Those Left Will Be Purified

Posted: November 13, 2022 | Author: | Filed under: Euthanasia, evil, Faithful, Idolatry, Jesus, Remnant, Sermons, Sexuality, The Lord's Supper | Leave a comment

Have you been cut off? Maybe it’s on the highway when somebody quickly pulls in front of you and you have to jam on your brakes? Maybe it’s your parent who cuts you off from cookies before supper? Maybe it is the bartender who thought you had hit your limit on the number of drinks you have consumed? Then there is a cut off that I personally find sad and that is when my wife cuts off her hair. I like long hair on Lori and do not want to see it cut off. When I met Lori, she had this super long hair and I found it very attractive as seen in her senior picture. I like long hair on girls and women. Anybody else feel this way? You have Bible for feeling this way. 1 Corinthians 11:14-15, “Does not nature itself teach you that if a man wears long hair it is a disgrace for him, but if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For her hair is given to her for a covering.” This explains why one of the saddest things for a woman who has cancer is when she loses her hair from chemo treatments. Now I admit that I have been selective in picking all that the Bible has to say about cutting one’s hair. I failed to include how in Bible times, holy men took a Nazirite vow not to cut off the sides of their beards (Numbers 6:5). Orthodox Jews do practice to this day, which is why you see them have ringlets on sides of their face. As you can see, I violate this command every week when I shave. Should I be kicked out of the church? Don’t answer that! 

I also admit that these two verses in 1 Corinthians 11 had a lot of cultural overtones and the cutting of one’s hair in ancient Corinth meant something different than it does today. Clothes and hair don’t make the man or woman. If you lose your hair for whatever reason, this does not change your identity. Your character is more important, but outward appearance makes an impression. I also have in my spiritual heritage where the denomination my grandfather helped to start forbid women cutting their hair. So, I vividly remember seeing both my grandmothers who went to churches in that denomination that when they were at home they would take out their long hair from the buns they wore and wash it. I certainly do not want to restart some rule about hair-cutting. We are recovering legalists here at Temple. But I can still like long hair on Lori, though I still find her very attractive no matter her length of hair.  My view of cutting hair presents a problem for me because my daughter makes her living through cutting hair. What I have learned though through the years is that when hair gets too long, the ends of the hair become unhealthy and split. This means that sometimes cutting off something makes it healthier and more beautiful. Did you hear what I said: sometimes cutting off something makes it healthier and more beautiful. Cutting off can lead to purity.

Today, we are going to learn that sometimes God cuts off people and things that harm us. He does so for our good! We find that in Micah 5:7-15 – God’s quarantine from the contagious of sin and the sinful. Micah is the Old Testament Book of the Bible that we have been studying this Fall. We started with the “top and tail”[1] as the English would say. We started out studying both Micah 1 and 7 – the first few and last few verses of the book, which are often so telling. This gave us the overview that God’s justice and forgiveness to the nations gives hope and should motivate us to act justly, with loving kindness and walking humbly with our God. Micah was a prophet who wrote in very disturbing and confusing times. He prophesied about the coming waves of destruction. The first wave coming from the siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians. A few weeks ago, Pastor Jason did a marvelous job explaining the bigger picture of God’s Kingdom and how we got to the time of the writing of Micah. Notice that the 10 northern tribes of Israel had just been exiled for their idolatry, which is really spiritual adultery or cheating on God. God used the Assyrians to discipline Israel. This exile of the 10 northern tribes would have had an effect on the 2 remaining tribes of Israel – Judah & Benjamin. Last week, we talked about the two southern tribes would be themselves exiled to Babylon over 100 years later in 586 B.C. But Micah goes back to the present situation of his day and Assyria was knocking on the front door of Jerusalem with their siege “in 701 B.C.”[2] This is clear in Micah 5:1, “Now muster your troops, O daughter of troops; siege is laid against us; with a rod they strike the judge[3] of Israel on the cheek.” The “they” is defined in Micah 5:5-6, “When the Assyrian comes into our land and treads in our palaces, then we will raise against him seven shepherds and eight princes of men[4]; they shall shepherd the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod at its entrances; and he shall deliver us from the Assyrian when he comes into our land and treads within our border.” But that isn’t the final word. Pastor Steve made our Staff aware this week of a poem by Lord Byron that captures well the situation with the Assyrians and God’s miraculous defeat of their 185,000-man army:

The Destruction of Sennacherib

BY LORD BYRON (GEORGE GORDON)

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,

And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;

And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,

When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,

That host with their banners at sunset were seen:

Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,

That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.

For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,

And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;

And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,

And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,

But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride;

And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,

And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.

And there lay the rider distorted and pale,

With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail:

And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,

The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.

And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,

And the idols are broken in the temple of Baal;

And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,

Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

            One glance of the Lord and the Assyrians were cut off. What remained? A remnant of God’s people. What is a remnant? God selected a group out of the people in the world to be His people that will remain faithful until the end. God has always preserved a remnant of His people no matter how hard or bad things are. A remnant are those who God leaves standing when the dust settles. 10 tribes gone, but 2 remained. But God wasn’t done cutting off. Let’s read Micah 5:7-15 now to discover what else God cut off to purify His people.  Read Micah 5:7-15! 

So how would we summarize these verses in Micah 5:7-15? Simply, God will cut off evil from His remnant! Cut off what evil? Two dangers! I believe these two dangers are still true for us today and believe that though God partially fulfilled His promise in Micah in the past, He wants to fulfill them in your life and also in the future for His people. Here is the first danger: God will cut off from His remnant evil: 1) Influencers who tempt us to do evil (v. 7-9). Look what Micah 5:7-9 declares, “Then the remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many peoples like dew from the Lord, like showers in the grass, which delay not for a man nor wait for the children of man. And a remnant of Jacob shall be among the nations, in the midst of many peoples, like a lion among the beasts of the forest, like a young lion among the flocks of sheep, which, when it goes through, treads down and tears in pieces, and there is none to deliver. Your hand shall be lifted up over your adversaries, and all your enemies shall be cut off.” Instead of the nations leading God’s people into sin and destruction, God’s people will become the powerful like the lion and do the destroying of evil. I talked about the dominists last week who think that time is now and they as a church have authority over government. Some of you had some questions about that, which are always welcome. Let me clarify by quoting Dr. Allen Tennison, professor at North Central University in Minneapolis, “The church has lost much of its authority. Do not confuse control with authority! When the church tries to control, everybody gets hurt, especially the church. But the church is supposed to have spiritual authority, moral authority and intellectual authority. We have lost our spiritual authority because we are no longer submissive to God and each other. We have lost our moral authority because of our inconsistent lives. We have lost our intellectual authority as we are no longer looked to for answers to the ethical questions of life.”[5] You may not this but I have been asked to let me named stand for being elected to our denomination’s National Council. In order to prepare for this role, I have been studying what the Fellowship in partnership with the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada has been doing to appeal to government regarding euthanasia and other ethical issues. The current government is not heeding our warning. We seem to have to lost our moral and ethical high ground. But I believe, based on Micah 5:7-9 that someday this will not be the case. God’s remnant will be cut from influencers who tempt us to do evil. I believe God will do this en masse, but He is already doing this in micro ways amongst His people the church. For some of you, I am going to give you counsel from the New Testament parallel in 2 Corinthians 6:14, “Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness?”God has called His church out of the world to be purified. We are called out and cut off. This is why sometimes the most important decision is to cut yourself off from friends and family who are spiritually bringing you down. You may need a whole new set of friends. I declare that today you have that in a church family, but not in a cult-like way. You still have agency and you can search the Scriptures yourselves rather than just blindly follow a cult-like leader who is the only one who hears from God. I’ll say it again – you may need a whole new set of friends if they are leading you down a path of destruction. Cut them off as painful as that is. Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers in any spiritually detrimental alliances such as dating or business partnerships as an entrepreneur. However, if you are the influencer (the lion) and not the influenced, then stay in that relationship for the sake of the gospel. But be careful. Even if you are the influencer, you need other believers around you to remind you and hold you accountable to living out the word of God. 

This past Sunday, the news show 60 minutes did an exposé on social media’s role in North America’s polarized political climate.[6] In other words, social media makes us angrier and super-charges the worst parts of ourselves. Social Media is all about engagement and when we get angry, we become more engaged. Think about how you may ignore somebody until you feel you are wronged by that person. The experts interviewed talked about how China’s version of Tik Tok and the version of Tik Tok we use in the West is different. The Chinese version does not allow those under 14 to be online too long (only 40 minutes/day) and focuses more educational videos that teach you about museums or science experiments. They call this the “spinach version.” Our version or the “opiate version” has kids hooked for hours at a time. A survey of pre-teens in the U.S. says that when they grow up they want to become social media influencers whereas in China pre-teens want to become an astronaut. So listen to me. I am giving us all a warning as to how much social media is affecting us, but more importantly, I am also calling us to be an influencer for the gospel. We can’t win on social media, but we can win people. God wants to cut you off from influencers of evil and maybe you need to fast from your phone for awhile.

But God doesn’t just cut off the evil influencers. God will cut off from His remnant evil: 2) idols (v. 10-15). (I know! All idols are evil, but our own we still think bring us comfort.) God will cut them off. Think of this like God getting rid of the rats and the garbage. Look again what Micah 5:10-15 says and notice the personal promises of God with the words “I will” that He has used before in 2:12-13, 4:6-7, 13. Micah 5:10-15 records these divine promises, “And in that day, declares the Lord, I will cut off your horses from among you and will destroy your chariots; and I will cut off the cities of your land and throw down all your strongholds; and I will cut off sorceries from your hand, and you shall have no more tellers of fortunes; and I will cut off your carved images and your pillars from among you, and you shall bow down no more to the work of your hands.” Bible Scholar Walter Kaiser says, “God was attacking four sources of self-reliance: 1) self-help (v. 10); 2) self-defence (v. 11); 3) self-deception (v. 12); and 4) self-worship (v. 13-14).”[7] That is helpful, but we are going to summarize these categories of idols a little bit differently and robustly. The first category of idols is a) Mobility (v. 10). God was going to cut off His people’s horses. Are horses a good thing? Absolutely! However, sometimes God cuts off a good thing when it becomes a bad or ultimate thing in our lives. Horses had military connotations, but they also had work connotations. Horses were used in the battlefield, but also just in the work field. Horses symbolized power. We even have the term “horsepower.” Horses enabled people to travel and be mobile. So, if we are relying on mobility – social mobility, work mobility, technological mobility or geographical mobility to be the thing makes us self-reliant, then God will cut it off. He loves you that much!

The second category of idols is b) Security (v. 11). Here is God’s promise in verse 11, “And I will cut off the cities of your land and throw down all your strongholds.” Does this mean that God hates cities? No, not at all. We, who are believers, will someday all live in a heavenly city (Hebrews 13:14; Revelation 21:9-27). But the cities in Micah’s day had become the people’s sense of security, especially those in Jerusalem. Remember, the siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians. The people may have thought that it was the walls that saved them. But it was the God of Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 32:19), the God of the City, who saved the people. The people could have trusted in their military. “Whenever a people trust more in their systems of defense and military preparedness than they do in the Lord of the universe, they are in for trouble.”[8] Maybe today you find yourself trusting in your security? Your emergency savings in the bank. Your home. Your job. God will cut off all of the things we are putting our security in rather than Him. He loves you that much!

The third category of idols is c) Spirituality (v. 12). Look again at verse 12 and God’s promise, “And I will cut off sorceries from your hand, and you shall have no more tellers of fortune.” We can easily dismiss this category of idols. Don’t! Even if we don’t dabble in the occult or witchcraft or sorcery, deviant spirituality is rampant and may be affecting you. Much of the spirituality out there including yoga with New Age meditative practices has dark roots. Stretching is good; inviting unholy spirits is not. Who would have thought that exercise may lead to need for an exorcism? Notice in verse 12 that it wasn’t just overt deviant and dark spirituality, but spirituality tied to money – tellers of fortune. Have you noticed how gambling has increased at an alarming rate? Some of the gambling that was found only in Las Vegas and few other casino-consumed cities is now everywhere. You can bet on every sporting event and even each play. Lotteries in the U.S. just hit a record $2 Billion this week. Their desire for greed by getting a leg up on the future and many will try spirituality to get rich. God will cut off all the spirituality that does not align with Him and His Word. He loves you that much!

God will cut off the idols of mobility, security, and spirituality, but also the fourth category of idols: d) Sexuality (v. 13-14). God’s promise in verse 13 alludes to this, though at first it may not be apparent. Let me read it to you again and then explain it, “and I will cut off from your carved images and your pillars from among you, and you bow down no more to the work of your hands and I will root out your Asherah images from among you and destroy your cities.” These idols were sexual in nature and were fertility gods and goddesses – the god Baal and the goddess Asherah. “There were overtones of sexual perversion with the pillars probably referring to Baal and his obscene phallic structures and Asherah’s female reproductive structures.”[9]Archaeology has given us clues about how sexuality and idolatry formed an unholy alliance.  One idol archaelogists have discovered dates back to the 8th century B.C., the exact time of Micah’s writing has an inscription that says, “‘I bless you by Yahweh of Samaria and his Asherah.’ This refers to the Lord and his consort goddess, an idea that is utterly contrary to the Bible. Those returning to the Lord receive instruction (4:1-2), while those that will not submit to rule receive destruction (5:15).”[10] Sex is an incredible gift from God within the bounds of marriage. Outside of it, it can be deadly dangerous and will be spiritually detrimental. This is why we find in going back to the New Testament parallel, we find the warning to avoid idols in 2 Corinthians 6:15-16, “What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols?” God will cut you off from idols of sexuality that are harming you. He loves you that much!

Cutting off can lead to purity. God’s remnant will be cut off from influencers and idols. But God doesn’t just take away something bad; He replaces it with the good. In fact, the best. His own Son Jesus. God will cut off His remnant from influencers and idols in order as they follow the Ruler from Bethlehem (v. 2). Jesus Christ came to call us away from idols and to follow Him. He came to earth, born as a baby in Bethlehem, lived a sinless and perfect life, and died on a cross in Jerusalem. He rose again so we could have fellowship with Him forever and ever.

As we enter the Lord’s Table, let’s remember that for many people around the world, they sacrifice on altars or tables to their influencers and idols. They don’t need to anymore. You don’t need to anymore. Why not? The ruler from Bethlehem made that sacrifice once and for all. Let me be clear what we believe: the Lord’s Supper is not a re-sacrifice of Christ. It is Communion; not the Cross. This is why if you have been cut off from fellowship with God because of your sin, He is calling you back to the table. Now, we have quite a few of you here from a Catholic background. You may have been taught that this bread and cup become the body and blood of Christ. However, that was not what Jesus was teaching. It doesn’t make any logical sense for Him to say on the night He was betrayed, to take the bread and say, “This is My body” when His body was actually holding the bread with His hands. However, Jesus was saying that we were to remember His sacrifice. This is more than a memorial service. I believe Jesus is very much here. He isn’t in the bread and cup as our Catholic friends teach. He isn’t around the bread and cup as our Lutheran friends believe. He is here. We are communing with Him. Here is what I want you to think about in light of God cutting off the bad to bring purity. God sent His Son Jesus to become sin for us (2 Corinthians 5:21). And this meant that God cut Him off. Remember when Jesus cried, “My God! My God! Why have You forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46) God’s Son was being separated or cut off from the Father so we would never have to be. Jesus being cut down and cut off was so that we would be purified. Those left will be purified. Therefore, this table is for all who are part of God’s remnant. To be a part of God’s remnant, you must trust in Christ alone for your salvation. You must be not like the nations who are disobedient as we read in Micah 5:15. You need to be in a right relationship with God and His family – your brothers and sisters in Christ. If all this is true, then eat heartily and be nourished by Christ!

If you follow the Ruler from Bethlehem, Jesus Christ and are trusting Him alone for salvation, you can take the layers off the cup. I want you to hold this wafer and cup as if you are holding Christ. I want you to think about how bitter-sweet it is to have your sin forgiven by Christ. And yet, I want us to love Communing with Jesus and eating with Him. Where we don’t think of this supper as just a re-enactment of a funeral or doing business with God over our good deeds and bad deeds once a month like checking your income vs. expenses sheet. Ask Jesus to meet you in a special way today. Confess your sin, but then Commune with Jesus like all of us prodigals who have returned home purified by the grace of God.

[1] I learned this term from Jonathan Griffiths in his lecture at the Heritage Preaching Lectures, October 17, 2022.

[2] W. Brian Aucker, The ESV Study Bible (Wheaton: Crossway, 2008), 1703.

[3] Aucker, 1703. (c.f. 2 Chronicles 32:10)

[4] “The ‘seven shepherds and eight princely men’ should not be taken literally, but are an example of x + 1 factor (c.f. Eccl. 11:2); therefore, an indefinite, but adequate number of leaders will be available to withstand any resistance against Messiah and His Kingdom.” Walter Kaiser, Mastering the Old Testament (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1992), 65. “It expresses a parallel between the Messiah’s actions and those who lead in His place.” (Aucker, 1703.)

[5] Allen Tennison, “The Art of Theological Preaching,” https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tI5QD_0n4jM&feature=youtu.be. Accessed November 7, 2022.

[6] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/social-media-political-polarization-60-minutes-2022-11-06/. Accessed November 8, 2022.

[7] Kaiser, 66.

[8] Kaiser, 66.

[9] Walter Kaiser, Mastering the Old Testament (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1992, 67.

[10] W. Brian Aucker, The ESV Bible, (Wheaton: Crossway, 2008), 1704.