Micah 6:6-8
6 With what shall I come before the Lord
and bow down before the exalted God?
Shall I come before him with burnt offerings,
with calves a year old?
7 Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,
with ten thousand rivers of oil?
Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression,
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
8 He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.
The people are guilty of failing to worship God as he deserves. Despite his great mercy and amazing rescue, which we were reminded of yesterday, they have not only ignored him but actually worshipped other gods instead. But what would right worship look like? Can they undo their unfaithfulness by paying off the sacrifices they owe him? If they filled the temple courts with sheep and drowned the city in oil, would that wash away their guilt? Or maybe it needs something even more dramatic. Perhaps he’d like them to offer up some firstborn children, as if he were a pagan god. Of course not!
What does God require of them? It’s not animal sacrifices. Or even child sacrifices. What would please God would be justice, mercy and humility before him. Thinking back to the earlier chapters, we know that justice and mercy were conspicuously absent in Israel at this time. Yet these things are the characteristics of God himself, so they should also characterise his people. They would be the outward signs of a people whose hearts were humble before him, and who wanted to be as closely identified with him as possible.
It’s not that ticking off a long list of just or merciful acts will enable them to earn their way back into God’s good books. Everything we’ve read so far in this book has shown us that the people are facing a problem that it is completely impossible for them to fix themselves. They can only humble themselves before their God, admit that their need of him and trust in his promise of salvation that was hinted at in chapter 5. They couldn’t have foreseen how that salvation would be worked out, but we now know. There was a firstborn who was offered for their transgressions and ours. Let’s praise the Lord for that, and let’s ask him to help to show our gratitude by walking humbly with him every day of our lives.
