Daily Thoughts from Micah: From Power to Disaster (2:1-5)

Daily Thoughts from Micah: From Power to Disaster

1Woe to those who devise wickedness and work evil on their beds!  When the morning dawns, they perform it, because it is in the power of their hand.  2 They covet fields and seize them, and houses, and take them away; they oppress a man and his house, a man and his inheritance.  3 Therefore thus says the Lord: behold, against this family I am devising disaster, from which you cannot remove your necks, and you shall not walk haughtily, for it will be a time of disaster.  4 In that day they shall take up a taunt song against you and moan bitterly, and say, “We are utterly ruined; he changes the portion of my people; how he removes it from me!  To an apostate he allots our fields.”  5 Therefore you will have none to cast the line by lot in the assembly of the Lord.  (Micah 2:1-5, ESV)

When Jehu came to power in Israel, the northern kingdom, by overthrowing Joram, the son of Ahab, he recalled the prophecy of Yahweh through His prophet that Ahab would be repaid for stealing his neighbor’s land, Naboth’s land, and Jehu threw the body of Joram, Ahab’s son, on Naboth’s field with no burial.  Stealing the land of others was one of Israel’s big sins because this land really belonged to Yahweh and was His provision for His people’s needs.

We are supposed to use power to benefit others.  When someone uses their power to perform the evil they have planned, God plans evil against them.

In this case the oppressors in Israel are stealing lands and houses allotted to God’s people for their sustenance.  These are properties that have been handed down for centuries after Joshua’s allotment.  The haughtiness of these oppressors deserves divine judgment and Micah promises through Yahweh that that will take place when the “apostates” (Israel’s invaders, the Assyrians) take the land.  When the oppressors need someone to stand up for them, there will be no one.

God has given us provision through His gifts:  spouses, property, reputation, jobs, etc.  When you “fall in love” with someone’s spouse and steal them, you are depriving that person of their needs.  When you ruin someone’s reputation through gossip or accusation you ruin their chance to provide for themselves.  When you take property that does not belong to you, you hurt the one you stole from and God will not hesitate to devise disaster against you.  Your pride will be brought low in the day of disaster He has planned for you.

Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. (Galatians 6:7, ESV)