WHAT DOES THE LORD REQUIRE OF YOU?

Inaugural Worship Service Message for Governor Steven Beshear

A Sermon by Rev. Bill McDonald from Micah 6:6-8

December 11, 2007

Micah 6

⁶ “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?

⁷ Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams,

with ten thousands of rivers of oil?

Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression,

the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”

⁸ He has told you, O mortal, what is good;

and what does the LORD require of you

but to do justice, and to love kindness,

and to walk humbly with your God?

Steve and Dan, you know much of what the jobs of governor and lieutenant governor require of you. And what you don’t know already, you will find out soon enough. Please know that all that the people of the Commonwealth require of you is perfection! That shouldn’t be too hard, should it? My mother had several wishes and wants for my life as I lived under her roof. She wanted me to do my homework and pass my classes at school. She wanted me to have fun and to realize that life is supposed to be enjoyable. She wanted me to learn to eat green food. But in addition to her wishes, she had a few requirements. Sunday was the Lord’s Day and I was to spend part of it in worship—a requirement. If I was going to be out later than eleven o’clock, I was to call her just to let her know that I was okay—a requirement. And I was to date only nice girls! I’m not sure she thought I always measured up to that requirement--until I met and married my wife Julie, who more than made up for any previous lapses. Now, my mother was not the Lord, but I am convinced that they were on a first name basis. Just like my mom, God has wants and wishes for our lives that are good for us and good for the community of believers—regular worship, calling home frequently through prayer, savoring this creation which God has proclaimed to be good. But God also has requirements. The prophet Micah brings them to us clear as crystal: to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with our God.

I love the passage about justice from Deuteronomy 16:18-20 that my friend Rabbi Marc Kline read this morning. No distortion, no twisting of justice to favor a colleague or benefactor. No partiality, as fair to the stranger as to the friend. No offering of justice for sale, “for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and subverts the cause of those who are in the right…Justice, and only justice, shall you pursue.” In the 1970s John Willie McDaniel was the long-time Chief of Police in the small town of Midway, Ky. In response to community complaints about cars speeding down Stephens Street endangering the children who lived nearby, John Willie purchased the town’s first radar gun. He handed out 52 tickets in the very first week. When court was convened that month in the old building downtown, looking through the tickets the judge said, “Why, these are some of the finest citizens in Midway!” And he dismissed all the tickets. The community wanted tough law enforcement, but not toward themselves or their friends even if they were in the wrong. But the townsfolk underestimated John Willie’s integrity. He just kept issuing tickets, dozens of tickets, until the judge finally felt obliged to act on them and the speeders felt obliged to slow down. It was a minor incident in a small town but it portrays a cosmic truth. The old saying goes, “I believe all people are equal, but some are more equal than others.” Not in God’s eyes. Nor can that be so in the eyes of the leaders of our commonwealth who are to follow the requirements of God. Do justice.

The Hebrew word used by Micah translated here as “kindness” is rendered in most places in the New Revised Version of the Bible as “steadfast love.” It means having a consistent, caring heart for the poor and disenfranchised. It means consideration for each individual’s life-journey, for the struggle in it and for the potential of it. It is the opposite of harshness and tyranny. Kindness is the absence of envy so that one can rejoice when good things come to others. It is a heart that can hurt for others. It is that wonderful description of the word “empathy” as “your pain in my heart.” Steadfast love…kindness.

A little over seventy years ago a Johns Hopkins professor gave a group of graduate students an assignment: Go to the slums. Take 200 boys between the ages of 12 and 16, and investigate their background and environment. Then predict their chances for the future. The students, after consulting social statistics, talking to the boys and compiling much data, concluded that 90% of the boys would spend at least some time in jail. Twenty-five years later another group of graduate students was given the task of testing that prediction. They went back to the same slum. Some of the boys—now men—were still there, a few had died, some had moved away, but they got in touch with 180 of the original 200. They found that only four in the group had ever been sent to jail. How was it that these men, who had lived in a breeding place for crime, had such a surprisingly good record? The researchers were continually told, “Well, there was this teacher….” They pressed further and found that in 75% of the cases it was the same woman. The researchers went to this teacher, now living in a nursing home, and asked how she had exerted this remarkable influence over a group of slum children. Could she give them any reason why these boys should have remembered her? She said, “No, I really couldn’t say.” And then, thinking back over the years, she said musingly, more to herself than to her questioners, “I loved those boys….” Steve, in four years from now, let me correct that, in eight years from now, may the citizens of the Commonwealth look back musingly and say, “He was the people’s governor. He loved us.”

Ronnie had those dashing good looks, that flashing smile, that sculpted physique that made him the aim of all the girls and the envy of all the guys at church camp. Plus he could speak what we were calling back in those days “jive talking,” which added considerably to his “cool quotient” with the kids. In a moment of brave creativity I cast him for the role of God in our play about the Pharisee and the Publican and I encouraged him to ad lib. He sat on a throne as the two actors prayed out their parts. The publican beat his chest and prayed for forgiveness for his sins. Ronnie leaned down from the throne, held out his hand and said, “Slip me some skin, brother; everthing’s cool.” The other prayer, who gave thanks that he was not like sinful folks, not like that pitiful publican, finished his prayer and held out his hand to Ronnie/God, who quickly pulled his back and said, “Get back, Jack; you need to go get some….” And Ronnie’s mind just blanked on the word, “humility.” Humanity, humidity, all ran through his mind as he kept repeating the intro, “You need to…, you need to…” Finally, his eyes brightened and he exclaimed, “You need to go humilitate!” Across these long years, Ronnie’s word has stuck with me as being perfectly descriptive of what we mortals need. We need to humilitate, to meditate on the overriding greatness of God. God our main priority, God our first thought, God our highest principle, God our greatest allegiance! No matter where life takes us, to whatever grand halls or high places, eventually and finally it takes us to a solitary spot where we stand before the Lord God Almighty. At that moment it does not matter what we have achieved or what we once could do. “Oh, I could dance! Ah, I could make the walls ring with the sound of my voice! Oh, the power in the stroke of my hand! Ah, the compliments, the accolades, the awards!” None of that will matter as we stand there before God. All that will matter is our relationship to the Holy One. Letters of reference will not avail us, newspaper clippings won’t impress, resumes will lie unread. But at that moment in time it would be helpful if we were recognized by God as companions who have been traveling the road with him all along. Then there will be no inquisitive look of “Now, who are you?” But instead there will be the flicker of recognition, “Ah, my friend, it’s you; welcome home.”

My wife Julie claims humorously that my preference is for her to walk three steps behind me and slightly to the left. Funny. Yet that is precisely where we need to be in relationship to God. Knowing our place, knowing who holds the power and the truth, and always, always following. Walk humbly with your God.

You didn’t really need me here, you know. That old preacher Micah said it all already—and a lot briefer than I have. What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?