Thru the Bible

Steve Schwetz: Welcome to Through the Bible with Dr. J. Vernon McGee. We're in the Old Testament book of Micah chapter two and we're going to learn how people in Israel 2,700 years ago had problems very much like ours today. I'm your host Steve Schwetz inviting you to hop aboard the Bible bus and find your seat and as you do, here's a letter sent by a fellow passenger Nick from Kentucky to encourage us. It's a longer one, but it's so good. I know you're going to love it. I grew up in church and was baptized when I was around 10 years old, Nick writes.

I thought I knew about Jesus, but I never really read the Bible. Gradually my relationship with God took a backseat to drinking and going to parties. During that time I entered into a sinful relationship with a girl I met at work. We eventually got married and had a child together. Only a few years into our marriage it began to fall apart. There was no communication and we decided to get a divorce. I left that relationship feeling like I had been through a gauntlet of bad decisions and I was covered in my own sins. I didn't know what to do with myself or who to turn to.

I had reached the bottom of the barrel. One night I sat outside alone staring at the stars and for the first time I had an honest conversation with God. I confessed all my sins to him. I felt so humble, so ashamed. I cried out and asked him to give me another chance. That night God began working in me. He guided me into a new job with a long commute. While driving I got very lonely and felt disconnected from everyone. One day I turned on the radio and scanned through the stations. I found Dr. McGee and paused.

I had heard his voice on the radio before, but I had never bothered to listen for long. Something about his voice was so unique and comforting. I soon started listening every day and using the app anytime I wanted. Through him God brought me to an understanding of his word. Only after listening to Dr. McGee did I begin to read the Bible, the entire Bible, all 66 books. I trusted Jesus and was saved by his grace. I have now been on the Bible bus for seven years. I teach a young adult Sunday school class. I'm married to a woman who loves God and knows him as her savior and we are blessed with a son.

I now recommend the app to my family and friends. I've come so far where I once was because I decided to trust him. I pray that this ministry continues to be blessed by God. Well, thanks so much for writing Nick and may God bless your ministry and your family. Well, how's God been using our time in his word in your heart and life? You know we'd love to hear about it and maybe even share it here. So send your story from our app or by email to biblebus@ttb.org or write to box 7100 Pasadena, California 91109 or in Canada box 25325 London, Ontario N6C 6B1.

You can also leave a message anytime at our voicemail number 1-800-65 Bible. Now let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for your promise that your word will accomplish your purposes in our lives. We ask that you'd help us to hear the message that you have for each one of us in Jesus name. Amen. Here's Dr. J. Vernon McGee with our study of Micah two verses 1 to 11 on Through the Bible.

Dr. J. Vernon McGee: Now we've come as we indicated last time. We got down to the second chapter of Micah verse one. We just got into the chapter and therefore let me repeat again that this is the prophet's second message and it describes specific sins. And these sins we saw beginning last time that the evil man would even lie upon their beds at night, not only committing sin there, but actually planning and plotting commit sin the next day. In other words, it's a day and night, 24 hours a day job of doing evil and that was the thing that characterized them.

Now he said that they are able to practice it because it is in their power and their hand. In other words, God was not deterring them. He could, but he was not. He was permitting them and God does permit evil to run its course. That seems to have been his method and the picture that the prophets have is the cup of iniquity is filling up and certainly it is filling up today. And we find here that he continues and he begins now to deal with these specific sins that relate to those that are around them.

Again, I want to say it because it's important to say that a man who's not right with God cannot be right with his fellow man. Cannot be. The human heart is so constituted that you can't be because of the fact that we do evil. We are sinners by nature. We were dead in trespasses and sins. That is dead to God and to the things of God. Now he goes on in verse two and he's going to be very specific and they covet fields and take them by violence. In other words, here are two sins, covetousness and violence and houses and take them away so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage.

Now they covet fields and take them by violence. Now we have an example of that in Israel, Ahab and Jezebel. You remember Ahab coveted the vineyard of Naboth and he was like a spoiled brat and he wanted it, but didn't make a move. But his wife Jezebel, I tell you she was a sinner that believed in action and she immediately went about getting the vineyard and they eliminated Naboth. Well, that is one example and it comes from the head of the government and down below others began to practice it, the wealthy that were able to take a field while they would take it because they had the money and the power to do it.

My how that's been used actually in our day. We hear so much complaint today about the little businessman. Well, the little businessman doesn't stand much of a chance in this contemporary culture that we produce today. It has to be the big operators, the big thing and very frankly they say we are in it for profit. Sure they're in it for profit, but the point is that sometimes profit is nothing in the world but a synonym for covetousness and this was the great sin that is there. I've never understood why any man wanted more than $1 million.

I've always felt if I got that much I'd never want anymore, but it seems as if when one man gets a million he wants 2 million. Well, he can't eat anymore and he actually can't sleep anymore. He can't indulge himself anymore. He can only drink so much. He can only sin so much and a million dollars will enable him to do all of that that he wants to, but yet they want to continue getting richer and richer and richer. And the old bromide, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and that is the story of mankind.

And Micah speaking into that situation, by the way. Now will you notice that they take a man's house from him. And you see God not only gave that land to the nation Israel and put them in it, but he gave to each tribe a particular portion of the land and he gave to each individual a particular plot in that tribe that he was in and that was his heritage. And God put up certain laws that he couldn't lose it forever. For the year of Jubilee meant every mortgage was canceled and every bit of property returned to its original owner, but it's a long ways between 50s by the way.

Every 50 years if you lose it the second year after Jubilee you got 48 years to wait and you can get very hungry in that length of time. And that was the thing that God is condemning here that they were taking advantage even though he'd made a law to protect the poor. Well, they always found out a way to get around it of course. Verse three he says, therefore thus saith the Lord, behold against this family do I devise an evil from which he shall not remove your neck, neither shall you go haughtily, for this time is evil.

Now this is a very interesting verse here. God says, I condemn you because you even lie on your beds and you plot evil. Now God says, I'm going to plot evil against you. Now what does he mean by that? Was God going to do evil here? No. God was not going to do evil from his viewpoint, which is the right viewpoint, but it would be evil from their viewpoint because God intended to punish them and they wouldn't like that. They would call that evil. They would call that wrong, you see. You hear today even Christians condemning God for permitting certain things to take place.

In other words, what they're saying is God is doing evil. Well, God beats you to it, friends. If you want to say he's doing evil, he says I'm going to do evil from your viewpoint. You want to go on sinning, I'm going to stop you. I'm going to judge you. You'll say that's wrong. And a great many people are saying today, why does God let this happen to America? We're such lovely people and we've been engaged in missions and we're such nice folk. May I say to you that from the viewpoint of many today God is sure doing evil, but he's not doing evil.

He's judging because he always judges sin and he says, I'm going to judge you and he says, and I'll devise an evil from which he shall not remove your neck. In other words, God intended to put around those necks the chains of bondage. And the children of Israel were led away into Assyria, one of the most brutal nations that has ever been on top side of earth and they were led away in chains. Neither shall you go haughtily, for this time is evil. And how haughty and proud they were. And we today have been in that position as a nation.

We've been a very proud nation. In fact, we have heard of the abominable snowman, but abroad today in foreign countries it's been in the past the abominable American tourists. It's amazing how in many countries and we've discovered this in the many countries we've been in in South America and Europe and Africa and Asia. We found that we're not loved today and we haven't been loved for years. Why? Because we have been a haughty, proud people and we had the audacity. We had the temerity to tell the world after World War II we were going to lead them.

And we thought if we just gave them a few dollars we'd solve all the problems of the world. We sure have got this world into a mess, haven't we? And American diplomacy is nothing to boast about since World War II and I don't care who you're talking about in office at the time. We just don't have a good record anywhere at all. And why? Well, the thing is because I think the judgment of God is already taking place. I think we've come over the hill. Now I know that I'll get a great many letters telling me how wonderful my country is and I love my country as much as you do.

And I want to say that I'm not only love my country, it breaks my heart to see what's happening to it today as it continues to fall into the hand of godless rich today. And that my friend is not good for this land of ours. Abraham Lincoln, if he lived today, could never be elected president at all. We may make a monument to him in Washington today and put him there in stone, but he never could be put in the White House again, never again, because we've come to the place that a man has to have a good TV personality and he needs a lot of money today and he needs money back of him.

How sad it is that today it's charisma, not character. And that is the thing that will bring a nation down. And that's the philosophy of this man's government here. Micah telling us very definitely it's not the character or the method of government. It is the character of the man and that's what makes a nation. Now will you notice he moves on here because he's really talking very plain. He says verse four, in that day shall one take up a parable against you and lament with a doleful lamentation and say we are utterly spoiled. He hath changed the portion of my people.

How hath he removed it from me? Turning away he hath divided our fields. In other words, great confusion was coming and there was lamentation and doleful lamentation, by the way. This expression here, they lament with a doleful lamentation is a very unusual thing in the Hebrew and I doubt whether they can get it into the English to say exactly what Micah was saying, but it reveals how tragic it was that was happening and people were very pessimistic. There seemed to be no hope at all and they were saying we are utterly despoiled and they were because already Assyria had been making forays down in that land and fact of the matter is when they finally came they marched to the gates of Jerusalem.

And there are those that say well Jerusalem was in sin at this time. Why didn't God let them go into captivity? Well, I've never quite understood the ways of God. Why in the 12th chapter of Acts was James when Herod arrested him? He put him to death. He arrested Simon Peter at the same time and he got loose. Why did God permit that? Well, I read in Hebrews some were slain with the sword and others escaped the edge of the sword. Now both of them did it by faith and God permits these things to happen like this for his own purpose and he is accomplishing his purpose.

You may be sure that. The thing is this, they were turning away from God and as they were turning away from God they were utterly spoiled, the northern kingdom. But a revival came to the southern kingdom under Hezekiah and it took place shortly after Micah had written this. And that explained the reason that God gave them a few more days of grace. Now let's move on down here and I'm reading in verse five now of chapter two of Micah. Therefore thou shalt have none that shall cast a cord by lot in the congregation of the Lord.

In other words, there'll be no worship anymore of God there. Prophesy not. Say they to them that prophesy, they shall not prophesy to them that they shall not take shame. O thou that art named the house of Jacob, is the spirit of the Lord shortened? Are these his doings? Do not my words do good to him that walketh uprightly? And this is something very interesting. This was a time when God cut off the flow of the spirit of prophecy. Why the people wouldn't hear it? And there became a famine of the word of God. But the important thing to note in these two verses is this.

The Lord here responds by stating that he too is plotting evil and what they call evil because it's going to be judgment against him and God's word will be received by his people who obey him and it will be rejected when they do not obey. And though it's harsh words, God's people will obey it. God's people will accept it. And God's people right now as we're dealing with this passage of scripture, I'm sure that you're saying this is not delightful. This is not the 23rd Psalm we're looking at or the 14th of John, but it just happens to be in the word of God.

And as far as God is concerned he gives it just as much prominence. In fact, he didn't put this in the 23rd Psalm and he didn't put this in the 14th chapter. He put it in the first and second chapters of Micah so you get it in a hurry. And God's people will accept it. Of course they'll accept it. It's because God says it and they'll respond to it. And God through it all will comfort them. God will lead them and God will bless them. Now verse eight, even of light my people are risen up as an enemy.

You pull off the robe with the garment from them that pass by securely as men averse from war. Now God says you are my people, but you've actually become my enemy. And one of the evidences of it here is the way they were treating the poor. God always takes up for the poor. You see he says you pull off the robe with the garment from them that pass by securely. The robe evidently is what the man slept in under. Actually take his bed out from in under him and over him, if you please, and no cover.

That's how far they were willing to go to rob the poor. Now will you notice again verse nine, the women of my people have you cast out from their pleasant houses. And I take it that here we're dealing with a slum problem and God never would permit their furniture to be put out on the street and especially of widows from their children. Have you taken away my glory forever? God says that these children will grow up to despise you. These children will grow up to be in rebellion. We certainly had that in our day. I'm not sure but what God today has been speaking to us in many different ways.

I think the rebellion of you was permitted of God to try to shake us out of our lethargy. And it didn't do very much by the way. Verse 10, arise and depart, for this is not your rest because it's polluted. It shall destroy you even with a great destruction. Now actually what they were doing there, they were tempting to solve their problems and be at rest without being at rest with God or at peace with God. They were attempting to work it out without God. And as a result it'll come to naught. Now in verse 11 God says if a man walking in the spirit and falsehood do lie saying I will prophesy unto thee of wine and of strong drink, he shall even be the prophet of this people.

And this is biting sarcasm. God says that the kind of prophets that you want are those that will approve you of your sins. And today I'd be very frank with you. I broadcast a program that said a terrible disadvantage. I don't attempt to say things that are going to comfort you unless the word of God says it. And when it speaks of judgment I speak of judgment and that's what we have here. And I know it's not popular and a great many people, the unsaved man, he doesn't want anyone to prophesy and say that drinking is wrong and drunkenness is bad.

Of course he doesn't. And we have a great many today and unfortunately in so-called conservative circles there are few today that are approving social drinking. They say we're living in a new day and we're not under law and we can do these things. My friend, may I say this to you today? You may not have a specific rule or regulation and you are under grace today, but there's one thing for sure. If you love him, you're going to keep his commandments. And he sure does condemn drunkenness, doesn't he? And the prophets in that day that were the popular prophets, they weren't condemning the sins of the people.

They were saying nice things, popular things. But they were not speaking to the sins of the people. Now we're going to come and we'll have to wait until next time to get to it of course. But we're coming to the one of the most remarkable little passages and it's one of these striking statements that's in every chapter and it's just put in here like a ray of light in a very dark place because this is very dark this picture of judgment. But now the light's going to break in and just as it were there is a rift in the clouds and the sun shines through.

We'll see that next time. Until then may God richly bless you my beloved.

Steve Schwetz: What about you? Are you in a dark place? You know if we're honest we've all been in a dark place or maybe we're in one right now where we have no hope and no light. And then a ray of hope breaks through. And that's the gospel in a nutshell. We're lost in darkness and we look to Jesus, the light of the world. The light that shines brightly in our lives is the work Jesus performed on the cross when he died for our sins, paying the punishment that was due for our sins and then giving us the righteousness that we need to stand before a holy God.

Isn't that incredible? This is his gift to anyone willing to turn to the living and true God in complete faith and trust. The critical question is have you done that? If not, now this is your opportunity. To better understand what Jesus has done on your behalf just click on how can I know God in our app or at ttb.org. If you'd rather we email you a couple of resources on salvation just let us know by calling 1-800-65 Bible. And when you're in touch please tell us how you listen to Through the Bible. This little bit of information really does help us make important ministry decisions and to make sure that we're being faithful stewards of the resources that God provides through faithful friends like you.

So please let us know that. We're so glad that you're with us on the Bible bus and I want to invite you to hop aboard next time as we study how a man or woman's character impacts the way they live. I'm Steve Schwetz and I'll be here as always saving a seat just for you.

Guest (Male): Our story on the Bible bus today is just one step in a five year journey through the entire word of God. Come along for the ride and you'll study both the Old Testament and New Testament discovering God's great redemption story. Is this your story too?