Wednesday Discussion

"Hear now, O heads of Jacob, and you rulers of the house of Israel: Is it not for you to know justice?" (Micah 3:1)

Why God's word to corrupt leaders 2,800 years ago still confronts the way we measure our own sin today.

The Old Testament Was Written for Us

It's good to be here together as we continue our study through the book of Micah. Before we turn to chapter three, I want to reference a verse in the New Testament. In 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 11, the apostle Paul writes:

"Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come."

Paul is talking about the things that happened to the people of Israel thousands of years ago, and he says they were written down for the instruction of those of us living in the latter days, that we might learn from them. He goes on to say, "Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall."

So the things we're studying in Micah, which happened 2,800 years ago, are applicable to us today—living in the 21st century, in a nation that didn't exist back then, experiencing technological advances people of that day could never have imagined. And yet God's word is still applicable. All these things were written for our instruction.

God Addresses the Leaders of Judah

In this passage, God, through the prophet Micah, is speaking to the nation of Israel, and specifically the focus seems to be on the southern portion. The nation was divided into two kingdoms—a northern kingdom called Israel and a southern kingdom called Judah, whose capital was Jerusalem on Mount Zion. Here Micah references the people in Jerusalem and Mount Zion, and he is speaking to the leaders of the nation.

The judgment in chapter three is upon the leaders of Judah, calling them to repentance because of their sin. We've already considered some of this sin. In chapter one, we saw the sin of idolatry. Last week in chapter two, we saw covetousness, and as a result, they were defrauding and robbing one another. Now we see more.

In Israel, the religious leaders were also the political leaders. We have a clear separation between church and state in our nation, and many places in the world today highly exalt that separation. But Israel 2,800 years ago was a theocracy—God was the leader of the nation. So here God addresses the judges who cast judgment on the sins of the nation, the priests who led the people in worship, and the prophets who spoke on God's behalf. The princes, the priests, and the prophets are all addressed because of their sin, for they were leading the people into error.

As I mentioned in our first week, Micah was speaking at the same time as the prophet Isaiah. In Isaiah chapter three, God says through him, "O My people, those who lead you cause you to err, and destroy the way of your paths." Isaiah was saying the same thing Micah was: your prophets, priests, and princes are leading you toward sin. Micah says, in effect, "Listen up, all you leaders. You're supposed to know what's right, what's just, how the Lord wants you to walk—and yet you're leading the people into wickedness."

How God Sees Our Sin

In this passage, Micah speaks of their sin in vivid, hyperbolic terms. He talks about the leaders stripping the skin from the people, taking the flesh off their bones, and putting it into a cauldron or pot—as if they were cannibalistically eating the people. Of course, the people would have protested, "We're not doing that. We're not cannibals." And yet in God's eyes, the defrauding and robbery of the people by their leaders was no different. That's how vile and wicked it was to God.

This causes me to think: how does God see our sin? We often minimize our sin by comparing ourselves to other people. The people of Israel in Micah's day would have compared themselves to the Philistines, the Syrians, the Moabites, or the Assyrians—the most powerful nation of that time. It's striking that God says, "You are flaying the people, you are skinning the people," because flaying captives alive was actually a torture the Assyrian empire developed in this period. The people of Israel would have looked at that and said, "Those Assyrians are so wicked." And God says, "Your sin is no different. You're defrauding your brother, robbing one another, you're covetous, you don't judge with equity—and it's no different in My eyes."

So God sees our sin far more seriously than we do, and we have a terrible way of minimizing it. We say, "I'm not as bad as that guy. I'm not perfect, but I'm certainly not as bad as those people over there." In 2 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 12, Paul says it's not wise to compare ourselves with one another.

A Cry for Mercy That Comes Too Late

In verse 4, after pronouncing judgment upon the leaders, there is a cry for mercy—but it's a cry that comes too late. They have not repented. God has been calling them to turn from their sin for years through multiple prophets, and they've refused. Now judgment is coming, and during this period it would come through the nation of Assyria. When Assyria began to move as the tool of God's judgment, the people would cry out, "O Lord, deliver us." And yet God says, at the end of verse 4, that He will not deliver them because of their iniquity, because of the evil of their deeds.

Judgment on the False Prophets

In verses 5 through 7, Micah pronounces judgment against the false prophets of his day. We talked a little about this last week. There were soothsayers—men looked up to as prophets, mouthpieces of God, sometimes called seers. While Isaiah, Micah, and Hosea were warning that God would judge the people for their sin, these false prophets told the people, "You're okay, everything's fine, don't worry. God loves you, you're His people, you're going to be blessed. Peace, peace." And yet God was saying there is no peace for the wicked.

These men were essentially prophets for hire—fortune tellers, diviners. If you paid them, they'd pronounce a blessing. If you didn't, they'd speak a curse. And the way they led the people into sin was twofold. First, unlike Micah, Isaiah, and Hosea, they did not speak against the people's sin. They allowed the people to walk in idolatry and covetousness without ever calling them to repentance.

This is similar to what Paul refers to in Romans chapter one, verse 18, where he says the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all who "suppress the truth in unrighteousness." They were holding back the truth. They had God's law, but they wouldn't apply it. Who knows why—maybe they had forgotten God's law, or maybe it's simply hard to confront people for their sin. We all know how difficult that is.

As we were discussing this today, Pastor Jason made the comment that what we don't confront, we confirm. By not confronting the people's sin, these prophets allowed them to continue in it. So God says judgment is coming, and they won't know where it comes from. Their eyes will be closed; there will be darkness for them, no vision. They will be ashamed because they cried "peace, peace" when there was no peace.

The Word of the True Prophet

In verses 8 through 12, the word of the true prophet comes. Micah says in verse 8:

"But truly I am full of power by the Spirit of the LORD, and of justice and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression and to Israel his sin."

The job of a true prophet of God in the Old Testament was to declare the sin of the people—to make plain what they were doing in rebellion against God—and then to call them back to righteousness.

There's sometimes discussion in the church about whether the office of prophet still exists as it did in the Old Testament. Not really, because we have the revealed word of God. In 2 Timothy chapter three, we're told that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness, so that the people of God would know how to walk rightly. The word of God now plays the part of the Old Testament prophet—it rebukes, corrects, and calls us to righteousness.

The Sins of Princes, Priests, and Prophets

Micah identifies three groups. The princes were not judging righteously; they took bribes. When a judge takes a bribe in our day, he gets prosecuted and thrown in jail, because it perverts justice and does away with righteousness. The priests were merely hirelings, doing the job only for the money. And the prophets were like fortune tellers, just trying to make money from speaking forth a word.

As a result, the last verse of the chapter pronounces judgment on Mount Zion and Jerusalem:

"Therefore because of you Zion shall be plowed like a field, Jerusalem shall become heaps of ruins, and the mountain of the temple like the bare hills of the forest." (Micah 3:12)

If you've ever passed a freshly plowed field with all the dirt turned up, that's the picture—Jerusalem completely destroyed because of their sin. This would be literally fulfilled about 150 years later through the Babylonian empire. Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon—a name you know if you've read the book of Daniel—destroyed Jerusalem in 586 BC. But even before that, around the time of Micah, the Assyrians came in and surrounded the city, destroying all the other major cities of Judah as a direct result of the people's sin.

Closing Prayer

Father, thank You for Your word. Thank You for making it so that the Jewish people recorded the Old Testament and did such a faithful job keeping the records of the prophets, the Psalms, and the Pentateuch, so that we can study these things and learn from them. You had these things recorded and maintained for centuries, for millennia, so that You could speak to us and teach us. I pray that You would open our hearts to hear from You through Your word tonight and teach us, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.