Sermon Transcript

I have a great burden to share this message with you today. We have entered a part of the book that is unfamiliar to most people and often skipped, but that contains vital and urgent truths that we desperately need to hear. God recorded these events so we can learn from them. We should see in them a condemnation of wickedness and confusion in our own age, as well as the amazing patience and grace of God, not only to Israel, but to us.

With the death of Samson, we came to the end of the stories about the deliverers and now we shift to life among the people. We have seen that the Canaanites and their gods were a snare to Israel. We have seen how their leaders often failed them. But this morning we will begin to see that the problem in Israel is not an external problem. Their main issue is not foreign enemies or even the corruption and foolishness of their leaders, but their own wickedness.

They have wasted their covenant blessings and become like the Canaanites. Over the next two weeks, we will observe how their corrupted faith tries to keep the appearance of true faith but lacks its power. The main point of the message today is that

Man-made religion and worship dishonor God and cannot lead to salvation.

I am burdened to preach this text because a great deal of what passes for Christianity today is thoroughly pagan. Instead of dying to self and worshiping as God requires, many have exchanged the glory of God for the doctrines of men, covering self-worship under a thin veneer of Biblical words and religious traditions. Idols, ancient and modern, may have the form of godliness, but they have no power to save.

Friends, the fact is the Bible says God hates most of what many people sincerely believe pleases him. Leaders who should be preaching repentance and grace are too often silent or complicit. It is a tragedy that so many wander in darkness when God stands ready to forgive and to save if we will simply repent and believe. The cause is nothing more than the refusal to believe what God says about how he must be worshiped and trying to invent our own way. Verse 1.

1 There was a man of the hill country of Ephraim, whose name was Micah. 2 And he said to his mother, “The 1,100 pieces of silver that were taken from you, about which you uttered a curse, and also spoke it in my ears, behold, the silver is with me; I took it.”

It is as if we are parachuted into this home right in the middle of a pretty bad day. A woman has just learned that a lot of silver has been stolen. Something like 6 to 10 thousand dollars are missing. She pronounces a curse, calling for God’s wrath on whoever stole the money. But then her son Micah comes forward and admits that he was the one who took it, and he still has the money.

The man’s name is Micah, which is a Hebrew name that means “Who is like Yahweh”. In the ancient world, names that referenced gods usually reflected the faith of either the person or the one who named them. We therefore expect that Micah, or at least his parents are worshipers of Yahweh and considered Yahweh as the one true God.

But we also know Micah has already broken at least 3 commandments; he has coveted, stolen, and dishonored his mother. There is no evidence of repentance, but he returns the money, apparently because he doesn’t want to be under this curse.

And his mother said, “Blessed be my son by the LORD.” 3 And he restored the 1,100 pieces of silver to his mother.

When he returns the money, she pronounces a blessing on him, designed to remove the curse. In doing so, she requests the blessing from Yahweh. She uses the covenant name of God. The name that indicates a special relationship with God as one of his people, set apart for his glory. She believes that her prayers and requests, both for blessing and cursing, will be heard because they are offered in the name of the lord. There is an appearance of godliness. She prays with the vocabulary of faith, she gave her children biblical names, but the next statement should cause our hearts to break.

And his mother said, “I dedicate the silver to the LORD from my hand for my son, to make a carved image and a metal image. Now therefore I will restore it to you.” 4 So when he restored the money to his mother, his mother took 200 pieces of silver and gave it to the silversmith, who made it into a carved image and a metal image. And it was in the house of Micah.

She dedicates the silver to the Lord, again using the precious covenant name, Yahweh, the great “I am,” the living God, the Holy One, and her plan is to honor him by making an idol. She is a religious woman; I have no doubt that she thinks this is an act of faith, but brothers and sisters, this verse should be like nails on a chalkboard when we hear it. This makes no sense at all; it is like requesting a police escort to rob a bank, or asking the fire department to help you set a house on fire.

This is what happens when we are influenced by the culture and listen to our heart rather than God’s word or think we can be spiritual without truth. We end up rejecting God’s perfect worship and trying to substitute our own foolish, flawed, and offensive gifts that do not please God. Rather than praise God and give the dedicated silver to the priests, as the law requires, she returns it to her son and keeps 200 pieces to pay a craftsman to make idols for them.

In the name of the living God, who is eternal and created the universe by the word of his power, they decide to worship sticks and stones fashioned according to their own imagination. Rather than glorify the God who hears and speaks, they bow down to deaf and mute idols that can neither see nor save. They have traded the God who led them out of Egypt by a pillar of fire and through the sea, for a trinket that needs to be carried from place to place.

She thinks she is honoring God but the very words she chooses condemns her. Deuteronomy 27:15 says,

15 Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast metal image, an abomination to the Lord, a thing made by the hands of a craftsman…

This verse is the first of twelve curses upon one who makes carved or metal images, calling them an abomination to the Lord. Micah and his mother may have believed they could counter the curse she proclaimed, but now they have made themselves enemies of God. This is spiritual insanity, borne out of ignorance, and pride.

I hope it is easy for us to see the stupidity and wickedness of thinking we honor God while rejecting his word and setting up carved images. Maybe we have never been tempted to pay a craftsman to make an ephod or a statue to pray to, but it is equally wicked to set up idols of any kind. It is just as stupid and foolish to think we can create our own way to worship and just stick God’s name on it to make it acceptable. Despite this, the world and the church are drowning in the idolatry of man-made worship.

I’m not just talking about other people, although I am warning you to be vigilant. But each of us have idols in our lives that have no place in the heart of one that belongs to Yahweh. Like splinters, foreign loves lodged in our hearts and causing spiritual infections. We need God’s help to destroy them and help us to not be tempted to set up shrines to them. Sadly though, that is what Micah does.

5 And the man Micah had a shrine, and he made an ephod and household gods, and ordained one of his sons, who became his priest. 6 In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.

Now that he has his little gods he builds a shrine. He makes space to worship them. Micah is a religious man. Regardless of what they say, most people are. What Micah wants, and what most sinners want, is to figure out how to game the system to use God to get what they want. Our flesh doesn’t want to submit to God and take up a cross and follow Jesus. We want just enough of God to remove our feelings of guilt, while we pursue our own interests. We want just enough of God to get a benefit without having to change or be inconvenienced.

We think God’s word is like a buffet where we can choose what we want and leave behind what we don’t. The devil convinces us if we check certain boxes God will bless us, so we fill our worship with entertainment and our prayers with empty words, hoping we can check the box, be blessed, and remain comfortable. The enemy tries to convince us we can disconnect our religion from our love for God. Though he is very religious, Micah is not looking for a genuine relationship with God.

God established places of worship, anointed his priests and ministers, and laid out in His word how he is to be worshiped. Micah doesn’t want to bother with all that. He isn’t interested in a God who places demands on him, he wants a God who works for him. He doesn’t have time for organized religion.

This sounds familiar, doesn’t it? It’s cool these days to reject organized religion- conveniently forgetting that God is the one who organizes and regulates how he is to be approached. Yes, churches are messy. Many have even slid into weak or unbiblical thinking  but this is even more reason for godly men and women to be involved and engaged.

If the devil can’t push you off one side of the road, he is happy to push you off the other. We must be aware of his tactics and avoid errors on both sides. In Micah’s time the Spirit had not been poured out to equip all believers for ministry, so there is a priestly class, but I want to apply this to us. In the New Testament we have structure and leaders, but it is not the kind of hierarchical structure we find in business or the military. Much of the New Testament is addressed not to leaders, and not to individuals, but to local congregations. To the saints at Rome, to the saints at Corinth and so forth.

It is therefore right to resist authoritarianism in the church but that does not the existence of lone-wolf believers. God’s plan for church leadership is found in local congregations of believers committed to one another. It is the job of the leaders to equip the congregation for ministry. There is no such thing as a church of 1.

To suggest that we should withdraw from committed fellowship with other believers because there are issues is to ignore our responsibilities as believers for the discipleship and wellbeing of our brothers and sisters. The most important leadership responsibilities in the church are given not to the pastors, but to the congregation. It is the congregation that has the final say in who is accepted in fellowship and who is removed. It is the congregation that is ultimately responsible for the purity of the doctrine of the church. Look at what Paul tells Timothy in 2 Timothy 4:3,          

3 For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, 4 and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.  

In Galatians 1:8, Paul tells the congregation,

8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed.

It is directly to the church members in Colossae that Paul says, 

8 See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.  

If you are a follower of Jesus Christ, you are your brother’s keeper. It is your responsibility to guard the teaching of the church, to bear one another’s burdens, and to use your gifts to disciple others. It is impossible to be faithful to this calling apart from a committed fellowship with other believers. I wonder how many congregations have been weakened or abandoned the faith because those who should have guarded them were not there.

Every church is a collection of sinners, being redeemed by grace and learning to love each other. It is messy but that is the process God works through to make us more like Christ. There is a point at which we cannot have fellowship, but the imperfection of the church is no excuse to try and do it on your own. Charles Spurgeon captured it well when he said,

“You that are members of the church have not found it perfect and I hope that you feel almost glad that you have not. If I had never joined a Church till I had found one that was perfect, I should never have joined one at all! And the moment I did join it, if I had found one, I should have spoiled it, for it would not have been a perfect Church after I had become a member of it. Still, imperfect as it is, it is the dearest place on earth to us.”

When someone says they do not need the church because they can study the Bible on their own, that is itself evidence that they either can’t or don’t. When we are weak, we need our brothers and sisters to help us. When we are strong, we need to help our brothers and sisters. Of course, there are legitimate reasons why someone may need to be apart from regular fellowship, but a desire to avoid it is never a mark of spiritual maturity. More often it is the opposite. We need to be careful of the temptation to think we are better off doing it our way.

In fact, that is really the whole point. One way to understand the Bible is to see it as God’s rejection of every attempt for human beings to have a relationship with him on their own terms. From Adam and Eve to you and I, this is our great temptation. We think we are independent. We think God is like us, but maybe just smarter or stronger. We forget that he is not like us. We are utterly dependent upon him for everything.

Beth and I were reminded last week that our ability to even take our next step is only by his grace. Every breath is a gift, so what would make us think we could take something as marvelous as salvation into our own hands? We can’t buy the favor of God with our trivial offerings. God will not be in the debt of sinners. If we are to be saved, it will only be because God saves us and that is good news. It is good news to all who know they are weak that salvation does not depend on our strength, but his.

In God's eternal wisdom and sovereign plan, Jesus, who is God the Son—equally divine with the Father and the exact representation of His glory—willingly left the splendor of heaven and entered our world as a man. By the power of the Holy Spirit, He was born of a virgin, and lived a flawless life of perfect obedience, fulfilling every requirement of God's law.

Despite His sinlessness, He was rejected, betrayed, and crucified under the law in the place of all who will believe, fully absorbing the condemnation we deserved. Abandoned, condemned, and broken, He died and was buried for us. But, on the third day, He rose again, proving that God’s justice was satisfied and God’s wrath against our sin was exhausted. A short time later, he returned to heaven, where he is seated at the right hand of the Father, where He now reigns in glory and intercedes for His people, ensuring their salvation. And now God calls all people to repent and believe in Jesus so they can be saved. This is the gospel—the power of God for salvation through Christ alone, by grace alone, for the glory of God alone.

God invites us to abandon all other ways and to follow Jesus. He alone came down from heaven, and he alone can bring us to heaven. It is only by trusting in the promises of God and obeying his word that we have peace with God. This is the message of all true ministers of God. But we must be on guard because Satan has ministers too and they are happy to take your money and tell you what you want to hear. Look at verse 7,

7 Now there was a young man of Bethlehem in Judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite, and he sojourned there. 8 And the man departed from the town of Bethlehem in Judah to sojourn where he could find a place. And as he journeyed, he came to the hill country of Ephraim to the house of Micah. 9 And Micah said to him, “Where do you come from?” And he said to him, “I am a Levite of Bethlehem in Judah, and I am going to sojourn where I may find a place.”

Micah meets a Levite who happened to be passing by and comes to Micah’s home. The Levites were descended from Levi, the third son of Jacob and Leah. They were a tribe of priests and were the main group of ministers in Israel at this time. Remember, Micah had set up his own shrine but now he meets a young man with legitimate credentials. We are told three times the Levite is from Bethlehem, which is in Judea. Micah is from Ephraim.

This highlights that the wickedness of idol worship was not just something on the fringes, it had penetrated deep into the heart of Israel. From Ephraim to Judea, from the people to the priesthood, the worship has become corrupt. We are also told twice that the Levite is looking for a place. Unlike the other tribes, the Levites were not given a territory. They have certain towns and in Deuteronomy Moses says they may go to any place the Lord chooses and if they minister there they are supposed to be fed and taken care of. He is basically looking for a place he can be housed and fed and Micah sees an opportunity.

10 And Micah said to him, “Stay with me, and be to me a father and a priest, and I will give you ten pieces of silver a year and a suit of clothes and your living.” And the Levite went in. 11 And the Levite was content to dwell with the man, and the young man became to him like one of his sons. 12 And Micah ordained the Levite, and the young man became his priest, and was in the house of Micah.

The sin just keeps piling up like a snowball rolling downhill. This began with Micah stealing money from his mom and now we have the corruption of the priesthood. The Levite should have been offended at the offer and rebuked Micah, but he was more concerned about his bank account than his soul. It says he was content. He was satisfied to be a spiritual prostitute, a parasite and a disgrace to his office, because it was an easy life.

Following God is not easy. It requires us to take up a cross and to die to self every day. It is often not easy, but God promises to sustain us, and nobody who places their confidence in his promises will be disappointed. The Levite chooses ease over faithfulness.

We learned in verse 7 that the Levite is a young man. In verse 10 Micah asks him to come and be a father to him. He can speak the religious language and pretends to be willing to humble himself under the Levite’s spiritual leadership, but what he really wants is a priest who will serve him rather than God. The narrator gives us a hint as to the true situation by telling us that the young man became like a son to him.

Friends, it is not good to have spiritual leaders who will do your bidding or tell you what you want to hear. I often wonder if people truly understand the gravity of sin and the reality of hell. Please pray for me and for all your pastors that we would love you enough to be willing to make you uncomfortable. Pray that we would be protected from the temptation to not share hard truths because of a desire to be complemented, praised, or comfortable.  

The Levite should have called Micah to repent. By going along with this plan, the priest puts both their souls in jeopardy. Brothers and sisters, it is not the pastor who makes you feel good that loves you the most, it is the one who will tell you the truth. The Levite valued 10 pieces of silver and a suit of clothes more than he valued Micah’s soul. He feared Micah more than he feared God and that is a dangerous thing.

Our leaders here are far from perfect. Sometimes we are wrong, or insensitive, or just inadequate to the task we are trying to perform, but I can tell you this. We love you and our greatest desire is for you to come face to face with God and hear him say, “well done, good and faithful servant.” Pray for us that we are always faithful to say what God says and to follow him no matter what people think. If you pray that, your prayers will not only bless us, but you.

Micah believed that he could manipulate God. He thought if he dressed up his self-worship in the right clothes, God would bless him. Verse 13,

13 Then Micah said, “Now I know that the Lord will prosper me, because I have a Levite as priest.”    

The blessings of God are not for sale. Those who worship must worship in Spirit and truth. Just because we pray in the name of Jesus, or sing Christian hymns, or attend church does not mean our heart is right with God or that he will bless us. Micah is proof that it is possible to create worship that looks a lot like the real thing while being under the judgment of God.

We cannot ask God to bless our wickedness as we disregard his word. We cannot expect God to bless our pursuit of entertainment over the truth. When we install ministers that God prohibits because we fear being culturally insensitive, we are no better than Micah. If we get the same message from our pulpits that we can get from most Hollywood or Disney movies, we are not hearing the voice of God. If our hope is indistinguishable from the platform of our favorite political candidate, we do not know Christ. The wisdom of God is foolishness to the world, but it is salvation to those who receive it.

We must come on God’s terms. That is to repent and trust entirely in God’s promise to save us because of what Jesus has done. That means we trust what his word says, and regulate our worship and our lives by his word.

Throughout this passage, the narrator has simply described for us what happened. Although he has given us several clues, he has made no explicit comment about these events except for one. Back in verse 6, he says…

6 In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.

Friends, this is what it boils down to. When we go our own way, we are lost. We may think he is talking about a human king like David or Solomon but as we read further, we will quickly realize that no human king is up to the task. I think God is pointing us to a particular king. The one king who has the power not only to enforce the laws, but to change our hearts. The king we need is Jesus, the Messiah.

We should understand even better than they did in the Old Testament why trying to create our own religion or salvation is so offensive to God. Not only because we could never do it, but because to do so is to reject the immense price paid by the Son of God himself to accomplish it. Our main point was 

Man-made religion and worship dishonor God and cannot lead to salvation.

Friends, that does not leave us without hope because Jesus Christ died to save sinners. May we all be given the grace and wisdom to trust him and to examine our hearts for any place we need to trust him more as we rejoice in the salvation he has accomplished on our behalf.

I would like us to finish this morning by considering the words of the prophet Isaiah 66:1–2, as we reflect on these truths.

1 Thus says the Lord: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest? 2 All these things my hand has made, and so all these things came to be, declares the Lord. But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.

Amen