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One man blasphemes God’s name every day, his neighbor prays to God in the name of Jesus

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Christ every day, and when the storm comes, both of their homes are taken out. The righteous

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and the wicked are caught up in these things together. So whatever we say about disasters

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must hold true both for the righteous and for the wicked.

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Welcome to Open The Bible with Pastor Colin Smith. I’m David Pick. I’m glad you’re with

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us today and Colin, we often struggle to understand why God allows disaster to happen to innocent

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and righteous people.

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Yeah, that’s right. And I think that the default of the human heart is for us to think that

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good happens to the good, and bad happens to the bad. Very simply, reading the Bible

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that doesn’t hold up. You have Job the most righteous man on the face of the earth and

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terrible tragedy comes to Him. You have the Son of God who committed no sin, and look

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at how He suffered. So the Bible clearly is saying to us, it ain’t as simple as that.

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And we need an understanding of suffering in this life and of disasters in this world

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that takes seriously the fact that both the righteous and the wicked also suffer and suffer

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together in a fallen world. And Micah speaks to this and we’re going to look at that in

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the Scripture together today. It’s really important. Otherwise, I find as a pastor there

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are so many people are saying, well, now, is God punishing me for this, and so forth

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and so on. And there’s all kinds of confusion about how we are to interpret suffering in

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this world. Well, the Bible is going to be our light and our guide to something where

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we really need the truth and the wisdom of God.

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So join us today if you can in the book of Micah, chapter 1, as we begin the message,

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The God Who Brings Disaster. Here’s Colin.

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Now, the book of Micah begins with a terrifying scene. In verse 3 God rises up from his dwelling

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place and he comes down to the earth. The reason that is given for God’s coming down

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in this way is that he has a case against the peoples of the earth. Verse 2, he is bringing

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charges against a rebellious world. Verse 4 describes the sheer terror of what happens.

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It really is like a scene from a disaster movie. Micah says the mountains melt with

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wax, like wax beneath the Lord. The valleys split apart. I was trying to think what Steven

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Spielberg would do if he was depicting this in the form of film, the special effects department

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would have an extraordinary time with this. Think of this picture. Imagine the mountains

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and they’re like wax melting away, just falling, crumbling, eroding, and valleys that are splitting

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apart. Revealing great chasms beneath the earth.

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Now Micah was a brilliant communicator. He uses the drama of these vivid pictures to

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put across his message. But the real punch of what he has to say comes in verse 5. You

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see when Micah opened his prophecy here, saying «Listen oh earth and all that is in it,

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the Lord is coming in Judgement», his audience would have been nodding their heads in quiet

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agreement «Amen, amen» they would say. Judgement day is coming, God is going to deal with his

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enemies. The Assyrians really have it coming to them. Their mountains are going to melt

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like wax, their valleys are going to split apart, the Lord will come from his dwelling

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place, Lord come quickly judge the earth, reign in righteousness, may the Lord be praised

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forever. Amen, and amen. You see, that’s what the audience would be

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thinking just like an evangelical audience whenever the subject of Judgement is addressed

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today. But then look at what Micah says in verse

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5. All this is because of Jacob’s transgression. Sorry, Micah, what did you say?

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I said, all this is because of Jacob’s transgression. This is because of the

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sins of the house of Israel. Now Jacob and Israel are ways of speaking about

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God’s people in the Old Testament. They saw themselves as the true believers, the

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light of the world, the people who carried the name of God in the world.

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And Micah says you need to realize it’s not the Assyrian mountains that God’s

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going to melt. It’s not the valleys of our enemies that God is going to split

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apart. It’s our mountains. It’s our valleys that are going to be destroyed.

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Now talk about a knockout punch. I mean this is a left hook landed straight on

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the jaw. Micah you cannot be serious. But Micah is deadly serious. This is the Word

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of the Lord. You want to know what God is saying. He continues verse 6 I will make

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Samaria a heap of rubble, a place for planting vineyards. I will pour her

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stones into the valley and lay bare her foundations.

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All her idols will be broken to pieces. In other words he’s saying this disaster

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that I’m talking about it’s coming on you. Now of course this is exactly what

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happened during Micah’s lifetime. Samaria in the year 722 BC was overrun the

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Assyrians invaded the northern kingdom of Samaria marked there in green. The

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great war machine of Assyria trundled over the valleys and indeed the

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mountains bringing absolute devastation to the entire country. Now notice Micah’s

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response to his own message. He says verse 8, because of this I will weep.

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I will weep. Now here is a man with the word of God and he also has the heart of

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God. He knows that he cannot change the course of events in Samaria. In fact he

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says, verse 9, that the wounds of the northern kingdom are incurable Samaria’s

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resistance to the Lord has reached the point of no return. So, Micah cannot

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change the course of these events but his tears show that he really cares.

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There may be times in your life just like that. Things reach a point where

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they cannot continue as they are. You have to tell a son or a daughter to

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leave home. You have to make an intervention in the life of somebody

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that you dearly love. The day of reckoning has come and it tears you

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apart but you cannot avoid it, and Micah says what you will experience, because of

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this I will weep and wail. Notice how he continues, verse 10, tell it

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Not in Gath. Now Gath was one of the five main cities that belonged to the

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Philistines. Philistines, of course, being the long-time enemies of God’s people.

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Goliath, the giant Goliath, he came from the town of Gath, and this phrase tell it

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not in Gath was used first by King David at the time when Saul died on the field

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of battle. And at the beginning of 2 Samuel chapter 1, we’re told that David

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took up this lament about Saul and Jonathan, that the glory of Israel,

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Israel’s king, had been slain on the heights, and lies slain, and the mighty

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have fallen. And then David says through tears, tell it not in Gath. Don’t proclaim

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it in the streets of Ashkelon. Don’t let the Philistines be glad. In other words,

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he knows that one of the worst aspects of this disaster is that the enemies of

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God’s people will rejoice in the downfall of Saul, the king among them.

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And it’s true, don’t expect sympathy from your enemies when disaster comes. The

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world’s press has not been entirely sympathetic to the disaster that has

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befallen our country. Some who despise our country seem to have found a certain

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strange and perverse satisfaction in our troubles. And that is what David was

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talking about when Saul died, and Micah takes up his well-known phrase,

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‘…tell it not in gath,’ knowing that the enemies of God’s people will rejoice when

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they come into trouble, he says, ‘…tell it not in geth.’ Then Micah gives us a list

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of towns that will be caught up in this great disaster. These are all little

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local areas. In verse 10, he speaks about Beth-opera, Shaphir, then Zhainan, Beth-ezel,

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Marath and Lachish. And if you look down to verse 14, you’ll see

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there that he includes his own little hometown that we referred to last time,

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Moresheth. That must have been particularly painful for Micah to think

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about his own little hometown being caught up in this terrible disaster that

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would come from the Lord. Now Micah uses the names of these towns to

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communicate his message. The name opera in Beth-opera sounds like the Hebrew

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word for dust. And so he says let Beth-opera roll in the dust. The word

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Shaphir sounds like the Hebrew word for beautiful, and Micah was saying, in

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effect, Shaphir ain’t going to be beautiful for too much longer.

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Zenon sounds like the Hebrew word for exit, and he’s saying the problem for

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this city will be it’s under siege, so nobody will be exiting from it. So to get

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the impact, what you need to do is to think about the places that are our

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places. And it would sound something like this. It’ll be No-Go in Chicago.

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They’ll be A-realing in Wheeling. They’ll be Out of time in Palatine. There’ll be

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Big pains in Desplaines. It’ll turn out the lights in Arlington Heights. Now you

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see, we smile because that kind of pun seems very shallow and trivial in our

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culture. But it really was a very common way to communicate in ancient times. And

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the impact of this on Micah’s first audience would be to say, Wow he’s

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talking about here. He’s talking about where I live. He’s

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talking about something that will touch me. Now verse 12 really is the key

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statement in this whole chapter and this is what I want us to focus our attention

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for the rest of our time this morning. Verse 12, Those who live in Marath

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waiting for relief because disaster has come from the Lord.

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Even to the Gate of Jerusalem I want to focus in on these words. Disaster has

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come from the Lord. Now this raises the very important question how should we

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think about great disasters today? How should you think about personal loss,

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financial crises, breakdowns in health? See, all of these things happen in the

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lives of God’s children. What are we to say about the disasters that come into

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the lives of those who are encircled in God’s covenant love? And what are we to

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say indeed about natural disasters that come on the earth? You cannot separate

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these two questions. Because every time a natural disaster comes, the righteous and

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the wicked are caught up in it together. It doesn’t matter whether you’re talking

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about the fall of Samaria in 722 BC or the Second World War or the terrorist

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attack on 9-11 or the tsunami in Indonesia and Sri Lanka, or the hurricane

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that has affected New Orleans. The righteous and the wicked are always

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caught up in these things together. Think of it. One man blasphemes God’s name

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every day. His neighbor prays to God in the name of Jesus Christ every day. And

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when the storm comes, both of their homes are taken out. The righteous and the

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wicked are caught up in these things together. So whatever we say about

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disasters, must hold true both for the righteous and for the wicked. Both for

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God’s enemies and for his children. You’re listening to Open the Bible with

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Pastor Colin Smith in our message called, The God Who Brings Disaster.

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It’s part of our series Close Encounters with the Living God, and if you ever

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miss one of the series, you can always catch up or go back and listen again

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online at our website openingthebible.org.uk. Back to the message now. We’re in

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Micah chapter one, here’s Colin. Now I want to suggest to you three things that

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we should do when disaster comes so we’re talking particularly this morning

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about our faith and how we respond as Christian believers with regards our

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faith in such times as these, three things.

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Number one, we must affirm that God is in control of disasters. We must affirm

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that God is in control of disasters. Now this isn’t easy. There are a hundred

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questions I’m sure that come quickly to your mind as they do to mine as soon as

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we come to this statement of truth. In fact, it is so difficult to face some of

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the questions that arise from affirming that God is in control of disasters that

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some Christians have felt that it would be better to keep God at a distance

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from disasters altogether. Now there was a movement that began back in the 18th

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century called deism and the deists believed that God created

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the world, but then that he stands back from the world and leaves it to run by

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its own devices. The deist taught and indeed still do that rather like a

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watchmaker, God made the world like a watch and

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winding it up as it were, he left it to run by its own mechanism without any

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further interference, he walked away and left it to its own devices for better or

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for worse, in other words that God is at a distance and therefore if something

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good happens to you, there’s no reason to thank him for it and if something bad

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happens to you, there’s no reason to blame him for it that God is at a

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distance both from the blessings and the disasters of life, that he was simply the

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inventor of the great machine called the cosmos that he created and then he’s put

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us in it and here we are to work out our own experiences which will essentially

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be a matter of random chance in this created universe. So for the deast there

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there are no miracles, there can be no salvation, because by definition

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salvation is an intervention of God, there can be no prayer because that

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would involve God hearing and answering and intervening, no all you really have

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is yourself. Now anyone who knows the Bible will see that deism is quite

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different from Christianity. The Bible makes it clear that the Creator is

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always involved with his creation, that he directs and reigns, that he rules and

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intervenes, he hears and answers prayer, he sends his son into the world, he

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opens blind eyes and deaf ears and raises those who are spiritually dead. So no one

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who believes the Bible will embrace deism. But some Christians want to go

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halfway there. They want to say that God is in control of the good but not of the

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bad, that his hand is seen in the good things of life but they don’t want his

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hand in any way associated with something that is bad. Now here’s the

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problem with that – if God is in control of the good only, who is in control of

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the bad? And if the bad is outside of God’s control, then the bad is actually

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greater than God, because it’s beyond his ability to control it, and then we’re

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in real trouble. A God who is not sovereign over evil, would leave evil

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sovereign over us – and that leaves us in a world where chaos reigns, where

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disaster rules. If God is not in control of all things, then we are adrift on the

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sea of chance. The Bible therefore brings us the good news that God is in control

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even of the disasters of our lives. Let me give you Scripture for that. First.

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Micah 1 in verse 12 – right where we are, where he speaks of the disaster that

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comes from the Lord. It’s not coming through another hand apart from His. Psalm

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107. You might like to look through verses 25 to 30 that speak specifically

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of the God who stirs up the storm. Some people went down to see in ships, the

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As Sonia the psalmist writes, And they saw the works of the Lord. for He spoke and stirred up the Tempest and

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lifted high the waves. And then he pictures this boat

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mounting up to the heavens, and the panic as the sailors are reeling like drunken

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men it says, at their wits end. And they call out to God. And then God stills the

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storm. But you see the Bible attributes both the raising of the storm and the

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instilling of the storm to the same hand of God. You find the same of course in

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the book of Jonah, chapter 1 and verse 4. It was the Lord who sent a great wind on

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the sea and such a violent storm that the ship threatened to break up. But

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perhaps the greatest testimony to the good and the bad coming from the hand of

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God comes from Job himself. The righteous man in the Old Testament who

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experienced such terrible loss in a terrorist attack and a natural disaster

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we saw last time on the same day. And in Job chapter 2 and verse 10, this is what

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Job says in response. Shall we accept good from God and not trouble? See, I’ve

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affirmed that that good has come to me through the hand of God. Here’s trouble

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now, shall I not accept that too and submit to it from the hand of God? Now, we

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know from the book of Job that Satan’s hand was behind what Job suffered. But

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the Bible will never allow us for one moment to think that Satan operates as

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some kind of free agent. Martin Luther said, and I find this profoundly

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helpful. He said, even the devil is God’s devil. His point was that Satan’s best

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effort to destroy God’s work always ends up contributing to its growth. That’s the

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ultimate frustration for the evil one. He can never ultimately accomplish his

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own ends. So now, the mystery of God’s sovereignty leaves us with many many

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questions, but I would far rather live with these unanswered questions than

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with the alternative which would be that the storms of life are somehow outside

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of God’s control. Nothing happens to you or to me except it passes through the

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hand of a sovereign God. The circumstances in your life may be very

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far from what you would like them to be right now, but they are under the control

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of God, and that’s the first thing you need to know in times of disaster. We

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must affirm that God is in control of disasters the bedrock of Christian faith.

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It’s so important for us to remember that whatever our circumstances are, they

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may not be under our control, but they are always under God’s control even in

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times of disaster. You’re listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith

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and our message called The God Who Brings Disaster, part of our series

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Close Encounters with the Living God. There is something about times of

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difficulty and disaster, often we can look back and realize that we have

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experienced God in a new way. That’s what happened in Micah’s day, Israel’s faith

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had gone soft and the nation came to the brink of disaster and at that

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critical moment Micah’s voice cut through the spiritual fog and led the

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nation to a new encounter with God. The same can be true for you. If you’re

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feeling spiritually flat, spending time in the book of Micah and in this series

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can give you a new vision of what God wants from you. The whole series will be

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broadcast in the coming days and after that will still be available to listen

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to free on our website and also available as a podcast. Our website

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address is openthebible.org.uk, and the podcast is available on your

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regular podcasting site by searching for Open the Bible UK or by following the

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link from our website. While you’re looking at our website you’ll also find

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Open the Bible daily, a series of short 2 to 3 minute daily reflections

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based on Pastor Colin Smith’s teaching and read in the UK by Sue MacLeish.

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Open the Bible is supported entirely by our listeners, people just like you and if

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that’s something you’ve been considering doing we have an offer for

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you this month to say thank you for your support. If you’re able to set up a new

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payment to the work of Open the Bible in the amount of £5 per

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month or more, this month we’d love to thank you by sending you Pastor Colin’s

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new book, Flying Through the Bible. Colin, why did you use the flying metaphor to

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describe this book? Well, suppose you were making a visit to the Grand Canyon and

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exploring it for the first time. I mean, I guess you could hike down and you’d get

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a sense of the depth of the canyon, you could drive around the rim, you’d get a

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sense of the length of it but perhaps the best way to get an overall sense of

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the vastness and beauty of the Grand Canyon would be to take a flight over it.

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Now when it comes to the Bible, to get a high-altitude overview of what the

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Bible story is all about seems to me to be the best place to begin. The Bible

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really is one story. It begins in a garden, it ends in a city, and all the way

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through it’s about the Lord Jesus Christ and flying through the Bible is kind of

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cookies on the bottom shelf, to change the analogy. It gives an overall picture

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and introduction to the scripture that I hope will help and encourage people to

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want to explore more when they get on the ground.

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Well, we’d love to send you a free copy of Colin’s book, Fly Through the Bible, to say thank you for

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setting up a new donation to the work of Open the Bible this month, in the amount

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of five pounds per month or more. Full details of this offer are on our website

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openthebible.org.uk. For Pastor Colin Smith and Open the Bible, I’m David Pick

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and I hope you’ll come and join us again soon

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You know that God’s in charge of the good things that happen in life, but what

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about the bad? Find out next time on Open the Bible