What Does the Lord Require of You? (Mic 6:8 NAS95)

 “What Does the Lord Require of You?” (Mic 6:8 NAS95)

Thinkers and cultures have asked this question throughout human history. We have always had a sense that we owe religious beings something, and are accountable to them. Depending upon how this “god” or “gods” is conceptualized, the answer changes.

But we are not left to the game of “anybody’s best guess.” People and prophets have put themselves forward to claim that they have particular insight into their god(s), and what they demand. We are all dependent upon intuitions or revelations.

As Christians, we have a particular revelation that we depend upon - the Bible, God’s Word. It is unique in that it does not depend upon one prophet, but upon God’s revelation to prophets over the course of centuries and from radically different situations. Further, the Bible attests to itself of its veracity. It explains its inspiration as not from men but from God. Yes, it is accepted by faith, but faith with evidence. And the self-attestation speaks to believers.

So what do we owe the God of the Bible? Yes, He had established a religion with its own liturgy, involving animal sacrifices. But these routines were never ends in themselves, but pointed to something greater, that redeemed people would reflect the character of their Creator and Redeemer in ways that humans were created to do.

Micah 6:8 is a familiar and popular verse that answers this question. The context is specifically about how to please God. Some people have taken this verse as though it is the sum total of all that we owe God. It is not. It is a behavioral summary of how we are to respond to neighbor and to God. But it is one verse in a very large book.

I do not want to discount what this verse says, and I do not believe that many of us, especially in our groups, have obeyed this verse seriously. We tend to be most concerned with justice for ourselves as opposed to people we don’t know. We are better at being kind to people who agree with us. We all have a pride problem, even if we are just a little proud of our humility.

But to take this verse in isolation would imply that a person can be right with God without faith in Jesus Christ. One could belong to any number of religions and espouse these ideals, even while identifying their “god” if very different terms.

But the largest error would be to conclude that I can be “right with God” based upon my own doings, as though what I “owed” Him, I  myself could accomplish. And that misses the largest truth of the Bible, that Jesus paid it all.