Daily Blast - Minor Prophets: Day 18
Scripture
“Listen to me, you leaders of Israel!
You hate justice and twist all that is right.
10 You are building Jerusalem
on a foundation of murder and corruption.
11 You rulers make decisions based on bribes;
you priests teach God’s laws only for a price;
you prophets won’t prophesy unless you are paid.
Yet all of you claim to depend on the Lord.
“No harm can come to us,” you say,
“for the Lord is here among us.”
12 Because of you, Mount Zion will be plowed like an open field;
Jerusalem will be reduced to ruins!
A thicket will grow on the heights
where the Temple now stands.”
Reflection
Today we are looking at chapters 3 to 4:7. This section of Micah is very similar to chapters 1 and 2. In chapter 3 Micah begins by talking directly to the leaders of Israel. At this point the leaders are running the land through bribery, favouring the rich because of their wealth and depriving the poor as they couldn’t afford to pay the bribes set by the leaders. They were completely violating the Torah, by selling off the land of the poor to the rich. This was illegal, as the Torah specifically stated that it was illegal to sell the land of families, regardless of that family’s wealth.
Micah then moves on to give the prophets their message from God. He reprimands them, telling them that they are leading God’s people astray. He challenges them on their bias to only promise peace to those who give them food and money, and how they declare war on those who do not feed their greed.
Micah warns both the leaders and the prophets that disaster is coming for them. Jerusalem is going to be reduced to ruins and its temple will become a pile of rubble.
As Noah mentioned yesterday, Micah, like a lot of the other minor prophets, adds a few verses of hope for the future. The section we are looking at today also follows this pattern. In Chapter 4: 1-7 Micah gives the nation of Israel a poem, which speaks of a New Jerusalem. Micah paints the picture of Lord’s house as a mountain higher than all the rest, where people for many nations will come to worship God and where God will teach His people His ways. Micah also says that nations will no longer fight amongst each other and everyone will live in peace.
The leaders and prophets were greedy, they hungered for power and money. They were not living as God had instructed them to, in fact, they were twisting the law to suit themselves. This greed created a massive barrier between them and God. Sometimes we can allow things of this world to create a barrier between us and God. These things will be personal to each of us and are areas that we priorities over God. This could be something like social media or similar things we bury our time and effort into. Also, as we see from the text above the leaders were manipulating to suit their needs, throwing their weight around and elevating themselves in a very self-righteous way.
Challenge
I encourage you to spend some time with God, reflecting on areas of your life that you may be prioritising over God. Ask God to help you to manage these areas, staying true to His word, and bringing God back to the centre. In being centred in Him it will allow us to also see those around us in a completely different and more humble way.