How will God establish peace on earth? It begins with God judging. Here are three more things Micah tells us:

God will gather. “I will assemble the lame” (4:6). These people have been injured by others’ cruelty. They have difficulty getting where they want to go. Imagine the Lord saying this to you. He will not allow your wounds to keep you from the blessing He wants you to enjoy. He is gathering His community: “Come to me, all you weary and I will give you rest” (Mat. 11:28).

God will rule. “The LORD will reign over them” (Mic. 4:7). The same Jesus who says, “I will give you rest,” also says, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me” (Mat. 11:29). Those He gathers, He also rules. To rule means to give direction. And “many nations shall come, and say: ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths’” (Mic. 4:2). Here is a community of people who say, “Without you, Lord, we would make a mess of our lives.”

God will redeem. “The LORD will redeem you from the hand of your enemies” (4:10). “Redeeming” is buying back what would otherwise be lost. You will see God’s strong arm revealed as He breaks the dark powers around you and in you.

God will fulfil His promise by judging, gathering, ruling, and redeeming. These are the things Christ does for all who will come to Him, and that is why you can have hope.

Is this something that you would want to be a part of?

Peace on earth sounds great, but how will God deal with the problems around us and the problems within us? The first thing Micah tells us here is that God will judge, and that this judgement will have two parts.

First, God will resolve disputes among His own people. So many disputes among God’s people never get resolved. But here we read that Christ will resolve them.

Second, God will judge the enemies of His people: “Many nations are assembled against you” (4:11). That’s the reality. In Micah’s time—and this has been true ever since—there have been many nations who have wanted to destroy Israel. They want to invade the land and to do violence. What is God going to do about that?

Micah says, “They do not know the thoughts of the LORD; they do not understand his plan, that he has gathered them as sheaves to the threshing floor" (4:12). What happens to sheaves on the threshing floor? They are destroyed. God will remove those who persist in evil from the earth.

People often say that a God of love would never send people to hell. That sounds good but it hides a great naivety about the power of evil. We need someone who can overcome the power of evil (human and demonic) that spoils life in this world.

Who can stop the thief or the murderer? Who can break the drug cartels or the terror cells? Who can break down the structures of self-interest that leave half the world hungry, while the other half is drowning in gluttony? We need the judge. Without the judge, the vision of Micah 4 would only be a dream, as it has been throughout human history.

What is your reaction to God’s work of judgement?

“The house of the LORD” is the temple, and the temple in the Old Testament was the place where God’s presence came down on the earth. God had said that He would meet with His people at the ark of the covenant (Exodus 25:22).

The ark was housed in the temple and when Solomon’s temple was built, the cloud of God's presence filled the temple. So, when we read about the temple (or the house of the LORD) in the Old Testament, we are talking about the place to which God had said He would come.

Micah foresees a day when God would visibly come to His temple: “Many nations shall come, and say: ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths’” (4:2).

The “he” here is obviously God Himself. So, Micah is talking about a day when the presence of the Lord will be known to all the nations of the earth. People will come to see the Lord, to hear His teaching, and to walk in His paths. This is what he is saying!

God is invisible and so, if He is to be seen and known and heard, He must take some visible form. That means Micah is clearly anticipating a day when the Messiah, the Christ, will come to the temple in Jerusalem. There will be a day when God will draw near and His presence and His Word will be made known on the earth.

Can you imagine what this would be like?

Micah is describing total disarmament—something that’s never been seen in world history—all bombs exploded, all weapons eliminated, all training camps closed, all prisons emptied, and all national defence budgets reallocated.

Now, of course, we find this almost impossible to imagine, because the only world we have ever known is one in which there is hostility, fear, and danger. But Micah speaks of a day when there will be peace on earth—imagine that. It’s quite a dream!

Along with this peace, there will also be security: “They shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid” (4:4). Imagine being able to walk the streets of London any time, day or night, without being afraid—no stories of murder or rape, and no reports of theft.

These sound like beautiful words for church on Sunday, but they are obviously light years away from the reality of the world we live in today. So, is Micah just a dreamer? Notice what Micah says at the end of verse 4: “They shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid, for the mouth of the LORD of hosts has spoken.”

Micah is saying, “You need to know that I’m not just dreaming here. What I’m describing is not some vague hope for a better world. It’s not a dream. It’s a promise! This is the promise of Almighty God!”

What is your initial reaction to the idea of peace on earth? Laughable? Sceptical? Hopeless? Hopeful? “Yawn”? Something else?

For twenty years Micah preached and prayed, and watched things move from bad to worse among the people that he loved, but he was faithful in doing what God had entrusted him to do.

God called Micah to speak and pray, and that’s what he did. That’s the secret. He stuck with it—in season and out of season—and as a result, he lived to see a miracle that he probably never thought possible.

We have the Bible and we’ve been called to pray. God has entrusted each of us with a ministry to carry out, and he holds us accountable for it. If you want to see a breakthrough in the darkness in your family, office, or some other place where there is resistance, follow Micah’s model.

You can make a difference and here’s how:

Tell the truth. Plant the living seed of God’s truth wherever you can. If it doesn’t seem to bear fruit, don’t get discouraged. This is what God has called you to do.

Do what’s right. Micah is "filled. with justice." (3:8). Truth and integrity belongs together.

Pray with faith. “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land” (2 Chron. 7:14).

Persevere. Micah preached and prayed for twenty years without seeing any change. But he stayed faithful in what God called him to do.

How can you make a difference?

If you had heard Micah speak the words of this prophecy, you would have felt completely hopeless. But the wonderful thing is that it didn’t actually happen for another 100 years. If you want to know why, turn to Jeremiah 26.

The city of Jerusalem and its temple were still standing 100 years after Micah said that they would be destroyed. Jeremiah reminds the people of God what Micah said, “Micah of Moresheth prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah. 'Zion shall be ploughed as a field; Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins, and the mountain of the house a wooded height’” (Jer. 26:18).

Notice what happened when Micah gave this message: “Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah put him to death? Did he not fear the LORD and entreat the favour of the LORD, and did not the LORD relent of the disaster that he had pronounced against them?” (Jer. 26:19).

Micah spoke the Word of God all through the years of King Ahaz (20 years), and if ever there was a leader who abused the trust he was given by God it was Ahaz. Think about what that was like for Micah—twenty years of teaching the Word and faithful prayer, and no sign of progress.

Then Hezekiah came to the throne. The new king heard Micah’s message and God touched his heart. Who could have predicted that the son of the most notoriously wicked Ahaz would turn with all his heart to the Lord? That’s what happened. Hezekiah turned to the Lord, the Lord relented, and an entire generation was saved from disaster.

Micah’s preaching and praying made a difference. The disaster he spoke of was postponed and he lived to see a great turning back to God in his generation.

Why do you think God included this story in the Bible?

Here we come to another principle that runs throughout the Bible.

“The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working” (Jas. 5:16). Effective praying depends on right living.

“Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way… so that your prayers may not be hindered” (1 Pet. 3:7). Effective praying depends on right living.

“If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened” (Psa. 66:18).

This does not mean that you have to be perfect before you can pray. The reason that we come to God in the name of Jesus is that none of us can come before Him with hands that are entirely clean or hearts that are entirely pure.

But these Scriptures clearly teach that if there is sin in your life that you refuse to face, God says, “If you will not deal with your sins, I will not listen to your prayers.”

That’s why self-examination and confession of our sins is so important when we come to God. God has made an inseparable connection between your relationship with Him and your responsibilities toward other people.

In the Lord’s Prayer, when we come and ask God to forgive us for our sins, He immediately asks us to look around and see if we need to forgive someone who has sinned against us. How can we receive from Him what we are not willing to offer to others?

Is there a sin in your life that you are aware of, but have been unwilling to face?

God is speaking here to the leaders among His people. The problem is that these leaders have betrayed their trust. They were abusing the trust that they had been given by God.

These prophets and priests were called to be shepherds of God's flock, but they seem more like butchers than shepherds. So, what does God do when leaders prove unfaithful to their trust? When a prophet, priest, pastor, parent, product manager, publicist, professor, promoter, or plumber proves unfaithful, what does God do? The answer is: He stops listening to their prayers.

Here are leaders who are ripping people off and chewing people up. They come to the temple and say their prayers, and they feel that they are spiritual. But they have ignored the cries of the poor, and God says as long as that is the case, he will not listen to their cries either. God holds His people accountable.

Is it possible that God is not listening to your prayers? Are there cries from the weak, vulnerable, or poor around you that you are ignoring? If so, how can you respond differently?