Reflections on Micah 2

 Micah 02  (Contemporary English Version)

1. Doomed! You're doomed! At night you lie in bed, making evil plans. And when morning comes, you do what you've planned because you have the power.
   
2. You grab any field or house that you want; you cheat families out of homes and land.
   
3. But here is what the LORD says: "I am planning trouble for you. Your necks will be caught in a noose, and you will be disgraced in this time of disaster."
   
4. When that happens, this sorrowful song will be sung about you: "Ruined! Completely ruined! The LORD has taken our land and given it to traitors."
   
5. And so you will never again own property among the LORD's people.
   
6. "Enough of your preaching!" That's what you tell me. "We won't be disgraced, so stop preaching!"
   
7. Descendants of Jacob, is it right for you to claim that the LORD did what he did because he was angry? Doesn't he always bless those who do right?
   
8. My people, you have even stolen clothes right off the backs of your unsuspecting soldiers returning home from battle.
   
9. You take over lovely homes that belong to the women of my nation. Then you cheat their children out of the inheritance that comes from the LORD.
   
10. Get out of here, you crooks! You'll find no rest here. You're not fit to belong to the LORD's people, and you will be destroyed.
    
11. The only prophet you want is a liar who will say, "Drink and get drunk!"
    
12. I, the LORD, promise to bring together the people of Israel who have survived. I will gather them, just as a shepherd brings sheep together, and there will be many.
    
13. I will break down the gate and lead them out-- then I will be their king.

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Judah had stooped to the same practices as her northern brothers in Israel and now lay on their beds dreaming up schemes to confiscate the property of others to increase their own wealth. Once a person was without property he had no means of providing for himself and would end up enslaved to another to pay his debts or to have a source of food and shelter. What made this behavior of greater concern for Israel was that it was forbidden in the Mossaic Covenant which highlighted a principle of God's kingdom. God had delivered Israel from slavery in Egypt and did not want Israel forcing slavery on its own people.

The principle involved is that what God has done for us He expects us to do for others. This principle is taught also in a parable told by Jesus in which a king was settling accounts and discovered a servant who owed him a great amount of money which he could not pay. The servant begged him to be patient and he would pay the debt. So rather than extending the time he had to repay the debt, the king forgave the debt all together. But then the servant went out and found a fellow servant who owed him a small amount of money and demanded it be paid. When the fellow servant begged his patience he was not willing to extend the kindness he had been given and he threw the fellow servant into prison. When the king heard of this he summed the servant whom he had forgiven the large debt and handed him over to the jailers.

The parable teaches that as God has forgiven us, we should extend that same forgiveness to others. Whatever God has done for us He wants us to do for others. In the case of Judah, God had blessed the nation by delivering the people from slavery and giving them a land to call their own. He expected them to extend a similar blessing to others, but instead they were robbing people of their property. So now their enemies were about to come and take their property from them.

False prophets in Judah told Micah to quit preaching such things. These things were not going to happen. But Micah responded by saying that his words were good not bad for those who walk uprightly. It was not Micah but those who wanted to shut him up who were the enemies of the people. It would be as if they were participants with those who invaded the country and forced women from their homes and took away the blessing of Israel. Those who protested Micah's preaching did not belong in Israel for it was not a place for those who defiled because they brought destruction on the nation. They did not want the truth that Micah preached but would rather follow a preacher who invented lies, preaching to them about wine and beer.

The tone softens, though, as we come to verses 12-13. Becoming even tender, Micah explained what God was about to do through the coming judgment. Yes, the people would be punished and would suffer and would be taken away into exile, but on a larger scale, God was using it as a means to gather all of Israel as He would gather sheep in a pen to regroup them and make them safe once again. Their imprisonment in exile would serve as this pen for God's sheep, Israel. As sheep leave the pen, once danger has passed, following behind their shepherd, so Israel would eventually leave their exile now following their King, the Lord, as their leader.