Wednesday, November 26, 2025
Scripture Readings
- Primary Reading: Micah 4-7, Nahum 1-2
Devotional Thought
Micah stands in the gate of a doomed city and sees what no one else can see: a hill lifted above the hills, nations streaming to it like rivers running uphill, swords hammered into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks. He is a small-town prophet from Moresheth, speaking to a Jerusalem that feels secure and a Samaria that has already fallen. Around him, Assyria is the terror of the age, and later Babylon will come. Yet Micah sets beside that dread a picture of a shepherd-king who gathers the lame, the driven-out, the afflicted—”her that halteth”—and makes of them a remnant. Then he gives us the most quoted verse in the prophets: “What doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?” And when the case against Israel seems closed, he ends with a God who delights in mercy, casting sins into the depths of the sea.
Nahum finishes the thought. Nineveh, that vast and bloody city, the empire that flayed its captives and deported whole peoples, is finally answered. “The LORD is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked.” The mountains quake, the rivers dry, the chariots rage in the streets—and then silence. The shield of the mighty is made red, and the city that sold nations is sold herself.
This is the last week of the church year, days given to endings and judgment—the very note Nahum sounds. But the lectionary does not leave us in the rubble. It sets Micah’s mountain against Nineveh’s ruin. One city falls; another is exalted. The difference is not strength but covenant. And in the middle of it all, a promise: “But thou, Beth-lehem Ephratah… out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel.” In late November, with the year closing down and Advent nearly upon us, we are handed the address of Christmas.
So the question Micah presses is not whether God will judge—He will, and Nineveh proves it—but what kind of people we will be while we wait. Not the noise of ten thousand rivers, not chariots, not the bribe that buys a verdict. Justice, mercy, humility. That is the road to the mountain of the house of the LORD, and it is walked one ordinary day at a time.
Reflection
- Micah says God requires justice, mercy, and a humble walk—not impressive religion. Where in your week has God been asking for the quiet obedience rather than the grand gesture?
- Nineveh trusted its walls and its armies and fell; Micah’s remnant trusted a shepherd and was gathered. What are you actually trusting as this year ends?
Prayer
Lord God, slow to anger and great in power, we confess that we have loved mercy in the abstract and withheld it in the particular. Teach us to do justly in small things, to love mercy when it costs us, and to walk humbly before You rather than performing for others. Gather us among Your remnant, the halt and the driven-out, and shepherd us with Your strong hand. As the year closes and Advent draws near, fix our eyes on Bethlehem, where the Ruler came forth from of old, and cast our sins into the depths of the sea, for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.