The Sea of Forgetfulness | The Book of Micah | Gary Hamrick

so here we are in the Book of Micah today we're closing out the Old Testament looking at the last 12 books of the Old Testament known as the Minor Prophets were halfway through now Micah is number six out of the twelve his name is actually pronounced mica mica so one of our worship pastors is mica research and you are free to call him mica from now on but actually mica is a contracted form of mica Yahoo and mica Yahoo in Hebrew translates who is like God in other words it's a name that basically says that God is incomparable who is like God so if any of you guys have the name mica it's a strong name that reflects the incomparable nature of God we know very little about this prophet most of what we know is found here in chapter 1 verse 1 if you look at your Bibles real quickly with me in chapter 1 verse 1 it says the word of the Lord that came to Micah of Moorish F in the days of jotham ahaz and hezekiah kings of judah which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem and so the word of the Lord came which he saw because prophets in those days were often called seers because God gave them visions and then they spoke forth what God had told them and what God had put on their hearts and the visions that he saw so what we learn about Micah here very little but we find out he's from Morris chef that's the name of the town from which he comes and Morris chef is located about 25 miles due west of Bethlehem closer to Philistine territory so Micah is a country boys not from the city he's from the country about 25 miles west of Bethlehem and it tells us the timeframe of his ministry it expands the reigns of three different kings of Judah now remember at this time in your history Israel is a divided nation they've gone through a civil war so the larger part of the country to the north is known as Israel the smaller part of the country to the south is known as Judah and each has their own capital city the capital city to the north is Samaria the capital city of the south is Giroux and each territory has its own kings and so it tells us the names of three kings of the southern territory of Judah Jotham and ahaz and hezekiah Jotham was a good king ahaz was a very bad King Hezekiah was a mostly good King and the time period of their reigns covers about 50 years from 750 to 700 BC so that's when micah is ministering whether he ministered all 50 years or a portion of that we don't know for sure but it spans that time period of 752 752 both the north and the south because of the end of verse 1 it tells us things concerning samaria capital city of the north and jerusalem capital city of the south so he is sent by god to speak to both the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom micah is probably best known for a scripture verse that has often quoted at christmastime because he is one of really the of all the prophets who prophesies the birthplace of the messiah he mentions bethlehem as being that place where God makes his grand entrance into the world I'll put the verse on the screen for you but it's Micah 5 verse 2 it says but you Bethlehem Ephrathah if froth is just the ancient name of that region though you are little among the thousands of Judah but you're this tiny little village among all the towns of Judah yet out of you shall come forth to me the one to be ruler in Israel whose goings forth are from of old from everlasting and so Micah famously prophesies 700 years before the birth of Christ the actual town into which God comes now how do we know this is a messianic passage how do we know that Micah I have to refers to the Messiah first to Jesus well number one because when the wise men came from the east guided by a star they stopped in Jerusalem and they asked for more clarity the star only took them to this point but they needed clarity as to where exactly the star was illuminating them - they consult the chief priests and teachers of the law herod invites them in remember and asks they asked where is the one who's been born King of the Jews they go exactly to the scroll of Micah - what is our chapter five verse two and they quote what I just read to you so the religious leaders at the time that Jesus was born understood that that passage referred to the Messiah and specifically the birth place of the Messiah here's something else interesting about this verse it tells us that this ruler who comes his origins it says whose goings forth are from of old from everlasting but most other English translations say it this way whose origins are from of old from ancient time so it speaks you're about a ruler whose origins are from a time that is new King James says everlasting there are different terms that in the Hebrew language the Jewish people use to denote time and one of the terms that they use to denote time that cannot be measured time that is immeasurable is the phrase Yom Alam and Yom Alam means the days of eternity and it literally translates that days beyond the vanishing point when there's no way to calculate time they talk about time in terms of beyond the vanishing point beyond anything that we could know or understand that's the phrase used here to describe the origins of this ruler that's how we know that this is no ordinary ruler this is a passage in Micah 5:2 speaking about the Messiah because Jesus being God steps out of the outside of time comes enters into our time-space continuum comes to Bethlehem to dine across for our sins but he has no origins he is of everlasting he is yom alam who came into our world so mike is probably best known for that verse predicting 700 years before the birth of Christ the actual birthplace of the Messiah what I want us to do is we look through each of these twelve minor prophets taking one prophet a week is I want to look at Micah's book here from the angle of three different categories as he speaks to us through the pages of Scripture here and these are the categories he's going to start out talking about the problems facing Israel in his day and you'll note with me that they are not too dissimilar to the problems we face today and then he's gonna challenge us about the right way to live he's gonna talk about the practice how should we live out our lives and then he's going to end with a beautiful promise in Chapter 7 this promise from God concerning us and so we'll save that obviously to the end we're gonna go in that chronology we're gonna talk first about the problems we got to get the remedy before we can get the sorry we got to talk about the diagnosis before we can get to the remedy and then we'll talk about the practice and finally the remedy the promise so let's pause first and pray and then we'll we'll survey through this book together and see what God says to us lord thank you for this time in your word today and thank you that we can just humble ourselves and quiet ourselves before you and as we read through this book this ancient text we pray that you would speak to us it's timeless truth for our lives even today Lord and we thank you for the prophet Micah we thank you for how you spoke through him speak to us now Lord through these pages speak to our hearts we ask and be glorified in our lives and in our church we pray these things in Jesus name and everybody said amen so in the first few chapters Micah spend some time talking about the diagnosis what is sick about Israel and Judah and I'm gonna highlight five things there are many things we could say but I'm gonna highlight five things from the first three chapters and if you look here in chapter 1 of your Bibles are still open they're two chapter one the first thing that he points out in terms of the problems facing the nation of Israel and Judah is the age-old problem of idolatry and so here in Chapter 1 look at verses 2 through 7 he says hear all you peoples listen o earth and all that is in it let the Lord God be a witness against you the Lord from his holy temple for behold the Lord is coming out of his place he will come down and tread on the high places of the earth the mountains will melt under him and the valleys will split like wax before the fire like waters pour down a steep place all this is from the transgression of Jacob and for the sins of the house of Israel what is the transgression of Jacob that's talking about the south is it not sorry it's talking about the north is it not Samaria and what are the high places of Judah that's talking about the south are they not Jerusalem therefore I will make Samaria a heap of ruins in the field places for planting a vineyard I will pour down her stones into the valley and I will uncover her foundations verse 7 all her carved images shall be beaten to pieces and all her pay as a harlot shall be burned with the fire all her idols I will lay desolate for she gathered it from the pay of a harlot and they shall return to the pay of a harlot so Micah points out here and combines the fact that they are engaging in idolatry and it is the equivalent of spiritual adultery that they have carved images out of wood and stone and metal and that they have bowed down to these images and that they have worshipped these images now where do they get the concept of these images they got the concept from the neighboring nations around them where Israel has forsaken the true and living God and they started to adopt the gods of the nations around them which included these carved images so they were bowing down to these images and worshiping these images and they were forsaking the true and living God and in doing this they are in a sense prostituting themselves and that's why mica uses the term here harlot you you you you've made yourselves like harlots you're prostituting yourself you are committing a love affair adultery with these other gods and you have forsaken the true and living God so they're guilty of idolatry and then he calls out if you go to chapter 2 he calls out something prevalent in his day something that we see common in our own day as well injustice in chapter 2 look at the first two verses he says woe to those who devise iniquity and work out evil on their beds that morning light they practice it because it is in the power of their hand they covet fields and take them by violence also houses and seized them so they oppress a man and his house a man and his inheritance and so in other words Micah is saying here how neighbor is mistreating neighbor how they're lying on their beds at night plotting how they can scheme to confiscate property and possessions from their fellow neighbors to take them by force so at night they plot and then during the day they carry out their plans where they take advantage of one another and confiscate their property by force and rob a man of his inheritance so they're guilty of injustice number thirty if you go to chapter three they're guilty of deception by the prophets in Chapter three look at verse five it says thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who make my people stray these prophets are leading people astray who chant peace while they chew with their teeth I'll explain that but who prepare war against him who puts nothing into their mouths okay your attention so in the day there were legitimate prophets and there were false prophets just like today you know there are real teachers that there are false teachers okay you have to be wise discerning about it and so even in Micah's day you know you have a profits that are called by God yeah Micah you have Isaiah you have Amos you have Isaiah they're all ministering at that same time period but you also have other prophets who are not prophets at all who were basically running a nonprofit organization okay but they were acting like prophets and here's what they would do if you fed them this is what it means by while they chew with their teeth if you fed them they would tell you whatever you wanted to hear they wouldn't tell you the truth they would just say peace be unto you and they would tell you whatever you wanted to hear feed them a meal you know it's it's you know prophesy for pay like you like you give them a good meal and we'll tell you whatever you want to hear if you don't feed us that's the second part of verse 5 but who prepares war against him who puts nothing into the room a house if you don't feed me we're gonna be violent against you so these are these false prophets going around saying about for a good meal I'll tell you what you want to hear you don't feed me you get punched in the face and so that's what they were doing so all this deceptions and not telling them the truth deceiving them telling them lies all for a good meal they were running a racket not acting like true prophets at all and so they were guilty of deceiving people number four you also see something that I think you'll notice is not too unfamiliar with her own day you have corruption among civil and spiritual leaders in chapter 30 still in chapter 3 look at verses 9 through 11 now hear this you heads of the house of jacob and rulers of the house of Israel who abour justice and pervert all equity who build up Zion with bloodshed in Jerusalem with iniquity her heads judge for a bribe her priests teach for pay and her prophets divine for money yet they lean on the Lord and say is not the Lord among us no harm can come upon us so there's this corruption here among civil and spiritual leaders they're guilty of social injustice they're guilty of social inequality they're guilty of wickedness they're guilty of bribery just you know pay us and and we'll we'll take care of you they're guilty of extortion they're guilty of deception this is not the Lord among us we're fine giving people this false sense of security so there's corruption among civil and spiritual leaders and then the last thing that I'll point out we can point out several other things but something else they were guilty of was division within families if you jump over to chapter 7 chapter 7 and look at verse 6 in Chapter 7 verse 6 it says for son dishonours father daughter rises against her mother daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law a man's enemies are the men of his own household and so there was division people within their own families they were fighting and they were arguing and they were rising up against one another and so all of this was happening at this particular time it's not to indifferent from our own day that idolatry and injustice deception by false prophets and corruption by civil and spiritual leaders and division within families all this is going on and more and in the middle of this I mean technically near the end of it but in Chapter 6 God asks them a question through the prophet Micah and I'll summarize what God says and then we'll actually look at the text here in chapter 6 God basically says this God basically says to the people what have I done to you that you should act like this I don't know if you've ever thought of that in your life before I know that I have there have been times in my life were just gently the Holy Spirit has spoken to my heart saying you know whatever what have I ever done to you that you should treat me like this and God is basically saying to them as I think that he still says to us have I not blessed you taking care of you provided for you done so much for you and yet you will treat me in response this way because all of their sin was really ultimately against the war they were sinning against God and God says what have I done to you that you should treat me like this look here in chapter 6 verse 3 he says o my people what have I done to you and how have I wearied you testify against me I mean like tell me what have I done to you that you should act like this that you should behave like this he says there in verse 4 for I brought you up from the land of Egypt I redeemed you from the house of bondage in other words God just revisits a little bit of their history a tiny a little bit to point out the fact that how he's taking care of them you just remember when you were slaves in Egypt who brought you up out of that bondage who delivered you from slavery was it not I the Lord didn't I free you didn't I take care of you the rest of verse 4 and I sent before you Moses Aaron and Miriam I raised up these two brothers and their sister as leaders to help you and to lead you and to love you and to care for you he says in verse 5 o my people remember now what Balak king of Moab counseled and what Balaam the son of Beor answered him if you remember there's a story in Israel's history where Balak the king of the Moabites was having trouble defeating the Israelites because God was with the Israelites and so Balak hired Balaam who was a false prophet of the day to come and pronounce curses upon the Israelites that's how Balak thought he'd gain victory over the Israelites a liar Balaam I'll give him money he'll come and he'll pronounce these curses upon the Israelites but what happened instead is every time Balaam opened his mouth to curse God's people God put a blessing on his mouth and he blessed God's people and Balak is standing around going I'm paying you to curse these people why are you blessing these people like I can't help but every time I open my mouth God puts blessings on my mouth for the Israelites and so God's reminding you this is it remember when when Balin came to curse you and every time he opened his mouth I put blessings on his lips to bless you to care for you he says there in the end of verse 5 from acacia Grove to Gilgal that you may know the righteousness of the Lord the Acacia Grove was on the eastern side of the Jordan River Gilgal was on the western side and God then took them through the Jordan River into the promised land going from east to west and God is reminding them didn't I take care of you all along the way I brought you into the Promised Land that you would know the righteousness of the Lord why are you behaving in such a way look at all that I've done for you and so much more I delivered you from slavery I took care of you along the way I raised up leaders who would love you and lead you when Balaam opened his mouth I put blessings on his mouth for you I brought you through the wilderness I took you to the promised land what have I done that you should treat me this way the people are cut to the heart and so they asked in response what what can we do to get right with you Lord look at the rest here Micah 6 verse 6 with what shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before the high god shall I come before him with burnt offerings with calves a year old will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams ten thousand rivers of oil shall I give my firstborn for my transgression the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul and so in response they asked the Lord what's it gonna take do we need to increase all our sacrifices including the offering of oil do you want like rivers of oil do you want thousands upon thousands of Rams can we offer sacrifices to appease you do we even need notice they asked do we even need to offer our firstborn for the transgression of our lives the fruit of our lives because of our sin should we offer our firstborn and God basically says to them no your sacrifices are meaningless and don't even think about offering your firstborn that's what the pagan gods want of you that's not me here's what I want verse eight he has shown you O man what is good and what does the Lord require of you but to do justly to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God so he takes the first few chapters and he says here's all the problem facing the nation he says now here's what I want you to practice here's the practice and he summarizes life in these three terms I want you to practice justice I want you to love mercy and I want you to walk humbly with your God that's what I want that's what I want he says basically if I could summarize the way that you should conduct yourself this is what I want I want you to practice justice this is important for us to understand - God wants us to be just and fair with people don't take advantage of them or mistreat them deal with others honestly fairly justly God says that I want you to love mercy don't just like it love it love mercy because God is merciful be merciful toward others in the same way that God has been merciful toward you don't punish people for their sins or remind them of their past be forgiving as Christ has forgiven you jesus said in Matthew 5:7 blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy you want mercy show mercy you want to receive mercy be merciful like God is God says I want you to practice justice I want you to love mercy and I want you to walk humbly with the Lord your God know your place with God be humble about your life and what you have and what you've accomplished and who you are because it's all from the hand of God and he can take it away anytime he pleases God resists the proud but he gives grace to the humble we need to be quick to repent from sin God honors a broken and contrite heart but he will oppose the proud in the arrogant we need to walk humbly with our God so he outlines the problems he says this is the practice and he ends this with a promise and this is one of the most precious promises in all of the Bible if you'll go to chapter 7 and we'll close with this in Micah chapter 7 verses 18 and 19 Micah 7 verse 18 who is a God like you pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of his heritage he does not retain his anger forever because he delights in mercy and he will again have compassion on us and will subdue our iniquities and you will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea you need to underline those verses in your Bible because they're gonna be different times you're gonna want to refresh your memory with those verses about who God is Micah starts out this passage here in verse 18 asking a question who is a God like you it's a play on his own name remember Micah contracted form of Micky Yahoo means who is who was a God like you and he asks this question of the Lord because he's making a statement that God is incomparable and he points out these different things about the character nature of God there in verse 18 pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of his heritage he does not retain his anger forever because he delights in mercy he will again have compassion on us and will subdue our iniquities and you will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea to summarize these verses he's basically saying this this is the incomparable nature of God there's no other God like him he's a forgiving God he's a merciful God he's a compassionate God and he's a God who casts our sins into the sea of forgetfulness it's figurative language there but he's basically saying you're the God who does not hold our sins against us when we come to God and we confess our sins and we get right with God and we repent from our sins God in a sense he cast them into the depths of the sea to be forgotten and forgiven he doesn't revisit our sins he doesn't rehearse our sins with us he doesn't remind us of our sins when God forgives us of our sins he forgives us completely entirely and holy and Micah says it's as if you cast our sins into the depths of the sea yeah three people are glad about that all right all of us should be glad about that let me tell you something that the Jewish people still practice today they read this passage here in Micah seven verses 18 and 19 they gather by a river or an ocean some moving body of water typically not a pond or a lake but a moving body of water like a river or an ocean Jewish people today on Rosh Hashanah which is the first day of the new year from the Jewish calendar it's in September on our calendar on the first day of Rosh Hashanah they will take bread and they will go to a body of water and they will stand on the bank of the body of the water and they will recite micah 7 18 and 19 and they will take bread symbolic of their sins and they will cast the bread on the water and it's a practice that is in hebrew called tosh leak tosh leak and hebrew means to cast and they recite this passage as they cast the bread upon the water to remind themselves that God will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea a practice called touch leak I came across a short film it's only four minutes long it was directed by Brendan bellum oh and written by Sarah Rose Feinberg that illustrates what I'm talking about here I want you to take a look at the screens and I want you to to watch and see the practice of tush leak take a look [Music] I once heard of the Jewish ritual we're going gathers by the shore and throws bread [Music] I never understood why they did that [Music] [Music] each person tosses a piece of bread into the water and as the pieces float off the previous year's sins are washed away an old woman's racist comments to the cleaning lady a wife's infidelity a father's drunken rage of daughters live [Music] poisoning the sea like a papyrus oil spill they call it Ashley [Music] thank goodness the fish you say they believe that fish are immune to the evil eye a source of bad deeds fish don't have eyelids so they see the world purely de then this way they eat the bread and digest the sins without absorbing evil [Music] I can't take that risk [Music] not with this in what do you do if there is no water [Music] it'd have to burn your sins [Music] that's safer [Music] [Music] [Music] there goes the worst of me and my best hat [Music] I share this video with you because I think that it along with the practice of Tish leak just really illustrates how desperately people want to feel forgiven and this guy didn't even want to run the risk that his piece of bread would have been found by a diver so he burns it in his hat before he sets it out on the water because he's so ashamed of it he doesn't want anybody to know about it now as a purely symbolic gesture I don't have a problem if someone wants to cast Bread on the water as a tangible physical reminder of a spiritual truth that when we come to God and we repent that as bread dissolves upon the water so it is that God casts our sins into the depths of the sea to be forgotten and forgiven and better than casting bread on the water is casting our sins upon the Lord because this is why God sent His Son Jesus to die for us on a cross and this is why God says to us in Psalm 103 verse 12 as far as the east is from the west so far have I removed your transgressions from you this is why he says in isaiah 43:25 i even i am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake and i will remember your sins no more now it isn't that God is forgetful because he knows all things but it means that he will no longer hold our sins against us because God accomplished forgiveness of sins through the sacrifice of his son on a cross so that we might be forgiven as Colossians 1:14 says in Christ we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins the Bible says in second Corinthians 5:21 that God made him who had no sin to be sin for us so that in Christ we might become the righteousness of God he is a forgiving God he is a merciful God he is a compassionate God and He is a God who will cast our sins into the depths of the sea to be remembered no more this is our God this is our Savior Jesus who died to set us free from the shame and the guilt and the weight of sin this is the promise that Micah ends his book with this is our God who casts all our sins into the depths of the sea don't leave here today feeling the weight or the shame no the forgiveness of our Lord would you pray with me isaiah 55:7 says let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts let him return to the Lord and He will have mercy on him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon we thank you Lord that you are forgiving and merciful and compassionate and in some ways it's it's sad when we see a film like this to think that that's the best that some people can feel about their sins in other ways it's it's simply a reminder to us of how the bread dissolves in the ocean and you dissolve our sins but we have no hope without the cross of Jesus Christ and we thank you Lord that you love us so much that you died for every sinful thing we've ever done today I pray Lord that people would receive your forgiveness that whatever they've done that they might today just leave it we that you would cast it into the depths of the sea to be remembered no more thank you Lord that you clean our lives and you forgive us of our sins thank you that your merciful and compassionate your abounding in love and I'm gonna pause in my prayer and just invite you with your heads bowed that if there's sin in your heart and in your life that you just you just want to get clean from and you just want the Lord to take from you then just even right now right where you're seated just ask himself just say Lord would you take this sin from me the guilt of it the weight of it the shame of it I cast it on you Lord and I thank you that you are merciful and compassionate and forgiving that you would take my sin and you would cast it into the depth of the sea to be forgotten than to be forgiven oh how we thank you Lord that we can run to you whenever we fail you whenever we sin against you that you stand ready to forgive us to cleanse our hearts to make us right with you again we're humbled by it Lord we love you and we thank you that you first loved us and sent Jesus to dinah cross for our sins wash over our hearts Lord cleanse us from our sin we thank you and we praise you in Jesus name and all God's people said amen

Channel: Cornerstone Chapel - Leesburg, VA

Views: 68,704

Keywords: Cornerstone Chapel, Calvary Chapel, Gary Hamrick, Biblical sermons, Cornerstone Connection, leesburg va, cornerstone chapel leesburg virginia, cornerstone connection radio, what is tashlich, tashlich praryer, tashlich pronunciation, the sea of forgetfulness, the book of micah summary, micah summarized, micah:overview, summary of the book of micah, where is Jesus in the book of micah, where does we see Jesus in the book of micah, tashlish ritual

Id: A9AbU-ezHpE

Length: 40min 8sec (2408 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 13 2020