The Book of Micah – Part 2, Micah 2:1-13

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The Book of Micah – Part 2, Micah 2:1-13

[Study Aired March 2, 2024]

In the study of the first chapter of Micah, we saw that he prophesied the coming destruction of Israel. Not only to Israel, representing God’s model nation purposely defiled, but inclusive of humanity, both parties each in their God-given time and order. Of course, we know that spirituality means a sequential connection with two primary women in scripture; first, Old Jerusalem fading away and the New Heavenly Jerusalem within created in every person ever to exist.

Gal 4:21  Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? 
Gal 4:22  For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman. 
Gal 4:23  But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the freewoman was by promise. 
Gal 4:24  Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. 
Gal 4:25  For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. 
Gal 4:26  But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all. 
Gal 4:27  For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband.
Gal 4:28  Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. 
Gal 4:29  But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now. 
Gal 4:30  Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman. 
Gal 4:31  So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free. 

1Co 15:19  If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.
1Co 15:20  But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. 
1Co 15:21  For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 
1Co 15:22  For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. 

There is one event for all mankind since all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Rom 3:9, Ecc 9:2), so none have eminence above his brother – except to whom the Lord chooses to give honour and glory, and most outstandingly and humbly experienced by his Bride (Mar 4:11:-12, Rev 19:6-10).

Rom 3:9  What then? are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin; 
Rom 3:10  As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:
Rom 3:11  There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.
Rom 3:12  They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. 
Rom 3:13  Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: 
Rom 3:14  Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: 
Rom 3:15  Their feet are swift to shed blood: 
Rom 3:16  Destruction and misery are in their ways: 
Rom 3:17  And the way of peace have they not known: 
Rom 3:18  There is no fear of God before their eyes. 
Rom 3:19  Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.
Rom 3:20  Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.

Those verses in Romans are a wonderful spearhead to our study in Micah chapter 2. Since Adam and Eve, we all are oppressors, one against the other and particularly individually against our Lord.

Ecc 4:1  So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they had no comforter.

While we are in Babylon (the world), “Woe to the Oppressors”, who, like the Lord’s Elect initially thought, “they had no comforter” since we couldn’t understand Daniel’s ‘sealed book’ until Christ opened our eyes and ears and prophesied again before the nations within (verse 11) as seen in Revelations 10:1-11.

Micah Chapter 2

Woe to the Oppressors

Mic 2:1  Woe to them that devise iniquity, and work evil upon their beds! when the morning is light, they practise it, because it is in the power of their hand. 

As I’ve noted in myself, the Lord designed a strange quirk in the nature of man that happens profoundly when lying in bed. Being prostrate on our backs or heads or knees bowed in prayer is a biological position that seems to stimulate vivid imagery and hyperfocus for a subject. Since man is inherently evil, darkness physically and spiritually facilitates that focus in devising evil or good while on their backs upon their beds. Of course, in the positive sense, the bed is an ironically ‘dreadful’ place to be if suffering from insomnia by the Lord’s vivid spiritual stimulation; if one’s mind is exhilarated by the Lord’s spirit, the incredible insights just have to be written down because of the extremely high chance of them being lost at daylight is too painful.

However, sin in the natural man, similar to a young teen viewing a ribald movie, seems more starkly memorable than righteous thoughts, and a thought persistently held captive is bound to be repeated mentally upon boldness being exercised when a covert opportunity arises. That evil is one of the six oppressive things the Lord hates and is “A heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that are swift in running to mischief – Pro 6:18.

Gen 6:5  And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

2Co 10:3  For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: 
2Co 10:4  (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) 
2Co 10:5  Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; 
2Co 10:6  And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience, when your obedience is fulfilled.

Few greater “powers of their hand” are there than those who rule from the pulpit of political Christianity (inclusive of every other religious ideology), controlling every detail of our day-to-day living. The churches are ruled by emasculated priests who use ‘the power of their hand’s authority’ and not Christ’s. As limpid as these priests are, the laity is so bereft of truth they, too, are gelded of witnessing against these wizards to hold them to account before Christ’s commands. The most damning identification of those representations is, of course, ourselves, the rapidly receding ‘man of sin, ‘the son of perdition’.

Isa 3:12  As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths.

Nah 3:13  Behold, thy people in the midst of thee are women: the gates of thy land shall be set wide open unto thine enemies: the fire shall devour thy bars [city gates within made of wood].

Joh 17:9  I pray for them [His Elect]: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine [and not the world’s time in this age].
Joh 17:10  And all [the world is] mine are thine, and thine [Elect] are mine; and I am glorified in them. 
Joh 17:11  And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.
Joh 17:12  While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled.

A “son of perdition” is given spiritual understanding, turns back to the ways of the world and is the more potent oppressor of himself.

With the gates of our former Babylonian minds wide open to “believe a lie” (2Th 2:1-12), 200,000,000 of them, meaning a symbolic incalculable number (Rev 9:16), the man of lawlessness, formally ourselves, is emboldened to unwittingly “oppress” himself inwardly with the multitude of doctrinal lies. Emboldened, he now sallies forth to oppress Israel, today’s Christian world, outwardly and most hellishly, spiritually (Mat 23:14-15). However, just as she gets chastised to learn Christ’s commandments, so, too, will her oppressors in the figurative sixth hour remain in darkness to the ninth hour (meaning judgment) and, in due course, headed for the more likely Resurrection to Judgment.

Ecc 4:1  So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed [Both the world and the Lord’s flock], and they [the Lord’s Bride initially thought that they] had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they [the Bride] had no comforter.

Mat 27:45  Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour. 
Mat 27:46  And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? [ay-lee’-lam-ah’-sab-akh-than-ee’] that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

We, too, fill up behind the afflictions of our Lord and, according to our level of God-given endurance, feel similarly aggrieved as Christ (Psa 107:22-31).

Mat 27:40  And saying, Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, save thyself. If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross. 

Luk 23:39  And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. 
Luk 23:40  But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? 
Luk 23:41  And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this man hath done nothing amiss. 

2Co 4:8  We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; 
2Co 4:9  Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; 
2Co 4:10  Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.

Of course, it is the Lord who uses His murderous Serpent to give us night terrors upon our bed in virtual visions and dreams inclusive of us consciously devising evil schemes against either a good or evil perceived foe.

Psa 16:7  I will bless the LORD, who hath given me counsel: my reins also instruct me in the night seasons. [Interestingly, the “reigns” are the ureter running from the kidneys to the bladder, and a consequence of having night terrors can make some people incontinent enough to receive instruction].

The two malefactors in Luke’s verses above represent positively and negatively the two camps of ‘oppression’ in Micah 2:1. The positive aspect is the Lord’s Elect being oppressed on every side sees ultimately as only positive since she knows her Lord’s chastisements brings forth much fruit. Of course, the negative malefactor represents the world goaded by the Serpent to send a flood of lies after the Woman (Rev 12:12-17).

However, in the meantime and context of Micah’s chapter 2, Babylon is about to oppress Israel. The thief and murderer straddling each side of Jesus on the cross can represent us in our coming out of Babylon. We first deride Christ until He gives us to see that we are just as guilty as the rest of the world, and our oppressors gnashing their teeth upon us eventually has little effect.

Hos 7:1  When I would have healed Israel, then the iniquity of Ephraim was discovered, and the wickedness of Samaria: for they commit falsehood; and the thief cometh in, and the troop of robbers spoileth without.

Ephraim and Samaria represent all the northern tribes of Israel apart from Judah and her few associated priestly tribes in the south, who later go into captivity in Babylon. They primarily represent Babylonian Christianity (inclusive of the world), today from which the Lord’s few Elect are told to flee.

Hos 7:2  And they [the Lord’s Elect coming out of Babylon] consider not in their hearts that I remember all their wickedness [Working (devising) iniquity upon their bed as seen in Micah 2:1]: now their own doings have beset them about; they are before my face. 
Hos 7:3  They make the king glad with their wickedness, and the princes with their lies.

The most insidiously wretched gladness is in the hearts of the Lord’s Elect, who formally sent themselves gifts of self-righteous lying beliefs against the word of God. It is all a part of their chastisement in learning to think and speak only Christ’s commands that he receives from our Father and be the most heinous “oppressors” against themselves and the world.

Hos 7:4  They are all adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker, who ceaseth from raising after he hath kneaded the dough, until it be leavened. 
Hos 7:5  In the day of our king the princes have made him sick with bottles of wine; he stretched out his hand with scorners. 
Hos 7:6  For they have made ready their heart like an oven, whiles they lie in wait: their baker sleepeth all the night; in the morning it burneth as a flaming fire. 
Hos 7:7  They are all hot as an oven, and have devoured their judges; all their kings are fallen: there is none among them that calleth unto me. 
Hos 7:8  Ephraim, he hath mixed himself among the people; Ephraim is a cake not turned. 
Hos 7:9  Strangers have devoured his strength, and he knoweth it not: yea, gray hairs are here and there upon him, yet he knoweth not.
Hos 7:10  And the pride of Israel testifieth to his face: and they do not return to the LORD their God, nor seek him for all this.

As Jerusalem who represents the Lord’s priests, his Elect was prophesied to experience, they received destruction and captivity by the Babylonians in 597 BC. She particularly received “no comforter” when the Romans utterly destroyed the city in 70 AD when mothers ate their children, symbolically seen today as the churches of the world consume the laity. In Babylon, the world since the cross, where their priests are witless to Christ’s commands, they not just steal from the laity and take their inheritance (the fields) with physical tithes and offerings but take away the whole stay and the staff and the whole stay of bread and water.

Mic 2:2  And they covet fields, and take them by violence; and houses, and take them away: so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage. 

Jer 6:13  For from the least of them even unto the greatest of them every one is given to covetousness; and from the prophet [in this case, any person who unrighteously touts the word of God]  even unto the priest every one dealeth falsely. 
Jer 6:14  They have healed also the hurt of the daughter [‘… I sit a queen and am no widow, I have a husband…’ Rev 18:7] of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

Isa 3:1  For, behold, the Lord, the LORD of hosts, doth take away from Jerusalem [meaning us when reclining in imagined peace in Babylonian Christianity] and from Judah the stay and the staff, the whole stay of bread, and the whole stay of water [ALL righteous teaching is gone],
Isa 3:2  The mighty man, and the man of war, the judge, and the prophet, and the prudent, and the ancient,
Isa 3:3  The captain of fifty, and the honourable man, and the counsellor, and the cunning artificer, and the eloquent orator. 
Isa 3:4  And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them. 
Isa 3:5  And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbour: the child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient, and the base against the honourable.
Isa 3:6  When a man shall take hold of his brother of the house of his father, saying, Thou hast clothing, be thou our ruler, and let this ruin be under thy hand: 
Isa 3:7  In that day shall he swear, saying, I will not be an healer; for in my house is neither bread nor clothing: make me not a ruler of the people. 
Isa 3:8  For Jerusalem is ruined, and Judah is fallen: because their tongue and their doings are against the LORD, to provoke the eyes of his glory.

Mic 2:3  Therefore thus saith the LORD; Behold, against this family do I devise an evil, from which ye shall not remove your necks; neither shall ye go haughtily: for this time is evil. 

Not having this oppressive yoke removed from our necks severely humbles our adulterous coquettish ways with our neighbours, the harlot churches of the world. Yet, having (temporarily) severely curtailed our version of lustful worldliness by frenetic church attendance, tithing and outward genuinely good works, we are not given the holy spirit to see and live spiritually. 

Isa 3:16  Moreover the LORD saith, Because the daughters of Zion [the multitude of harlot churches, and particularly within!] are haughty, and walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they go, and making a tinkling with their feet: 
Isa 3:17  Therefore the Lord will smite with a scab the crown of the head of the daughters of Zion, and the LORD will discover their secret parts [outwardly today, it is not hard to discover the secret parts beneath the ‘eye-patches of the worshipful trinity’ of the ‘church’s/harlots beach wear].

Mic 2:4  In that day shall one take up a parable against you, and lament with a doleful lamentation, and say, We be utterly spoiled: he hath changed the portion of my people: how hath he removed it from me! turning away he hath divided our fields. 

How stunning is Micah 2:4 as a parable! (Something that is hidden from the world’s spiritual observation). Having once believed that scripture is impossible to understand (as many a friend in Babylon has said to me), we now see that “all things are yours” (1Co 3:22) and that every ‘jot and tittle’ (Mat 5:18) of scripture relates to us. The Elect understand that they are both the oppressed and formally the oppressor. Paradoxally, the Lord’s Elect become the chastising oppressor in the one-thousand year reign with Christ’s rod of iron for zero conversion.

Mic 2:5  Therefore thou shalt have none that shall cast a cord by lot in the congregation of the LORD. 

In other words, there is one event to all of mankind, so there is no use casting a lot or prophesying speculations to see who upon the evil or good may fall since it is God from before creation and written in each person’s book deciding who should suffer good or evil in what age and circumstances; very man is His workmanship.

Ecc 9:2  All things come alike to all: there is one event to the righteous, and to the wicked; to the good and to the clean, and to the unclean; to him that sacrificeth, and to him that sacrificeth not: as is the good, so is the sinner; and he that sweareth, as he that feareth an oath. 
Ecc 9:3  This is an evil among all things that are done under the sun, that there is one event unto all: yea, also the heart of the sons of men is full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live, and after that they go to the dead.

Mic 2:6  Prophesy ye not, say they to them that prophesy: they shall not prophesy to them, that they shall not take shame. 

Deu 18:20  But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die.
Deu 18:21  And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the LORD hath not spoken? 
Deu 18:22  When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.

Rev 19:20  And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone. 
Rev 19:21  And the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth: and all the fowls were filled with their flesh. 

Mic 2:7  O thou that art named the house of Jacob, is the spirit of the LORD straitened? [Definition: 1. to be short, be impatient, be vexed, be grieved]  are these his doings? do not my words do good to him that walketh uprightly?

Mic 2:8  Even of late my people is risen up as an enemy: ye pull off the robe with the garment from them that pass by securely as men averse from war.

Pulling off the robe with the garment utterly exposes our nakedness, as did the Northern tribes of Israel going naked into Assyria, subsequently becoming one with Babylon (Isa 20:1-6). Our treachery and self-righteousness of believing that nothing untoward would happen to the Lord’s very own people is amplified by us seeing the outward prosperity and health while having our enemies consistently routed before our eyes each time we return from war ever since Israel in the Old Testament times ‘till now, not knowing that we are naked to the coming derision by the Ten Horns of the Beast (Rev 17:16).

Mic 2:9  The women [churches of Babylon] of my people have ye cast out from their pleasant houses; from their children have ye taken away my glory for ever. 

Our former dwelling safely in ‘another Jesus’ while in Babylon made a mockery of the Lord’s commands.

Mar 7:13  Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.

Tit 1:13  This witness is true. Wherefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith; 
Tit 1:14  Not giving heed to Jewish fables, and commandments of men, that turn from the truth. 

Mic 2:10  Arise ye, and depart; for this is not your rest: because it is polluted, it shall destroy you, even with a sore destruction. 

We have to move on from the Old Covenant that is impossible to please God by the keeping of its outward works, and has made no man righteous. Leaving our wealth in the inheritance of the Promised Land and going into Babylon initially seems a dreadful chastisement not worthy of the pleasant sounds of the daughters of music singing to a melodious harp.

Psa 137:1  By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. 
Psa 137:2  We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. 
Psa 137:3  For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. 
Psa 137:4  How shall we sing the LORD’S song in a strange land? 
Psa 137:5  If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. 
Psa 137:6  If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy. 
Psa 137:7  Remember, O LORD, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof. 
Psa 137:8  O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us
Psa 137:9  Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.

For the Lord’s Elect, being oppressed in Babylon is a blessing in disguise when he gives us eyes to see and ears to hear to leave her behind and have the Lord rebuild his temple within. We learn to walk in the spirit and shun all falsehoods and strong delusions. Meanwhile, back in Babylon, our elder sister is living in the lap of luxury, deceived by the strong drink of spiritual wizardry, witless of her yet again coming destruction that typifies the one event to all mankind that the Bride of Christ, ‘the remnant’ experiences ahead of her sisters. 

Mic 2:11  If a man walking in the spirit and falsehood do lie, saying, I will prophesy unto thee of wine and of strong drink; he shall even be the prophet of this people. 
Mic 2:12  I will surely assemble, O Jacob, all of thee; I will surely gather the remnant of Israel; I will put them together as the sheep of Bozrah [the Lord’s sheepfold], as the flock in the midst of their fold: they shall make great noise by reason of the multitude of men.

The Lord’s Bride is in the world, a separate pen in the midst of the same sheep yard. In the soon coming rule by her under Christ in the One Thousand Year reign with the nauseating and deathly strong drink by the rod of iron, great consternation will arise from the multitude of mankind for the seeming heartless ‘oppression’ without mercy. 

Mic 2:13  The breaker is come up before them: they have broken up, and have passed through the gate, and are gone out by it: and their king shall pass before them, and the LORD on the head of them.

The Lord’s Elect will be the great breaker in unity with her Husband, who will pass first before her sisters hand in hand with her Husband and Lord.

1Co 15:21  For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 
1Co 15:22  For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive
1Co 15:23  But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming. 
1Co 15:24  Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. 
1Co 15:25  For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. 
1Co 15:26  The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. 

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