MY GOD WILL HEAR ME

This particular portion of God’s word has been a comfort to persecuted believers down the centuries. In our own generation, the Chinese preacher WONG MING - who when held for twenty-two years, almost all in solitary confinement, tortured and mocked for his faith in Christ - told this writer in Shanghai that the main scripture portion that sustained his soul during all those years was Micah chapter 7 verses 7 to 9!

For Micah, speaking as the representative of the spiritual remnant of Israel, it was an expression of faith in the ultimate triumph of God, and the vindication of His afflicted people. Good men had gone, and their influence, likened to precious and fragrant fruit, had perished. The land was morally and spiritually barren because the excellent, in whom was all God’s delight, had been removed. The overwhelming influence was now degenerate and corrupt; to find a good man was like finding choice grapes when the vintage had been gleaned, v. 1. The whole of society was depraved, violent, evil, and corrupt, vv. 1-3.

It is amazing how, time and again, circumstances in Old Testament history reflect similar conditions in this modern age. Here is the value of such scriptures; they encourage believers in parallel situations today to take hope. The godly of past generations lived under the same conditions, and came through victoriously for God.

Yet, verses 4 to 6 are also prophetic and quoted by Christ to show the kind of persecution His mainly Jewish disciples would suffer for following Him, with dark overtones looking on to the final apocalyptic end-time persecutions, the Tribulation, Matt. 10. 21, 22, 35, 36.

In the final section, vv. 7-9, Micah roots his faith and hope in the reality of God. If one cannot trust the nearest and dearest, or the old familiar friend, vv. 5, 6, there is another who is nearer and dearer still. It is the Friend ‘that sticketh closer than a brother’, Prov. 18. 24. Micah looks to Him, waits for Him and knows that He will hear him. Let us also cry out in prayer when our hearts are overwhelmed by the darkness of the times. Our God will hear, and though we pass through dark days and appear to fall in the eyes of the enemy, v. 8, yet we shall arise and in the present darkness God shall be our light.