MICAH (7 of 7) - Chuck Missler

well we're going to wrap up the final session of our exploration of the book of micah and we are in chapter 7 which is a short little chapter so we'll also use the occasion to just sort of review where we've been and as we started out looking at the two houses after solomon dies of course through the civil war and they broke into the southern and northern kingdom southern kingdom calling itself judah the northern kingdom calling itself israel and i prefer the northern kingdom designation so we don't confuse ourselves when we're talking about israel that is the northern portion of the nation or the word israel for the entire nation because we'll discover in this particular book too we're going to find micah addressing primarily the southern kingdom but he'll talk a lot about the northern kingdom in part because he foresaw their collapse and their the judgment coming upon them and he emphasized that as a lesson to the southern kingdom so he's sometimes talking to the northern kingdom sometimes he's talking to the southern kingdom sometimes he'll address the entire nation he'll use the term jacob meaning the whole combination and he'll even address non-uh israel nations the gentiles he'll speak some of his remarks addressed to all the nations of the world so that's one of the interesting exercises as you go through this book is to to note which verses apply to which audience if you will but in any case we have let's just focus on the uh the part that's covered by second kings southern kingdom northern kingdom and of course we have the assyrian captivity assyria is the dominant empire for much of their for several centuries actually and uh because of that we're going to deal with as we talk about prophecy nineveh the capital of the assyrian uh uh empire and uh that's succeeded by the babylonian empire one of its cities rises to power and takes over creating the babylonian empire and the the northern kingdom gets wiped out by the assyrian uh empire but the as it gets taken over by babylon by then babylon conquers takes captive the southern kingdom not to wipe it out but for 70 years they're captive and then they're returned to the land and so so assyria falls to babylon let's keep that in mind ultimately after the babylonian captivity of exactly 70 years literally through the day by the way um we have what's called the we call that the exile really so the post-exile prophets and writers are ezra nehemiah and esther and uh under the leadership zerubbabel and following but we talk about major prophets isaiah jeremiah ezekiel and daniel these are major in the sense they're larger not necessarily more important they're very all significant of course but uh that's a missile that's really a librarian's label and of course i uh isaiah uh prophesied during jotham ahaz and hezekiah all the way through manasseh and then we have jeremiah he prophesies from josiah on to the captivity and into the captivity and so also in the captivity daniel in babylon and ezekiel in jerusalem both prophesy during that period and babylon daniel being deported in the first uh deportation there was a second one in which ezekiel was taken and the third attack caused jerusalem to get to wiped out and so on um and then so get talking about the minor prophets now the uh the these 12 aren't they're just smaller but they're very significant so we don't want to misunderstand that but they're in your bible they're in a particular order that isn't that useful uh in many respects and hosea directly addresses the northern kingdom in fact the parallels between hosea and our own predicament in america is astonishingly parallel from hosea 4 through 14. it's it's quite noteworthy as such joel is one of the earliest prophets and he prophesies uh to the southern kingdom the days of amaziah now we have amos was a rural kind of guy not a urban kind of guy he also prophesized to the northern kingdom hosea and amos being the principal prophets there um obadiah really speaks to edom and that that's really his writings are really do a little later jonah's called to talk to the uh capital of the world empire at that time nineveh and the his his uh mission was more successful than he really cared it to be gave nineveh a whole another century uh before they finally do get wiped out micah the one we're going to be most interested in starts in the days of ahaz and following then we have nahim in our bible which really is a follow-up 100 years later after jonah to nineveh but they don't repent and that's when they finally fall the babylonian empire falls habakkuk is a prophet to the southern kingdom just prior to the exile and zephaniah zephaniah's also to the southern kingdom and uh then we have the three post-exile prophets haggai zechariah and malachi which is where you'd expect them to be at the end there right after the uh exile prophet after malachi we have a 400 year period between the testaments that are sometimes called the silent years and that's unfortunate because they actually are in your bible that may surprise you they are written in advance daniel chapter 11 verses 5 through 35 is really a chronicle of those 400 years so precise by the way that the critics have tried to make indicate they were really written later and all that sort of thing which is a little hard to explain how they got translated in greek three centuries before christ was born so i mean before his ministry so um but in any case that that's the the the between the testaments if you will before the new testament okay and so that's daniel 11 verses 5 through 35 if you want to make a study of that sometimes really worthwhile doing that digging to put that together well these minor prophets as they are in your bible are not the most useful order from our point of view the way we might cluster them and i'll throw this up here so you can see it better the northern kingdom is hosea and amos they really have something in common because that's their target jonah nahim are addressing nineveh that's a particular uh context the ones that we're really focusing on are joel micah zephaniah habakkuk and and uh so that's that's um um all having to do with the southern kingdom are calling themselves judah and of course the three post exile prophets are where you'd expect them to be that's straightforward now uh the tenure micah prophesied during the reigns of jotham ahaz and hezekiah over the southern kingdom calling itself judah and simultaneous to that was pachaya and pekka and hosea over the northern kingdom and which calls itself israel so i'll try to use the term northern kingdom just so we don't confuse ourselves about the term of israel this uh micah covers a period of about 40 years in his prophets and he have primarily concerned with the failure of the northern kingdom if for no other reason than its implications as a lesson if you will to the plight of the southern kingdom and so you'll discover some of the commentators regard micah as a prophet to the northern kingdom that's the misunderstanding i believe he talks about it but really in it's a secondary issue from his point of view he's primarily ministering if you will to the southern kingdom in our view what makes mike a little different you know if you study hosea joel amos and obadiah you don't you will discover that their messages were not heeded their warnings were rejected and judgment followed it's interesting that the nearer god's judgments were at hand the more obstinately the false prophets denied that they would come how interesting i wonder if that's characteristic of our day too is the people that know the least about prophecy are the ones that are most critical about that in our context but anyway false prophecy was a very gainful occupation back then because they had a marketing advantage the false prophets had man's wishes on their side that's we find that too the most popular churches today are not necessarily the ones that are preaching the gospel of christ as paul would define it in in terms of the the shed blood of jesus christ on our behalf and so forth the real core gospel and uh so what makes mike a little different is that jose and amos were ignored jeremiah was in prison for his message in micah's case his message was heeded repentance followed and disaster was postponed for virtually a hundred years so in that sense he's distinctive that he had an effective message and he was a prophet like jonah that changed history jonah is the same thing you know it's interesting that one man can make a difference and one of the things you might consider pray about maybe you are such a person god may have a destiny for you that is going to impact history don't be surprised i'm sure these guys were surprised at the destiny that god had for each of them now now micah say was a contemporary of isaiah hosea and amos he probably was a friend of isaiah and his book has been called by some as a miniature book of isaiah there are many striking similarities between the two in fact isaiah prefixes his second chapter with three verses from micah's prophecy and now micah prophesied during the reigns of jotham ahaz and hezekiah and it bore fruit in the reign of hezekiah in second kings 18 through 20. it's interesting that no kings of the northern kingdom are mentioned by the prophet only prophets of israel make mention of kings of israel see micah doesn't acknowledge that they're kings if you will because they were the rebels the son and jeroboam they're the ones that rebelled from from the empire and so forth the subtle thing but interesting the capital of the northern kingdom of course was samaria the city was built originally by omri the king of israel and was the seat of idolatry it was made infamous by ahab and jezebel who built a temple to baal and so forth god sent elijah and elisha and amos to turn them from the practices elijahs and first kings elisha in the second kings period but and then amos of course and his prophecies there and so hosea who is also mike is contemporary also prophesied against the northern kingdom his warnings went unheeded that god used their enemies as his instrument of judgment we want to keep that in mind as we go forward here in fact uh we did a study of hosea from chapter 4 through 14 particularly in the sense that it seems to parallel the plight of america the united states and uh in one of our planning sessions uh we were looking for a title for it and i think was john leffler who said why call it hosea can you see and we all chuckled as sort of the the pun and yet it sort of stuck so we actually went ahead and used that as the title you might want to check into that but uh back in 734 bc the assyrians carried away uh all of the north israel in 721 uh bc charminizer assyria attacked the northern capital of sumerian overthrew it and deported the remaining people of the northern kingdom and uh so eight years later under sennacherib shamanism's successor he attacked the southern kingdom judah and uh his name by the way senecara means sin multiplies his brothers the the worship of the moon god in that region was called sin by them it was called elah in arabia that becomes al-ilah or allah but the worship of the moon god but moving on here at one point the field commander of the assyrians appeared before the walls and challenged them for surrender and tsunakura sent a letter to the same effect to hezekiah well hezekiah took the letter and he actually goes to the altar and lays it out in front of the lord and he received confirmation through the prophet isaiah that the city would be spared senecarab would fail and one night after dinner one angel wipes out 185 000 of them and they went they they they never again they never again attacked the southern kingdom hezekiah organized a revival and he smashed the idols of his predecessor even the original brazen serpent which was still around for after almost a thousand years had become a fetish to which they were burning incense and so he destroys it the houston the thing of brass but uh very important issue there but interesting there is a hidden hero of the scene that gets it doesn't get mentioned micah is actually the one that's credited in the in the bible with the the uh uh uh effectiveness of that revival as isaiah was the well-known prophet to the king of that period with direct access to the king but we know from an incident a century later that it was actually because of micah's preaching that the people repented and jerusalem was spared now that's quite outrageous remark let's find out where we get that jeremiah 120 years later was prophesying over the impending destruction of jerusalem in his day his message so offended the priests and the false prophets that they seized them brought him before the officials demanding his death wow he gave his defense citing the previous experience of micah notice the words of jeremiah that are part of the word of god in jeremiah 26 starting at verse 18 micah the mortalite prophesied in the days of hezekiah the king of judah and spake to all the people of judah saying thus saith the lord of hosts zion shall be plowed like a field in jerusalem shall become heaps and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest he's quoting jeremiah's quoting a century earlier prophecies by micah and then jeremiah makes the point his own defense he says did hezekiah king of judah and all judah put him at all to death did he not fear the lord and besought the lord and the lord repented him of the evil which he had pronounced against them thus might we procure great evil against our souls jeremiah's using the example of micah to defend himself at the point that here that's that we miss unless we've catch this is that it was uh jeremiah's point was it was micah's preaching that caused the revival and that surprised many because isaiah was such a prominent prophet one of the one largest of the books of course and he was had access to the king and it's one of the most eloquent uh uh books of the bible but in any case uh interesting point here anyway as a result jeremiah was spared 120 years later micah's words were remembered and used by god to dis to spare jeremiah in fact it appears that micah lived to see the beginning of hezekiah's revival and so that must have been very gratifying so who was he really you know comparatively little is known of micah personally he was a rural prophet like amos not of the city or the palace like his contemporary isaiah his writing is pungent and personal he is touching and tender and he was the authority referred to by herod's advisors during remember when as well when uh the wise men come to solicit herod who was born king of the jews they turn dig into the archives check out what micah said and that becomes the authority there if you will in fact jesus also quotes micah in in in matthew 10 in another way we'll touch on there's one verse that's well known by most people micah 6 8 is often quoted in the congress and elsewhere he hath showed the old man what is good and what does the lord require of thee but to do justly and love mercy and to walk humbly before thy god we don't have to dwell on the misunderstandings this because we've just we've done that the previous session but we'll move on here micah pronounced judgment on the cities of israel and on jerusalem the urban centers of the nation so he could be labeled a prophet of the city condemning its violence corruption robbery covetousness gross materialism spiritual bankruptcy and illicit uh sex sounds like today's cities doesn't it and uh so but he plays words on the names of the cities and their similarity to the points he's making all the way through and yet through the gloom of the impending judgment micah clearly saw the coming glory of the redemption of israel which makes this makes this book particularly relevant to our time because we still of course see the impending judgment on the world in general in the u.s in particular and yet there is a glory forthcoming and his grand question that mike poses all through his book is who is like unto thee lord the lord he really glorifies god why was micah's ministry successful when many others were not well a number of reasons he identified himself personally with his people he didn't ask them to do something he refused to do himself he was specific town by town by town he preached to them and he was persistent he didn't give up he preached through three succeeding kings and the reigns jotham ahaz and of course hezekiah so he was he had tenacity and the first two reigned at 16 years each so it appears that he may have preached for 20 years without any apparent signs of success he hung in there didn't let go and it bore fruit well the first chapter in fact the first three chapters are sins since against god chapter one since against each other chapter two and sins by their leaders in various forms in chapter then chapter 4 is going to talk about the coming kingdom that's one reason it's it goes far beyond the local horizon and then of course chapter 5 is just so replete with insights about the messiah that it's an incredibly uh focused incredibly rich chapter uh in front of especially from a prophetic point of view chapter six talks about the coming judgment and chapter seven is what we're going to wrap up with today the final wrap-up of these seven chapters but one of the things we have to be conscious of as we read uh prophecy in general but specifically micah is the whole idea of the for the near the an early event that is prophesied that also carries implications for a similar but larger later event and there's a time gap between these two and the early event is sometimes called the type if you will and the later event is called the anti-type and this idea is often is often made analogous to two mountains that as you see in the distance you realize there's two mountains but you may not be sensitive to the extent of the valley between them in terms of a time gap and we need to be sensitive to that as we go and there's a local disturbance there in the early chapters uh chapter 6 through 16 which then gives rise to the prophecy of a greater invasion in the last days and of the lord's final deliverance and all that was laid out as we went through those chapter by chapter we also had a chance to explore a little bit this whole business of megiddo and petra petra is very significant in the prophecies and we notice in revelation it even highlights the specific distance between them 1600 furlongs between megiddo armageddon if you will and the fleeing of the remnant to petra and micah touches up on that and but he was also shocked by the conditions in the capital city of jerusalem and his own capital if you will the corruption of their leadership the evil among all the ruling classes the courts the palaces and the temple itself and how they work hand in hand among themselves and we see that as a practical thing in pra in in power politics today and just we see the same thing we're just as shocked when we visit our own capital at the corruption everywhere not not only among the politicians but in the courts and in the schools and and among the media and wall street itself it's just disturbing to see how widespread corruption has taken place in our own country too it's interesting how we've in america especially you know all governments love crises because it gives them an excuse to rate to increase budgets and take away rights and in the united states they discovered that you don't have to have a military crisis a social crisis works just as well and so so the the government's like social crisis because it gives them an excuse to increase budgets and restrict freedoms and what's interesting though social crises are caused by immorality and and so it shouldn't surprise us if that's the dynamics that that the government has an incentive to promote immorality because that increases the social crisis and gives them even a bigger excuse to take control and take away freedoms so it's no surprising that these things have a tendency to grow as we've experienced the total decay of our own heritage and foundation in this country so is there any surprise not really and now in our particular case we have a rep we're a representative republic originally were at least and so it it the offset of these things is to have an electorate that shares a god-fearing worldview as a restraining influence and that operated in our early years but has gradually eroded away and decayed there are three steps to the downfall of a nation spiritual apostasy immorality political anarchy and the primary problem wasn't the political anarchy even immorality was simply only a symptom the root problem is the spiritual apostasy a turning away from the true and living god it's that apostasy that leads to immorality that immorality leads to political anarchy and that tears the place apart that was true in the book of judges it was highlighted at night the book of isaiah and it was highlighted by micah in his book here you know there's been a number of studies on the life cycle of nations how they start and how they die tyler gibbon joe parkinson and jim black being the contemporary ones if you will and tyler was actually back in the 18th century but when you look at the the the all of them really come to the same conclusions when nations die it starts with social decay crisis of lawlessness lack of lack of discipline rising bureaucracy then the culture decays the decline of education the weakening of cultural foundations loss of respect for traditional values and then that leads to of course moral decay the rise of immorality the decay of religious belief in all kinds and the devaluing of human life these patterns have been studied by historians all through history the average cycle of these empires about two centuries and they go through a life cycle and they all have the same pattern they start from bondage you get some kind of spiritual faith which leads to great courage that courage attains to liberty and that liberty produces an abundance in our case it produced an abundance that was the envy of the world but watch out for that envy because that leads to complacency apathy back to dependency and ultimately back to bondage that's the cycle and you can figure out where we are on this and where we're headed by this cycle a classic classic cycle one of the things may surprise you is that uh our republic is based on the concept of balance of power from in the separation of those powers the three branches legislative executive judiciary were inspired by isaiah 3 chapter 33 verse 22 the lord is our judge that establishes the judiciary the lord is our lawgiver that establishes the legislature the lord is our king that establishes the executive the judiciary legislative executive the idea was to keep those powers separately you'll notice that the grasper powers caused them to commingle and we now have an executive branch that tries to dictate the laws we have the judiciary which tries to invent its own laws it's a mess as you know separation of powers is a is uh a tragic um uh uh anachronism today they don't have that anymore but anyway micah chapter three had three sections the judges were in the corruption of the courts was his focus in the first four verses the prophets were market driven does that sound familiar verses five through eight and then the politicians were for higher and um so that was the breakdown of chapter three as we skim through some of the highlights of our previous chapters here now corrupt leadership had an emphasis on all three of these things the judges the prophets and the politicians and he dealt with each one of these as he went through them and now politics the strife of interest masquerading as a contest of principles but actually the conduct conduct of public affairs for private advantage very very cynical but rather um to the point of uh defining politics by ambrose beerus i always i kind of enjoy that anyway we also got exposure to the prophet balaam and we had three things show up the doctrine of balaam the way of balaam and the error of balaam all mentioned by revelation ii peter and writer of jude and each of these are slightly different aspect of his error the spiritual unchastity marriage with the world was the doctrine of balaam that revelation touches on the way of balaam is the hireling making a market for his gift that's what second peter focuses on and the error of balaam is what uh sacrificing eternal riches for temporal gain but balaam this peculiar prophet from mesopotamia um who apparently is quite had some quite a following uh among the kings certainly king balak hired him for that uh he was a influential character that got into big trouble um and uh as we went through that another thing we touched upon was nebuchadnezzar's famous dream the poly metallic image in chapter two well known to most of us the gold the silver the bronze and the iron uh referring to four major empires and but that a stone cut without an iron mix with clay it goes into a phase with there but a stone cut without hand strikes this destroys it and becomes a mountain that fills the whole earth and daniel explains that to us he says in the days of these kings that is the first four groups the god of heaven set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed and the people and the kingdom shall not be left to other people but it shall break in pieces consume all these kingdoms and stand forever the point is that the kingdom that god is speaking of that he sets up is the fifth in a line of five the god of heaven is going to set up a kingdom and micah talks about that in chapter four he says in the last days shall come to pass that the mountain of the house of the lord shall be established in the top of the mountains the top of all of them and shall be exalted above the hills and people shall flow with it mountain being an idiom if you will for a government and all through the scripture and so zion will be the governmental and spiritual center of the entire world not just israel and the temple or a palace will be rebuilt in fact amos 9 11 makes reference to the tabernacle of david don't confuse that with the the uh temple of solomon and uh so he makes reference to it in amos 9 and it's echoed all through the new testament as well and one of the things we highlighted as went through the study was the four unconditional covenants in the bible the abrahamic covenant in genesis 12 the covenant of the land in genesis 15 and also 17 the davidic covenant in second samuel seven and the fourth and final one the everlasting covenant the one from which the whole the old new testament take their their labels the old covenant the new covenant and so on the everlasting covenant being uh the idiom for the new testament every one of these the first three at least every one of these are under attack the abrahamic covenant is challenged by the world all anti-semitism the holocaust all of that are attacks on the abrahamic covenant a covenant that is the source of all of our benefits gentile and jew alike derives from that incredible covenant in genesis 12. but the second covenant is also under attack the land covenant under attack by islam very directly very aggressively with force and and commitment but many people may don't realize that the divinity covenant is also under attack by the church and that's the the the their nine out of ten churches i imagine in the country denominational ones at least that have their heritage anchored in the reformation have adopted a eschatology that denies the fulfillment of the divided covenant and that's something that deserves a lot of attention and it's one that micah deals with very directly isaiah does too remember we all know about for where isaiah says for unto us a child is born unto us a son is given and the government shall be upon his shoulder and his name shall be called wonderful counselor the mighty god the everlasting father the prince of peace a child is born that's the human side of it a son is given that's the divine side the child is born in bethlehem the son is given at golgotha and and the second next verse talks about the increase of his government peace shall be no end upon the throne of david that's a promise that was given to mary yeah that throne did not exist during the roman empire it's yet it's yet to be reestablished and uh to deal with upon us came to order it to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever the zeal of the lord of hosts shall perform this and in when gabriel announces the birth of her child to mary he says behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bring forth the son and shall call his name yeshua or jesus he shall be great and he shall be called the son of the highest and here's the and the lord god shall give unto him the throne of his father david that has not happened yet he's presently sitting on his father's throne no there's one that's going to be set up on the earth that will be his it be the throne of the the davis throne and he shall reign over the house of jacob forever and of his kingdom there shall be no end when you get to the book of acts they're getting ready for the ascension the disciples ask they said when when therefore they will come together they ask of him jesus saying lord will thou at this time restore again the kingdom to israel and he said unto them it is not for you to know the times of seasons which the father hath put in his own power many people miss the point he doesn't say he's not going to do it he just says the timing of it is none of their business and it's in effect a confirmation that that is yet coming the kingdom to israel it's going to be the king of the whole world but from israel now sistering there are two terms we discover in the bible the kingdom of god and the kingdom from heaven or kingdom of heaven as you see it in your king james well it's interesting that matthew is the only one that uses the term the kingdom from heaven mark luke and john speak of the kingdom of god in many passages they're very very similar but matthew chooses the term kingdom of heaven or kingdom from heaven 33 times some most commentators say well that's just his choice that they're essentially synonymous no because they're off they're used side by side by matthew and the fact that he makes a distinction implies they're not exactly synonymous they have their their there's a distinction and we discover that this is a genitive of source not a genitive opposition in other words it doesn't mean the kingdom of heaven are equivalent it means the kingdom comes from heaven and it's a genitive of source and once if we say kingdom of heaven that get people get confused with heaven or the kingdom of heaven like the same thing no no it's the kingdom from heaven it's a kingdom on the earth from heaven and that's what daniel talks about that's what amos talks about in chapter 9 and that's what's all through the new testament here and micah brings it up that's why this comes up in chapter four verse two many nations shall come and say come let us go up to the mountain of the lord that is the head of the government here and to the house of god of jacob and he will teach us of his ways and we will walk in his paths for the law shall shall go forth of zion and the word of the lord from jerusalem that's a prophecy of the future the pivotal event in the book of acts is the council for jerusalem where the council of jerusalem where they had a number of issues that they were dealing with and james himself who's presiding over this quotes from amos 9 in responding to this in acts 15 he says and to this agree the words of the prophet as is written after this i will return interesting thing for god to say he's going to return because that must mean he left it after this i will return and we'll build again the tabernacle of david don't confuse that with the temple of solomon those are different things which has fallen down and i will build again the ruins thereof and i will set it up that the residue of men might seek after the lord and all the gentiles upon whom my name is called saith the lord who doeth all these things known unto god or all his works from the beginning of the world there's a again and again and again we discover that this kingdom is a major theme in the new testament and and we even have a floor plan of the palace if you will and the outer gates and so forth and the darkness outside there's all those issues that deserve very careful study we also know it isn't in jerusalem it's about 50 miles to the north apparently because we have a map also scheduled in in ezekiel 45. the temple is there and there's there's properties that it's it's substantial substantially to the north of jerusalem and the portion for the prince and there's all kinds of mysteries about this that you can explore by going through a careful study with the commentary on the book of ezekiel and how the water will flow from the temple to jerusalem and then to the mediterranean and to the dead sea in both directions we also encountered another these these idioms that are used in the scripture it came up in in our study of micah from the parable of jotham in and how the olive tree the fig tree and the vine and the bramble are all used as idioms of israel and with a particular context and owl tree has valuable oil the fig tree has sweet fruit the vine yields wine and the bramble doesn't have fruit and it has no fruit that's too low for even being providing any shade and so and it's only good as fuel for the fire so as we study this we realize these idioms that are profiled for us in the book of judges are used consistently through the scripture yes the olive tree refers to israel in its genetic or genealogical sense being being grafted in and that sort of thing the fig tree is the political thing it's supposed to bear fruit and it gets cursed when it doesn't bear fruit as we saw that in the new testament of course the vine produces wine so that speaks of israel in the spiritual sense the bramble speaks of it as satan's empire and so it's only good for burning but let's talk a little bit about the roman empire um because there's part of it that's often misunderstood that all comes up in in the fifth chapter of the micah we need to be a sense of fact that there was a rival empire to the east called the parthian empire from about 250 bc through about two about 200 before and 200 after uh birth of christ the parthian empire and uh it was some uh priestly king makers the magistrates if you will apart from the empire that come to visit to to meet herod and to understand the politics that period you need to understand that rome didn't control completely the area of judea it was a buffer zone and even herod when he was appointed king couldn't go there he did that in rome it had it took some effort to get it safe enough for him to even be there but it's a buffer zone we need to understand that why he was so nervous when a group of parthian king makers with full military escort arrive exploring some king of the jews what's all that about and so you won't understand what's going on there without doing some background there but that gives rise when they come to herod and say where is he to be born they check the archives and go to micah who and quote micah 5-2 to herod to explain to these visitors what's going on here in the parrot passage of course we know very well but thou bethlehem ephrata though that be little among the thousands of judah meaning all the little towns yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in israel oh boy whose goings forth have been from old from everlasting there is so much in this verse we could spend the whole a week on that because it also talks about his pre-existence and his rulership and there's a this is a very pregnant verse in many respects but in any case uh let's us move on to other issues that are also in chapter five a very rich chapter but it mentions something that many people need to pay attention to today because it identifies something about the antichrist that many people have overlooked and said this man shall be the peace when the assyrian shall come into our land and when he shall tread in our palaces then shall we rise against him seven shepherds and eight principle men goes on it's interesting micah 5 and isaiah 10 and a number of other passages use the term assyrian to be to speak of the one that we commonly call the antichrist and so the assyrian and it was an assyrian that oppressed israel during their sojourn in egypt the pharaoh of egypt was an egyptian he was an assyrian isaiah 52 points that out to us and so that's why he was so insecure with the growth of the of the hebrew uh uh nation because he himself was not an egyptian so he felt he was honest that made him insecure and nothing more dangerous than a leader that's insecure but anyway uh so uh that's why he was concerned about the growth of a non-egyptian population that that was just rendered into slavery now the roman empire is something else that we get confused about so often when we talk with the roman empire most of us myopically regard that as western europe no no no no the the roman empire divide into two legs in fact the western leg erodes away the eastern leg outlasts the western lake by a thousand years virtually and yes the antichrist will come from the roman empire but from the eastern leg not from western europe as is so commonly taught in so many of the publications the assyrian is a title of the antichrist he has there's actually 33 different titles of the antichrist in the old testament alone 13 and the new but this is the most frequently used one incidentally all through isaiah 10 and isaiah 24 and elsewhere and i mean 14 and elsewhere and uh so seneca was about a type and uh there's a the final climax is going to be a confederated movement on the part of the nations of the earth to blot out god's chosen people israel is the focus that's what joel 3 is all about zechariah 12 and 14 and so forth well getting back to the organization of the micah's that we've gotten through for the chapter for the coming kingdom the coming king that was so eloquently dealt with in chapter five we then got to chapter six which focuses on the coming judgment both an immediate judgment that they're facing but also eclipsing that to the final judgment is in focus in chapter six that we've just finished really and we're now going to go into chapter seven for the final wrap-up of our review here micah 7. the last chapter of course is similar to jeremiah's book of lamentations it echoes the prayer of the repentant remnant in the days of jacob's trouble which is jeremiah's term for what we commonly call the great tribulation and it's a silica we have penitence the first nine verses are all about that they had application in the days of micah and yet they also are a graphic anticipation of the conditions of the day of the antichrist and so contrast the repentance and hezekiah's day which was credited to micah versus the climax we're going to see in the great tribulation which is interrupted by the return of our lord to set up his kingdom and so he says whoa is miami as when they have gathered the summer fruits as the grape gleanings of the vintage there is no cluster to eat my soul desired the first root first ripe fruit that's this is very personal idioms here the vine is being used as a picture of israel but the vine is not producing fruit and we highlighted that in the first half a dozen verses of isaiah 5 and a number of other passages when we went through it previously the good man is perished out of the earth and there's none upright among men they all lie and wait for blood they hunt every man his brother with a net wow see that's we're used for hunting as well as fishing by the way as you get the picture here it was not safe to walk in the streets there and it isn't safe to walk in the streets of our major cities here lawlessness abounds lawlessness is not the same as breaking laws laws are when lawlessness is when the laws are not being enforced does that ring a bell to do our front page headlines today of course there were exceptions back here that's why the good man is perished out of the earth and so they that may do evil with both hands earnestly the prince asketh and the judge asketh for a reward and the great man he uttereth his mischievous desire so they wrap it up that's king james believe it or not okay bribery and corruption abound the rule of law has ever been abandoned at the highest levels of our own government here our entertainments and news broadcast if i can call them that are tailored by the spin doctors they promote immorality violence and anything sacred it's fair game compare that to the whole story of naboth's vineyard in first kings 21 that's alluded to in revelation 2 20. we won't take the time to go through that here the best of them is as a briar the most upright is sharper than a thornhedge the day of thy watchmen and thy visitation cometh now shall be their perplexity see even the best of them is as a briar you had to be careful not to get stuck as the idea even the most upright was sharp that is in the deceitful sense he was a sharp traitor so forth how interesting is that the french canadian trappers used that idiom for the indians they traded with in this region they called them the coeur d'alene's heart of the all why because they were sharp traitors was the idea interesting that that echoes here in this in their own regionalism here the day of the watchmen cometh that phrase occurs in isaiah and ezekiel and jesus warned that they would come upon the earth distressive nations perplexity and the sea and the waves roaring confusion would be the characteristic of the end of the age and by the way i get confused every time i hear a broadcast i see thing happening three things happening in washington that i never would have dreamed would have been possible and yet every day it gets more bizarre the standards of micah 6 8 were not and could not be kept we went through that last time and many who assumed they were safe were not how interesting it is when you look at the seven letters seven churches of all seven churches were surprised those thought they were those that thought they were doing well were not those who thought they weren't doing well were very interesting very sobering to really understand that every one of the seven churches were surprised in in the lord's epistles to them on to verse 5 trust ye not in a friend put ye not confidence in a guide keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom it's a rough world out there jesus warned us that think not that i come to send peace on earth like i'm not to send peace but a sword and then he goes on to emphasize that you will not be able to trust your own family you see what we live in a day when one's word means less than it used to we've lost the sanctity of commitment not only in our marriages but in our businesses this also goes especially for bible teaching test it all against the word of god don't believe a thing that chuck mister tells you check it out yourself in the word of god remember our trademark acts 17 11 re receive the word with all openness of mind yet search the scriptures daily to prove whether those things be so there's another passage that was found that doug whitmore my friend that founded the firefighters for christ used all the time prove all things hold fast to that which is good an equivalent admonition there let's move on verse 6 for the son dishonoreth the father the daughter rises up against her mother the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law a man's enemies are the men of his own house wow and jesus quotes this very passage in matthew 10 he quotes it from micah 7 6 therefore i will look unto the lord i will wait for god of my sp the god of my salvation my god will hear me there's only one place to rest your confidence in on him that sounds trite but it's the only thing that abides luke 21 it speaks of this men's heart filling them for fear and for look looking after those things which are coming on the earth for the powers of heaven shall be shaken and when these things begin to come to pass then look up and lift up your heads for your redemption draweth nigh love that verse but i have to tell you every time i see it now i'm reminded how walter martin used to love that verse and he couldn't quote it without gesturing he'd always say men's hearts failing them for fear and for looking upon those things which are coming on the earth and you see them gesture like a flying saucer coming in when these things begin to look bad he he had a fixation about that and it was we used to kill him about that a lot that's exactly what mike is saying therefore i will look unto the lord right continue verse 8 rejoice not against me oh my enemy when i fall i shall rise when i sit in darkness the lord shall be a light unto me that's micah's faith in the night season so that's my way of plugging a book by that same name that we've come up with i will bear the indignation of the lord because i have sinned against him until he plead my cause and execute judgment for me he will bring me forth to the light and i shall behold his righteousness his confidence comes from the only place it should the complete submission to god he is confessing his individual and national sins both personally and nationally we too have gone along with the affluent society and accepted its comforts we too have snickered at the lack of integrity in the public life and also in the corporate life we have closed our eyes to the gross immorality that is everywhere all around us it is time indeed for us also to confess our sins just as micah did now in israel's case god used the rod of assyria to punish them for their sins in judah's case it would be babylon that will be his rod if you will is the judgment of america overdue many think so billy graham quipped many years ago if god doesn't judge america he's gonna have to apologize to sodom and gomorrah great soundbite thomas jefferson said that quipped the same thing in 1781 he says i tremble for my country when i recall that god is just and that his justice will not sleep forever there are many that believe the abandonment judgment of god has already begun need to pray for repentance in this nation verse 10 then she that is mine enemy shall see it and shame shall cover her which said unto me where's the lord thy god mine eyes shall behold her now shall she be trodden down as the mire of the streets see the nations are bent on israel's annihilation and that's the idiom that's being used here yet ultimately the nations will see that god was dealing with his people after they are restored it will be they who are trodden down as mire in the streets in the day that thy walls are to be built in that day shall the decree be far removed interesting phrase see verse 11 and 12 look to a later and final fulfillment it's interesting that daniel's 69 weeks of the daniel 9 were triggered by the decree that the walls were to be rebuilt not the temple as many have erroneously assumed if you check verse 25 daniel 9 the famous seventh prophecy moving back to verse 12 here in micah in that day also he shall come even to thee from assyria and from the fortified cities and from the fortress even to the river and from sea to sea and from mountain to mountain from assyria there it is again by the way as we saw back in chapter four during the millennial kingdom the nation shall come to zion even their former enemy assyria remember back in chapter 4 verse 2 it said and many nations shall come and say come and let us go up to the mountain of the lord and to the house of the lord of jacob he will teach us his ways we will walk in his paths and for the law will go forth of zion and the word of the lord from jerusalem and that's also echoes in isaiah 19 that same equivalent passages and many other places down to verse 13 not with notwithstanding the land shall be desolate because of them that dwell therein for the fruit of their doings micah reminds them that before this time of blessing punishment lies before them the land of the people are inextricably linked together and by the way that's what makes the current confrontations in the middle east so significant because god hasn't forgotten israel when they mess when you mess around the middle east you run the risk of poking your finger in the eye of god so you want to watch very closely what's going on as the cauldron gets ready to boil over in the middle east as we watch verse 14 feed thy people with thy rod the flock of thine heritage which dwell solidarity in the wood in the midst of carmel let them feed in bashan and gilead as in the days of old now carmel and bashan and gilead bashan being what we think of as the golan heights were all highly desirable grazing lands that's why they were favored by the tribes of reuben gad and the half tribe of manasseh back there in deuteronomy 3 and so on but here the idiom is being used just to speak of the whole land not just that was favored over the uh that portion which they selected east of the jordan talk about the whole land here and uh in zechariah 11 the first three verses you have a similar figure of speech or your seduction if you will and it says as in the days of old that refers to the days of solomon and david and solomon of course before the civil war according to the days of thy coming out of the land of egypt will i show unto him marvelous things it's interesting to notice how god repeatedly alludes to their deliverance from egypt as one of his most dramatic shows of force on their behalf he again here references the exodus as one of his most important achievements in that regard he goes on says the nation shall see and be confounded at all their might they shall lay their hand upon their mouth and their ears shall be deaf see the nations are going to be defeated and astounded now remember rahab when when they visited rahab and jericho she was trembling because they had got they'd hurt she they were terrified of what they'd heard that god was favoring these people so she uh made arrangements on her behalf and uh but there's an interesting parallel here you might want to study in all of that so israel is going to be regathered in order to possess the land and this regathering will be accomplished by miracles that's what verses 14 and 15 have highlighted here in verse 16-17 it says when the gentiles see this they will cease reproaching the jews and have reverential fear of the jews they will then submit to the god of israel wow okay devoutly to be wished verse 17 they shall lick the dust like a serpent they shall move out of their holes like worms of the earth they shall be afraid of the lord our god and shall fear because of thee they shall lick the dust like a serpent strange use of phrase is that an allusion to genesis 3 verse 14 the serpent licking the dust and the they move out of their holes that sounds like revelation 6 doesn't it remember in revelation 6 15 16 the kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men and the chief captains and the mighty men and every bond men and every free men hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains and said to the mountains and rocks fall on us hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne and from the wrath of the lamb how interesting that is in revelation 6 15 and 16 it's an echo if you will of joshua 10 verses 16 22 and 24 because back in the days of joshua the enemy said the same thing they hidden in in caves and so forth from the uh from joshua and so on there's a real parallel between the whole structure of the book of joshua and the whole structure book of revelation i invite you to study for yourself come to your own conclusions verse 18 who is who is a god like unto thee that pardon of iniquity and passes by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage he retaineth not his anger forever because he delighteth in mercy praise god for that by the way here's a question for your evening your bible you're i assume if you're really serious about the bible you're meeting during the week in a small group to study the scripture intensely there is something that god has not seen but you and i see every day what do you see and i see every day that god has never seen that's your little question this is the last session i can't delay the the answer till next time so i'll let you in while that is something he what is god not saying that you see every day you're equal god has no equal we have lots of equals okay so that was first asked by the way in exodus 15 verse 11 and a number of other places god is not seen as equal there is no equal to god but i just thought i'd throw that out there for fun see god is unique he's a he is the creator the gods of the heathen are creatures created things that's an enormous difference god is holy and righteous our god is a holy god and he reveals his anger against sin but yet he pardons iniquity and delights and mercy and he's able to do that because that price has been paid by the death of jesus christ that allows him to to indulge in that mercy he will turn again he will have compassion on us he will subdue our iniquities and thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea the depths of sea strange use of phrase in exodus 15 and jeremiah 15. his forgiveness is like a debt we see that echoed in isaiah and acts and colossians his forgiveness is like the healing of a disease jeremiah 3 and isaiah 61 his forgiveness is pictured as a cleansing of pollution or contamination these are all different idioms for his forgiveness his forgiveness is like a debt that's been forgiven his forgiveness is like the healing of a disease his forgiveness is also like a washing or cleansing elimination of contamination but he never forgives until the debt is paid christ paid for my debt on that cross 2000 years ago how about yours has he paid for yours i believe it every one but you have to accept it verse 20 that will perform the truth to jacob and the mercy to abraham which thou has sworn unto our fathers from the days of old god will perform on the basis of his covenant to abraham genesis 12 to confirm to isaac in genesis 26 and to jacob in genesis 28 that's the linkage ishmael is not on the list these things god has sworn god is one to abraham and their fathers are irrefutable and immutable the things that god has sworn to abram and their fathers are irrefutable and immutable unchangeable and yet most of the churches deny them by the way they have a very strange twist where they ignore uh generalize spiritualize it away i'll mention one last thing when we close tashlish is the last three verses are joined to the book of jonah for reading in the synagogue on the afternoon of yom kippur the day of atonement the last three verses of micah and the the book of jonah is read yom kippur once a year the orthodox jew goes to a running stream or river and symbolically empties his pockets of his sins into the water while he recites verses 18 19 and 20 of micah 7. just thought you'd like to know that the service is called the tashalish after the hebrew word meaning thou wilt cast it's a ceremonial way of casting your sins into the water okay well i encourage you we appreciate you being with us in the study of the book of micah i encourage you to review your notes and make it your own and i encourage you to take these things as courses they're all available on the internet through the institute the cognitive you can do that and and not only progress within the curricula of the institute but also get university credit if you so desire there's ways to do that i encourage you to explore the institute coina institute and with that let's you and i stand for a closing word of prayer

Channel: Adam Champion

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Id: A-TuBzk3R4s

Length: 60min 42sec (3642 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 22 2021