Okay, I know not all of my readers are religious people, and even more are not Christians, but I wanted to share this. My first sermon! Well my first written one anyway. So, consider this your forewarning. If you don't like Bible/Christian stuff, don't keep reading. Just ignore this post and wait for the next one. I'll be back with an update on doll dresses later. But if you would like to see what I am up to in my divinity courses, please feel free to read on.
This sermon is my intellectual property. Please do not steal it.
In America today, we live in a relatively free and lavish society. Even with the current economic crisis, we go about our daily lives with little concern or worry what tomorrow is going to bring. Day in and day out, we go to work, we go to the stores, we spend time with friends and family without worrying about someone coming in and telling us that we can’t go to work, we can’t go to the store, and we can’t even see the friends and family we would like. If someone came into the church today, or into our markets, or into our city streets, and said that tomorrow another country, say China, was going to come in, take over America, kill some of her citizens, and send the rest into exile, we would probably laugh right in their face.
This must have been what it was like for the Old Testament prophets. Imagine with me for a moment what it must have been like in eighth century B.C. for the average Hebrew. A dusty street runs between houses where children are running around outside playing. Women are here and there attending to the daily duties of the household – the laundry, the cooking, and the general keep of the house – while the men have gone off to work – perhaps to the vineyards or the threshing floors, maybe to the fishing ships, or perhaps to the market place. While the strong kingdoms of Babylon and Assyria surrounded the small kingdoms of Israel and Judah, the average Hebrew probably would not have given much thought to the threat that these powerful kingdoms posed. If anything, the average Hebrew of the eighth century B.C. lived as the average American does today, in ignorance with a seemingly blissful life free of the cares and worries of tomorrow.
It was into this simplistic countryside atmosphere that eighth century B.C. prophets like Micah stepped out into to give their message from God to the people. According to Micah 1:1, Micah was from the town of Moresheth-Gath located west of Hebron and twenty miles southwest of Jerusalem. Contemporaries with Micah would have included Isaiah, Amos – who had just finished his ministry to the northern kingdom – and Hosea, who also prophesied to the northern kingdom. Presumably, Micah was from the tribe of Judah as he came from the area where the tribe of Judah lived.
Micah’s message, like so many other prophets of his time, was a simple one: a call to the holy, chosen people of God to repent and return to the Lord or they would face the wrath of a vengeful and jealous God. But Micah’s message was more that just a call to the chosen people, to the inhabitants of Israel and Judah. In this oracle given in verses two through seven, Micah’s very first words are a call to all of mankind: “Listen, all you nations! Pay attention, all inhabitants of earth!” Just imagine how the people who heard his message begin like that must have reacted! I would imagine that some of them would have reacted with indignation, especially those Gentiles who would have heard his message – “How dare a Hebrew tell them what to do!” And a Hebrew’s reaction? “Well, why should we be worried what that crazy prophet has to say to all the other nations? We are God’s chosen people after all.” Poor Micah! Even just to get a listening audience for his words from God must have felt like he was beating his head against a brick wall! Micah may have even felt that a brick wall would have listened more!
But audience or not, Micah delivered his message, and boy was it an accusation! So much was his accusation a leveling of God’s demands against the chosen people, in this case Samaria and Judah specifically, that this oracle is known as a divine covenant lawsuit. God was taking HIS people to court! And Micah was to act as the herald for God. He was to bring God’s subpoena to appear and take account for their actions to the residents of Samaria and Judah. Micah cries out to those who will listen, “The sovereign Lord will testify against you; the Lord will accuse you from his majestic palace.” Now I don’t know about you or the ancient Hebrews, but a subpoena like that would have terrified me! Not only were you being called to court, but you were being called to court by the supreme God! Think for a moment how you would have answered. What would you do if someone came today and said, “God has spoken to me. HE has said that HE is very angry and displeased with you and HE wants you to account for your actions in front of the whole world!” Personally, I think I would run and hide. Or at least would have felt like running and hiding. Or maybe beg for forgiveness and hope that my cries were heard. But was this the answer of the ancient Hebrews? No. They didn’t listen to Micah, or any of his contemporary prophets, and thus, God had to take action against HIS chosen people, actions out of both HIS supreme justice and HIS supreme love, actions that would ultimately result in the conquering and exiling of the Hebrews by first Assyria and then by Babylon.
And Micah even warns the Hebrews of this coming of Assyria when he levels God’s accusation against the Hebrews. He specifically states that Samaria will be destroyed for her sins against God, for her breaking of the covenant which HE had established with HIS people, first with Abraham and then with Moses and the people of Israel in the desert. Not only will Samaria be destroyed, but she will be utterly destroyed. Micah cries out the warning: “I will turn Samaria into a heap of ruins in an open field!” and “I will tumble the rubble of her stone walls down into the valley and tear down her fortifications to their foundations.” The destruction of a city to its utter ruin brings to mind some other scenes from the Old Testament. I think first of the city of Jericho. We have the account of Joshua and the Israelites coming up to the city of Jericho and having to march around the city for days before finally, at the appropriate signal, the walls of Jericho would fall with the sounding of the trumpets by the Israelites. The Israelites had to work to topple Jericho. Now, somehow, I don’t think that this is the type of utter destruction Micah is foretelling of for Samaria. His message seems to be a much more urgent one. I think more of like a scenario like that of Sodom and Gomorrah, an instant in time where God utterly destroyed a pair of cities for their unfaithfulness to HIM. But whether Samaria was to be utterly destroyed like Jericho or like Sodom and Gomorrah, the ruin of Samaria would seem an impossibility to the Hebrews of Micah’s day, for “Samaria’s great palace had walls 5 feet thick made of fine ashlar masonry and its city walls were 30 feet thick. It would have seemed impossible that these would be utterly destroyed, pulled down in the valley and left a heap.”[1] Think about how you would react if someone told you that they were going to utterly destroy Fort Knox. Or how you felt on 9/11 when the World Trade Center Towers fell. These are scenarios that we, in our wildest imaginations, would never imagine could happen. This must have been how the ancient Hebrews felt when they heard Micah’s words foretelling of Samaria’s fall and utter destruction.
But as radical as the utter destruction of Samaria would have been for the Hebrews to imagine, Micah brings even more destruction in his message, in fact, he levels this part of the reaction to the accusations brought by the Lord before he tells of Samaria’s destruction. Micah says that not only is God going to level a lawsuit against the Hebrews and their actions, but HE is going to come down from HIS divine palace to level HIS accusations against the Hebrews, and HIS coming down brings drastic consequences, not on an established city like Samaria, but on the vary nature of the earth herself! Micah lists four different natural disasters that will occur when the Lord leaves HIS dwelling place and descends upon the earth’s mountaintops: 1) “the mountains will disintegrate,” 2) “the valleys will be split in two,” 3) “the mountains will melt like wax,” and 4) “the rocks will slide down like water cascading down a steep slope.”
For those of us here in the flat, endless plains of West Texas, these natural disasters seem distant and inconsequential, but for the Hebrews, who were surrounded by a hilly and low mountain terrain, they would have been a real threat. The mountains disintegrating and melting like wax seem to signify a natural disaster like that of a volcano erupting, which could have drastic consequences not only for those in the immediate area, but possibly even for the whole world. Those of us who are younger like myself would not remember the 1980 explosion of Mt. St. Helen’s, but I remember hearing stories from my parents and seeing pictures of the utter devastation this volcano erupting caused. It wasn’t just for the immediate area in the state Washington, but for the whole country and even the whole world. The ash from her explosion would reach around the world, blocking the sun and creating a haze that would last for days and even weeks in some areas. My mom would relate how even here on the South Plains of West Texas, she has to wear a medical mask just to breathe outside through the ash particles in the air. If a volcanic eruption had that devastating of an effect in modern times where we have the equipment needed to handle its after-effects, just imagine what it would have been like if a volcanic eruption like that happened in eighth century B.C.
Or the valleys being split in two? Sounds like an earthquake to me, which do occur occasionally in the Middle East region, but it’s not something that we here in West Texas can really relate to. I think of the confusion that is caused when the small earthquakes occurring two hours south of here can be felt here. Imagine the confusion which would occur with an earthquake strong enough to rip the valley in two, to literally open the ground up. I think of the recent quakes over the last decade or so which have shocked the nation and even the entire world. As a young teen, I remember watching the devastating pictures of the 1994 Northridge earthquake which happened just outside of Las Angeles, California. Buildings were destroyed. Freeways and flyovers were collapsed on top of one another. It was one of the most devastating earthquakes the U.S. had seen in recent years. But in more recent years, who could forget the devastating earthquakes that hit Haiti and Chili in the spring of 2010 or the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami that threatened to destroy Japan just over one year ago! Whether it was in a third world country unable to muster enough resources on its own to care for its displaced citizens or a first world country with the capacity to survive on its own for many years to come, these earthquakes threatened destruction on these countries and had effects which were felt all over the world, and in some cases are still being felt. An earthquake to split the valleys in two would crumble the world today; in ancient times, it would collapse the entire infrastructure!
And lastly, the rocks would slide down the mountain like a waterfall. A rockslide is perhaps the one natural disaster we West Texans could actually relate to. Not a rockslide per say, but at the very least, a large movement of dirt. In an area where you can see the dirt hanging in the air if the wind blows too much, just imagine that happening with rocks! More than trees and power lines would be uprooted! It would be more like the force of a tornado than a dust storm. I remember one year when I was a teen when my family had gone to southwest Colorado for vacation one summer. It was my first experience with mountains and I was in awe of it from the moment I could see the Rockies on the edge of the horizon. But as majestic as the mountains were, they could be deadly, too. Before we could arrive at our destination in Durango, we were diverted not once, not twice, but three different times to three different highways all to avoid the same rockslide which had covered the roadways. And even on the third detour, we still had to skirt around the bulldozers and other machines they brought in to clear the rockslide. An entire mountain top had crumbled and sent itself flying down the mountainside! Even as we were passing the construction site, we could hear an ominous roar coming from behind us. We were flagged to pull over to the side of the road in what was deemed a “safe zone.” We were allowed to step outside of our car and were able to watch as movement up on toward the top of the slide zone caused the rockslide to shift again and set itself in motion once again! A rockslide is not just a single occurrence, but rather, like earthquakes and volcanoes, has aftershocks and far reaching effects. When my family returned to Colorado the following year, we passed by the area where the rockslide had occurred. The path of the rockslide was still evident and in the valley below the mountain, piles upon piles of rocks still sat, waiting to be removed. The one house in the area had been displaced from its foundation by the rockslide and still sat nearly four hundred yards away from its foundation in the valley floor. And yet, Micah doesn’t warn of one of these natural disasters, but rather, of all of them. These disasters will happen when the Lord comes out of HIS dwelling place to accuse Samaria and Judah of their sins against HIM and against the covenant which HE established with their ancestors.
Even with the heralding of the devastating news which Micah brought, the Hebrews of Samaria and Judah did not head his warning. They kept on with their ways, breaking the covenant which God had made with them, and in return, God kept HIS promise and brought the utter devastation and ruin upon them and their cities.
This ignoring of God’s call has happened many times when HE declared HIMSELF to those whom HE calls HIS own. Like the Hebrews of the eighth century B.C., many Hebrews, and many more Gentiles, did not hear or heed God’s call in the first century A.D. when HE sent HIS messenger, John the Baptist, and even HIS own Son, to call the people back to HIM. How many people today do you know who ignore the call of the Lord? Or maybe perhaps they are waiting on a Micah to bring them the word of the Lord? Will you hear HIS call? Will you heed HIS call?
[1] Eric A. Mitchell, “Micah – The Man and His Times,” Southwestern Journal of Theology 46.1 (2003): 68.
If you have read down to the bottom here, I hope that you have enjoyed my "sermon" - even written as it is. Though I must say, I never thought my first fully written sermon would been on the Old Testament, much less on a Minor Prophet! Thanks for reading!
