Micah 7:3 That they may do evil with both hands earnestly, the prince asks, and the judge asks for a reward; and the great man… This is a picture, given at a stroke, of a proficient in sin in the highest state of sinful activity. He is doing evil "earnestly," systematically, persistently, with a certain enthusiasm as if it were the very instinct of his being and the very business of his life. In order that he may be stimulated and kept at it, he asks a reward, a pecuniary consideration from those who are to profit by his villainy. The man stands at the uttermost point from duty, and is ready to perish in his own corruption: This is terrible as a moral phenomenon. Terrible as an illustration of the natural history of sin, and its tendency to run out to unspeakable issues. None of us have a proper and adequate idea of sin, either as in God's sight or in its deadly influence on ourselves. There is no sin which has not its root in the human heart. And wherever there is the root there may be the fruit. Wherever there is the germ there may be the growth. Upon the development of this possibility God does not put any mechanical restraint. He tells us our duty; He plies us with motives; He presses us with arguments, with reasons, with threatenings, with promises. He does not override our nature, so as to destroy that free agency which makes us responsible, and without which we should belong to a totally different circle of life. Sometimes God does make His providence seem to stand in the way, as when He made the angel cross the path of Balaam. But it is to make a man pause and reflect before he goes further, not to compel him to desist. Is it not a strange thing that God should reward men with success who are breakers of His laws? But these men are not breaking those of His laws from which they receive their reward. Whichever of God's laws you obey, that law will reward you according to its kind, just because it is a law. Why does God allow the ungodly man to attain wealth? Simply because that ungodly man has sought wealth with all his might. He has made it the one aim of his life, and in order to secure it he has scrupulously obeyed those laws with which the attainment of it stands connected. The man obeys the law of success in that department. But he also allows the law which he disobeys to bring to him the natural result of that disobedience. And if the law which he disobeys be the higher law, the law of his spiritual life, then, whatever he may gain in the lower sphere, he is a loser in the higher, and therefore a loser in reality, a loser in the end, for he destroys his soul. As this success in sin is not prevented by providence, so neither is it prevented by the circumstance of possessing religious privileges. Privileges are a means of good; but the more good we resist the more hardened we become. Learn — It is not necessary that we should disobey the laws in the lower sphere; they can be obeyed in subordination to the higher. But if we practically make the lower the highest, then that which is really highest avenges itself by destroying the soul. The lesson of the text is just this — If we have not yet turned to good, the sooner we do so the better, There must be a great turning on the part of every one. (A. L. Simpson, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: That they may do evil with both hands earnestly, the prince asketh, and the judge asketh for a reward; and the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire: so they wrap it up. |
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