What would you think of a contractor, supposedly a devout Christian, who hired someone to do a job at a certain price, but when it came time to pay his employee, he brought a check that was 20% less than agreed and said he (the employee) could either accept the check and have more work or be given a different check for the amount agreed on? This is similar to God’s declarations in chapter 3.
Micah denounced the leaders of Israel for their deeds and then posed a question. When times go bad and you plead with the Lord for His help, “do you really expect Him to listen? (Verse 4). Micah then told these leaders, “This is God’s message to you: ‘The night will close about you and cut off all your visions; darkness will cover you with never a word from God. The sun will go down upon you, and your day will end. Then at last you will cover your faces in shame and admit that your messages were not from God’.”
Micah even specifically described the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple that occurred in 586 BCE; his prophecy was more than 100 years before that event happened. Why did God wait so long to punish the people? Peter tells us in 2 Peter 3:9, “He isn’t really being slow about His promised return, even though it sometimes seems that way. But He is waiting, for the good reason that He is not willing that any should perish, and He is giving more time for sinners to repent.”