The great question: What does God expect of me?
Micah 6:8 The Message
8 But he’s already made it plain how to live, what to do,
what GOD is looking for in men and women.
It’s quite simple: Do what is fair and just to your neighbor,
be compassionate and loyal in your love,
And don’t take yourself too seriously—
take God seriously.
Micah 6:8 New King James Version
8 He has shown you, O man, what is good;
And what does the LORD require of you
But to do justly,
To love [a]mercy,
And to walk humbly with your God?
Charles Spurgeon was a 19th century preacher with gifted insight and talent for expressing spiritual thought in words that prick the heart and soul. Here are his notes on the Great Requirement from the Spurgeon Study Bible.
Walking with God denotes an active habit, a communion in the common movements of the day. Some bow humbly before God In The Hour of Prayer, others sit humbly in His presence at the time of meditation and others work themselves up to draw near to God in seasons of religious excitement; but all these fall short of Walking with God. Walking is a common pace and ordinary rate of progress and it does not seem to require great effort. But then it is a practical working pace, a rate at which one can continue on and on and make a Day’s Journey by the time the sun is down. So walking with God means being with God always. Being with him in common things; being with him on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, as well as on the Sabbath. It means being with Him in the shop, with Him in the kitchen, with Him in the field feeling His presence in buying and selling and weighing and measuring, in plowing and reaping doing as for the Lord the most common acts of life. Then comes in the qualifying word of “humbly”. When our walk with God is closest and clearest, we must be overwhelmed with adoring Wonder at the condescension that permits us to think of speaking with the Eternal One. To this reverence must be added as a constant sense of dependence, walking humbly with God in the sense of daily drawing all supplies from Him and gratefully admitting that it is so. We are never to indulge a thought of independence from God as if we were anything or could do anything apart from Him. Walking humbly with God involves a profound respect for His will and a glad submission to it, yielding both active obedience and passive submission. Humble walking with God cries undercutting afflictions, “It is the Lord let Him do what seems good to Him.” When the Lord bids me serve Him I must plead for Grace to run in the ways of his Commandments and when the Lord chastens me I must beg for patience to endure His appointments. Walking humbly with God implies all this and much more. May the Holy Spirit teach us what a broken and contrite spirit means and keep us always low before the Lord. The practical result of all of this inward humbling will be an acting toward others and a moving in all matters as under the influence of a humble spirit.
I trust this inspires thoughts that are of value to you in your quest to master discipleship in Jesus Christ.
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