All
Eyes Upon Zion
Micah 4:9 “Now why dost thou cry out
aloud? is there no king in thee? is thy counseller
perished? for pangs have taken thee as a woman in
travail.
10 Be in pain, and
labour to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a
woman in travail: for now shalt thou go forth out of
the city, and thou shalt dwell in the field, and
thou shalt go even to Babylon; there shalt thou be
delivered; there the Lord shall redeem thee from the
hand of thine enemies.
11 Now
also many nations are gathered against thee, that
say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon
Zion.”
1. Trouble
2. Pain
3. Deliverance
1. Trouble
Trouble comes for various reasons at various times to a nation, or to a people. Now, make it real personal.
Trouble comes to us for various reasons.
Trouble can be a friend, or trouble can be an enemy.
But, there is one thing we can all know for certain. This one thing is this; that trouble will indeed come to us. Trouble will come … for us all.
Invariably, trouble comes because there is the presence of something in the hearts of men. This thing is SIN.
Now, sin is the root cause for all the grief that is experienced on the planet Earth.
You say, “What is sin?” “Where did sin come from?” “Who disobeyed God?”
Here are your answers.
Sin occurs whenever and wherever there is disobedience to God. Sin made its entrance into the world through one man [Adam], which is exactly what we find in the King James Bible, [in Romans chapter five, verse twelve]: “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:” [Romans 5:12]
There is the problem! It is SIN. Sin [naturally] brings us to a place: called DEATH.
Now, there is something else here for us to see. Ever since Adam sinned, “sin lieth at the door” for us all. [Genesis 4:7] Did you know that?
Sin was at the door … when the kings of Samaria disobeyed God. [Micah 1:5-6]
Sin was at the door … when the kings of Judah disobeyed God. [Micah 1:9]
Sin is at the door … whenever we decide to disobey God.
When sin comes in … then Death will follow.
Where sin is … trouble will come. Consider the sad story of Achan in Joshua chapter six and seven.
• [Joshua 6:18] “And ye, in any wise keep yourselves from the accursed thing, lest ye make yourselves accursed, when ye take of the accursed thing, and make the camp of Israel a curse, and trouble it.” Trouble came to the camp of Israel … when Achan disobeyed God.
• [Joshua 7:25] “And Joshua said, Why hast thou troubled us? the Lord shall trouble thee this day. And all Israel stoned him with stones, and burned them with fire, after they had stoned them with stones.”
2. Pain
Verse ten: “Be in pain, and labour to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail: for now shalt thou go forth out of the city, and thou shalt dwell in the field, and thou shalt go even to Babylon; there shalt thou be delivered; there the Lord shall redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies.”
When trouble comes, it brings forth “pain”.
For a woman to bring forth a child is for her to experience tremendous pain. The prophet Isaiah tells us this very thing in the book of Isaiah, chapter twenty-six, verse seventeen: “Like as a woman with child, that draweth near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth out in her pangs; so have we been in thy sight, O Lord.” [Isaiah 26:17]
A woman “in her pangs” therefore, pictures the condition of Israel before her LORD. It is the old truth that trouble comes to those who sin. [WE ALL SIN.] Judgment comes to those … who sin. Then, what of Israel? Israel ends up cast out … as a nation … to be captive in Babylon.
It is as it says it is … in the book of Job, chapter fifteen, verse twenty: “The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days, and the number of years is hidden to the oppressor.” [Job 15:20] She [Judah] is oppressed. She is in trouble. She is in pain! Here she is … in Isaiah chapter twenty-one, verse three:
• “Therefore are my loins filled with pain: pangs have taken hold upon me, as the pangs of a woman that travaileth: I was bowed down at the hearing of it; I was dismayed at the seeing of it.” [Isaiah 21:3]
3. Deliverance
Verse eleven: “Now also many nations are gathered against thee, that say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon Zion.”
This is what we see in verse eleven. In the midst of Judah’s trouble [and in her travail], there will be deliverance.
“Before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child. Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.” [Isaiah 66:7-8]
Now, did you catch the order of the events in these verses of Scripture? It is backwards to what we would expect!
First, according to the prophet Isaiah, there is a woman giving birth to a man child, then, comes her travail, then, follows her pain.
Then, what does this mean? How can this thing be? It is the opposite of what happens in child birth. The normal experience for a woman is this.
The travail comes first, then the pain comes, and then, there is the birth of the child. In the midst of pain and in the trouble [delivering a man child] … a woman brings “forth her children.”
The order of the events is this:
1. Jesus Christ is born 00 AD. “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given:” [Isaiah 9:6a].
2. The Jewish nation rejects their Messiah. “And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.” [Daniel 9:26]
3. The Jewish nation shall be gathered. “And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.” [Isaiah 11:12]
4. The Jewish nation shall travail, and be in trouble, and be in pain. “Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob's trouble, but he shall be saved out of it.” [Jeremiah 30:7]
5. Then, the nation will be re-born in the establishment of the dominion of Jesus Christ in the Kingdom of Heaven.
This will be the time of “the restitution of all things” spoken in the book of chapter three, verse twenty-one: “Whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.” [Acts 3:21]
The man child that was born … becomes the King in Israel, and all the nations are ruled from Zion. Amen!
All eyes are upon Zion!