I Am Ready To Lead - Micah 2

[00:00:00] Thank you for listening to the Calvary Monterey Podcast. Please visit calvary.com to learn

[00:00:10] more about our church and visit Nateholdrich.com for additional Bible teaching from our lead

[00:00:16] pastor, Nateholdrich. Teaching today is our lead pastor, Nateholdrich.

[00:00:24] All right, good morning church. Great to see you guys today. Let's take out our

[00:00:29] Bibles and turn to the Old Testament prophet of Micah. If you weren't here last

[00:00:34] week we started a brand new study looking at the book of Micah. I think it's

[00:00:38] going to take us six sessions to get through these seven chapters and

[00:00:42] today we're in Micah chapter two if you'd turn there in your Bibles. Micah

[00:00:47] chapter two. If you're new to the church my name is Nate on the lead pastor here and

[00:00:51] I'll be in the lobby after the service. I'd love to meet you if you're brand new

[00:00:55] to the church or if I haven't said hi to you for a long time it come by and say

[00:01:00] hello to me there. Be good to catch up together. All right, Micah chapter two

[00:01:05] that's our that's our text today but as I shared last week I'm teaching the book

[00:01:10] of Micah as the call of the shepherd king because all throughout the book of

[00:01:15] Micah there's a remnant flock that a shepherd who is also king who was also

[00:01:22] God who is divine takes care of and that for us of course we know to be Jesus

[00:01:29] and so I'm expressing each one of these teachings as an invitation from the

[00:01:34] shepherd king and today I want to talk about the call of the shepherd king saying

[00:01:38] I am ready to lead. I am ready to lead and Micah is going to say some hard

[00:01:45] things as he often does throughout his prophecies his name means who is like

[00:01:50] Yahweh, who is like the Lord so I want to start our teaching today by looking at

[00:01:55] Micah 7 verse 18 to 20 just to remind us of where this book is ultimately

[00:02:00] headed to he says who is a God like you?

[00:02:06] Cardening iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his

[00:02:10] inheritance he does not retain his anger forever because he delights instead fast

[00:02:16] love he will again have compassion on us he will tread our iniquities underfoot

[00:02:21] you will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea you will show faithfulness

[00:02:28] to Jacob instead fast love to Abraham as you have sworn to our fathers from the

[00:02:35] days of old Amen praise the Lord let's pray together for our time in the

[00:02:39] word Lord we come to you today you know as we crack open Micah chapter 2 and as

[00:02:44] we read it in three successive stages I pray Lord that you would speak to us

[00:02:49] from it today thank you Lord for your holy word and we ask Lord and pray that

[00:02:55] we hear your desire to lead us and that we would Lord every day of our lives

[00:03:02] increasingly say yes to your guidance and your leadership of our lives we bring

[00:03:08] it to you today Lord asking that you'd speak to us from your word in Jesus

[00:03:13] name we pray together Amen one of my hopes for this teaching for our time in the

[00:03:22] book of Micah is that Micah's prophecies Micah's words would help us become big

[00:03:29] gospel people big gospel people what I mean by that is that when God saves us

[00:03:36] when he reaches into our lives he does it not just to produce a personal

[00:03:43] salvation in us but he does it to produce so much more like for instance when

[00:03:49] God delivered the people of Israel from their oppressors in Egypt we know

[00:03:54] because we just studied the book of Exodus together that he brought them out of

[00:03:59] Egypt not just to release them in the wilderness to go their own way but to come

[00:04:05] into partnership with him to hear his word and his law and to walk with him and

[00:04:12] be a light to the nations we also know that when Jesus produced the great

[00:04:19] Exodus of the cross he produced it not just so that when someone confesses

[00:04:24] him believes in him trusts in him that we would then be left to our own

[00:04:30] devices to go our own way but that we would also come into a partnership with him

[00:04:36] that his leadership and rule and reign of our lives would increasingly be

[00:04:42] manifest in our lives and the Bible teaches and Micah teaches that when

[00:04:48] Christ returns he will bring an ultimate salvation upon this world he will

[00:04:58] bring every nation every tribe and every tongue when he returns into his

[00:05:04] kingdom and he'll be the leader of all flesh everyone and everything in that

[00:05:10] kingdom will be reordered and reorganized under his leadership and laws and

[00:05:16] guidance that is a big gospel view rather than just a small gospel view that

[00:05:23] says Jesus came to save individuals from their sin he did do that but so that he

[00:05:30] could place us in his grand cosmic story of redemption of all things I begin

[00:05:37] this way because I think that the contemporary church is often consumed with

[00:05:43] the concept of Jesus as savior but too readily forgets that Jesus also wants to

[00:05:50] be the Lord of our lives he is going to be King one day and so he wants to be

[00:05:56] King two day he is our example he's our model he's our template he's the one

[00:06:04] who told us to mimic him by denying ourselves and taking up our cross and

[00:06:09] following him but a lot of times we think of Jesus we think of his gospel as

[00:06:14] like spiritual fire insurance or earthquake insurance you know it's there

[00:06:21] for when the big one hits but otherwise we just go through our lives doing as

[00:06:26] we will but if I'm to borrow the language of the monopoly game Jesus wants to be

[00:06:33] more than just a get out of jail free card he wants to build some hotels he

[00:06:39] wants to build out our lives he wants his kingdom to be expressed in the way we

[00:06:45] live in our church communities and one day in an entire world that is governed by

[00:06:50] an in partnership with him part of the reason I'm bringing this up today is

[00:06:55] because it's the issue that Micah encountered in his book his day roughly 700

[00:07:02] years before Jesus came onto the scene was a day when God's people not the

[00:07:08] nation's elsewhere but God's people were severely compromised and as we'll

[00:07:14] discover in the passage we're about to read the most powerful people in Israel

[00:07:20] were at Micah's point in history the worst people who were producing so much

[00:07:28] sin in the land they had feelings of covetousness but they acted out on those

[00:07:34] feelings of covetousness all well over emphasizing that God is long suffering

[00:07:40] and gracious and merciful to the loss of the populace and rebuffing God's

[00:07:48] leadership and so in this passage we're going to see God saying I want to

[00:07:53] lead my people I want to be the leader all right so I'm gonna show you three

[00:07:58] things from this passage of the Lord wants to lead us into and the first one

[00:08:02] is this number one he wants to lead his people into contentment and generosity

[00:08:08] contentment and generosity if you guys would look in your Bibles or look on the

[00:08:12] screen at the word let's read verse 1 through 5 together Kevin if you could turn

[00:08:17] down my monitor up here just a little bit he says in verse 1 well to those who

[00:08:24] devise wickedness and work evil on their beds when the morning dawns they

[00:08:33] perform it because it is in the power of their hand they covet fields and

[00:08:40] seize them and houses and take them away they oppress a man and his house a man

[00:08:47] and his inheritance therefore verse 3 thus says the Lord behold against this

[00:08:54] family I am devising disaster from which you cannot remove your necks and you

[00:09:01] shall not walk hotly for it will be a time of disaster in that day they shall

[00:09:08] take up a taunt song against you and mone bitterly and say we are utterly ruined

[00:09:14] he changes the portion of my people how he removes it from me to an apostate

[00:09:21] he allots our fields therefore verse 5 you will have none to cast the line by

[00:09:28] lot in the assembly of the Lord like reading there for all of us this is

[00:09:42] my God for the first time in his prophecies telling us the specific crime that he

[00:09:47] observed in Israel last week we saw that they had succumbed to idolatry but

[00:09:54] here we see that that idolatry had led them into aggressive forms of

[00:09:59] covetousness now you might be saying to yourself well why doesn't Micah just

[00:10:03] mind his own business what gives him the right to be thinking about the

[00:10:07] spirituality of a people far away you see Micah was from a city called Morisheth

[00:10:12] a town called Morisheth and a valley called the Valley of the Sheffala which

[00:10:17] was a valley to the west of Jerusalem which is in the mountains of Israel but

[00:10:24] anytime an enemy attacked Israel they would want to take Jerusalem and to get

[00:10:31] to Jerusalem they would have to go through Micah's town and region and since God

[00:10:37] had told the people of Israel and Deuteronomy 27 and 28 if you walk with me I

[00:10:43] will bless you and if you do not walk with me as my people in other words as my

[00:10:49] covenant partners if you persist in disobeying me and you push me to the side

[00:10:56] and do not submit to my rules and laws for my nation my people then I am

[00:11:04] going to unfold the sequence of judgments upon you one of the culminating

[00:11:09] sequences which happened over long periods of after long periods of rebellion

[00:11:14] was that enemy invaders would come into the land and since they always wanted to

[00:11:19] go to Jerusalem Micah as a man from Morisheth was concerned what are they

[00:11:24] doing up in Jerusalem are they walking with God are they holy what Micah saw

[00:11:31] up in Jerusalem concerning the spiritual health in that place was the rich

[00:11:37] and the powerful oppressing the middle classes in the valley below their crime as

[00:11:44] I already said was covetousness but for them that was so much more than just a

[00:11:49] feeling of jealousy I wish I could have those lands I wish I could have those

[00:11:55] houses because they were in positions of power Micah depicts them in verse 1 and

[00:12:00] 2 as on their beds dreaming about how to steal these lands and these

[00:12:07] inheritances for themselves and then waking up and carrying out their desires

[00:12:14] he portrays them as successful in looting the populace everything they devised

[00:12:20] they executed no plan was thwarted all their greedy dreams and the mountain tops

[00:12:27] turned into nightmares for the villagers below but Micah I don't know if you

[00:12:33] noticed this he saw how they weren't the only ones planning Yahweh himself was

[00:12:41] also planning it says in verse 1 that they devised wickedness on their beds

[00:12:47] but it says in verse 3 that the Lord was also devising same word he was

[00:12:53] devising disaster the disaster of war to discipline his people they would

[00:13:00] according to verse 4 eventually sing a song of defeat all about their own ruin

[00:13:06] singing that the very fields that they had stolen from their fellow Israelite

[00:13:11] brothers would be captured one day by apostate invaders when God said in verse 5

[00:13:18] that they would have none to cast the line by law and the assembly of the Lord

[00:13:23] what he meant was that they would lose their ability to define property lines

[00:13:28] because none of the land would belong to them anymore as they were brought into a

[00:13:33] foreign land in exile and captivity so this movement cheery chipper little passage

[00:13:41] of scripture it describes God's promise of discipline because of the covetousness

[00:13:48] of some of his people almost 3,000 years ago what are we supposed to do with

[00:13:55] this excertation from Micah today it's tempting to merely I think step back and

[00:14:04] maybe take a moment of introspection and critique the way that we often go

[00:14:11] along with society and culture and cave to materialism and greed as God's people

[00:14:18] you know some people even say that our entire economy is bolstered by covetousness

[00:14:24] we don't say it that way but we say we're a consumer economy and in order to

[00:14:29] be a consumer economy the consumers got to consume and for consumers to want to

[00:14:34] consume there needs to be a desire that is sparked within so we could sit back

[00:14:41] and say that's an excertation we should receive from this passage of scripture

[00:14:47] but for as bad as all this is I think there's more at play in Micah's words than mere warnings

[00:14:54] against covetousness when Jesus came along he and his disciples seemed to show us that the focus

[00:15:03] isn't necessarily for us to say here's what I don't want to do that it's not just stopping

[00:15:10] the sin but it's replacing it with something else for instance when Jesus came he

[00:15:19] did not come as one who would abolish the law and prophets or destroy the law

[00:15:24] and prophets but to fulfill the law and prophets is the perfect man Jesus did not

[00:15:30] relax even one of the commandments but he fulfilled them by living out their

[00:15:35] purest intention what do I mean well Jesus took things like you shall not murder and turned

[00:15:44] it into a reconciling and forgiving heart Jesus took you shall not commit adultery and turned

[00:15:52] it into a focused pursuit of a pure inner thought life Jesus took Moses's guardrails surrounding

[00:16:03] divorce and remarriage and turned them into a lifelong honor of the marital covenant Jesus took

[00:16:11] you shall not swear falsely and turned it into becoming a person of your word even when it

[00:16:17] hurts you to do so Jesus took an eye for an eye and turned it into turning your cheek and going

[00:16:25] the extra mile Jesus took love your neighbor and turned it into a love for your enemies even praying

[00:16:34] for those who persecute you when when Jesus did this he was not making a new law he said I came to

[00:16:43] fulfill the law and the prophets in other words those original commandments if you're to look behind

[00:16:52] them you see God's truest heart and intention for his people he was not looking in other words to

[00:16:58] bottom line it for you for just a group of Israelite people who would say I'm not going to covet

[00:17:04] he was looking for a group of Israelite people who would say I'm gonna go beyond that into a

[00:17:09] contentment and generosity that rules my life that's with the Lord the shepherd king was looking for

[00:17:17] among his people he was talking to people who were not content with the lines that God had drawn

[00:17:23] for them but they should have been content God when he had brought them into the promised land had

[00:17:29] given lines and borders and boundaries to all the people of Israel and then the families in each tribe

[00:17:35] divvied up that land and these lands were passed down from generation to generation rather than be

[00:17:41] content with the design the lines the plan that God had for each one of them individually they

[00:17:48] said I want more than that I'm not content with what God has given to me now I don't think that

[00:17:55] contentment means that we don't work hard that we don't try hard that we don't try to be everything

[00:18:01] that the Lord has called us to be I look at Paul the Apostles is a great model of this incredible

[00:18:06] work ethic he actually wrote in the Bible I worked harder than all the rest of the Apostles that's

[00:18:14] a brazen thing to say unless the spirit of God has led you to say it and I don't think any of the

[00:18:20] Apostles would have argued with Paul's statement he was a man who only wanted to preach the gospel

[00:18:25] where no one else had ever gone before he was a man who worked tirelessly to proclaim the kingdom

[00:18:31] everywhere but that same man also said in Philippians chapter 4 that he had learned the secret

[00:18:38] in whatever situation he was in to be content there's a beauty in contentment there's a power in

[00:18:49] contentment the question that I have for you this morning is what lines must you receive from the

[00:18:56] shepherd king what lines has he drawn in your life borders as he put in your life situations as

[00:19:04] he put in your life that you must embrace what portions or elements of his word have you

[00:19:10] bucked against because you want to do it your own way what facets of your reality do you try

[00:19:17] to escape when it's simply a line that God has drawn for you the sooner that they accepted their

[00:19:24] situation the sooner peace would have come into God's land and the sooner we accept the station

[00:19:31] that God has given us the sooner we become generous with those around us and if we're in a position

[00:19:37] to do so raise up and elevate others the sooner God's blessing will be unleashed upon our lives

[00:19:45] but as God said these things he was of course correcting his people but he wanted and was rooting for

[00:19:53] them to turn back to him it would still be another hundred plus years before some of the things that

[00:20:00] Micah predicted would happen would happen in Israel because God was rooting for his people

[00:20:07] to turn from their sin and to walk with him back in 2020 Netflix released a show that became an

[00:20:15] incredibly popular called the Queens Gambit I don't know if you saw it or not it was set in the 1950s

[00:20:21] in 60s and it was about a tormented young woman who became a chess prodigy after a janitor in her

[00:20:30] orphanage introduced her to the game and her success just took off and she began to climb the ranks

[00:20:38] in the chess world and she became famous for being a world class chess athlete in this story I don't

[00:20:48] know if chess athlete is an oxymoron or not but but the story as it's told shows that her inner

[00:20:57] demons the more popular she became grabbed a hold of her life and her life began to spin out of control

[00:21:05] and one day at the peak of her demise she heard news that the janitor a man named Mr. Shible had died

[00:21:13] and so on a lark she goes to his funeral only to discover that the whole time she had been off doing

[00:21:22] what she was doing he had been tracking her career every article every news clip that he could find

[00:21:31] he saved about his long lost student in other words he was rooting for her even while she was self

[00:21:39] distracting and something happened to her in the story when she saw this it helped her to realize that

[00:21:46] there's this man this father figure if you will who is rooting for me to do well and I'm not living

[00:21:51] up to his desires for me and it sparked a pivot in her life from that moment into the life that the

[00:21:59] janitor had envisioned for her and I think in a similar way Yahweh is presented here as rooting

[00:22:07] for his people while they self-destructed he wanted them to live beyond their covetousness beyond

[00:22:15] their greed he wanted them to be content he wanted them to help others when they could

[00:22:21] he wanted them to overcome themselves and our shepherd king he wants the same for us so that's

[00:22:27] the first thing he wants to lead us into contentment and generosity okay but the second thing

[00:22:33] that the passage shows us is that the shepherd king he wants to lead us into God's word and God's

[00:22:40] nature God's word and God's nature let's read in verse six and following and as we go through this

[00:22:46] portion pay attention to the contrast between myka as a true preacher of Yahweh and these false

[00:22:52] preachers that existed he says in verse six do not preach thus they preach one should not

[00:23:02] preach of such things disgrace will not overtake us these are the words of others should this be said

[00:23:08] verse seven oh house of Jacob has a lord grown impatient are these his deeds do not my words do good

[00:23:15] to him who walks up rightly but lately my people have risen up as an enemy you strip the rich robe from

[00:23:24] those who passed by trustingly with no thought of war the women of my people you drive out from

[00:23:32] their delightful houses from their young children you take away my splendor forever arise and go for

[00:23:41] this is no place to rest because of uncleanness that destroys with a grievous destruction if a man

[00:23:50] verse eleven should go about an utter wind and lies saying I will preach to you of wine and strong

[00:23:58] drink he would be the preacher for this people this movement of myka's prophecy it tells us that not

[00:24:11] only had the populace collected forbidden idols and not only had they collected forbidden fields

[00:24:20] but they had also acquired false prophets for themselves what these false prophets did according to

[00:24:28] verse six is confront myka they told myka do not preach it's a it's a word that literally in the

[00:24:37] Hebrew means do not secrete it's like their way of saying stop your drivel you're like a looped

[00:24:47] track repeating over and over and over again a broken record saying the same thing over and over

[00:24:54] again do not say these things myka it wasn't just that myka was repetitive that bothered these

[00:25:02] preachers it was the content of his message that's why in verse six they said disgrace will not overtake

[00:25:12] us it seems what they were saying was myka you are preaching that god will discipline us one day

[00:25:20] you are preaching that god is going to bring judgment upon us one day but we reject the very premise

[00:25:27] of that statement we know who god is they even ask in verse seven has god now grown impatient

[00:25:36] myka don't you remember how god revealed himself in Exodus 34 on the mountain to Moses and to

[00:25:43] the nation god slow to anger abounding and loving kindness how can you myka say that god will

[00:25:51] bring judgment upon us has god changed from who he says he is in his word as his nature

[00:25:59] and his character been altered but myka would not fall for such terrible theology he knew better

[00:26:07] he saw how these rebels were only highlighting one part of god's nature while neglecting the rest

[00:26:18] of who god is they were over emphasizing god's grace and god's long suffering nature

[00:26:25] and using it as a ticket to live however they wanted in a sense myka is in agreement with Paul's question

[00:26:35] in Romans when Paul said in Romans six verse one and two are we to continue in sin that grace may

[00:26:43] abound by no means how can we who died to sin still live in it from from his side of the cross myka

[00:26:53] might have said it differently he might have said how can we who died to Egypt and who were rescued

[00:27:00] by by Yahweh live any longer like the Egyptians we're a new people god has set us free myka knew

[00:27:10] that god had given his people a long time to turn from their rebellion but they were entrenched in

[00:27:16] their evil so a flood he said in verse 10 of invading warriors would force them to arise and go

[00:27:24] if they did not turn from their sin the false prophets were teaching that god was like a cosmic

[00:27:30] grandfather who would forever turn a blind eye to the cancerous evil of his people even if it

[00:27:37] was killing the nations around them and ruining their witness no god had to act according to myka

[00:27:44] he's long suffering absolutely incredibly patient absolutely but he can be moved to discipline

[00:27:52] his wayward people and judge wickedness what we learn in this movement is that they had rejected the

[00:27:59] fullness of god's word and the fullness of god's nature by dishonestly emphasizing only part

[00:28:09] of god's word and nature myka even got a little humorous in the way that he confronted these false

[00:28:15] preachers when he said in verse 11 that the content of their message was of wine and strong drink

[00:28:23] he's like that's what you guys are experts in not theology but mixology that's what you're strong

[00:28:31] in you preach ease you preach prosperity rather than the kingdom of god and the people are getting black

[00:28:38] out drunk off your message they presented the capital city's residence with a message of the good

[00:28:45] life all while they destroyed the lives of others through their opulence and oppression this was

[00:28:53] not free trade it was abuse and it was theft but all their favorite podcasts and favorite feeds

[00:29:01] reinforce the idea that they were god's special people and in no danger of discipline but

[00:29:08] here's what y'all way asked them in the middle of this second movement of chapter 2 and verse 7 if

[00:29:14] you see it there in your bibles he says do not my words do good to him who walks uprightly

[00:29:22] what myka is doing there is he's fighting against the hypergrace perspective that the populace held

[00:29:29] with the truth when we submit ourselves to god's way the result is the true good life you can have

[00:29:38] all the fields that you want to you can steal all the inheritances that you want to but that is not

[00:29:45] the good life the good life comes under the dictates of the living god now this to me is where the book

[00:29:52] of myka becomes incredibly contemporary in its application and importance we also have to be careful

[00:30:01] not to overemphasize only part of god's nature only part of god's word well neglecting the parts

[00:30:10] that call us up to righteousness and justice this might be one reason why the prophets are largely

[00:30:18] neglected in the modern church they're fairly confrontational in nature they call us up into a higher

[00:30:26] standard of living but we must be careful not to commit the same error that the people in myka's

[00:30:32] day did and accumulate teachers who never challenge us every one of us has perspectives and values

[00:30:40] that are out of step with who god is and his revealed word so we should welcome voices that call us

[00:30:49] up to our true identity in christ and this is especially important in our age because Paul the

[00:30:56] apostle warned that a time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching but having itching

[00:31:02] ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers that suit their own passions what this does is reverse

[00:31:10] the proper order of things i start with my passions my grid my view my desires my thinking and i

[00:31:17] find messengers to reinforce my passions Paul said we have to watch out for that we need to hear all

[00:31:25] of who god is all the truth of his word or i could say it this way you need the minor keys

[00:31:32] to get the full range of musical beauty and you need the minor prophets to get the full range

[00:31:39] of god's majesty you know they say in the gym that you should not skip leg day

[00:31:46] because if you want to develop well-rounded strength the lower half must get work but the people in

[00:31:52] myka's day had skipped out on so much of who god is that would have helped them grow

[00:31:59] would have helped shape them to become who god wanted them to be we all need the truth but it needs

[00:32:06] to be all the truth of who god is because all scripture is breathed out by god and profitable

[00:32:12] to make us complete and equip for every good work as myka said doing good to those who walk

[00:32:19] up rightly okay so the second thing is that well the shepherd king he says i want to bring you

[00:32:28] into the fullness of my nature and my word but the third thing and last thing i want to show you

[00:32:33] is that the shepherd king he wants to lead us as our shepherd and as our king and this

[00:32:41] brings us to verse 12 in 13 of myka chapter 2 the last two verses of myka's first oracle

[00:32:50] he says in verse 12 he says i will surely assemble all of you oh Jacob i will gather the remnant

[00:32:55] of israel i will set them together like sheep and a fold like a flock in its pasture a noisy

[00:33:01] multitude of men he who opens the breach goes up before them they break through and pass the gate

[00:33:08] going out by it their king passes on before them the lord at their head now next week we're going

[00:33:19] to actually bleed into myka chapter 4 where we're going to see this very clear picture

[00:33:27] of a revival where all the nations of the earth flow up to jirusselam to hear the voice of the lord

[00:33:36] it's a picture of the rule and reign of jesus here on earth one day it's black and white it's

[00:33:43] hyper clear it's super inspiring but in verse 12 in 13 we start to get a clue or a hint of

[00:33:51] something beautiful this is like good news that myka is delivering after the hard word of his entire

[00:33:59] first oracle he pivots here and gives a little grace it's a proclamation of salvation remember

[00:34:06] the question of the book is who is y'all way what is he like and all through the book we learn

[00:34:13] that he's willing to judge he's willing to discipline if he needs to but the final words of the

[00:34:20] book tell us how he inevitably gravitates back to his forgiving and long suffering nature he wants

[00:34:26] to save his people and that's what you see here in verse 12 and 13 what you see is first of all a

[00:34:34] remnant this remnant is going to be mentioned all throughout the book of myka you could just look

[00:34:39] for that word remnant and you'll see it all throughout this book it's always portrayed as a flock

[00:34:46] like a flock of sheep this little remnant flock and this flock always has this shepherd king

[00:34:55] who is taking care of them according to myka because they're his flock how does myka describe him in

[00:35:03] these two verses well in verse 13 he says that this figure when he comes he will open a way for

[00:35:11] his people to break through and pass the gate in verse 12 he says that he does all this after he

[00:35:20] regathers his people and there will be so many of them that it's like a noisy multitude so a lot

[00:35:27] of people that he rescues the idea is that God's remnant because of their rebellion was taken into

[00:35:35] captivity but this shepherd king gathers them up breaks them out of their captivity and sets them

[00:35:43] free he then becomes their king and he becomes the lord because he is the lord who leads them he's

[00:35:52] their shepherd because he gathers his flock and he's his king their king because he leads his people

[00:35:59] and like I said this is abundantly good news especially in the light of the doom of this chapter

[00:36:05] myka had gone out of his way to berate the power structures of Jerusalem for their oppression

[00:36:11] of the people their covetousness and theft evaporated the middle class and pushed them into poverty

[00:36:19] in short the leadership of Israel the kings the prophets the priests they had failed the people

[00:36:25] but myka's news is that a great shepherd king would one day arise to set his people free he

[00:36:32] would bring them out of their captivity and lead them into his glorious reign now from a new

[00:36:37] testament perspective we know that this shepherd king is Jesus who declares himself to be the good

[00:36:45] shepherd even in myka's prophecies this shepherd king is described as being born in Bethlehem which

[00:36:52] is where Jesus was born centuries later and do you see Jesus the way that myka envisions him

[00:37:00] as the great delivering shepherd who gathers his flock who sets them free and becomes king

[00:37:08] he's the one that Moses prefigured in Exodus the one who came to set us free from our captivity

[00:37:15] to sin and one day he will return and rule over all things I think that this should be a reassurance

[00:37:22] to every one of us who have at some point in our lives been disappointed or let down or frustrated

[00:37:33] by leaders and others in positions of power or authority or influence and it should certainly

[00:37:41] comfort those of us who have been abused or oppressed or marginalized by those with the power to do so

[00:37:49] what this text is saying is that one day a leader of all leaders a pure king a good king of all

[00:37:57] kings will arise and express his good sovereignty over everyone and everything you will never be

[00:38:08] disappointed by him you will never be discouraged by him you will never be disillusioned by him he will

[00:38:16] open the breach myka says and make a way out of all the messes dysfunctional and delusional

[00:38:24] leaders have made for us but myka did not have all these visions of the future

[00:38:32] and of the universal reign of christ just so that we could sit back and pine for these days

[00:38:38] oh yeah one day jesus is coming let's sit together and try to figure out when it's going to be

[00:38:47] that's not what myka envisions instead he wants us to engage today to live as we will be in that kingdom

[00:38:57] jesus is the good shepherd not just as a nozzler of tender little lambs but is the shepherd king

[00:39:04] who is worthy of one day remaking the world submitting all cosmic powers under his dominion and

[00:39:12] guiding every affair of a new humanity and if that's who jesus is then he is certainly qualified

[00:39:20] to help us navigate archaotic schedules today or prepare a monthly budget today or choose our

[00:39:28] friends today if he's going to do that tomorrow then he can do the lesser things right now

[00:39:34] it wants to lead our lives not just because he's supreme but because he loves us and he is really

[00:39:41] good at leading our lives his leadership leads to our flourishing so if myka and the other prophets

[00:39:49] and all of god's word declare that a day is coming when we will rush to god's mountain

[00:39:55] to hear god's voice then we should rush to our bibles to hear god's voice today

[00:40:01] if a day is coming when we will be under the jurisdiction of a perfect king who reigns in righteousness

[00:40:08] we should strive to increasingly submit to his rule in our lives today and if a day is coming

[00:40:14] when he will systematically cut off all the idols that permeate our lands and permeate our hearts

[00:40:21] then we should walk with him today so that he can systematically cut them off right now

[00:40:27] this is what it means to be big gospel people jesus saved jesus will save but we want him to keep

[00:40:36] saving right now in our lives today from everything that harms us

[00:40:47] thank you for listening if you would like more teachings and information about calvary monore

[00:40:52] please visit calvary.com you can also find books teachings through the bible and articles from

[00:40:58] our lead pastor at Nateholdrich.com thanks again for tuning in see you next week