Help is on the way (Mic 2:12-13)

In my last year of university in Budapest, I was doing some part-time teaching in a secondary school. The class I was assigned had been without an English teacher for over a year. Predictably, discipline was lax, and the class was hard to control especially for an inexperienced teacher like myself. One time, to make myself heard above the chatter, I banged my hand, palm open, on the teacher’s desk. A stricken silence followed, everyone looked apprehensively at me, except I could not help laughing at the effect and lost the advantage. In the same way, if we assume that God pronounced judgment and then with the same breath spoke of restoration (as in today’s passage), we create the same problem I had with my class: the lighter tone cancels out the effect of the prior warning. Since God is an effective teacher, it is best to understand these abrupt changes as prophecies spoken at different times rather than following each other closely and chronologically.

It is difficult to determine the historic context for today’s passage as the language is quite general. Possibly, it was spoken at the time when Assyria conquered several cities in Judah around 701 BC and was marching on Jerusalem (2 Kings 18:13, 17).[1] The reference to the people being put together into a sheepfold implies protection (Mic 2:12) and historically, it is probable that some of the population from the cities vanquished by the Assyrians escaped to the relative safety of Jerusalem that still stood at the time. The words ‘breaker’ and ‘break out’ (Mic 2:13) evoke God acting on behalf of His people and giving them victory (2 Sam 5:20), while the reference to the gate implies a city. If this is Jerusalem, then it is likely about God’s intervention in saving the city from the Assyrians during Hezekiah’s reign, who trusted the Lord (2 Kings 19:32-34). Alternatively, the situation may allude to the Babylonian exile when God’s people will be gathered, and the Lord will break open a way for them to return to their own land (for the historic events during the ministry of the prophets with books named after them see my introductory post on the prophets here).

As latter-day readers of Micah, what can we learn from this promise? First, it teaches us that God’s purpose is ultimately to save. Even in dark times of ungodliness, there is always a remnant group who seek the Lord and God sees them and cares for them. When things are difficult and we struggle to keep going, it is hard to believe that there is someone out there who knows our daily battles and the darkness that presses down on us. Someone once said that God is always ‘almost late’ and when we want to hurry the process, it does feel like He is later than late! Yet, the verbs in v.12 are emphatic, God will surely act on behalf of those who are His. This is not a blanket guarantee against any suffering, but an assurance that the Lord will make things right in the end. He will not let us down when we need Him.

Secondly, the passage teaches us that God is powerful to bring about change. He can ‘break through’ (v.13) any situation that looks beyond us and He often does so in ways that we did not anticipate. Just when we think that we are walled in and in a corner, the Lord makes a way where there was no way before. Finally, when God moves, He does not prod us from behind but goes ahead. Twice we read of this in v.13: the breaker goes up ‘before them’ and the Lord is ‘at their head’.[2] Sometimes when my husband and I enjoy leisurely walks in the NZ bush, I think of the first settlers who had to travel with someone going ahead to break open the path and cut through thick vegetation. This is what our God does for us, going ahead, making a way.

---

[1] Leslie C. Allen, The Books of Joel, Obadiah, Jonah, and Micah, NICOT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976), 301-303.

[2] It is unclear if the reference to the king is the earthly ruler or God. Biblical Hebrew does not distinguish between upper and lower case, though translations sometimes capitalise ‘King’ if they think it refers to God. Hebrew poetry typically uses parallelism where one line makes a statement and the next one repeats the same with slightly different words. If this is the case here, then the last two lines speak of God as King. However, it is also possible that the two lines form a progression from earthly king to the punchline of God at their head.

If you enjoyed this post, please share it with others.