Wherewith shall I come before Jehovah, bow myself before the high God? Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings, with calves of a year old?
God has just brought His people into court, reminding them of the rescue from Egypt. Now a voice answers Him. It is not a confession but an offer: what will it cost to quiet a guilty conscience?
The Charge That Prompts the Question
The question comes after God has laid out His case. He asks His people to name one thing He ever did to wear them out.
Then comes the conclusion of the prophecy. The first section of it (Micah 6) is partly a most solemn pleading of Jehovah… Jehovah appeals to their own sense of what is right. "O my people, what have I done to you? How have I wearied you? Answer me! For I brought you up from the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of slavery, and I sent before you Moses, Aaron, and Miriam." Had He ever been anything but the same God?
Who Is Asking
Some read verses 6 and 7 as words once spoken by Balak, the king of Moab who tried to hire a curse against Israel. Verse 8 would then be the reply of the prophet Balaam. Commentators here reject that reading and place the question in Israel's own mouth.
It is true that some well-known names have argued that verses 6-8 preserve an actual dialogue between Balak and Balaam… It is hardly necessary to say that we cannot accept this interpretation in any way. On our reading, Israel is the one who asks these questions. They had wandered so far away that they had forgotten the path of return… This teaches a lesson valuable at all times and in every age: no rites or sacrifices, even if God Himself set them up, are worth anything without a right state of heart before God.
A Conscience Awake but Untaught
The speaker is alarmed and looking for cover. Something real has woken in him. Yet his own words show how little he knows the God he is trying to approach.
A remnant has heard this challenge, and they answer it in verses 6, 7. They are awake now to the sword of the Lord, which He has lifted up. They are alarmed, and would gladly find a refuge. Ignorance of God and of His ways and truth marks their words. But no matter. It is no longer the sleep or dullness of the soul: there has been a quickening.
Raising the Price, Not the Heart
Notice the direction the questions travel: from a single year-old calf, to thousands of rams, to rivers of oil, to a child. The offer keeps growing because the heart behind it never does.
Here the people speak, but it is significant that they do not address the Lord, who had spoken to them through the prophet. They knew themselves guilty and condemned. So they address the prophet and ask what to do… For generations they had brought burnt offerings, thousands of rams and rivers of oil. But it was nothing but outward worship; inwardly they remained the same. But they were willing to do more in this outward service, even to the sacrifice of the firstborn.
Where the Escalation Dead-Ends
The last offer in verse 7 is a firstborn child. It is the highest price a person could pay, and the clearest proof that no price will do.
God could not accept the blood of one born in sin. That would be an insult to a holy God. To give one's firstborn for one's transgressions, the fruit of one's body for the sin of one's soul (Micah 6:7), might look to a pagan like a way to soften an offended god of his own imagining. But it could not meet the holiness and righteousness of the one true God… Long before, He had declared that animal sacrifices were powerless. Yet in that same revelation He had shown that one day a sacrifice would be offered that pleased Him — offered up and accepted too.
The Answer — and a Warning About It
Verse 8 gives the answer. But it names what is right; it does not give the power to do it.
Israel did not act in righteousness. They did not love mercy. They did not walk humbly in fellowship with the Lord. Why not? Because they were uncircumcised in their hearts. To do right, to love mercy, to walk in humility with God is impossible for the natural man. For this there must be the new birth. The new birth takes place when the sinner believes and expresses his faith in true repentance.
Kelly reaches the same conclusion by another road: no one walks this way "until he is brought in as a converted soul and receives the grace of God in Christ."
Summary
- Charge. God speaks first. He names what He gave: rescue from Egypt, and leaders to guide them. The question of verse 6 goes up to a God who has already proved faithful.
- Question. The speaker's conscience is awake. He is alarmed and hunting for refuge, but his words show he does not yet know the God he is bargaining with.
- Escalation. Calf, rams, oil, firstborn — the price climbs while the heart stays still. Outward worship can grow forever and change nothing inside.
- Dead end. Even a firstborn child cannot meet God's holiness, because that child is born in sin. God promised the one acceptable sacrifice long before it came.
- Answer. What God asks for is moral, not material. It stays out of reach for the natural heart until the new birth, which comes when a sinner believes and repents.