Micah 7:8

Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy: when I fall, I shall arise; when I sit in darkness, the LORD shall be a light unto me. REJOICE NOT AGAINST ME - at my fall. O MINE ENEMY - as Babylon, Edom, etc., were to Israel. A type of the great enemy of the believer and of the Church, Satan. The time shall come when the Church shall similarly say to him, "O thou enemy, destructions are come to a perpetual end" (Psalms 9:6). WHEN I SIT IN DARKNESS, THE LORD SHALL BE A LIGHT UNTO ME. Israel reasons as her divine representative, Messiah, reasoned by faith, in His hour of darkness and desertion (Isaiah 50:7; Isaiah 50:10). Israel addres...

Here the Prophet assumes the character of the Church and repels a temptation, which proves very severe to us in adversities; for there is not so much bitterness in the evil itself, as in the mockery of the wicked, when they petulantly insult us and deride our faith. And to noble minds reproach is ever sharper than death itself: and yet the devil almost always employs this artifice; for when he sees that we stand firm in temptations, he suborns the wicked and sharpens their tongues to speak evil of use and to wound us with slanders. This is the reason why the Prophet directs his discourse now to the enemies of the Church. But as God calls the Church his spouse, and as she is described to us under the character of a woman, so also he compares here the enemies of the holy people to a petulant woman. As, therefore, when there is emulation between two women, she, who sees her enemy pressed do...

8-13 Those truly penitent for sin, will see great reason to be patient under affliction. When we complain to the Lord of the badness of the times, we ought to complain against ourselves for the badness of our hearts. We must depend upon God to work deliverance for us in due time. We must not only look to him, but look for him. In our greatest distresses, we shall see no reason to despair of salvation, if by faith we look to the Lord as the God of our salvation. Though enemies triumph and insult, they shall be silenced and put to shame. Though Zion's walls may long be in ruins, there will come a day when they shall be repaired. Israel shall come from all the remote parts, not turning back for discouragements. Though our enemies may seem to prevail against us, and to rejoice over us, we should not despond. Though cast down, we are not destroyed; we may join hope in God's mercy, with submi...

Verse 8. _REJOICE NOT AGAINST ME, O MINE ENEMY_] The captive Israelites are introduced as speaking here and in the preceding verse. The _enemy_ are the _Assyrians_ and _Chaldeans_; the _fall_ is their _idolatry_ and consequent _captivity_; the _darkness_, the _calamities_ they suffered in that captivity; their _rise_ and _light_, their _restoration_ and consequent _blessedness_. To _rejoice over the fall or miseries of any man_, betrays a malignant spirit. I have known several instances where people professing to _hold a very pure and Christian creed_, having become unfaithful and fallen into sin, their opponents, who held a very impure and unchristian creed, have exulted with "Ha, ha! so would we have it!" and have shown their malignity more fully, by giving all possible _publicity_ and _circulation_ to such _accounts_. Perhaps in the sight of God this was worse than t

REJOICE NOT AGAINST ME, O MINE ENEMY - The prophet still more makes himself one with the people, not only as looking for God, but in penitence, as Daniel bewails “his own sins and the sins of his people” Daniel 9:10. The “enemy” is Babylon and “Edom” Obadiah 1:10, Obadiah 1:12; Psalms 137:7; and then, in all times, (since this was written for all times, and the relations of the people of God and of its enemies are the same,) whosoever, whether devils or evil men, rejoice over the falls of God’s people. “Rejoice not”; for thou hast no real cause; “the triumphing of the ungodly”, and the fall of the godly, “is but f

EXPOSITION MICAH 7:1 § 5. _Israel's penitential acknowledgment of the general corruption._ MICAH 7:1 WOE IS ME! (Job 10:15). Micah threatens no more; he represents repentant Israel confessing its corruption and lamenting the necessity of punishment. I AM AS WHEN THEY HAVE GATHERED THE SUMMER FRUITS; literally, _I am as the gatherings of the fruit harvest. _The point of comparison is only to be inferred from the context. At the fruit. harvest no early figs are to be found, and (in the next clause) after the vintage no more grapes; so in Israel there is none righteous left. The Septuagint gives a plainer exposition, Ἐγενήθην ω

REJOICE NOT AGAINST ME, O MINE ENEMY,.... These are the words of the prophet in the name of the church, continued in an apostrophe or address to his and their enemy; by whom may be meant, literally, the Chaldeans or Edomites, or both, who rejoiced at the destruction of Jerusalem, and the calamities the people of the Jews were brought into at it; see Psalms 137:7; spiritually, Satan the great enemy of mankind, and especially of the church and people of God, to whom it is a pleasure to draw them into any sin or snare, and to do them any hurt and mischief; and also the Inert of the world, who hate and persecute the saints; and watch for their haltings, and rejoice at their falls into sin, and at any calamity and affliction that may attend them, though there is no just reason for it; since this will not always be the case of the saints, they will be in a better situation, and in more comfort...

The prophet begins in a sorrowful strain, and there is much that is said in the chapter, yet there is also much of holy confidence in God. Micah 7:1. _Woe is me! for I am as when they have gathered the summer fruits, as the grapegleanings of the vintage: there is no cluster to eat: my soul desired the first ripe fruit._ It is a terrible thing for a good man to find good men growing very scarce, and to see wicked men becoming more wicked than ever. It makes him feel his loneliness very keenly, and joy seems to be banished from his heart. Micah 7:2. _The good man is perished out of the earth: and there is none upright among men: they all lie in wait for blood; they hunt every man his brother with a net._ Those were sad times in which Micah lived; and yet, under some aspe

CHAPTER 7 _ 1. The prophet's complaint (Micah 7:1) _ 2. Confession, prayer and thanksgiving (Micah 7:7) Micah 7:1. It is the prophet's voice complaining over the conditions of the people. But he is also the typical representative of the remnant during the time of travail in Zion. It is to be noted that our Lord quotes from this portion of Micah. (See Matthew 10:21, which dispensationally applies to the future remnant.) In the midst of the conditions the prophet describes we read that his refuge was prayer, looking to the Lord with the assurance that He will hear. “Therefore I will look unto the LORD; I will wait for the God of m

ISRAEL'S CONFESSION OF FAITH. This undoubtedly post-exilic utterance of Israel's confidence _in._ Yahweh's delivering intervention falls into three portions, probably once distinct, viz. Micah 7:7 (the time of Messianic deliverance will come); Micah 7:11 (Jerusalem will be repeopled); Micah 7:14 (Yahweh will renew His kindness to Israel). The first and third of these have numerous affinities with the Psalter; the second, by its anticipation of the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem, dates itself between 586 and 444 B.C. Israel proclaims her confidence in the deliverance ( SALVATION) from her heathen oppressors which is about to come from Yahweh ...