Daily Devotional for Wednesday, August 19

Zion Shall Be Plowed

“The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet will they lean upon the Lord, and say, Is not the Lord among us? none evil can come upon us. Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest,” Micah 3:11, 12.
After buying my first house I decided that the backyard needed to be redone due to many needed improvements, and so forth. After plowing up the dirt and removing all the grass and weeds that had been in the yard, I watered it and pulled up any additional weeds that sprang up. After feeling that the weeds were out of the yard, I seeded the yard with grass seed. As it came up, I started to notice that most of it was weeds and that they were choking out any real grass seed that was trying come up. It was very frustrating, but I had to plow it all up and start over.
The Lord had started the nation of Israel with good seed, but many weeds had come in over time. We are taught that the judges, priests and the prophets had all grown corrupt while claiming to be God’s representatives (Micah 3:11). This is what had been sown in Israel, and it has been noted, “Even as I have seen, they that plow iniquity, and sow wickedness, reap the same” (Job 4:8). It was time to get rid of the weeds in Israel and plow them under. It was time for Israel to get rid of the corruption.

JUST A THOUGHT
Have you gotten rid of the weeds and corruption that are choking out the good fruit you want to grow in your life? “Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord, till he come and rain righteousness upon you” (Hosea 10:12).

Tim Chambers