Prophets

"What is the Bible?"

Most of my Bible classes started off this way while I was in college. Asking a question that the professor already had a very specific political answer to. Typical answers from students ranged from a love letter, a history of God, a holy rule book, the story of Jesus (both testaments implied), etc. Professors would listen however long it took to eat up the necessary amount of class time before offering a very dry and safe answer: "it is a collection of books and letters written to specific peoples in specific contexts that the Holy Spirit inspires to reveal God to us . . . . . . ."

I just started a new book. I like the way it opens: "The Bible is a story". That's it. It's a story that is often about God, but not always. Look at Ruth and Esther and try to tell me that God is really a central character. It's often about Jesus, but not always. The fact that the OT leads up perfectly to Jesus, does not mean it was written with him in mind. Fulfillment of prophecy does not mean that the only purpose of the prophet was to declare one single event that was to come.

Most of the Bible is prophetic. Moses was considered a prophet, which means the Torah ascribed to him is a prophetic collection. The "history books" of the Bible are actually refered to as the "Former Prophets". Then there's obviously the Latter Prophets that follow. Typically we pick out the Jesus-friendly aspects of those and ignore the rest. Then think of how much prophetic material in the Gospels is pulled from the Psalms and literary books like Ruth, etc. We tend to read the Gospels themselves in a very literal sense, but it's hard to deal with synoptic theory and still believe that all Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John had in mind was to give a police report of the Jesus event. We can read the life of Jesus and start to see that much of what is said is prophetic of his Church. The Church fulfills the life that Jesus lived . . . ideally, at least. We can read the account of the early churches and find in them prophetic threads that carry into our congregations today. Have you ever been urged to model the Bereans? How many churches today are seeking to fulfill the prototype of Antioch?

Prophecy has never been a matter of predicting something that would happen once and only once, describing it specifically and letting that declare it once for all. There are times in the OT that such predictions are made, but rarely. Even those instances are vague; there is little detail to them. Yet, today, this is what we expect from "prophets". With our Modern mindset we say "Well, if you can see the future, tell me what will happen to me tomorrow at 5:34pm."

The book I started had this to say: "the prophets were gripped by the pathos (passion) of God - not God's pity, but God's deep emotional concern. Prophets had God's heart and passion for justice and mercy. So . . . real experience of God is that which livens our hearts and lines up with the heart of God, a heart of mercy and justice, a heart given to unconditional love and blinding holiness."

Prophecy is the heart of God, not necessarily the voice of God!

The book of Joshua is considered a prophetic book. How!!? It is a book that sanctifies genocide. (this is not a question I really presume to give any form of adequate answer to here) Except, that God calls sinful people to be his. God does not wait for the murderer to quit and adequately pay for his sins first. God redeems him with blood as he pulls the trigger. As God looked on the mess that was the Ancient Near East, he realized it was hopeless to wait for them to get it together. The sons and daughters of Abraham were evil, but he introduced his heart in that setting. A heart of holiness. A heart of conquest. A heart that calls for purity. In this sense I find that the heart of God is all over Joshua, but allow me to say I do not believe God was proud or in any way pleased as the people of Jericho were slaughtered. And I firmly deny that God's voice in this text justifies any form of war or genocide. Later texts uncover more of God's heart, and we find that he is strongly opposed to violence.

Often I hear the statement that prophecy is the proclamation of truth. I agree. I just think we've got a jacked up idea of what truth is. Reality is Truth. As Christians we believe that everything we see and experience does not necessarily reflect the way things really are. Truth is not empirical facts. Eldridge points out that truth is found in the heart. Truth calls on your mind, but is verified by your heart. What is in the heart of God is True. Prophecy proclaims Truth in this sense. It is not concerned with things to come, it is concerned with the heart of God.

Back to story. If the story of the exodus, wilderness, and conquest are attributed to a prophet, what does that tell us? If the "history" of the Bible is actually considered to be prophetic writing, shouldn't that hint something to us? If the story of Jesus is supposed to become our story (read: be fulfilled by us), what does that say about it?

We often refer to inspiration like we refer to Ph.D.'s. "It's inspired", means it's got the credentials to be listened to whether or not what it's saying is important to anyone else or not. There are plently of professors that are totally irrelevant, and I'm sure many people think the same of plenty of the books within the Bible. "It's inspired" has ceased to mean, "it matters".

In every book of the Bible, and every follower of Christ there are deep wells into the heart of God which is Truth. We live by prophecy and it flows from us.