The
Ax Man Cometh Or The Point of No Return
Micah 1:9 “For her wound is incurable;
for it is come unto Judah; he is come unto the gate
of my people, even to Jerusalem.
10
Declare ye it not at Gath, weep ye not at all: in
the house of Aphrah roll thyself in the dust.
11 Pass ye away, thou inhabitant of
Saphir, having thy shame naked: the inhabitant of
Zaanan came not forth in the mourning of Bethezel;
he shall receive of you his standing.
12
For the inhabitant of Maroth waited carefully for
good: but evil came down from the Lord unto the gate
of Jerusalem.”
1. The Wound Is Incurable
2. Past The
Time For Lamentations
3. The Devil Receives His
Standing
1. The Wound Is Incurable
Verse nine: “For her wound is incurable; for it is come unto Judah; he is come unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem.”
There is a point of no return in all life.
The point of no return has now been reached for Jerusalem [Judah].
What has happened to Samaria [Israel] was now going to happen to Jerusalem.
What came to Samaria … now comes to Jerusalem.
[See in Isaiah 8:7, 8, the temporary respite given to Hezekiah concerning the 185,000 thousand Assyrians outside the gate of Jerusalem.]
The wound is incurable! The disease is terminal! The end is coming without recourse, and without any possibility in escaping the consequences of SIN which is starvation [famine], plagues and death at the hands of the Babylonians.
An incurable wound … involves a perpetual pain. It refuses to be healed. Israel had an incurable wound which refused to be healed. See Jeremiah chapter fifteen, verse eighteen. Israel [Judah] comes to God crying this: “Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable, which refuseth to be healed? wilt thou be altogether unto me as a liar, and as waters that fail?” [Jeremiah 15:18] And the LORD answers them [Israel] with this [in Jeremiah chapter thirty, verse twelve]: “For thus saith the Lord, Thy bruise is incurable, and thy wound is grievous.” [Jeremiah 30:12]
Now, why is this wound incurable? Why is this bruise incurable? The Bible tells you why. It is because God has called to them many times and they would not come. They all the while have had God’s word through God’s prophets coming to them … betimes [many times] pleading with them to hearken to the voice of the Lord but they would not.
They WOULD NOT!
See this thing for yourself Jeremiah chapter six, in the last part of verse sixteen: “But they said, We will not walk therein.”
God tells them, fully and out in the open, in verse fifteen of Jeremiah chapter thirty, that it is because their sins have increased. “Why criest thou for thine affliction? thy sorrow is incurable for the multitude of thine iniquity: because thy sins were increased, I have done these things unto thee.” [Jeremiah 30:15]
My friend, look around, do you not see this thing is true in America today? Since World War II, our sins have increased exponentially. What will God do to us?
2. Past The Time For Lamentations
Verse ten: “Declare ye it not at Gath, weep ye not at all: in the house of Aphrah roll thyself in the dust.”
There is a proper time for something to be said. There is a proper time to repent and to get things right with both God and man.
It is … as it says it is … in the book of Ecclesiastes chapter three: “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.” [Ecclestasties 3:1-8]
CONVERSELY, there must be a time NOT to be born, or a time NOT to die and so on. According to God’s word here, there was a time to WEEP. There was a time to WEEP for Israel, but now it was too late to weep.
The Spirit of God places a limit to the duration and persistence to the mercies of God given to man.
Further, the Spirit of God will “not always strive with man” as shown in the days of Noah before the flood in Genesis chapter six, verse three: “And the Lord said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.” [Genesis 6:3]
3. The Devil Receives His Standing
Verse eleven and twelve: “Pass ye away, thou inhabitant of Saphir, having thy shame naked: the inhabitant of Zaanan came not forth in the mourning of Bethezel; he shall receive of you his standing. For the inhabitant of Maroth waited carefully for good: but evil came down from the Lord unto the gate of Jerusalem.”
Who is the “he” in verse eleven referring to? And what is “he” to receive? The “he” in this verse is the “it” that is “come unto Judah” located in verse nine. This is the “he” who “is come unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem." The “evil” that comes in verse twelve though it “came down from the Lord” is coming from a type of the Devil.
Now in the Bible there are several men who can be identified as a type of the Devil.
• Nebuchadnezzar is a type of the Devil … by the destruction of Jerusalem: [Jeremiah 27:6] “And now have I given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant; and the beasts of the field have I given him also to serve him.”
The Devil hates God’s people!
• Sennacherub is a type of the Devil … by what he did to Israel and Judah [See Isaiah 8:7-8].
The Devil hates God’s people!
• Hazael is a type of the Devil … by what he did to Israel as shown in [2 Kings 8:12].
The Devil hates God’s people!
• Pharaoh is a type of the Devil … by his keeping Israel in bondage and with severe cruelty: [Exodus 5:2] “And Pharaoh said, Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go.”
The Devil hates God’s people.
The “he” here in verse eleven is a reference to Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians.
The evil from the Lord is to bring destruction to Jerusalem via a wicked Babylonian king.
What Nebuchadnezzar was to receive, was his reward [his standing]. [Nebuchadnezzar] “shall receive of you his standing” which is due to his RANK among the nations of the world in that day.
Whatever belonged to Jerusalem would now belong to Babylon. The people of Maroth [Judah] “waited carefully for good” but evil came.
For in that day, and in this instance, the Babylonian king would serve as the axe man for God … to bring evil to His people Israel because of their sins. Nebuchadnezzar … a type of the Devil … served here as the axe man for God. Nebuchadnezzar did receive of Jerusalem’s STANDING.
The evil did come.
The axe man came.
One day in the DAY of
LORD, God will use Israel as HIS
AXE MAN to destroy the kingdoms of this
world. [Jeremiah 51:20] “Thou art my battle
axe and weapons of war: for with thee will I break
in pieces the nations, and with thee will I destroy
kingdoms;” Amen!