Open the Bible UK Daily

“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.” John 5:39-40 There is no better place to hide from God than religion. Being religious allows you to think you’re spiritual even while you are avoiding God. It is possible to tell yourself that you are seeking God, while wh...

"You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.” Jeremiah 29:13 Why do idols exist? Here are two reasons: Our attraction to God. Every human being is made in the image of God. That’s true of the most messed up, dysfunctional, twisted person you can think of. It is also true of you. That's why wherever you go, you will find that human beings are engaged in some kind of spiritua...

“You shall bow down no more to the work of your hands.” Micah 5:13 It’s dangerously easy to turn God’s good gifts into idols. Adam was made to enjoy a relationship with God. Adam had that relationship before he had a home in Eden, before he had work in the garden, and before God gave him a wife. The order is important. God gave Adam the gift of marriage. But he was not made for marriage. Marriage...

“I will cut off your carved images and your pillars from among you.” Micah 5:13 Notice the word “your” in verse 13. Idolatry had taken root among God’s own people. Micah is talking to the church crowd. Idolatry is worshipping and serving created things rather than the Creator. The apostle Paul speaks about this: “They exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshipped and served the creature r...

For all the peoples walk each in the name of its god, but we will walk in the name of the LORD our God forever and ever. Micah 4:5 God sits exalted on the throne of the universe, the sovereign Lord over all creation. Nothing can touch Him. No one can usurp Him. He is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. One God is adored in heaven, and one day He will be confessed by every tongue on earth. He is incompar...

“Your hand shall be lifted up over your adversaries, and all your enemies shall be cut off.” Micah 5:9 If you are walking by faith in Jesus Christ, then over the noise of your enemies’ voices, you are able to say: “I am a child of the King. I have a place at His table. I have been redeemed by the blood of Christ. I belong to the Shepherd-King. My life is secure in His hands.” What will happen when...

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. Psalm 23:5 Imagine a great banquet hall in the king’s palace. The king is dressed in common clothes, and he is doing the work of a servant, preparing the table for a great banquet. All of us are gathered in this vast hall. We would like to help the king, but he will not allow it. He wants us to watch as he prepares the table for us. The...

From you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days. Micah 5:2 David was the greatest king God’s people ever had. But he had his own sins and flaws. You will never find a leader who is everything you think a shepherd should be. The good news of the gospel is that God Himself has come to be your shepherd. Other shepherds may disapp...

“The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” John 10:11 The common image of a biblical shepherd is an older man with a beard walking slowly through the countryside. He is wearing a flowing robe and carrying a long stick with a hook on the end. If that’s how you think about a shepherd, then it’s time to change the image. Think about a cattle rancher and you’ll get a picture that is much cl...

“And you are my sheep, human sheep of my pasture, and I am your God,” declares the LORD God. Ezekiel 34:31 Whenever we come to this theme of shepherds and sheep in the Bible, we have a problem. Animals tend to make us sentimental, and most of us have a remarkable capacity to project an image onto animals that is a long way from reality. Take bears, for example... Some children get anxious at night...

“It shall come to pass in the latter days...” Micah 4:1 How will God establish peace on earth? It begins with God judging. Here are three more things Micah tells us: God will gather. “I will assemble the lame” (4:6). These people have been injured by others’ cruelty. They have difficulty getting where they want to go. Imagine the Lord saying this to you. He will not allow your wounds to keep you f...

He shall judge between many peoples... Micah 4:3 Peace on earth sounds great, but how will God deal with the problems around us and the problems within us? The first thing Micah tells us here is that God will judge, and that this judgement will have two parts. First, God will resolve disputes among His own people. So many disputes among God’s people never get resolved. But here we read that Christ...

It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and it shall be lifted up above the hills; and peoples shall flow to it. Micah 4:1 “The house of the LORD” is the temple, and the temple in the Old Testament was the place where God’s presence came down on the earth. God had said that He would meet with His peop...

“They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.” Micah 4:3 Micah is describing total disarmament—something that’s never been seen in world history—all bombs exploded, all weapons eliminated, all training camps closed, all prisons emptied, and all national defence budgets reall...

But as for me. I am filled with power. with the Spirit of the LORD, and with justice and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression and to Israel his sin. Micah 3:8 For twenty years Micah preached and prayed, and watched things move from bad to worse among the people that he loved, but he was faithful in doing what God had entrusted him to do. God called Micah to speak and pray, and that’s what...

Therefore because of you [unfaithful leaders] Zion shall be ploughed as a field; Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins, and the mountain of the house a wooded height. Micah 3:12 If you had heard Micah speak the words of this prophecy, you would have felt completely hopeless. But the wonderful thing is that it didn’t actually happen for another 100 years. If you want to know why, turn to Jeremiah...

Then they will cry to the LORD, but he will not answer them; he will hide his face from them at that time, because they have made their deeds evil. Micah 3:4 Here we come to another principle that runs throughout the Bible. “The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working” (Jas. 5:16). Effective praying depends on right living. “Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an unde...

“Hear, you heads of Jacob and rulers of the house of Israel! Is it not for you to know justice?—you who hate the good and love the evil, who tear the skin from off my people and their flesh from off their bones. who eat the flesh of my people. and lay their skin from off them. and break their bones in pieces and chop them up like meat in a pot, like flesh in a cauldron." Micah 3:1-3 God is speakin...

Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Hebrews 13:17 You are accountable for all that you have been given, and the more you have been given, the more accountable you are. That’s why the Bible urges us to pray for our leaders. Children, pray for your parents, because God has given them a big responsibility to lead...

“Well done, good servant! Because you have been faithful in a very little, you shall have authority over ten cities.” Luke 19:17 Jesus told a story about three servants who were trusted with investing money. Two of them did a good job. They were enterprising and showed themselves to be wise managers. In Matthew’s version, when the master returned, he said: “Well done, good and faithful servant. Yo...

Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required… Luke 12:48 It is worth taking a moment to think about what God has entrusted to you. Here are some areas to reflect on. Relationships. Your relationships are a trust from God. Every wedding reminds us that one person’s happiness is largely entrusted into the hands of another. When a child is born, he or she is entrusted to parents. Fri...

Hear, you heads of Jacob and rulers of the house of Israel! Micah 3:1 The Bible has a great deal to say about leadership. Some positions of leadership are elected. That is, people make a choice through a process of voting, by which they trust the task of leadership to people who are willing to take that responsibility. This is what happens in a democracy, and it is also what happens in many church...

“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.” Hebrews 4:7 God is speaking. And He says two things that He will do: Some time ago, Professor Don Carson was asked to speak at Cambridge University. When he had finished his presentation on biblical Christianity, one of the faculty got up and asked: “So what you’re saying is… if God is a talking God, that changes everything?” This highly e...

“Do not preach”—thus they preach— “one should not preach of such things; disgrace will not overtake us.” Micah 2:6 When Micah spoke the Word of God, there were strong voices in the community that did not want to hear it. The first marker of the false prophet is that he or she brings comfort to people who are still in their sins: “Micah, you talk about judgement from God. How can that be? We are th...

Therefore, thus says the LORD… Micah 2:3 “I am devising disaster.” He is explaining the action that He is about to take against those who take advantage of the vulnerable: “against this family I am devising disaster” (2:3). A society that follows the path of exploitation will not survive for long. God says that those who have taken the land will be removed from it, and that is precisely what happe...