Humility

You are listening to a message from Thrive Community Church, a church located in Southwest Florida. For more info, visit us at thrive-fl.org. With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with a thousand rams, with ten thousand of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgressions, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? Has he told you, O man, what is good and what does the Lord require you but to do justice and to love kindness and walk humbly with your God? The word of the Lord. The life without wonder is not really worth living. Now you might question that, but often a lot of people are now going through life just surviving, just getting by, just trying to get through, and yet there's wonder all around. God has made a wonderful world, and he has made you. You are fearfully and wonderfully made. as the Psalm says. You are part of His plan. God, as He created this world in Genesis chapter 1 and 2, we see these stories of creation. He created as an artist. creates something beautiful and wonderful and harmonious and together, and then he creates us in his image so that we not only reflect, but we partner with him in the care of this wonderful world. That's the whole point. And as I think G.K. Chesterton rightly said, this is kind of a phrase that we've used a couple of times, he said, The world will never starve for want of wonders, but only for a want of wonder. We just keep going by and ignoring or dismissing or not even seeing the wonder that's around us every day. Today we're in Micah 6, as Jaden read, a passage that doesn't actually use the word wonder or awe or reverence, but is filled with that whole posture, the whole idea of humility, if you want to call it that, openness before God, To love mercy, to act justly, to walk humbly with God is that center of it all. It's all about that. And Micah asks us and invites us in. He's a book full of questions. If you read through the prophet Micah, he's kind of a mini Isaiah, as some people say. I know that's maybe a little too much background material, but he does also have all these questions, and he keeps asking questions of the people of God. And here in this section, With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God? Now he's responding, it's like, how can we relate to this God? How do we come before God in one form or another? And so today we're going to be taking this passage and I only have two points, but I do have some points. So get ready. So we're looking through these two questions. What does God require of us? And how do we live in this way? How do we even possibly live in this way? Now, that first question comes right out of the text. What is it that God requires of us? And if my intuition is right, you don't like that question. I don't really like that question. We kind of are repelled by the idea of what? We prefer instead, not a God that requires some things from us, but that we require from him. Do you know what I mean? It's like, I really would like a divine concierge. Someone who, when I need him, is there, but if I don't, he just is politely, just in the backdrop, you know, always available, but not. getting in my way. Our whole culture has trained us to imagine a life free of all obligations except to fulfill ourselves. Just think about that, though. If we are among an entire people, a community of everyone who's free, absolutely free of any obligation, I'm not obliged to do anything for you, and you're not obliged to do anything for me. What happens? I mean, it doesn't sound, well, maybe that's what we're living through. Maybe that's what we're doing. What's fascinating, though, is there's some irony to this all. Even if we resist that God would ever make a claim or require anything of us, that doesn't leave us off the hook. We're still living under the demands of this world. Oswald Beyer rightly says, we are always called upon to legitimate our existence. In other words, you're always, every day you get up, I think Lisa, you used to have a poster, is that right? Where it said every day there's a lion that gets up and runs, the gazelle gets up and has to run because there's a lion. that's going to be there. And every day the lion gets up and has to run to catch that gazelle. So every day you get up and you are running. Everybody's running. Everybody's got demands on them. No matter the position in your society, every day we are trying to prove whether we matter, whether we belong, whether we're worth up taking up the space, you know, am I worth the air that I'm breathing? Is my life matter? We build resumes, accomplishments, reputations, tiny arguments that are always going on in our brain of whether we are worth it and we deserve to actually even be here. Now, I think Arthur Miller, who wrote plays like The Crucible, he also wrote another play called After the Fall, whic...