Thrones: Psalm 122

Welcome! Today we will continue our look into the Psalms of Ascent, Psalms 120-134, today focusing on Psalm 122. We will also remember the Lord together with the bread and the cup, and following that we will gather in a circle and whoever wishes can share what the Lord has been teaching them.

When I was a child, one of the highlights of the year was when we as a family would get in the car and drive from our home in Pasadena, California northward to the resort called Mammoth Lakes, a town in the Sierra Mountains at about 9000 feet above sea level. The drive, somewhere in the neighborhood of 300 miles, took about 7 hours, accounting for stops. Now in Pasadena, it almost never snows – maybe once every 30 years the snow might stick around for an hour or so. We lived in a subdivision at the foot of the mountains north of Pasadena.  There was one mountain immediately in front of us that was lower than the ones behind it,  We were so close to it that this lower mountain blocked the view of the larger ones (the frequent smog sometimes blocked the view of them all). Anyway, that lower mountain got a dusting of snow from time to time, but it wouldn’t stick around very long and didn’t look very impressive even when it did.

This Is Not Our Home: Psalm 120-121

Good morning!  Welcome.  I am so glad for each one of you who are here today.  Do you know that God is sovereign?  Do you know what that word "sovereign" means?

I think about it a lot.  I marvel at things that happen, opportunities that come about.  I laugh at myself when I doubt God and He proves me so very wrong.  In those moments, I say to myself, “God is sovereign.”  Sometimes I’ll say to someone else, “God is Sovereign with a capital S.”  When something really awesome happens where God brings together people in ways that are completely beyond coincidence, I may say, “God is Sovereign with a capital S and a capital -OVEREIGN.”

What I mean when I say that is.  God knows everything.  He understands everything.  He brings us together with the people that we’re with because it is exactly what we need when we need it.  I should have absolute confidence that God can manage my simpleton life and my meager trials because He is sovereign over everything that’s going on in all the earth, all the time.  He may allow certain things to happen, but He has the authority and power to step in and work situations and circumstances out in any way He sees fit.

What the Lord Requires

Micah 6:1-16

Welcome! Today we are continuing our study of the book of Micah, focusing in on Chapter 6. I want to start today by reviewing briefly some aspects of the covenant God made between Himself and the people of Israel at the time of Moses. This covenant was a conditional covenant that that either could lead to God’s blessing or cursing of the people, depending on whether they kept their part of the agreement. The agreement, or Law, included the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20) along with many other commands, totaling about 600 requirements, about half of them positive (things to do) and half of them negative (things to not do). Through Moses, God told them:

See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse—the blessing if you obey the commands of the Lord your God that I am giving you today; the curse if you disobey the commands of the Lord your God and turn from the way that I command you today by following other gods, which you have not known. When the Lord your God has brought you into the land you are entering to possess, you are to proclaim on Mount Gerizim the blessings, and on Mount Ebal the curses. – Deut. 11:26-29

Majestic Shepherd

Micah 5:1-15

Before we begin let’s pray and ask God not only to allow us to hear His message but to inscribe it on our hearts and memory so that we can by faith persevere in this world until He returns and sets all things right on earth again as they are in heaven.

Today we will continue our series in the book of Micah.  As you will remember in Chapter 1, Micah, speaking the words of the Lord, pronounces the coming destruction and laments that it is to be. In Chapters 2 and 3, Micah explains further the reasons for the coming destruction; in Chapter 2 the focus is on the acts of the people, on the Israelite society, and in Chapter 3 the focus is primarily on the actions of the leaders of the people. The foretold destruction did come to pass; first, the northern kingdom (Israel) fell to the Assyrians, and later, the southern kingdom (Judah) fell to the Babylonians.  In chapter 4 Micah prophesied of the coming Kingdom and as Carl mentioned the Kingdom of God is coming, but the Kingdom of God is here. It is both “now” and “not yet.” It is now because Jesus lives inside of each believer and it is not yet because His second coming will be on the clouds to reign on earth as He does in heaven. Today we are going to look at chapter 5 where the focus is on the return of "Majestic Shepherd" whose place of birth and whose future majestic reign and greatness and whose inevitable vengeance in Anger and wrath the prophet Micah was foretelling. We begin with Micah 5:1: