us; he will tread our iniquities underfoot. You will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea. — MICAH 7:18-19

I read this week that the deepest part of the ocean is something like 35,500 or so feet deep1—that God says I don't want there to be a separation between us. I don't want your sins to come between us and that's why He says hey, here's what we're going to have to do. We're going to have to have something else that's going to change that. And he says that's going to be the steadfast love of God; the one who we're peering out for and he says hey, and I'm going to show you that hope: It's Jesus. In the New Testament of our Bible when we get to the book of John, John chapter 16, verse 33, may be a verse that helps us all today. You see I think the gospel has a couple prongs to it. The first prong of the gospel is very clear is Jesus wants to save you from your sins so that those sins can be washed away so you can have peace, so you can be made right with God, so that that wall between you and God can be taken away and the only way that can be taken away is through Jesus Christ and His taking your place in death. But there's a second prong that I see. The Good News of the gospel goes so far as to say hey, when you're in trouble, when you're in difficult times, the gospel is not just merely a once and done thing to save you, it is something every day that helps give you this peace that you can only find in Jesus Christ. In chapter 16 of John, verse 33, it says this: 33

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace.

Do you remember that verse from Micah? He is the source of our peace, now He Himself says "in me" you will have peace. Listen to these next words: In the world you will have tribulation. Get over it, hard times are going to continue in this world, but Jesus says in me you'll have peace. So you can have peace with the Father by putting your trust in Jesus today, but the gospel message just doesn't stop there where all of a sudden you now have eternal peace and you're going to Heaven. The gospel message is something that now we all have to receive today. We're saying I want that peace, that peace from Jesus; that even though there's tribulation in here, Jesus is the source of my peace and I'm going to grab onto that this morning. He says: But take heart; I have overcome the world.” — JOHN 16:33

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Retrieved from http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/oceandepth.html—The average depth of the ocean is about 14,000 feet. The deepest part of the ocean is called the Challenger Deep and is located beneath the western Pacific Ocean in the southern end of the Mariana Trench, which runs several hundred kilometers southwest of the U.S. territorial island of Guam. Challenger Deep is approximately 36,200 feet deep. It is named after the HMS Challenger, whose crew first sounded the depths of the trench in 1875.

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2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah Hey, I want you to leave this place this morning, I want you to leave here forgetting the cultural narrative that says I can't trust anyone, everyone's bad, I want you to just think I don't need to spend my life agitating over that. I want to leave here saying yeah, in this world there will be tribulation but in Jesus there's peace. He has overcome the world. I'd like to invite you today to grab a hold of that peace and make it yours. Say yes, Jesus, I want that. I want Him to be the source of your peace. I want you to peer out looking for Him to be your peace, so I'm going to invite you to take these next few moments to respond to that. In a moment I'm going to give you the opportunity to give your gifts and offerings back to the Lord, and I asked Pastor Mike and his prayer team to be back in the Prayer Chapel this morning. While we sing this last song, I would love to give you the opportunity to just slip back there. Just two thoughts, if you've never put your faith and trust in Jesus, don't wait, don't miss that opportunity to have the peace of God as the source of your life because you're wound up, you're looking for that. They'll walk you through that, how to have that. And if you have that peace of God, you've put that trust in Jesus but it's not working for you today, you're still wound up, the gospel is there for you today and Pastor Mike and his team would love to just pray over you today just for that peace, so I'd love for you to just go back there. I don't know what you're going through right now—it's normal. You are all going to have moments like that and I think the thing that we need when we come here to Calvary is just know that you come here with this huge burden but there are people here to pray over you, care for you, love you and carry you through it, so I would just love for you to go through the back doors there and there and just go right into the prayer lobby. If there's a line, just wait, they will pray over every one of you and take all the time necessary to meet with you and pray. I'm going to pray for you right now, I'm going to pray for our offering and then I'm going to ask us to stand while we give that, so if you would right now why don't you stand up. As I pray, if you want to be prayed over back there in the Prayer Chapel just slide back there right now, just head on back there. Don't wait for anything else and then as you're prepared to give we'll pass the buckets [inaudible]. [PRAYER] Lord God, Thank you for Jesus. Thank you that in this world that's messed up and so many frustrating things happening that You are our peace; You're the source of it. So Lord God I pray for that person that's never put their trust in You. I pray that you won't hold back. I pray that right now in this room they'll cry out to You. That's all the Bible says to do is just say a prayer that goes Jesus, come into my life. I need your peace. I want forgiveness for my sins. I want my sins cast as deep as the ocean and gone forever. I want to have peace with God through Jesus. Lord God, for that person in here today that's made that decision and their sins are forgiven and they know they have eternal life, but it's still churning inside of them, Lord, I pray they'll just grab on to You and Jesus today and find that peace that only You can give, Lord, to help them; wrap your arms around them, encourage them. I pray that even as they go to the back to be prayed over, Lord, that something would just come over them and they would just feel that peace and strength that only You and Jesus can give. Thank you, Lord, we get to give our gifts to You. I pray, Lord, that You would just have your people be a generous people. The things of this earth are passing away rapidly and we want to put You first and we'll start that even right this moment through our giving, so be glorified through our giving right now. We ask in Jesus' Name. Amen. –8–

2015-0823. {The Book} | Repent | Restore | Micah Thanks for being here this morning. I hope that as you leave here you would do this: Church just began, that's when you get to be together. The Bible says in Hebrews to take time to just encourage each other as long as it's called today, and we come to this place and say don't neglect the assembling together, you've done that. You've assembled together. And I believe it's part of that is just so we can encourage each other. Would you do me a favor? Don't leave here until you've encouraged someone, even if it's just turning to the person next to you and giving them a smile or turning to the person behind you and introducing yourself. Encourage those who are here, and may I ask you this? Next week is kick off for school, everyone gets their groove and agenda going for the year starting Sunday, would you invite someone to come with you? Everything's just going to be blowing and going here next Sunday, you've got to be here. Invite a friend, invite a neighbor, invite a family member, invite someone that normally doesn't come to church. You'll be surprised how many people really, really wish someone would just ask them. Tell them you'll bring them. It's freaky coming into a place you're not used to. Tell them I'll take away all the fear, just come on in here, it's awesome. God bless you, have a wonderful day. There's coffee out here, it's free. Free coffee – where do you get that?! Just hang out. We do that so you can hang out and be together. God bless you and thanks for being here this morning.

Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/137106288 UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED, SCRIPTURE QUOTATIONS ARE FROM THE HOLY BIBLE, ENGLISH STANDARD VERSION (ESV). COPYRIGHT © 2001 BY CROSSWAY BIBLES, A DIVISION OF GOOD NEWS PUBLISHERS SCRIPTURE QUOTATIONS MARKED (NLT) ARE TAKEN FROM THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW LIVING TRANSLATION. COPYRIGHT © 1996, 2004, 2007 BY TYNDALE HOUSE FOUNDATION. USED BY PERMISSION OF TYNDALE HOUSE PUBLISHERS, INC., CAROL STREAM, ILLINOIS 60188. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. COPYRIGHT © 2015 – LEE WIGGINS – ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

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