Far Past Its Limits

In true prophetic fashion, Micah takes our imagination, what we consider to be possible, and stretches it – not to its limits, but far past its limits.

In Micah’s day, there is immense corruption among Israel’s power structures. The monarchy, the priesthood, the royally appointed prophets (of which Micah is not one) – they all carry out their work for the highest bidder. “Hear this, you rulers of the house of Jacob… who build Zion with blood and Jerusalem with wrong! Its rulers give judgment for a bribe, its priests teach for a price, its prophets give oracles for money.” (Micah 3:9-11) Because of such corruption, there will be judgment. “Because of you, Zion shall be plowed as a field; Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins, and the mountain of the house a wooded height.” (3:12) God will not turn a blind eye to the powerful who abuse their power. God will bring their mighty accomplishments down to a heap of rubble. That is the prophetic pattern. Injustice is met with the decisive justice of God. But the prophetic pattern goes further. Out of the rubble will arise a new reality, one born directly from the heart of God. So as Micah 3 leaves us in a heap of rubble, with a mountain brought low, Micah 4 will now lift that mountain back up, full of the will and wisdom of God.

“In days to come, the mountain of the LORD’s house shall be established as the highest of the mountains… Peoples shall stream to it, saying: ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, that he may teach us his ways, and that we may walk in his paths.’ For out of Zion shall go forth instruction.” (4:1-2) Micah imagines that the whole world is getting a clue and realizing that Zion is where they’re actually going to experience the love and wisdom of God. The nations will all make this pilgrimage together, having realized that anywhere else we were looking for the love and wisdom of God was a fools’ errand. But the nations are not only bringing with them a willingness to learn from God; they’re bringing their conflicts as well, rightly suspecting that God will do a better job of settling them than we humans do. “He shall arbitrate between strong nations. They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning-hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. But they shall all sit under their own vines and their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid, for the LORD has spoken.” (4:3-4)

Just as soon as human conflicts and wars are brought before God’s discernment, weapons are being de-commissioned and repurposed into farming equipment. Micah shows us an entire planet of people looking at their weapons and wondering what to do with them now that violence and war are things of the past. Even the weapons will be redeemed along with the rest of creation. There will be nothing left to fear. There will be communion between God and his world that is completely uninterrupted by conflict of any kind.

Do we believe this is possible? Micah does. In fact, Micah not only believes it’s possible, but announces that it is in fact happening. We often think and speak with a stubborn pragmatism. “It’s just the way the world is,” we say. But Micah doesn’t know how to say such a thing. Micah is taking what we consider to be possible and stretching it far, far past its limits. Are we willing to imagine the way Micah does?