198 God speaks through Prophets and prophecy Part 2 - a podcast by Dr David Petts - Pentecostal preacher, former AoG Bible College Principal

How God speaks to us    Talk 14 Prophets and Prophecy (Part 2)

 

The ministry of a prophet

From what we’ve said so far, it should be clear that although all Christians are to ‘prophesy’ in the general sense of speaking on God’s behalf, not all will exercise the gift of prophecy. And not all who exercise this gift will be prophets in the Ephesians 4:11 sense. In short:

 

• All God’s people should prophesy (speak on his behalf)
• Some, but not all will receive the spiritual gift of prophecy (to edify the church)
• Some, but not all of these will exercise the ministry of a prophet.

So what can we learn about prophets as distinct from those who have the gift of prophecy? 

 

We saw earlier that prophets are people who hear from God and then pass on to others what he has said. They speak on behalf of God. Of course, because God knows the future, prophets may foretell the future (if that is what the Lord reveals to them), but most of the time they speak on God’s behalf to the people of their own generation. This was true of the prophets in the Old Testament and it’s true of prophets today. However, there’s a very important difference between prophets today and those of the Old Testament.

 

Differences between OT prophets and prophets today

Prophets today do not fulfil the same role as OT prophets and we should not expect them to do so. People like Moses, Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel etc. were people of great power and influence, proclaiming God’s word and manifesting his power to Israel and to the nations beyond. 

 

But we must be careful not to assume that prophets today will be the same. For a model of what we should expect of a prophet today we need to look at the New Testament and those who are described as prophets after the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2). Until then the Holy Spirit was given to relatively few people, but at Pentecost Moses’ prayer that all God’s people would be prophets (Numbers 11:29) was answered, and Joel’s prophecy that God would pour out his Spirit on all people began to be fulfilled (Joel 2:28, Acts 2:16-17). 

 

This meant that Acts 2 was in a very real sense a turning point in human history. The real dividing-line in God’s dealings with mankind is not the break between Old and New Testaments, but the seven weeks that started with Christ’s death and resurrection and that culminated with the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost. From then on the Holy Spirit was available to all and, as we have seen, all God’s people are in a sense ‘prophets’ (Acts 2:16-18).

 

This means that people referred to as prophets in the New Testament before Pentecost should be considered in the same category as the Old Testament prophets. John the Baptist, for example, was the last in the line of Old Testament prophets. Jesus himself made this clear when he said:

For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John (Matthew 11:13).

In saying this Jesus revealed the continuity of the prophetic line from Moses right through to John for, until Jesus came, all prophetic ministry pointed forward to him. 

 

But what was the purpose of prophetic ministry after Jesus had come?  There clearly was to be a change of emphasis and we must not be surprised if certain differences appear in the role of the prophet after Pentecost. So, what is the ministry of a prophet today and how is it different from that of the Old Testament prophets?

 

To answer this question, we need to look at some of the people who are named as prophets in the Book of Acts. These are Agabus (Acts 11:27-28, 21:10), Judas and Silas (Acts 15:32), and some or all of those mentioned in Acts 13:1-2 (Barnabas, Simeon, Lucius, Manaen, Paul). The difficulty here is that it is not clear whether they were all ‘prophets and teachers’ or whether some were prophets and some were teachers.

 

Of all those mentioned in the previous paragraph, we know nothing more of Simeon, Lucius, Manaen, and Judas.  Barnabas and Paul were also apostles and so it is difficult to distinguish their apostolic ministry from their prophetic ministry.  Silas said much to encourage and strengthen the brothers (Acts 15:32) and preached that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of God (2 Cor.1:19-20).  We know little else of his ministry except that he accompanied Paul on his second missionary journey. 

 

This leaves Agabus of whom we know rather more. He clearly spoke with great revelation from the Spirit (Acts 11:27-28, 21:10) including the accurate prediction of certain future events. His prophecy about a widespread famine is a well-known example of this (Acts 11:27-30) as is his prediction of Paul's captivity in Jerusalem (Acts 21:11). 

 

From this it is clear that his ministry involved more than the simple gift of prophecy which need not contain any element of prediction. However, there is no suggestion that he fulfilled a role similar to that of OT prophets like Moses, Elijah etc. who spoke prophetically to national leaders. 

 

This leads me to the conclusion that though the prophets referred to in Ephesians 4:11 exercised a greater ministry than the simple gift of prophecy, they are by no means the same as the prophets of the Old Testament or as John the Baptist in the New. And that understanding must surely influence any conclusion we may wish to draw about the role of prophets today.

 

Prophets today

So far we have looked briefly at the role of prophets in both the Old and New Testaments. Our purpose in doing so was to establish precisely what kind of gift is referred to in Ephesians 4:11. Our findings may be summarised as follows:

 

The prophets referred to in Ephesians 4:11 are not the same as

• the prophets of the Old Testament
• NT prophets before Pentecost
• the simple gift of prophecy (1 Cor. 12:10).

 

So to discover the role of prophets today, we must examine any NT examples of the ministry of prophets after Pentecost - and we have noted that Agabus is the only clear example.

 

Agabus

We find references to the ministry of Agabus first in Acts 11 and then later in Acts 21. In Acts 11:27-28 we read that some prophets came to Antioch. One of them, named Agabus

stood up and predicted that a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world.

 

We are then told not only that this came to pass (v.28), but also what the disciples decided to do about it and how they did it. They decided that they would provide help for the brothers living in Judea (v.29) and they did so by sending a gift by Barnabas and Saul (v.30).

 

Two things are important here. First, Agabus’ prediction came to pass. If it had not done so it would have been a false prophecy according to the principles laid down in Deuteronomy 18:21-22. Clearly if a prophetic revelation comes from God it will come to pass. 

 

Secondly, it is noteworthy that the prophet did not tell the disciples what to do. Agabus simply gave them information as to what would happen. There is no suggestion here, therefore, that the prophet gives direction to the church or to individuals. But this is something which becomes even clearer when we consider the later passage in Acts 21 where we read:

 

… a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. Coming over to us he took Paul’s belt, tied his own hands and feet with it and said, “The Holy Spirit says, ‘In this way the Jews of Jerusalem will bind the owner of this belt and will hand him over to the Gentiles’ (vv.10-11).

 

The disciples then pleaded with Paul not to go to Jerusalem (v.12), but Paul answered that if needs be he was ready to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus (v.13). Seeing that they could not persuade him, the disciples replied, The Lord’s will be done (v.14).

 

Again we see clearly that the prophet does not give direction to Paul. Agabus tells Paul that he will go to Jerusalem and that he will be captured by the Jews and handed over to the Gentiles. He does not tell him not to go. It is the disciples in the following verses who plead with Paul not to go. They put their own interpretation on the prophecy. But Paul knew that they were misunderstanding what God was saying, for he himself knew what God wanted him to do.

 

To help us understand this we need to go back to Acts 20. Paul is on his way to Jerusalem, hoping to get there in time for the feast of Pentecost (v.16). He reaches Miletus and sends to Ephesus for the elders of the church (v.17). In his farewell address to them he says

And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. I only know that in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me. However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me… (Acts 20: 22-24) 

Three things are significant here. First, it is clear that prophetic ministry was common at that time. In every city Paul was receiving prophetic words. Secondly, these prophetic words were testifying to the same thing. Paul would be imprisoned in Jerusalem. Thirdly, despite all this Paul was convinced that God wanted him to go for he was compelled by the Spirit to do so. 

 

It is very important to understand this when we come to Acts 21:4 which says that through the Spirit the disciples at Tyre urged Paul not to go on to Jerusalem. This apparently completely contradicts Paul’s own statement that he was compelled by the Spirit to go (20:22). However, the passage about Agabus (vv. 10-14) sheds light on this. The disciples at Tyre made the same mistake as those at Caesarea. They received a revelation from the Spirit as to Paul’s future imprisonment, but they wrongly understood that this meant that Paul was not to go.

 

So the ministry of Agabus teaches us that prophets today may receive revelation from the Holy Spirit with regard to the future. However, it is not their role to tell the church or individual Christians what to do. They do not give direction. They impart to us information from the Spirit which helps us decide in advance what to do (Acts 11) or may encourage us that we are still in the will of God even when we are called to pass though hardship and difficulty (Acts 20-21).

 

One example of a present-day prophet is César Castellanos. When I met him he was the leader of a church in Columbia which was at the time almost certainly one of the fastest growing churches in the world, with over 200,000 members. In 1998 he visited Britain and was the guest preacher at a conference I attended. At the end of a special late-night meeting where César had been speaking to about a dozen national Christian leaders, he prayed for each one of us in turn. When he came to me, instead of praying, he prophesied. His prophecy included the following statement:

 

This is what the Holy Spirit says: I will greatly anoint your pen and your writing will be a blessing to thousands and thousands of people.

 

How was I to respond to such a wonderful prophecy? Let’s see what the New Testament has to say about this and then ask how it applies to César’s prophecy about me. It’s very important, when we hear prophetic words of this kind, that we consider very carefully what has been said and judge it in the light of what the New Testament teaches.

 

 

How to respond to the ministry of prophets today

In 1 Corinthians 14:29 we’re told to judge or weigh carefully what a prophet says. We must not automatically assume that everything a prophet says comes from the Lord. A prophet may well have received something from the Lord, but the way they express it may be influenced by their own interpretation of what the Lord has given them. 

 

Remember the people in Acts 21 who were telling Paul not to go to Jerusalem? They had heard rightly from the Lord that Paul would suffer when he went to Jerusalem, but they put their own construction on it and told him not to go! There’s a human element in every prophecy, even when it’s given by divine inspiration.

 

So how do we weigh or judge a prophecy? It will greatly help if we ask ourselves questions like these:

• Is the prophecy in line with the principles of Scripture?
• Is the person who brought the prophecy reliable?
• Do we have an inner witness that this is from the Lord? 
• Are there any other signs confirming the prophecy?

If the answers to these questions are positive, then it would be wise to ask the Lord what our next course of action might be, and perhaps to seek the advice of one or more of our church leaders. Do they have any conviction that this is what God is saying? Other important questions you might ask are:

• Is there any indication of the timing of the fulfilment of the prophecy? We shouldn’t automatically assume that it will happen immediately. 
• As time passes, can we see definite signs that the prophecy is coming to pass?

 

Now, just by way of example, if I apply these principles to César’s prophecy about myself, I can certainly see that:

• His prophecy was in line with the principles of Scripture
• The person who brought the prophecy was reliable
• I did have an inner witness that it was from the Lord. It was a confirmation of what I had already felt that God was saying to me. In the weeks leading up to that conference I had been feeling that God wanted me to give more time to writing. César’s prophecy came as a wonderful confirmation
• The fact that he did not know me was in itself a good sign of its genuineness. César had never met me. He knew that I was a Christian leader but he had no way of knowing that I was a writer. 
• There was an almost immediate fulfilment and it continues to be fulfilled over 20 years later. Since that time, I have written several books which have been translated into a variety of different languages. They have certainly reached thousands already and I continue to receive messages of thanks from grateful readers. 

 

In using this illustration, I have simply tried to highlight the fact that God does still speak through prophets today and to show how important it is to know how to evaluate what they say. In the final analysis, as the children of God it is our privilege to be led by God’s Spirit and, although he may choose to speak to us through prophetic ministry, we, and we alone, can determine God’s will for our lives. And it’s because we have the Spirit that God sometimes speaks to us directly, without any human intermediary, and that will be the subject of our next talk.

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