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[0:00] We're going to be in Micah chapter 7. We're going to read verses 2 through 8.! Micah 7, verse 2.

[0:12] The good man is perished out of the earth, and there is none upright among men. They all lie and wait for blood. They hunt every man his brother with a net, that they may do evil with both hands earnestly.

[0:30] The prince asketh, and the judge asketh for a reward. And the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire, so they wrap it up.

[0:41] The best of them is a briar. The most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge. The day of thy watchmen and thy visitation cometh.

[0:52] Now shall be their perplexity. Trust ye not in a friend. Put ye not confidence in a guide. Keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom.

[1:04] For the son dishonoreth the father. The daughter rises up against her mother. The daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. Man's enemies are the men of his own house.

[1:17] Therefore I will look unto the Lord. I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me. Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy. When I fall, I shall rise.

[1:30] When I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me. And for just a little bit, I want to preach to you on this word. Lean on the Lord.

[1:42] Amen. We need to lean on the Lord. Jesus, I so thank you for your word today. I pray, God, that you help me do a good job to deliver that to your people. God, help us today grow in your word.

[1:54] Help us understand it. Bring us understanding. God, give us the ears to hear it. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Amen. You may be seated. We've talked about it quite a bit that God gives out spiritual gifts to the people that he fills with his spirit.

[2:13] It is the intention of God when he fills us with his spirit that he would do that in a way that we would have the power to be witnesses.

[2:25] And in order to be a witness of the things of God and of the gospel and to be able to provide a testimony of the things that he has delivered us from, and part of that is that we would receive spiritual gifts from God that would be used in the edification of the body, meaning that it's, as we've talked about recently, it's to profit us all.

[2:50] The gifts that we receive is to profit us all, not just us individually. Amen. But it's to edify the body of Christ and to advance the kingdom of God and with great power and authority that comes through those spiritual gifts that we have been given.

[3:07] And he deals out those spiritual gifts to you and to me, different gifts for different purposes and for different seasons and for different times, but it is up to God and to God alone who he gives gifts to and to what number of gifts that he gives.

[3:28] And so God gives gifts as he pleases. And the spiritual gift of prophecy, we just read from a prophet in the Old Testament.

[3:39] There are several books named after prophets that were written by prophets. The spiritual gift of prophecy is one of those spiritual gifts. And God has always used a prophet to proclaim his word to people, to the people that he is trying to reach, to the people that he is trying to save.

[3:57] He uses a prophet to do that. And a prophet, when we think of prophets today, we think of someone that might be able to read our mail or tell the future or something like that.

[4:10] But the biblical prophet is just one that is preaching truth. That is prophecy, to preach truth, to preach truth to unbelievers and to preach truth to those that were once believers and that need to come back and believe again.

[4:30] That's the work of a prophet. Prophets are very burdened by the word of God. They're very burdened by this book that I hold in my hand today. Before there was this book that we are blessed to have, there were old writings and things like that.

[4:49] But God used prophets to be his mouthpiece in those days when he didn't have his written word in a Bible like we have today. Prophets are a burden with the word of God.

[5:01] Like, literally, God gives them the word to say to the people. Prophets are controversial. All through Scripture we find that the prophets were always contentious, meaning that they are always bucking the system, so to speak, or trying to get people to wake up and realize where they are and how far off course they are with God.

[5:27] And God would send a prophet to speak to the people that he is trying to reach and deal with. And they're often in your face telling you, you need to repent.

[5:39] When you read through the Scriptures, they're usually addressed to the people of Israel. And they're usually addressing things on behalf of God, where God has given them a word to speak to his people, his called out people, the Israelites, the Jews, and trying to bring them back into a place that God would want them.

[6:00] Men and women given a burden. Prophets are men and women given a burden. And that gifting of the Spirit to preach repentance in the face of those that reject the things of God.

[6:15] God sends prophets, preachers of righteousness, to those that he wants saved. And he burdens them with the word of truth. And prophets don't mince words.

[6:28] They don't sugarcoat things. And people don't like that. They don't want to be told straight that they're rejecting God and that they need to repent. People don't want to hear that.

[6:39] And so they would kill the prophet that God had sent to save them. And Jesus cried out in Matthew 23, verse 37, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not.

[7:06] Amen. All through the Old Testament, we find God sending prophets to his people, trying to get them back on track, and they would reject the prophet.

[7:17] How many times did God send the Israelites, a prophet, to preach repentance to them, that they would turn from their wicked ways and be saved? And instead of thanking God for caring enough to burden a preacher to be sent to them, instead of turning back to God, instead of receiving the preacher and his spirit-filled message of divine salvation and protection, instead they would reject the prophet and they would kill the prophet.

[7:46] But when they would do that, when they would not listen, when they would scoff and pick up rocks to throw and to stone and kill that preacher that God sent to them, and they would kill the prophet, when they would do that, it wasn't the prophet's words that they were rejecting.

[8:05] It wasn't the prophet, the words of a man that they were rejecting. It was God's word they were rejecting. It wasn't the prophet they were killing. But it was God's arm of salvation that was reaching out to them in that time that they really needed it.

[8:21] And God was reaching for them. But it was God's arm of salvation that he was extending to them in that time that they were cutting off. Amen. And instead of being gathered together under the protection of a loving and just God, they would continue in their sins and would suffer great consequences, always being defeated by their enemies, always another power in control of their lives, always all through history of the Israelites, the Jews, always ruled by someone else and not having their promised land to themselves as God had offered them.

[8:56] If only they would listen to a prophet that God would send to them and to listen to the word of repentance, to repent from their evil ways that God drawed them out originally through Abraham, out of idolatry and out of a world that only worship idols and set the Israelites apart and gave them a nation in a promised land that they would serve the one true God, a people separated from the world that worshiped idols and worldliness and all these things.

[9:27] And so these were chosen people that God brought out and put in a place and promised them land and promised them a great nation. And God chose them.

[9:39] And there was a covenant between them and God, but they would continually break that covenant. And God would send a prophet to them to try to bring them back into covenant with them.

[9:49] And what would they do? They would reject the man of God. They would reject the prophet and they would stone him and kill him. And in doing so, cutting off, amen, God's protection. And so they would go year after year, decade after decade, and even century after century dealing with oppression from the world.

[10:10] Other rulers ruling them instead of allowing God to be their ruler. Micah was a prophet. Micah wasn't a prophet near the king's court like Isaiah was at that time.

[10:24] Micah was a prophet during around the time of 740 to 780, 700 years before Christ would be born on this earth.

[10:35] Micah was prophesying being the mouthpiece for God along working with Isaiah and Hosea. Hosea, excuse me.

[10:46] And Isaiah was in Jerusalem and Hosea was in the northern kingdoms. And Micah was about 25 miles southwest of Jerusalem.

[10:57] And Micah was not a court prophet. He was not a polished, well put together city preacher. He was a rural man. If you read the book of Micah, you can understand who he was and what he was about and where he came from.

[11:13] But he was from the country. He was a redneck, I guess. I don't know. He would speak with the tone of a farmer. He was direct.

[11:25] And God gave him a heavy burden to cry out against the sins of God's people in Samaria and in Judea and Jerusalem and that area. And we read in our opening scripture how Micah was disturbed and burdened by the state of Israel being out of the plan of God and being burdened with the fact that the people all around him seem to be not keeping the covenant of God.

[12:01] And so he's disturbed by this. And so he's burdened about the state of the world around him and the world that he lived in. Amen. So I would like for us to read through this again.

[12:14] And Trevin, if you could read, begin reading in Micah chapter 7, verse 2, and I'll interrupt you as we go. But I want to break this down a little bit for us. God gave him a burden when we read our opening scriptures, how Micah was disturbed and burdened.

[12:29] Let's look at this. Go ahead. The good man is perished out of the earth. In all the earth, there isn't one good man to be found. And there is none upright among men.

[12:41] Nobody has any morals. Nobody has any character. Nobody has any integrity anymore. They all lie in wait for the blood.

[12:52] They hunt every man and his brother. Man his brother with a net. Everyone is planning to kill somebody. Everyone is trying to entrap somebody or trap another. That they may do evil with both hands earnestly.

[13:05] Everyone is really good at doing bad things. They can do it with both hands at the same time. The prince asketh. The judge asketh for a reward.

[13:17] The judges are corrupt. They take bribes. They change their rulings. The princes are corrupt. And the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire.

[13:27] So they wrap it up. The leaders in charge do whatever they want and don't have any accountability. The best of them is as a briar. The most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge.

[13:40] Even the best people of them all are still as crooked and tangled as a thorn bush. The day of thy watchmen and thy visitation cometh. Now shall be their perplexity.

[13:52] Your preachers and your prophets have warned you about this day of judgment that was going to come to you. And now that day is here and you're going to be confused. Trust ye not in a friend.

[14:04] Put ye not confidence in a guide. You're not going to be able to trust a friend. Keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom. You can't even trust your spouse.

[14:16] For the son dishonoreth the father. The daughter riseth up against her mother. The daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. A man's enemies are the men of his own house. Your sons will disrespect you.

[14:27] Your daughters will be against their mothers. And your daughter-in-laws are going to be against their mother-in-laws. And your family and your house will be your enemies. And so the prophet Micah paints a...

[14:40] Thank you, Trevin. The prophet Micah paints this picture. It's a grim picture of a society that he lived in. And what is worse is that these are supposed to be the children of God.

[14:53] He's speaking to the Israelites. He's speaking to the ones that God had called out. And this is the report that he has to give to them from the Lord. What is someone to do when everyone around them is corrupt?

[15:07] Everyone around them has their own agendas. Everyone around them is selfish and stuck in their own ways. The government is corrupt. The legal system is corrupt. Everyone is trying to get something from someone else.

[15:19] Nobody can be trusted. And there's no respect anymore. And the people of your own house are against you. Your kids are against you. Even your spouse is against you.

[15:30] And Micah is realizing all of this. And he gives the perfect answer in response to what seems like a world that is falling apart all around him. He says, Therefore, I will look unto the Lord.

[15:43] I will wait for God of my salvation. My God will hear me. Amen. Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy. For when I fall, I shall arise. When I sit all around in this darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me.

[15:59] Amen. Thank God for the word. Amen. Thank God for the light. Amen. The fact of the matter is those that do not fear the Lord have no problem being your enemy and causing you pain and misery in your life.

[16:12] And they don't fear the Lord. And so they have no problem being a problem. The worldly do not fear the Lord. They are unjust. And they have no morals. They have no integrity.

[16:23] And they are in darkness. And they are evil. And yes, that affects you. And it affects us. It affects me. We all are affected by those things. Those that reject God and take pleasure in the things that God disproves of and of cause us a lot of issues in this life that we live today.

[16:44] Isaiah chapter 50 verse 10 says, Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness and hath no light?

[16:54] Let him trust in the name of the Lord and stay upon his God. Amen. The prophet Isaiah is saying people who respect God also listen to the one that God placed in their lives as their spiritual leader.

[17:08] And a true servant of God lives completely trusting in God without knowing what is going to happen. He really trusts in God. He really depends on God.

[17:19] Amen. That is a true person that trusts in God. Someone that depends on God. He doesn't know what's going to happen, but we trust God and we believe that God's going to work it out.

[17:31] Amen. And I want to tell you kind of just quickly a little bit of a personal story. And I don't know.

[17:42] I know not everyone is going to be able to relate to this directly, but I think everyone can relate to this in some way. What control over their lives and circumstances does a two-year-old have?

[17:59] And I was thinking of myself when I was putting this together, but then I began to think of Miles, of course. And about the age of Miles is, you know, before I could remember, when I think back to my earliest memories, as far back as I can go, I can't remember.

[18:20] Before I can remember, when I was about two, about Miles' age, my parents divorced, and I had no control over that. What control does a two-year-old have over the circumstances of their life? None.

[18:32] My life was greatly affected by people that did not fear the Lord. Affected by people like the prophet Micah was describing to us in the Word.

[18:44] From the ages of two to seven, I was physically abused in extreme ways. Extreme abuse. Extreme physical abuse.

[18:55] I was in a home that was dark, that was overtaken by drugs, and there was severe physical abuse, not just to me, but to others in the home.

[19:08] I had no control over that from the ages of two to seven. What could I do? I was at the mercy of the adults in my life that were supposed to be taking care of me.

[19:21] I couldn't care for or take care of, I couldn't take care of myself at those ages, although I have some memories of trying to cook my own food during that time because I was hungry, and my adult guardian was overcome by addiction and would be strung out in the room all day and night.

[19:40] I remember probably towards the later part that I was with that parent, closer to probably six or seven years old, taking hot dogs out of the fridge, opening the package and putting them on top of a, starting a fire inside the house in a wood stove and putting the hot dogs on top of the wood stove to cook myself hot dogs.

[20:01] Not much older than miles and not much younger than Vincent. Besides that, I couldn't really care for myself.

[20:13] I didn't have that ability. I had to trust the people that were supposed to be my guardians. I had to trust the people that were supposed to be my parents.

[20:50] fear God. Have no biblical morals. Have no biblical principles. There are things that happened to you by the people that were supposed to love you.

[21:01] People that were supposed to take care of you. People that you were supposed to be able to trust. And people that were supposed to be concerned for your well-being.

[21:13] And it can be out of your control. There's nothing you can do about it in that time. And when that happens, when you experience that, we cannot come out of that and blame God.

[21:25] I mean, if anyone had, I would say if anyone had a right to blame God, I think I could blame God. But nobody can blame God coming out of that. It's not our God that did that to us.

[21:38] It's all the darkness and the evil that's in the world. It's not God. All of the disorder. All of the confusion. All of the chaos. It comes from a dark place. Not from God.

[21:52] All of the darkness comes from the enemy of God. And the enemy of God is also the enemy of our soul. The thing you have to learn in a world as Micah describes, and in a world I experienced growing up, and in a world that we still live in today, is this everlasting truth spoken by the prophet Micah.

[22:15] Therefore, I will look unto the Lord. I will wait for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me. Rejoice not against me, O mine enemies. Speaking to the devil.

[22:26] Even though it's the people that is doing the things to him, we know where the darkness comes from. We know where it comes from. There's the enemy of our souls. The enemy of God. Amen.

[22:37] It's not just the people. It carries the face of the person that abused me. It carries that face. But behind it, inside, is actually the darkness of the most evil in this world.

[22:50] And it's a spiritual thing. And so, rejoice not against me, O mine enemy, when I fall, and when I'm abused, and when I'm taken advantage of, and mistreated, and all these things, because I will arise.

[23:06] Amen. When I sit in darkness, the Lord will be my light. Amen. It could be a stranger, or it could be someone you thought was a friend. It could be your family.

[23:17] It could be the ones that are supposed to take care of you. No matter who fails you, no matter who disappoints you in your life, remember this. You can lean on the Lord.

[23:29] Amen. That's what I'm preaching here today, is lean on the Lord today. Amen. You may not be able to depend on your friends. You may not be able to depend on your family. You may not even be able to depend on your spouse.

[23:41] But you can depend on Jesus. Amen. Amen. Thank God that I can depend on the Lord today. Amen. Thank God that I can lean on the Lord. Therefore, I will look unto the Lord.

[23:53] Amen. When everyone else is unstable, I can lean on the Lord. Amen. Micah lived in a generation that trusted in walls. Amen. They trusted in their armies.

[24:04] They trusted in money. They trusted in their religious rituals. And they trusted in their alliances that they would make with other nations and other people. And this generation today is no different.

[24:15] And just like Micah watched them all fail. All the things that they trusted in failed. Amen. We too can see that all those things fail even now today in this world that we live.

[24:27] And like Micah, we have to learn to stop leaning on any other thing and any other people. And the things everyone else leaned on and start leaning on the Lord and the Lord only.

[24:39] Amen. Amen. I've covered a lot of things that we can't lean on. A lot of things that we can't trust. We can't lean on other people. We can't lean on the government. We can't lean on religious rituals from the past.

[24:54] And there's one other thing that we can't lean on. There's one other thing that we can't lean on. We cannot lean on ourselves either.

[25:04] We're not going to be able to lean on ourselves. Proverbs 3 verses 5 through 6 says, trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding.

[25:16] In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths. See, we can fear the Lord when others don't. We can be walking in the spirit and in our calling.

[25:28] We can be trying really hard and we can still fail. Because we are not perfect and we are not able to be completely just and have our own righteousness.

[25:41] We're not capable of having righteousness. The only righteousness that we have is his righteousness. And so we can't lean on our own understanding. We have to lean on the Lord.

[25:52] And we read Micah 7, 2 through 8. And 2 through 6 is about how everyone else is corrupt. And then 7 and 8 is about how he depends on the Lord. And so I want to read the next verse.

[26:04] Micah chapter 7 verse 9. It says, I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against him. Until he pled my cause and execute judgment for me, he will bring me forth to the light and I shall behold his righteousness.

[26:22] Micah goes off on how bad everyone else is around him. He proclaims that he can only trust and lean on God. And he's right in that. And then he admits that even he is a sinner and has sinned against God.

[26:36] And that he would have to bear the indignation of the Lord. And then he recognized that nobody is beyond the need of God. Like without the need of God.

[26:47] We all need the Lord. We can't lean on people of the world. We can't lean on the leaders or government of the world. We can't even lean on our own family. And we certainly can't lean on ourselves.

[26:57] The only one we can lean on is the Lord. Amen. And so Psalm 118 and 8 says, It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man.

[27:08] It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes. Jeremiah 17, 5 through 9 says, Thus saith the Lord, Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord.

[27:24] For he shall be like a heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh, but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, and a salt land, and not inhabited.

[27:38] Blessed is the man that trusts in the Lord, and whose hope is in the Lord. For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaves shall be green, and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.

[28:00] The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it? I mean, when you catch yourself depending on someone else's approval, or if you catch yourself depending on someone else's personal, unbiblical, worldly advice, or depending on someone else's strength, or depending on your own strength, and your own understanding, you need to stop right there where you are, and what you're doing, and turn from those things, and say with your mouth, and with your heart, Amen.

[28:30] I will not lean here, but I'm going only to lean on the Lord. Amen. Amen. Psalms 55 and 22 says, Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and he shall sustain thee.

[28:41] He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved. 1 Peter 5 and 7 says, Casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you. As soon as a care, or a concern, or a fear, or some kind of life pressure rises up in your life, pray out to Jesus.

[29:01] Amen. Give it to him. Fill his ears with your concerns. Do not repeat your concerns to yourself and to others first, but give it to him, and leave it there with him, and lean on him.

[29:12] We have to learn how to lean upon the Lord. Amen. We also need to learn to put into practice what we have already learned of the Lord. We learn a lot about the Lord.

[29:26] We hear teaching and preaching multiple times a week from the word of God. We do not need a special sign. We don't need God to give us a sign.

[29:38] We don't need a new feeling to come along to move us or motivate us. We have to learn to do the next thing that is made clear in the word of God that has already been given to us.

[29:52] Amen. We hear from the word of God week in and week out, and what we need to actually do is just put the next clear thing that God has shown us in his word and to practice in our lives.

[30:04] I mean, do not wait for a new feeling. Don't be searching for a sign or anything like that, but week in and week out, you're getting the word. Apply it to your life. Amen. Begin today. There are things we already know we need to put into place from the word of God, so let's be obedient to the word of the Lord now while we have time.

[30:23] Let's lean on the Lord and the things that we have already learned. Amen. Let's all stand. When we're weak or when we fail, lean on the Lord even harder.

[30:36] Weakness is not the end. Our weakness is the place where his strength is perfected in our lives. That is why it's so important to learn to lean on the Lord because we are weak.

[30:51] We will fail. Paul said, and he said unto me, my grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. And so Paul said, most gladly, therefore, I will rather glory in my infirmities, my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

[31:09] For when I am weak, then am I strong. Because he realizes that in his weakness, that's where God gets to show up and be the gap and bridge the gap and stand in the gap of our weaknesses.

[31:23] Amen. And when we have God standing in the gap in our weaknesses, then we're as strong as anyone can ever be because we have God there with us. It's important for our own growth and salvation that we recognize and admit our own weaknesses and our failures.

[31:38] Quickly, quickly recognize it. Quick, quickly shine a light on it. Do not hide your weaknesses or failures. Do not try to fix your weaknesses and failures with your own wisdom or understanding or your own strength.

[31:53] We can't lean on ourselves that way. Lean on the Lord. Ask God for his grace. Ask God for his strength to rest upon us in those moments of weakness.

[32:03] And when we feel that we've gone too far and we have nowhere else to go. Amen. So what I'd like for us to do today is to reflect on this word that was just preached to us.

[32:15] How can we lean on the Lord more? Let's walk circumspectly in our lives and try to see where it is where we've been leaning on some things that we don't need to be leaning on those things because those are unstable things.

[32:28] But we need, amen, to lean upon our Savior. Amen. Who knows we have a Savior that cares for us. Amen. We should cast our cares upon him. Amen. And let's lean on him today.

[32:40]  Lord Jesus, come on, let's find a place to pray. Let's connect this word to our souls today before we leave here. Let's just spend a few minutes.