Monday • 10/10/2022
Proper 23
This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 1; Psalm 2; Psalm 3; Micah 7:1-7(8-20); Acts 26:1-23; Luke 8:26-39
Adding Sunday’s OT Scripture: Micah 6:1-8
This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 9 (“The First Song of Isaiah,” Isaiah 12:2-6, BCP, p. 86); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 19 (“The Song of the Redeemed,” Revelation 15:3-4, BCP, p. 94)
An audio or video version of this devotional can be found here: Apple Podcast, Spotify Podcast, YouTube
The last two chapters of Micah come to a thrilling (if complicated) climax. In Micah 6:1-8 (which would have been yesterday’s reading), the prophet presents Yahweh’s covenant-lawsuit against his unfaithful people: despite his mighty works to bring them out of Egypt, to conduct them through the wilderness, to win battles for them, and to bring them into the Promised Land—despite all the “saving acts of the Lord,” they have not kept covenant with him (Micah 6:1-5). What will restore covenant? Not works of empty religious ritual—no matter how pious looking, no matter how extreme (Micah 6:6-7).
What will restore the broken relationship is a return to the terms of God’s covenant (Micah 6:8):
Do justice. The covenant calls for Israelites to treat one another as well as strangers and foreigners (indeed, creation itself) with fairness and equity. Even rest on the Sabbath day contemplates the well-being of servants and livestock and the land (Deuteronomy 5:12-15; Leviticus 26:34-35; 2 Chronicles 36:21).
Love kindness. The term here denotes something quite different from normal English associations with “kindness” (i.e., “being nice”). The Hebrew is ḥeseḏ, perhaps better rendered as “lovingkindness.” What it calls to mind is God’s lovingkindness toward his people, which invites—actually, demands—love in return. While it might feel awkward to translate the phrase, “Love lovingkindness,” that wording brings out its true resonance. Here, Micah is saying, “Yahweh has loved you! Love him back! Worship him and only him. Worship him his way, not yours. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.”
Walk humbly with your God. The “walking” evokes Psalm 1’s “two paths” of life, one of life, and one of death. To walk the path of life calls for a non-bloated, rather than an over-inflated, sense of self. It calls for a sense of dependence, rather than of independence. A sense of one’s smallness and contingency. It calls for what Paul would refer to as “not thinking more highly of yourself than you ought” (Romans 12:3).
In the first part of chapter 7, Micah illustrates these points:
Doing justice means distancing oneself from practices like “lying in wait for blood … hunting one another with nets,” offering bribes and perverting justice (Micah 7:3).
Loving “lovingkindness” is all about “looking to the Lord … waiting for the God of my salvation” … expecting that “my God will hear me” (Micah 7:7). Loving “lovingkindness” is about worship from the heart.
The path of humility calls for “bearing the indignation of the Lord” when one has sinned, and then patiently waiting for Yahweh’s vindication (not one’s own!) in the sight of one’s detractors (Micah 7:9).
Those who “do justice, love lovingkindness, and walk humbly with their God” will indeed experience vindication, release, and peace. And that is what the last half of the last chapter of Micah promises. Micah is given a brief glimpse into the glorious future that God plans for his people and his renewed earth.
God, who first brought his people out of subjugation in Egypt, will one day expand their borders and cause his people to live “in the midst of a garden land” (Micah 7:11,14). He will bring refugees from all points of the compass—these refugees will come to God’s re-Edenized land after the desolation of God’s final judgment (Micah 7:12-14).
The God who made promises to Abraham and Jacob will prove faithful and unswervingly loyal (Micah 7:20). He will pardon iniquity and pass over transgression (Micah 7:18). He will delight in showing clemency: “He will again have compassion upon us; he will tread our iniquities under foot” (Micah 7:19).
Indeed, in Jesus Christ, Israel’s boundaries have been expanded to incorporate a worldwide “Israel of God” (Galatians 6:15) made up of sons and daughters of Abraham and Sarah from every tribe and tongue (that’s the essence of the message of Paul’s letter to the Galatians). New Creation has taken hold in and among all who are “in Christ”: “If anyone is ‘in Christ,’ there is “new creation”! The “old things” have gone away! Behold! New things have begun!” (2 Corinthians 5:17, translation mine). New creation has taken hold for the very reason that Christ has trodden our sins underfoot and nailed them to his Cross (Colossians 2:13-15). And, to turn once again to the language of Micah, all our sins have thus been finally and utterly cast “into the depths of the sea” (Micah 7:19). Praise be!
Be blessed this day,
Reggie Kidd+
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