Would you take your Bibles, please, and open up to Micah, who is one of those voices for the Lord? It tells us to do justice and to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God. Sometimes it's hard to understand what the prophets are saying. It takes good listening skills and listening is a matter of someone speaking clearly and us hearing clearly. I have a little granddaughter who you were praying for for years, Abigail, who's three now, and she had an inability to swallow when she was born. She had a tube down her nose for about a year and a half. And she's fine now. Thanks to your prayers. She's in good health on her growth curve and doing well. But she does have a little bit of a speech, a little bit of a lisp when she talks. And so the other day she was watching a show about animals on the Discovery Channel and she walked into the kitchen and said to my daughter, Joanna, her mother, she said, Mama, Jesus is a cat really.
And Joanna said, Jesus is a cat really? And she said, yeah. So Joanna said, where is this going theologically? She said, Abigail, Jesus is a cat and Abigail said, no mama. Listen, Cheetahs are a cat really.
There's a big difference between Jesus and a cheetah, the creator and the creature. And sometimes there's a big distance between what Micah is saying and what we hear. Sometimes the prophets are given, in my opinion, a bum rap. They're considered to be harsh and bold. In fact, to be prophetic is often a euphemism for being blunt. But if you really listen, if we had good listening skills, we would see that the prophets warn us, plead with us, pray for us, exhort us, and always offer us a word of hope. Micah in chapter 3 is talking about what it is that blesses a nation. He's speaking in a poetic and in a prophetic tradition that's throughout the Old Testament. Like David in Psalm 33, blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people who may have chosen as his heritage. Or the sons of Asaph in Psalm 144. May our sons and their youth be like plants full grown. Our daughters, like corner pillars, cut for the structure of a palace. May our granaries be full, providing all kinds of produce. May our sheep bring forth thousands and ten thousands in our fields. May our cattle be heavy with young, suffering no mishap or failure in bearing. May there be no cry of distress in our streets. Blessed are the people to whom such blessings fall. Blessed are the people whose God is the Lord. That is the poetry of many a prayer and many a song. Blessed is a nation whose God is the Lord. Blessed are the people whose God is the Lord. And it is the the statement of God in the Bible and the belief of the Christian church that when God is acting in a land into people through the resurrected and living Jesus Christ, then there is blessing. God told another prophet, Jeremiah, if at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck it up and break it down and destroy it. And if that nation concerning which I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I intended to do to it. But if at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build it up and plant it. And if it turns and does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will relent of the good that I had intended to do for it and will destroy it. It is God who says that he is the one who builds up and who brings down nations based upon how well they listen. If they listen to his voice, if they listen to his son Jesus Christ, if they respond to Jesus Christ's Lordship over their homes, their churches, their schools and communities, their nation, then they will be blessed. And if not, they will be in trouble. Michael speaks in that tradition. And he realizes that in his own nation, Judah, there was a balance of powers. You know, we have the same in America. We've learned this in senior high civics. That in our government there are three branches. There's the executive branch, the office of the presidency, who was responsible for the administration and the coordination of the government. Assisting him is the Congress, the legislative branch of the Senate, and the House of Representatives, who actually make the laws and create the budgets and set the course of the nation. And assisting those two branches is the judicial branch, the Department of Justice, headed by the Supreme Court and a series of courts and attorneys throughout the different levels of society. When these three work in harmony under the leadership of the Constitution, then we have what we call a balance of powers and our nation prosperous and does well. When that is lacking, we are headed for disaster and demise. Back when Franklin Delano Roosevelt became president, because of the crisis of the Great Depression and then the Great War, World War II, much of the responsibility that in the judicial and in the legislative branch were foisted upon the presidency. And in these hours of crisis, FDR performed brilliantly. He guided our nation to economic recovery and to victory on a worldwide stage that preserved our leadership among the nations of the earth for almost the better part of a century. But the balance of powers never went back to what they originally were. The presidency each year assumes or is given more power and executive privilege than was originally intended by our Constitution. It appears that the Congress becomes weaker and weaker each year plagued by partisan politics and gridlock because of its tension with the White House and our courts beginning with the Supreme Court assumed to themselves the power of making and shaping laws rather than interpreting the Constitution. And we as a nation are suffering for it. As a result, many Americans do not trust our government. They feel that it is neither just nor caring in its government of the people. This corruption of the balance of powers is causing all sorts of problems for everybody. Well, the same was true in Micah's day. There were three branches of the government. In this theocratic government where God rained, he rained through three offices. There was the office of the king and his court, which we would call the administrative or ruling branch. There was the office of prophet who was the conscience of a nation who received revelation from God and spoke to the people and spiritually guided the king and therefore the nation. And there was the office of priest and the courts that they served under that administered the law of Moses and applied the spiritual blessings of the covenant to the people. By the time that Micah was preaching, there was an imbalance in those powers. And they were corrupted at all levels. James Montgomery boy says, all three branches of government were corrupt. Worse yet, they worked hand in hand. The politicians got the way in the courts and the judges were paid for their destruction of justice. The prophets also benefited from this arrangement and supported the government in turn. This is not a new theme. It was already hinted at in chapter two, but here in chapter three we see it in its full measure in full picture. Micah addresses the problems of his people in two paragraphs in this chapter, but three messages. There are three separate oracles or statements by Micah. Each one of them four verses long and each one of them having three parts. A party or an office that is addressed an accusation that is made and a warning about something in the future. He addresses the rulers, the prophets and the priests. And he addresses each one as they were constituted under God's the oxen. Now here's where listening to the prophets and preaching them does become difficult. We cannot take whatever the prophets say and transfer it over to America, lock, stock, and barrel. Because the prophets lived in what we call a divine theocracy. God was their king, ruling them through prophets and priests and kings or judges. We live in a representative democracy where the people rule themselves through elected officials who are presidents and congressmen and judges. So we can't take whatever God legislated for Israel and say that it applies to America. But there are general principles like do justice and love mercy and will accompany with your God that do apply to us. And more importantly, there are spiritual lessons that apply to the Old Testament Church Israel that do apply even today to the New Testament Church in which we live. I do not feel called to speak as a voice for America because America has no prophet. If it does have one, it's the Reverend Billy Graham and not I. But I am a pastor of a church and it is my duty with your help to pull out from this text what principles apply to us and to see how God might bless our nation through blessing its churches. And that's the slant I'm going to take on this chapter this morning. There are three issues that Micah deals with that apply to us in the church today. Godly rule, godly preaching and godly ministry. Let's look at them one at a time. If you look at the first four verses, the first oracle, first little message in this chapter, Micah is talking about the importance of godly rule. And I said, here you heads of Jacob and rulers of the house of Israel, is it not for you to know justice? You who hate the good and love the evil, who tear the skin off my people and their flesh from off their bones, who eat the flesh of my people and play their skin from off them, break their bones and pieces, chop them up like meat and a pot, like flesh and a cauldron, then they will cry to the Lord, but he will not answer them. He will hide his face from them at the time because they have made their deeds evil. Micah speaks here in hyperbolic language, she exaggerates to make a point. And he's pointing to the rulers, that's who he's addressing, the king in his court and the elders, the administration we might say of the king under whom he preached. I want us to see that as Micah addresses these three offices of prophet and priest and king, he's really talking about the ministry of Jesus Christ. Because the Bible presents Jesus Christ as a prophet, a priest and a king. Our little Westminster Confession says, Christ as our Redeemer executes the offices of prophet, priest and king both in his exaltation and in his humiliation. It's easy to see how Jesus Christ is a prophet. The author of Hebrew says God has spoken in many portions and in many ways in ages past, but in these last days he has spoken to us in his son. So our little Catholicism says, Christ executes the office of prophet, we're revealing to us by his word and spirit the will of God for our salvation. We believe that Jesus Christ is still speaking to the church and to the world in his prophetic office. He's also a priest. That's perhaps the easiest thing to see because the author of Hebrew tells us that we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the son of God, therefore let us hold fast to our confession, for we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are in yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need, for he is able to save to the utmost those who draw near to God through him because he always lives to make intercession for them. Jesus Christ as the high priest offers himself is the ultimate lamb of God to take away the sins of the world. He continues to minister to us through acts of mercy and healing and tenderness and prayer which were the duties of priests. Christ executes the office of priest. It is once offering up of himself a sacrifice to satisfy divine justice, to reconcile us to God and in making continual intercession for us. Jesus Christ is also the king. He's the king of kings and lord of lords, but he's the head of the church. All things Paul says and divisions have put under him. Christ executes the office of the king in subduing us to himself, in ruling and defending us and in restraining and conquering all his and all our enemies. When we go to the back of the Bible to the book of Revelation, and I'd ask you to turn there for a minute, to Revelation chapter 19. We see Jesus Christ coming in glory bearing all three of these offices with himself, prophet and priest and king. The book of Revelation chapter 19 verse 11. And then I saw heaven opened and behold a white horse. The one sitting on it is called faithful and true. And in righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire. And on his head are many a diadems. And he has a name written that no one knows but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood. And the name by which he is called is the word of God. And the armies of heaven arrayed in fine linen, white and pure were following him on a white horse. From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the wine press of the fury of the wrath of God, the almighty, known his robe and on his thigh. He has a name written king of kings and lord of lords. Here is Jesus Christ coming as a prophet. He's called the word of God out of his mouth comes this two-edged sword. An image often used in the Old Testament prophets says they proclaimed thus they of the lord. He's presented as a priest. He's wearing a robe what's called literally an ephod. A white long robe the priest wore and on it is blood the blood of sacrifices soon the blood of judgment. And he is a king on a horse making war ruling the nations with a rod of iron with a tidal king of kings and lord of lords. This is not just a apocalyptic symbolical picture of Jesus Christ. This is who he actually is today. Speaking to the world, ruling his kingdom, ministering to us through his mercy and grace, cleansing the nations with his blood, saving mankind for his father and for himself. And Jesus Christ continues to live in the church this way. And he continues to exercise the office of prophet priest and king through the people he calls to serve him. The Bible says that the church is a priesthood of believers. He speaks as a prophet through men he's called to preach. He rules through elders in the church. And although we are no longer toning for sins because that had been done once for all, Christ continues to do his work of priestly ministry through deacons and people who care for one another. So these offices that Isaiah talks about in the old testament apply to us today in the church. Micah's first address is aimed at the rulers, the king in his courts. And I said, here you heads of Jacob and rulers of the house of Israel. Heads and rulers are who he's speaking to and address to those responsible for justice and the equitable treatment of God's people under a constitution known as the mosaic covenant. These people were failing in their responsibilities. They were not only unfaithful in what they were supposed to do, but they were unkind in all of this. So in addressing these men, he brings an accusation. You who hate the good and love the evil, who tear the skin off of my people, their flesh from off their bones, who eat the flesh of my people, play their skin from off them, break their bones in pieces and chop them up like meat in a pot, like flesh in a cauldron. Now again, he's speaking in a saturated form. But he's doing so to make a point that these men who were in office as rulers of Israel made decisions that affected the very life and welfare of their people. He'd already said in chapter 2 twice that they were abusing the people. And now he again points to the fact that their power, they were using for their own gain and they were treating people like something to be consumed and discarded. And so he brings a warning against them. Then they will cry to the Lord and he will not answer them. He will hide his face from them at that time because they have made their deeds evil. Mike is predicting the Babylonian invasion when these rulers and it's told the story in second chronicles as well as the second kings would run to the temple and cry out to the Lord for mercy that God would save them from the barbarian and from their abuses. And God would say to them, no, friend the day that the people cried out to me, you did not listen. This is some word, but there's a principle here. The principle is this that men who hold office and have the power to legislate, to guide, to govern, to guard have to do so according not to their own standards but to a constitution to a standard that God brings, not seeking their own agenda but the agenda of God. Now we can see this in our own country, how oftentimes American citizens are bewildered by the fact that our men of power and women of influence in Washington, D.C. don't really follow the constitution but violated. It bothers us and it should because that constitution is the contract between us and our leaders. It's the meeting ground where we agree on who we are, what we're going to be, what we're going to do and how we're going to do it. Well, I want to tell you that the Presbyterian Church is like that. In fact, those who studied American history know that our government is modeled after the Presbyterian Church. In its two offices, Elder and Deacon, and there's two houses, Senate and Congress, and it's General Assembly, the Federal Government, its Presbyterian, its regional courts, and its session, its local magistrates, and there is a constitution that governs us. One of the great mistakes people make about the Presbyterian Church is they say, well, it's a rule by a body of men. That's not true. Neither I or any of the officers you elect rule you by our own standards. Our government is a government by a constitution. That constitution is the Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms and the Book of Church Order interpreted by the Word of God. So there are three objective documents, the Supreme and infallible standard, the Bible, and two subordinate standards that could be wrong but are important to us. The Westminster standards and the Book of Church Order, it is these that you have elected me, the other pastors and elders of the Church to apply to you in an equitable and just manner. That is the common ground that we have. When you go through the discovery class and I tell you what our government is and what our doctrine is and how the Book of Church Order works and what your powers and privileges are and what those of the sessions are, that is the contract we make. And our just and equitable government of this people whom God has placed in our hands as elders is dependent upon the execution of that constitution in a fair and even-handed way. Not what we want or what our wives want or what our special interest group in the Church wants. That is the problem with America. We are being run by special interest groups rather than a mind for the corporate good. When we interpret this thing properly, God seems to bless us. In fact, we take a vow. Do you believe the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament as originally given to be the inherent Word of God and the only infallible rule of faith and practice that we say we do? Do you sincerely receive an adopt? The confession of faith and catechisms of the Church as containing the system of doctrine taught in the Holy Scriptures and do you further promise that if at any time you find yourself out of the court with any of the fundamentals of the system of doctrine, you will on your own initiative make known to your session the change which has taken place in your views since the assumption of this ordination vow and we say we do. Finally, do you approve of the form of government and discipline of the Presbyterian Church in America in conformity with the general principles of polity reflected in the Book of Church Order and we say we do? It is our responsibility as elders to guide, to guard and to govern you precious people by this Constitution and when we do that it is an even-handed just and fair treatment of biblical truth applying to everyone's life in a fair way and God will bless us. What we need to do is to pray for our elders. I'm here to tell you that I've never served with a session that was as respectful of the people and as obedient and sensitive to the Word of God, the confession of faith and the Book of Church Order as the elders we have here at Christ's covenant. I am privileged to serve with them. I can attest to you without any equivocation that they are always looking to see what is the Bible teaching and what our confession and Book of Church Order say and they're attempting to do that in an even-handed way. It's not easy, it's difficult and they need your prayers. They are assisted by the office of prophet, the preacher, now the preacher. That's another question. And Micah addresses him when he talks about the nature of godly preaching in his second oracle beginning in verse 5. Thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who lead my people astray who cry peace when they have something to eat but declare war against them who puts nothing into their mouths. Therefore it shall be night to you without visions and darkness to you without divination. The sun shall go down on the prophets and the day shall be black over them. The seers shall be disgraced and the diviners put to shame. They shall all cover their lips where there is no answer from God. But as for me, I am filled with power with the Holy Spirit of the Lord and with justice and might to declare to Jacob his transgression into Israel his sin. Micah addresses the prophets. Notice it's in the plural. He's speaking not just to himself but to Hosea and Amos and Isaiah, his peers and to other prophets, perhaps hundreds of them whose names we don't know. Micah identifies himself in the opening paragraph and is spoken about in Jeremiah chapter 26 as one of the sons of the prophets. He was a professional prophet. Amos on the other hand was not. He was a farmer, a tender of plant life, of vines who was called and a shepherd who was called into the ministry. But these prophets who followed in the school of the prophets established by Elijah and Elisha were given the word of God and they were to speak it clearly. These prophets, he says, were being unfaithful. Here's his accusation. You lead my people astray and cry peace when they have something to eat and declare war upon him who puts nothing in their mouths. When the people feed them well and pay them well then they tell people everything as well, everything's fine, peace. But when they don't get what they want, they don't make enough money, they don't get the right kind of benefits then they turn on the people and preach against them. These are men, Micah is saying, who were in the ministry for their own gain and really didn't care about the people. Micah is hard on these prophets and he should be. He's won himself. He knows what's expected of a prophet. Just as preachers are critical of other preachers, I know that sometimes I'll stand up here and quote a guy who's a preacher and criticize him and then then he'll say, why are you being unkind? I'm not being unkind. It's like a doctor who holds another doctor to a high standard or an attorney who was concerned that other attorneys lived by the bar. Preachers know what shenanigans, other preachers and what they themselves can fall into and how important it is for preachers to be even keeled and even handed. To preach the peace of the Lord, whether it's good or it's bad, whether it's easy for them or hard for them, we're not preaching for ourselves. We're preaching for the Lord and we're preaching for your benefit. So Micah says, here's the warning. If you continue to do this, night will be for you without vision, darkness without divination, the sun will go down, the day shall be black, the seers will be disgraced, the diviners put to shame, you will cover your lips and have nothing to say because you had no word from the Lord. In other words, unless these preachers repented of their sins and were faithful to love the people and tell them the truth, whether it served the preacher well or not, whether it brought him benefit or difficulty. Unless that happens, God was going to be silent to cover their minds and spirits with darkness and to take away the respect people had for them and make them ashamed. New testament preachers who fill the office of profit for Christ in the church have the same duty and comfort upon them. Listen to Paul, the preacher, speak to Timothy another preacher. I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ who is to judge the living and the dead and by his appearing in his kingdom, preach the word. Be ready in season and out of season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and instruction for the time will come when people will not endure sound teaching, but having their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions or turn away from the truth and start listening to myths. As for you, always be so reminded, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist and fulfill your ministry. Preaching is not easy, folks. They will come a day when I will take this mantle off and give it to a younger man that day is not too far in the future. I'll miss preaching the Bible. I said that to Jane many times, I don't know what I'm going to do the first year on Sunday morning. Pity, the church and the preacher I sit under that first year, but I'll tell you what I won't miss. I won't miss the weight of that mantle and that responsibility. I will not miss 1200 souls looking in my eyes every Sunday and feeling that if I just don't get it right, horrible things will happen to them. If you pray for your elders, please pray for me and the other pastors. I'm not the only prophet in our midst, Bernie and Bruce, Chris, Gabe, Mike, Andrew and Dave, we all are and we need you to pray for us. We need you to ask that we will get it very clear. Jesus really is God and not a cita. And we want you to pray that you learn how to listen when we have a word of peace, a word of warning. He turns finally to the third office. They're buried in this thing called the court, but he speaks to the priests and the nature of ministry or service. Verse 9, his third oracle, hear this, you heads of the house of Jacob, rulers of the house of Israel, who detest justice and make crooked all that is straight, who build Zion with blood and Jerusalem with inequity, its heads give judgments for a bribe, its priests teach for a price, its prophets practice divination for money, yet they lean on the Lord and say, is not the Lord in the midst of us? No disaster shall come upon us. Therefore because of you, Zion shall be ploughed as a field. Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins in the mountain of the house of wooded height. He speaks now in verse 11 to the priests. They're part of this court of kings and prophets that known eventually as the Sanhedrin, the ruling body of Israel, the ones that Jesus always had such conflict with. He speaks to these priests not because they have to make sacrifices for sins. He knows that there's a high priest coming who will do that once for all. He speaks to them because of their mercy ministry. They were called to care for widows and orphans, strangers to poor and the homeless, to administer the temple treasury to help the needy, to heal the sick and cleanse the lepers and the unclean, to pray for people, to settle disputes about mosaic law, to teach the people and what was equivalent to our Sunday schools about the word and its application today they live, to bless the saints and to maintain and manage the temple. They had what we call a ministry of service and they were not faithful. Hear this, you heads of houses of Jacob, rulers of the house of Israel and you priests who teach for a price. They too, it appears, were in the ministry from money. They were not concerned about justice or about the violence and bloodshed around them or faithful teaching of the word of God or practicing mercy. And so he gives them a warning because you were telling the people something false. When everything was going so bad here's what the priests were saying. Disaster will never befall us because God dwells in the temple. Micah has a horrible prophecy. Some day the presence of God, the Shakyana glory will leave the temple and a man named Nehka Bonesa will do the level of this city and burn this temple to the ground and you will not be saved because the Lord is in his holy temple. Jerusalem and the mountain of the Lord Zion will become a heap of ruins. Again, Micah points to the importance of the priestly ministry of mercy and justice and caring. Do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with your God. This priestly office is obviously reflected in the office of the Deacon in the church. They are called to care for the widow of the orphan, the refugee, the stranger, the homeless, the needy. They too manage the property not of a temple but of a congregation and its church buildings. They collect funds for the distribution of things. They assist the elders in all of their doing and they lead in reaching out in ministry a congregation known as a holy priesthood, a royal priesthood, a people who are a priest and a kingdom to God in heaven according to the New Testament. Our book of church order speaks very highly of the Deacons. The office of Deacon is set forth in the Scriptures as ordinary and perpetual in the church. The office is one of sympathy and service after the example of the Lord Jesus Himself. It expresses also the communion of the saints, especially in the helping of one another in time of need. It is the duty of the Deacons to minister to those who are in need, to the sick, to the friendless, to any who may be in distress, is their duty also to develop the grace of liberality or giving in the members of the church to devise effective methods for collecting the gifts of the people and distribute these gifts among the objects for which they are contributed. They shall have the care of the property of the congregation, both real and personal, and shall keep in proper repair the church edifice and other buildings belonging to the congregation. Now listen to this. It is often expedient that the session of a church should select and appoint godly men and women of the congregation to assist the Deacons in caring for the sick, the widows, the orphans, the prisoners, and others who may be in need in any distress or complication situation. It is the priests among us, our Deacons. Who gather your gifts and your ministries, your money and your spiritual talents, and activate you into ministry caring for yourselves, one another in the church, and people out in the community. Paul says of these Deacons, those who so well as Deacons gain a good standing for themselves and also great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus. Those who so well as Deacons, Paul said are held in high esteem. People love them. In fact, because of the personal touch, the caring when people are in need, the helping them in finances, it is often the case that people in the congregation feel much more affection for their Deacons than they do their pastors and their elders and rightly so. We have a remarkable group of Deacons in our church, men who are helping us and pushing us out into ministry to each other and to the church who have increased our stewardship, both our giving and our spending of our money and a more effective and I think biblical manner and they have a good standing among us. They deserve the esteem. They assert respect and affection and adulation that we give them because they are doing what Jesus Christ said is the greatest thing of all for the greatest among you is the one who serves and these men are leading us in the way of Jesus Christ. For Christ, the ultimate priest said, behold, I stand among you as one who serves. This is how God blesses a nation by filling it with churches who have faithful elders and diligent preachers and caring Deacons and the congregation who embrace these offices themselves being prophetic in the way they share the word of God, the gospel of people, being priestly in the way they care for those who are hurting without judgment, with mercy and humility and being people who are encouraging others to come under the rule of Jesus Christ by bringing the rule of Christ in their own lives and their own homes, their own institutions. If these officers fail,
the nation is afflicted with all kinds of evils. But if they are faithful, Christ works through them. You see, ultimately, Mike is speaking about Jesus Christ. Christ was alive. Christ was not surrendered any of his offices as prophet, priest, or king Christ who loves the church and loves our country. Christ who wants to speak into our lives, who wants to apply the benefits of his atonement to each one of us, wash away our sins, who wants to call us to repentance and faith into his kingdom, who wants to serve us with all of his great mercies because he always lives to make intercession for us and to be concerned for us. That's how Jesus Christ works in America. That's how he works in Matthews and that's how he works in our life. Through his own offices and through the men and women he's called to help him in these things. And he is warning us and exhorting us and encouraging us that he really does have a blessing in store for all of us. Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord Jesus Christ, prophet, priest, and king. Blessed are the people who are so favored, blessed are the people whose God is Jesus Christ. I think it's a great privilege for you and I to be part of the church. I think it's an even greater privilege to be part of that kingdom, to enter by faith into the kingdom of Jesus Christ and I believe the ultimate privilege we have in this life is to use our money and our gifts to serve the Lord Jesus Christ and to bring this blessing to the nations of the earth. Micah has a good word for us if we're listening. Not a word about cheetahs but a word about Jesus Christ. Blessed are the people whose God is prophet, priest, and king whose God is the Lord Jesus of Nazareth. Let's pray. Father, it is our great privilege to sit under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, to enter through faith into his kingdom. That's how Jesus Christ would describe salvation to us. He would say, you must enter the kingdom of God. And so we want to be his subjects. We want to be ruled by him as our king. We want to be instructed by him as our prophet. We want to be minister to and cared for by him, comforted him, and encouraged as he is our faithful priest. We ask him to take his blood and wash away us and our children's sins to a thousand generations. We have an opportunity this morning. Those of us who've never done so to engage this Jesus Christ, to receive him by faith and with him the joys of his salvation and to join his church, his outpost of the kingdom of God and join this priesthood of believers who are commissioned to serve themselves in one another and the world with these wonderful privileges of ruling and teaching and serving. We pray on this commitment Sunday as we come forward that there would be three gifts given to you. The tithes of our income, the spiritual gifts you've given us for ministry, and our own lives as we surrender them in faith to Jesus Christ. We ask you to continue through us to bless us and our children and bless the nation in which we live for which we have so much love and affection and instill these principles in us again that we might do justice and love mercy and walk humbly with our God all by his grace and all for our good and for the glory of Jesus Christ and whose name and for whose sake we now pray. Amen.