He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God? (Micah 6:8)
I Won’t Do That: Will I Live a Life that Pleases God?
Micah 6:8
I thoroughly enjoy writing these Monday devotionals each week for the nearly five people who read them (give me a shoutout this week if you’re one of those awesome people). My favorite part of this exercise is getting to share stories that didn’t quite make it into Sunday’s sermon. Sometimes the story that I enjoyed the most didn’t quite fit into the structure of the message and it’s painful to leave it on the cutting room floor. These devotionals give me the space to share that different perspective on whatever text we’re considering from the scriptures. This week is one of those weeks.
Micah shares such a simple, but difficult calling for what it means to live a life that honors God’s requirements for us as His people. The calling is simple, because it’s not hard to understand, but it’s difficult, because it requires a whole life commitment to honor God in how we engage the world around us. Because of His work in our lives, God now requires that we do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with Him. A life that is pleasing to God is one in which we: act in fairness and equity toward others; approach the world in a way that shows others the kind of loyal, covenant love God shows us; and live in humble communion with the One who saves us by grace. It’s so simple. But a lot of people in Micah’s day and a lot of people today hear that challenge and say, “I would do anything for love, but I won’t do that.” Many, like Micah’s neighbors, are willing to make great sacrifices and offerings to God but unwilling to live with obedience in these practical ways.
As I thought about this challenge and what a life of doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with our God looks like today, I kept thinking about a really interesting experience I had a while back. We were taking a love offering for a family in our church who was going through hard times. I shared a bit about their struggle without mentioning their names, because, though I knew they needed help, they hadn’t asked for any and weren’t expecting any. We collected that offering and the next week I got to go deliver a check for them that Cindy had prepared. When I sat down in their living room, handed them the check, and explained our desire to help, the wife, though very appreciative of the gift seemed perplexed. She asked, “Was this the offering that we took on Sunday?” I told her that it was. She smiled and said that she had leaned over to her husband and said, “That family’s going through what we’re going through.” Then she reached in her purse and found some money to contribute when the plate was passed. From their situation of struggle that was so significant that we decided to take an anonymous love offering for them, this family found a way to give, thinking they were helping someone who was also struggling in the same way. I’m not sure what doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God will look like as we go through this week, but I suspect it will look something like that.