Word of Salvation – Vol. 19 No.48 – September 1973
The Concept Of True Religion
Sermon by Rev. John Goris, Th.Grad. on Micah 6:6-8
SCRIPTURE READING: Luke 18:9-14; Micah 6:1-8
PSALTER HYMNAL: 197; 129:1,2 (after law);
25:1,2,3 (after creed); 230; 389; 491
Congregation loved by Jesus Christ our Lord,
Someone has once said that there are really only two kinds of religion:
the DO-IT-YOURSELF kind; and
the LET-GOD-DO-IT kind.
How true that is!
Every kind of religion, also WITHIN Christianity, can be classified under those headings: that means yours and mine as well!!
We know too well that only the second one of those two is acceptable to God, for it is the one in which His grace glows forth. Are we willing to let the light of God’s Word shine on our concept of religion? Are we prepared to have our religion placed under the searchlight of the Scriptures?
Let us turn to the prophecy of Micah for that purpose.
Micah lived at about the same time as the better-known prophet Isaiah, some 100 years before the exile. Both spoke about God’s judgment on the nation of Israel. Many did not see the need for such drastic preaching, for they thought that their religious life was quite in order.
God, on the other hand, did not at all think it was in order!
He says through His prophet:
“O my people, what have I done to you?
In what have I wearied you?
ANSWER ME!” (Micah 6:3).
The people’s answer shows what THEY understand religion to be (vss.6,7).
The prophet’s answer in return shows what GOD’S view of true religion is (vs.8).
So let’s take a close look at this:
THE CONCEPT OF TRUE RELIGION
1. According to Man (= Home-made salvation)
2. According to God (= Heaven-made salvation)
What is this home-made salvation like?
this DO-IT-YOURSELF kind?
There are two characteristics that stand out here:
– it is MATERIALISTIC
– it is in terms of PAYMENT,
– it’s seen as “MAKING-UP”.
First of all, it is materialistic.
It looks upon religion as having to do with THINGS,
not with the HEART as such.
Mind you, it realises that it must come before God,
it also realises that God is great, and worthy of our attention.
That leads to the idea that you cannot come to God
WITH EMPTY HANDS!
“With what shall I come before the Lord,
and bow myself before God on high?
Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings,
with calves a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,
with ten-thousands of rivers of oil?
Shall I give my first-born for my transgression,
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”
You see, that’s the kind of thinking.
Of course, religion has to do with acts of worship, it does include offerings (God Himself commanded them to His people… just read the book of Leviticus!
But here is a complete misunderstanding of the purpose of the offerings. It almost seems as if the people are driving it to the ridiculous.
Did you notice the climax?
—–burnt offerings
– excessive offerings (THOUSANDS of rams
TEN THOUSANDS of RIVERS of oil)
– extreme offerings (my first-born.
the fruit of my body)
You feel that the people are thinking deep down
that God is UNFAIR to them,
He is too demanding,
He is even cruel!
Now, let’s not just dismiss that as a particular idea of Israel of old.
These ideas creep into OUR thinking about God just as easily.
We can look upon God as the One
Who is after our money,
our time,
our children,
our talents,
our goods,
Really, don’t you sometimes feel that God is asking too much?
He shouldn’t have put your husband into the Session,
because his family needs him too?
Why must we come to church TWICE a Sunday?
It’s the only day you can spend with the family in a relaxing manner?
Why should our children be stuffed with so much religion?
They’re young, let them enjoy life a bit!
Why can’t we have a weekend on the beach,
or stay with our TV set on a Bible-study night?
These are the questions we hear and which we think ourselves.
And the Church gets the blame,
because we really don’t dare to blame God,
but God is really behind it.
He is unfair,
He doesn’t really want us to enjoy life.
BUT THAT IS NOT THE CASE AT ALL!
IT IS US! WE are to blame: OUR view of religion is WRONG!
We think of it in terms of THINGS,
that’s why we said that it was MATERIALISTIC.
It is not spiritual, it does not involve the HEART!
And in that way…
Church going becomes a bore.
Bible reading is dull and dreary.
Prayer is routine asking: “Give me, give me… give”
(and we’re surprised that God doesn’t answer).
Everything becomes a cold and formal DUTY
religious acts, that we put on!
Yes PUT ON, because it is external.
And no wonder, when we see young people leaving the church,
when parents go to church with a SIGH,
when they rarely see a smile of JOY on the faces of church-goers.
IS YOUR RELIGION LIKE THAT?
IS IT?
Is it expressed in certain FORMS
which are faithfully (yes, faithfully) attended to,
OR rejected?
O yes, we can be very FAITHFUL to our MATERIALISTIC religion!
Why that?
Well, that is the other characteristic of MAN-MADE religion.
It is looking at religion.
as a way of being rewarded by God,
as a payment, MAKING UP for our misdeeds.
Note those CLIMAXING questions again (vss.6 & 7):
With WHAT shall I come before the Lord.
with burnt offerings. . .
with ten thousands of rivers of oil. . .
with thousands of rams. . .
with my first-born. . . ?
We think of our religious deeds as…
things that should make God very pleased with us,
things that can off-set our failures,
things that bring us into credit with God.
Surely the Lord has taken notice
of the many things I have done for the church,
of the time I have sacrificed,
of the Sunday-school classes I have taken,
of the times when I spoke about Christ to others.
There are plenty of people who do far less for the Lord,
who only come once to church,
and who are too tied down to their telly to come to meetings.
That’s how we can reason,
and we do so to prove our acceptance with Him,
even though we know somewhere, somehow
that it is ONLY CHRIST, who brings us to heaven,
and that it is only HIS BLOOD that availed for my sins, all my sins!
Still we think along those lines when disaster strikes in our family,
when a child is run over,
when a job is lost.
Then we say, BUT we have served God faithfully?
We’ve done this and that?
WHY do we deserve that sort of treatment?
It can also happen
that we feel we DO DESERVE those happenings in our lives,
those misfortunes,
because we have failed God somehow,
and now He comes and takes it BY FORCE:
– we see our big losses in business
as a result of not giving God His “share”.
– we see the death of our child
as a punishment for our easy-going religion.
(“Shall I give my first-born for my transgression?)
It is amazing to see how many people
see certain unhappy events in their lives
as PUNISHMENTS from God;
that is one of the big arguments of the friends of Job.
And of course, in the end they are proven wrong.
MAN’S IDEA OF RELIGION always hinges on THINGS WE DO FOR GOD!
(That of course, is also the reason why we feel so often much better than non-Christians!)
WHAT THEN IS THE ALTERNATIVE?
2) It is a HEAVEN-MADE RELIGION.
And the chief characteristic of that kind of religion is that it is REVEALED religion:
“HE HAS SHOWED YOU, O MAN!” (vs.8)
God does not leave it up to us to decide what is good and acceptable to Him.
No one would make heaven that way!
We all fall for the do-it-yourself trap. ALL!
This is what Micah is to show to the people.
God has not left them in the dark:
“He has showed you, O man, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love mercy,
and to walk humbly with your God?”
“HE HAS SHOWED YOU…!”
Thank God He has.
From the beginning God made His Word known to man,
gradually He unfolded more and more,
(we think especially of the people of Israel!)
The prophets, beginning with Moses,
spoke God’s message to the people,
a message of grace,
a message of a covenant with fallen man:
(“I am the LORD your God who redeemed you,
you unworthy, you materialistic, you stubborn sinners,
I am your God! I saved you!)
That message of God’s grace was embodied and climaxed in CHRIST!
That’s where God’s love and mercy and justice came DOWN!
Salvation would have been utterly impossible
if God had not walked HUMBLY WITH MAN. . . sinful man. . .
the publicans and society-rejects!
IN CHRIST God showed the greatest JUSTICE
in dealing with the sin He had taken upon Himself FOR US!
IN CHRIST God showed the greatest MERCY
in reaching out to hopeless, helpless, down-trodden, sin-snared man!
IN CHRIST God HUMBLED Himself as creature, as servant,
even to the extent of being brutally slain to a cross!
The people in Micah’s days…
They knew of God’s bondless mercy and endless patience with them.
They knew of His power to deliver them from their enemies.
They knew of His justice as given in His laws.
They knew how God had come
to dwell with His HOLY PRESENCE in their midst!
YET it did not move them;
it left them cold, and loveless to the needy and widows,
they worked for their own gain.
– you can read all about it in Micah’s book!
So that’s where the true religion begins:
GOD HAS SHOWN YOU, O MAN.
God has DONE SOMETHING (Vss.4 & 5):
.brought you from Egypt,
redeemed you from slavery,
sent My spokesman to you, Moses, etc.
in one word: REMEMBER THE SAVING ACTS of the Lord!
And now…, what does the Lord require of you?
TO WALK IN THE WAY of what God has done
REMEMBERING, REMEMBERING, REMEMBERING!
God does not look for pious deeds,
He does not want formal worship,
He does not desire great sacrifices-as-such
(Remember 1Cor.13. . . .
“though I give my body to be burned, but had not LOVE….!
And of course, Jesus uses this very same text in Matthew 23:23 –
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!
For you tithe mint and dill and cumin
and have neglected the weightier matters of the law,
JUSTICE, and MERCY, and FAITH;
these you ought to have done,
without neglecting the others.”
God looks for something IN you,
not first of all for some deed BY you!
He looks for the HEART,
for LOVE.
True religion is based on a relationship: LOVE!
That love first comes from God:
I have redeemed you, you are Mine!
Look how I did it.
In JUSTICE, and MERCY, and HUMILITY!
God acted in GRACE,
the GRACE that is found in none other
but the heaven-made religion.
So God speaks to Israel (and to all of us
who think of religion as a bore, a burden,
a get-something-for-doing-something)
He says to us:
“With what have I WEARIED you?”
Did God demand some PAYMENT from us?
No!
Instead He has showed us HIS SAVING ACTS!
Has THAT touched your HEART?
THEN….
do justice,
when you have really seen my justice and righteousness in action!
Don’t wink at sin, don’t be afraid to speak up in whatever place you are!
love mercy,
when you have experienced MY mercy for your sins,
and don’t hold that grudge against your brother,
and don’t leave that drug-victim in the gutter!
walk humbly with your God,
when your God has taken the trouble to walk with you,
in your dirty shoes, stoop down to talk and walk. with Him!
Young people are often inclined to say,
“I hate religion, you HAVE to do this, and you HAVE to do that.”
“You can’t be free; I always feel pushed, forced…!”
God doesn’t do that.
You are thinking this yourself! (and maybe your parents too!)
True religion centres on what God has done:
and when you have seen that, really seen that,
then you long to be linked with that God in a bond of love!
That’s what real grace does; it amazes us more and more!
And the test of whether you have really understood God’s love…
is seen in your love to your neighbour:
DOING JUSTICE and LOVING MERCY:
And not only is it seen in your love to your neighbour,
it also shows in your love to God,
WALKING HUMBLY WITH YOUR GOD!
So what’s YOUR kind of religion?
The do-it-yourself kind?
Or, the amazing discovery of what God has done?
After all,
“HE HAS SHOWED YOU, O MAN.
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice,
to love mercy,
to walk humbly with your God!”
HAVE YOU SEEN WHAT HE SHOWED YOU?
HAPPY, HAPPY YOU!
Amen.