The Breaker is Come Up Micah 2:13

After proclaiming judgment that was to come upon Samaria and Jerusalem for their apostasy, Micah the prophet quoted the Lord as He told how he would “assemble, O Jacob, all of you; I will surely gather the remnant of Israel;” like a shepherd would gather his sheep, and in chapter two and verse thirteen of his prophecy Micah wrote of a “breaker” who would make all this happen. We read:

The breaker is come up before them: they have broken up, and have passed through the gate, and are gone out by it: and their king shall pass before them, and the LORD on the head of them.

The verse begins, “The breaker is come up before them: they have broken up, and have passed through the gate,” The word “breaker” in Hebrew is “parats” and means “to break through or down or over, burst, breach”, and Micah notes this “breaker is come up before them” or “ascends, climbs or causes to go up in advance of or in the face of them”. He goes on to write, “they have broken up” which is the same word as “breaker” and means the captive people will “break through” once their “breaker” leads the way, and Micah continued, “and have passed through the gate” or “exited through the gates which held them in captivity”. In other words, when the “breaker” arrives on the scene, the people of Judah and Israel will be set free from their captors, and assembled together once again.

The verse goes on to say, “and are gone out by it: and their king shall pass before them, and the LORD on the head of them.” Not only would the people pass through the gate of their captors, but they “are gone out by it” which means “lead out, exited from and delivered from it”. Micah also noted, “and their king shall pass before them” or “their ruler and one in charge shall go before their faces”, “and the LORD” which is “Yehovah or Jehovah God” “on the head of them” or “top, summit, upper part, chief, total, sum, height, front, and beginning of them”. The LORD God Almighty was to lead the procession of deliverance for the people of Israel when they are set free.

As we think about these words of Micah, we might be inclined to remember how John the Baptist was sent before Jesus as a forerunner to His appearance. John was a sort of “breaker” for the “king” to “pass before” us which lead us out of the captivity of sin and darkness. This deliverer of the children of Israel was promised in the midst of their transgressions, and although they were to face pending judgment for their apostasy and sin, they were promised deliverance through the “breaker”. While we are in this world and subject to the sinful ways within it, let us remember that our great Redeemer Jesus has a plan to rescue and break through every form of captivity and bondage that is known to man. The key for us is to follow Him as He leads, and may we ever follow “the LORD” who is “the head” of us.

Next time we begin a new chapter where Micah asks Jacob and Israel, “Is it not for you to know judgment?”, so read ahead, and we shall join together then.

Until tomorrow…there is more…

Look for the daily devotional book “Equipped for Battle – From Generation to Generation”, the marriage book “So, You Want to Be Married”, and the new devotional “One Year in the Sermon on the Mount” in all major bookstore sites, http://www.amazon.com ; http://www.barnesandnobles.com ; download to e-books, and find it locally at http://www.mrzlc.com/bookstore.