For the statutes of Omri are kept, and all the works of the house of Ahab, and ye walk in their counsels; that I should make thee a desolation, and the inhabitants thereof an hissing: therefore ye shall bear the reproach of my people.
For the statutes of Omri are kept - the founder of Samaria, who overthrew and supplanted Zimri, the conspirator and regicide, and of Ahab's wicked house; and a supporter of Jeroboam's superstitions (1 Kings 16:16-28). This verse is a recapitulation of what was more fully stated before, Judah's sins and consequent punishment. Judah, though at variance with Israel on all things else, imitated her impiety. This was true of the reign of Ahaz, king of Judah, especially, who "walked in the ways of the kings of Israel and made also molten images for Baalim;" which was the special sin of the house of Ahab (2 Chronicles 28:2).
And all the works of the house of Ahab - (1 Kings 21:25-26).
And ye walk in their counsels - though these superstitions were the fruit of their king's "counsels," as a master stroke of state policy, yet these pretexts were no excuse for setting at naught the counsels and will of God.
That I should make thee a desolation - thy conduct is framed so as if it was thy set purpose that I should make thee a desolation.
And the inhabitants thereof - namely, of Jerusalem.
An hissing - (Lamentations 2:15, "All that pass by clap their hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, Is this the city that men call The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth?")
Therefore ye shall bear the reproach of my people. The very thing ye boast of-namely, that ye are "my people," will only increase the 70 of your punishment. The greater was my grace to you, the greater shall be your punishment for having despised it, Your being God's people in name, while walking in His love, was an honour; but now the name without the reality is only a "reproach" to you.
Remarks:
(1) Yahweh deigns to enter into argument with His people, appealing to themselves to testify, if they could, of any wrong ever done to them, or any wearying burden ever laid upon them, by their God. So far from wrong, all God's dealings with them were one continuous series of loving-kindnesses and gratuitous mercies all along from the tint beginnings of their national existence. Nay, more; the evil which powerful temporal enemies like Balak, and powerful spiritual enemies like Balaam, devised against the elect nation, God had actually overruled to good. It is well for us all often to pass in review the loving course of God's providence and God's grace toward us all our life long, in order that we may have the feelings of love toward Him, and of shame and humiliation in relation to ourselves, intensified. Even though some untoward events have befallen us, still we may see, if we be His believing children, that "righteousness" and faithfulness to His promises have characterized all His ways: and that "all things work together for good to them that love God" (Romans 8:28).
(2) When the sinner is convicted by the Word of God brought home to his conscience, he is ready to give any external sacrifice, however costly, in order to obtain pardon and peace. Yea, many in apostate Israel among the pagan have given, in the intensity of fanatical zeal, "their first-born for their transgression, the fruit of their body for the sin of their soul."
(3) But all this is not what God "requires" of man (Micah 6:8). God had "shown" Israel long ago what is the "good" which He requires as the end of all positive ordinances-namely, "to do justly," by giving to all men that which is in strictest equity their due; to go beyond even this by "loving mercy," which gives even more to our fellow-men than strict justice demands; and, as the root of all this, "to walk humbly with our God," which implies a walk of love and faith toward God. All, "whatsoever is not of faith, is sin" (Romans 14:23). The sacrifices of the law were the means whereby God showed to the sincere and obedient worshipper by faith a "shadow of good things to come," even of that "better" sacrifice (Hebrews 9:23; Hebrews 10:1) which should supersede all former sacrifices, as the substance supersedes the shadow. Without loving obedience of the heart and life all external sacrifices were unmeaning mockeries.
(4) Though man's offering of "his first-born for his transgression" could avail nothing, God "brought His first-begotten into the world" (Hebrews 1:6), and by the offering of Him "once for all" "he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified" (Hebrews 10:10; Hebrews 10:14). No other atonement can make satisfaction for sin: and all that God now requires of us is loving obedience. It is only by living faith in the once, sacrificed and now living Saviour that we can "walk humbly with our God," being at agreement with Him as our reconciled Father, and as the fruit of faith "doing justly and loving mercy" in relation to our fellow-men. Let us ever remember that without love, holiness of heart, and righteousness of life, flowing from faith in Christ, all our church-goings, forms of prayer, and almsgivings, profit us nothing.
(5) "The Lord's voice crieth unto" men (Micah 6:9) in various ways-by His providence, by His Word, by His Spirit. He is truly a man of "wisdom" who regards God in His manifestations of Himself. When God lifts the rod of chastisement as about to smite us for sin, let us by penitence and humiliation avert, or at least mitigate the stroke. When the blow has fallen, let us hear submissively the voice which speaks to us thereby. Instead of looking to the instrument or secondary agents of the punishment let us regard the great First Cause-namely, God, who hath appointed it." Let us try to learn the lessons of spiritual profit which God hath designed us to derive from it.
(6) It is only "with the pure" that "God shows Himself pure." "With the froward God" can only, humanly speaking, "show Himself froward." (Micah 6:11-13; Psalms 18:26). As men deal toward their fellow-men and toward God, so God deals with them.
(7) The gains unjustly acquired do no good to the possessor. In righteous retribution they are doomed to "eat, but not be satisfied" (Micah 6:14). In vain the ungodly join hand to hand, and strain every nerve to keep fast "hold of their possessions. No effort can "deliver" them out of the hands of the executioners of vengeance to whom God has given them up.
(8) Without the blessing of the Lord, the sewer sows in vain, and even the reaper reaps in vain. God's blessing cannot be with us really and abidingly, so long as we regard "the statutes" of man, rather than the statutes of God. This was Judah's sin. Though at variance with Israel on all things else, yet she was in Micah's days at one with her idolatrous sister in apostasy. The "works" and "counsels" of the house of Ahab, politic as they seemed to the followers of worldly-wise expediency, in the end proved fatal both to their originators and to their imitators. The very name of which they boasted, as the people of God, only turned to their "reproach" when they walked unworthy of such a name (Micah 6:16). Let us remember, if we would have true honour and blessedness, we must seek them in the ways of the Lord.