Yers. 5, 9, and 13 (last clauses).-The contagiousness of sin. Great prominence should be given in Christian teaching to the sad and solemn fact of sin. Would we lead men to prize the redemption wrought by our Lord Jesus Christ, and to appreciate his unutterable love expressed in his "obedience unto death," we must seek to bring home to them a sense of that sinfulness, from the thraldom and evil consequences of which he came to deliver all who trust in him. The Hebrew prophets present to us in this respect an example well worthy of imitation. We find in their writings bright allusions to the deliverance to be wrought "in the fulness of time" by the Messiah, whose here.Ids they delighted to be, and whose "day" they "saw afar off;" but accompanying these words of hopo were heart-searching utterances, now indignant anu scathing, and anon tender, pathetic, wailing, all designed to bring home to the con- &eience and heart a keen sense of evil-doing, and to lead men to bow themselves low in 10 THE BOOK OF MICAU. [on. r. 1-16.
penitence for the wrong they had dono. We hnve brought very conspicuo118ly before U8 in these ,·erses the contagiOU8 influence of sin. Observe- L THE MISCHIEF IB HERE TRAOED, IN TIIE FIRST INSTAN0E, TO LAOHISH. (Connect Vl!ll'B. 9 and 13.) Lachish was one of the most powerful of the cities of Judah. It wae l!trongly fortified, and formed the cavalry depot for the nation. Sennacherib spared no effort to reduce it, and, when he had succec<led, he sent from it his boastful and con- temptuous mesmge to Hezekiah. The Assyrian monumeuts represent the taldog of this city by the Assyrin.ns, and indicate how that the victors regarded this as a great triumph. Geographically, no city of Judnh was more remote from the kingdom of Israel than this; yet it was through this city that the idolatry of Israel found its way into Judah. Lachish was "the bl'giunin_g of sin to the daughter of Zion: for tho transgressions of Israel \\'ere found in her." How this came to pass we can only con- jecture. Rehoboam fortifit'd Lachish. Maachn.b, bis favourite wife, cherished a warm attachment to the worship of foreign divinities, and may, through this channel, have introduced this foreign worship into her country; and in this way probably Lachish became "the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion." And, the gates once opened, the pernicious influence spl'tlad, until, despite certain attempts at reformation, the land became thoronghly infected, and the poison so prevailed that we read, "Her wound ls incurable," etc. (ver. 9). ll. Another influence that operated in bringing about this morally diseased condi- tion of Judah was THE ALLIANCE FORMED BY JEHOSHAPHAT WITH THE HOUSE OF OMnr, AND W'Hl:OH RESULTED IN THE :MARRIAGE OF JEHORAY, SON OF JEHOSHAPHAT, WITH ATnALIAH, DAUGHTER OF AHAB. Athaliah was a wicked, powerful woman, possessed of fierce det.ermination, cool and calculating, yet of dauntless, resolute spirit. She heard of the overthrow of her father's house, and of the sad end of Jezebel, and the intelligence but strengthened her resolve that the worship of B&al, uprooted in Samaria, should have a home in Jerusalem. And this she secured for it, with all its pernicious influence (Stanley's 'Jewish Church,' ii. 334, 335). III. THE B.EIAINlNG POWERFUL PER!IICIOUB INFLUEN0E IS TO BE FOUND IN THE AOCEl!SION OF Aluz TO THE THRONE. It was during his reign that Micah prophesied; and when we think of the snperstitious character of Abaz, how that he caused new idolatrous sanctuaries to rise on every hand, established the worship of Moloch under the very walls of Jerusalem, and devoted his son to sacrifice, casting him into the fire, need we wonder at the prophet crying with deep distress, "What are the high places of Judah? ~ they not Jerusalem?" Beginning at Lachish, in the very extreme border of the la.nd, the c-0ntagious influences spread until the whole nation, even to its very eentre, had become infected (ver. 9). So is it ever. There is the commencement of the downward course, "the beginning of the sin," leading on to general depravity and defilement. Learn : 1. To be watchful against "the beginnings" of evil. 2. Christ suffered "'without the gate," that he might deliver us from sin and bless us by turning us from our iniquities (Acts iii. 26). 3. Into "the new Jerusalem" there entereth not anything that defileth or worketh abomination, or maketh a lie; but there all God's perfected ones, freed from the cnrse and blight of sin, shall serve him in holiness and love for ever. Ver. 8.-Tlte prevalena of sin the sowrce of grief to the good. I. THE FACT. The good in all ages have mourned over sin and its consequences _(Ps. cxi.x. 136; Jer. ix. l; Luke xix. 41, 42). In ver. 8 we have pictured to us the distress of one thoroughly noble and good, ~rue and patriotic, occas!oned ~Y. the prevailing u~godlinees. and the calamities of which he had to speak. With a v1v1d sense of the evils of the times and of the coming judgments, this prophet (as others before him) flung aside his mantle and went about beating his breast, and pouring forth wild shrieks and lamentations, By " the dragons" is meant "the jackals,'' and by " the ow!B" is intended "the ostriches." Of the former we read, " The jackals make a lamentable howling noise, so that travellers unacquainted with them would think that a company of people, women or children, were bowling one to another" (Pococke), And of the latter, another writes," During the lonesome part of the night they often make a doleful and piteous noiae,. I have often heard them groan u if they were in the greatest agonies" (Shaw'• Clt, I, 1-16.] THF, BOOK OF MICAH. 11