Wednesday Discussion

Now it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the LORD's house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and peoples shall flow to it. Many nations shall come and say, "Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths." For out of Zion the law shall go forth, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He shall judge between many peoples, and rebuke strong nations afar off; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. (Micah 4:1–3)

When God shows His prophet the ruin of a nation's capital, He answers despair with a promise of a coming kingdom of peace.

A Devastating Vision

Imagine you had a vision in which an angel came and told you that at the beginning of next year, Washington, D.C.—the capital of our nation—would be completely destroyed, wiped out by a nuclear bomb. That would be a devastating thing to see. How does life for a nation go forward after that?

Micah had a similar vision. At the end of chapter three, in verse 12, he sees Jerusalem—their political capital, their religious capital, the place where the temple stood—completely destroyed. God tells him that because of the sin of the nation, it will be wiped out; the temple mount will be like a freshly plowed field. The people would be taken away as captives because of their sin. Naturally, the question would be: how can life go on after that?

A Hopeful Promise in the Latter Days

Then chapter four opens with a hopeful promise of restoration. "Now it shall come to pass in the latter days." Those words, in the latter days, are a temporal marker—a timestamp telling us when this will happen. It points to a yet-future time.

The mountain of the Lord's house will be established on the top of the mountains. As you correlate this with other Scriptures, you find the word mountain is often used in prophecy for a nation or kingdom. So God's kingdom and God's house will be established above all the other kingdoms in the latter days. God essentially says, "Micah, don't worry, don't freak out. There's coming a day when My kingdom will be established over all the other kingdoms of the world."

In that day, many nations will come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord." They won't come up to Jerusalem for war—they'll come to learn from God. God will rule and reign upon the earth, and the nations will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. In those days, swords and spears were what guns are today—the weapons of war. God promises a day when the world will get rid of its weapons and there will be peace as He reigns on the earth.

Peace, Prosperity, and Safety

Verse four says, "But everyone shall sit under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid." That language appears elsewhere in the Old Testament. First Kings 4:25 says that in the days of Solomon, "Judah and Israel dwelt safely, each man under his vine and his fig tree," from the top of the nation to the south. They had such peace and safety that they could sit out in the open field rather than hiding behind walled cities. It was a time of great safety, rest, and prosperity.

So God tells Micah: yes, chapter three verse 12 stands—the nation will be destroyed. But in the latter days, even though you think this is the end of everything, I still have a plan. I will establish My kingdom here on the earth, and there will be a time of peace, prosperity, rest, and safety.

A Prophecy Not Yet Fulfilled

At our very first study in Micah, I shared that there are different lenses through which we interpret prophecy—ecclesiological, eschatological, historical—and we need to test a passage through each to see if it fits. When you do that here, there is enough in these opening verses to say this prophecy has not yet happened.

None of us has seen in our lifetime, nor have we studied in history, a time when God ruled and reigned in righteousness over the whole earth with no more war and total peace and prosperity. But how many of you think that sounds like good news? I'm looking forward to the day every beauty queen has hoped for over the last fifty or sixty years—peace on earth. We hope for a day of peace, prosperity, and safety for all humanity, with God ruling in righteousness. That's exactly what Micah 4:1–4 proclaims will come.

In response, Micah says in verse five, even though the other nations walk and follow after idols, "we will walk in the name of the LORD our God forever and ever." Because my God is going to bring peace one day, I want to follow Him.

In That Day: Regathering the Outcasts

Verse six gives another temporal marker: "in that day." When the Lord rules and reigns upon the earth, God will do a great thing. He has already told Micah to prophesy that the people would be exiled and their land destroyed. But in that future day, He says, "I will assemble the lame, I will gather the outcasts and those whom I have afflicted; I will make the lame a remnant, and the outcast a strong nation; so the LORD will reign over them in Mount Zion from now on, even forever."

God encourages Micah: yes, you will go through a difficult time of judgment, your land will be destroyed, you will be taken away captive—but have hope. I will regather you to the land and rule over you forever; you'll never be displaced again. Verse eight adds, "to you shall it come, even the former dominion." God will restore them to a place of prominence in the latter days.

These first eight verses are God encouraging Micah and his hearers with a future event that, even today in 2015—2,800 years after Micah—we have not yet seen come to pass. That tells me there is still prophecy here yet to be fulfilled, which is a glorious thing. We're looking forward to the second coming of Christ, when He returns and reigns in righteousness, peace, and prosperity.

Micah isn't the only one who speaks of this. Zechariah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel all speak of this coming kingdom, and the book of Revelation in the New Testament describes the Lord ruling and reigning in righteousness. I hope you, like me, are looking forward to that day.

Looking to the Future With Confidence

I jokingly mentioned at the beginning, "Happy Back to the Future Day." For the last thirty years, those who watched Back to the Future 2 have looked forward to this date—flying cars, hoverboards, self-lacing shoes, and the Cubs winning the World Series. Of all those, only the Cubs look like they might actually happen. A fictional movie foretold a future, and people have looked forward to it for thirty years. How much more should we look forward when God tells us the future—a day when the Lord comes and reigns in righteousness.

Now: The Present Reality of Judgment

We had the marker "in the latter days" in verse one and "in that day" in verse six. Verse nine gives another marker: the word "now." Verses one through eight were a kind of prophetic parenthesis looking forward to better things, but now God brings the people back to their own day.

"Now why do you cry aloud? Is there no king in your midst? Has your counselor perished? For pangs have seized you like a woman in labor." God says you cry and complain because you're going into exile. Verse ten: "Be in pain, and labor to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in birth pangs. For now you shall go forth from the city... and to Babylon you shall go."

This is phenomenal. Micah wrote these words in the eighth and early seventh century B.C. Babylon wasn't even a nation then—it was just a city in the Assyrian empire, no world player. It wouldn't become a power for another 100 to 150 years. Yet 150 years before Babylon carried Israel into exile, God prophesied it would happen. "There you shall be delivered; there the LORD will redeem you from the hand of your enemies."

Labor Pains: Painful but Temporary

God says the nation will be judged, but before the day of restoration, you'll go through labor pains. Any moms in the room? You've gone through labor pains. I've only watched my wife four times, and they looked really bad—I'd never want to go through that. Every time I complain about something hurting, my wife reminds me, "You've never been through childbirth," and I have to admit she's got me there. If men had to give birth, the world would have less than a billion people on it.

But here's what you know about childbirth: it's painful, but it's temporary. There's an end, and the end is good. I've been surprised four times that within an hour of giving birth my wife would say she wanted another one. When God tells Micah this exile will be "like labor pains," it's a reminder that it's brief—painful and terrible, something you'd never want to endure, but not forever. You'll go to Babylon, it will be hard, but God will deliver and redeem you.

The Nations Gathered Against Zion

The fourth temporal marker comes in verse eleven: "Now also many nations have gathered against you." Babylon would destroy Jerusalem in 586 B.C., but even 150 years before that, in Micah's day, other nations came against Judah—the northern ten tribes, the Syrians, the Assyrians.

These nations say, "Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon Zion." They want to desecrate and expose Jerusalem. "But they do not know the thoughts of the LORD, nor do they understand His counsel." The Assyrians were on the move to destroy Jerusalem, but they had no idea what God was doing—something amazing described in Isaiah 8, 10, 36, and 37.

God says, "He will gather them like sheaves to the threshing floor." In those days, and still in parts of the world, they would cut wheat with a sickle, bind it into sheaves, take it to a hard threshing floor, and beat it so the chaff broke loose. They'd throw it into the air, and the wind would carry the chaff away while the wheat fell. God says, "I'm going to bind these nations like sheaves of wheat, and you're going to thresh them." Threshing is not good news for the chaff—these enemies would be destroyed. They thought they were coming to destroy Jerusalem, but God would use that to judge them.

Arise and Thresh

So verse thirteen: "Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion; for I will make your horn iron, and I will make your hooves bronze; you shall beat in pieces many peoples; I will consecrate their gain to the LORD, and their substance to the Lord of the whole earth." God calls His faithful remnant to stand up in His strength.

There is a great deal happening in this passage. We're looking far into the future at things not yet fulfilled, and we're looking at things already fulfilled prophetically. This is a real encouragement to me, because I long for the second coming of Christ and His righteous reign. People in our day call that a pipe dream—they say Jesus will never return.

But here is the awesome thing: 2,800 years ago, in this very passage, God told Micah that Jerusalem would be judged by the Babylonians—150 years before it happened. And it came to pass exactly as He said. Why, then, should we doubt that what He said about the latter days will also come to pass? What He fulfilled in the past is our encouragement that He will fulfill the future. So when people ask, "Where is the sign of His coming?" we answer, "Look at what He has already done," and then use the mind God gave us to conclude that He will surely do what He promised.

Closing Prayer

Father, direct our conversation tonight. Give us insight and wisdom from Your word and application, in Jesus' name. And all those that agreed said, amen. Amen.