Special responsibility of the elite
Read Mi 3.
1) v1: Why did Micah single out the rulers of Israel, and how?
- What did he mean by ‘knowing justice’, cf v2?
- How does love of justice differ from mere ‘knowledge’ of justice?
- What privileges of the elite should make it easier for them than for others to learn how to love what is good? Hint:
- Why did Micah plead especially with the elite and the rulers that they must hear? Cannot all people hear equally?
- Why are rulers privileged or advantaged in learning to love good? cf Lk 12:48; Eph 4:7
- Is it safer then to not hear at all? Why not? cf Mk 4:23-25
- Why can’t ignorance of God’s word excuse those who have been given much? cf Mt 25:25-28
2) vv2-3 show that failure to love good resulted in the love of evil: How did such love of evil manifest itself at that stage among God’s people?
- v4: What price did these rulers have to pay for exploiting the weak?
3) vv5-8: How did false prophets help to lead the people and their leaders astray?
- v5: What does it mean to prophecy for gain?
- How must churches and their leaders guard themselves against the same folly today? Jas 2:1-4; 1 Pet 5:2
- Is it enough to guard yourself against greed? Or is Micah an example for every Christian to take a stand and expose financial abuse of spiritual leadership positions? cf Tit 1:10-11; Jud 1:11
- vv6-7: Like the rulers (v4), also the false prophets must reap what they sow: What price will they have to pay for their sin?
4) v8: How could Micah be sure that he was not the same kind of false prophet?
- How did the power of the Holy Spirit manifest itself in Micah? cf 1 Cor 2:4
- What do these texts themselves say about what they mean by ‘power’?
- What can only this power of God’s word carry out? cf Heb 3:11-12
5) vv9-11: What fault did Micah expose in the ministry of those who are supposed to lead and build up the Zion, the ‘city of God’?
- Was their sin that they did not care about the success of their ministry? Or that they pursued it with the wrong means?
- What was so wrong about how they led this work?
- vv10-11 expose murder, corruption, bribery, greed: What is (again) identified as the root of such gross evil, v9?
- If the root problem is the heart, what must faithful preaching of a faithful prophet aim at? (cf what you just read in Heb 3:11-12)
- How does that differ from mere moralizing? (consider the example of Micah, v8) => What will any messenger speaking on behalf of God have to pursue with first priority if he wants to be of service?
- v11: How did the complacency and false assurance of Israel’s leaders deviate from the sure hope of salvation that Christians are called to find and enjoy?
6) v12: Why was Micah right to put the blame for God’s impending judgment so squarely on the shoulder of Israel’s spiritual and political leaders?
- Does that mean that common folks had no guilt? Or do they share in the responsibility what kind of leaders will arise from among them, and how their leaders are held accountable? => How so?
7) Personal and application
- How do you make sure that you use all the faculties and authority entrusted to you to the best of the people you are called to serve?
- Ministries (authors, publishers, counselors, music producers, even ’schools of prophecy’…) today abound where significant profits influence what is sold to mainstream Christianity: How do you discern what you can support and what you should expose as wrong?
- How can you help support your church and its leaders to not fall to Satan’s schemes as the leaders of Israel did?
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