DO THIS! (PART 11)

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

Do not treat prophecies with contempt but test them all.

1 Thessalonians 5:20-21a

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Study the Bible enough and you’ll quickly understand the importance of prophesy in the scriptures. In fact, the books that comprise the end of the Old Testament (17 total) reveal this by the way they have been grouped.

Four prophets – Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel - have been labeled the “major” prophets, not that they were any more significant than any of the “minor” prophets but their books are much longer. For example, the Book of Isaiah contains 66 chapters, Jeremiah, who also authored Lamentations, 52, Ezekiel 48, and Daniel 12.

After Daniel, we see the run of the following “minor” prophets:

Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi

Of interest, there is really only one New Testament book considered to be an overall book of prophecy and that is the Book of Revelation which was written by John who also authored one of the four Gospels and three other New Testament letters.

Why were prophets so important?

Plain and simple, they were messengers who spoke on behalf of God.

God chose them and in turn, they submitted themselves to be used by Him to communicate to His people. It was a unique and special responsibility that only a select few got to carry out.

Now, as you can expect, Satan, who is always working to counter anything good that God is trying to accomplish, had people he liked to use to thwart God’s efforts. These false prophets would bring forth messages they would claim were from God but weren’t.

Need an example?

Consider these verses:

Jesus speaking...“At that time if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Messiah!’ or, ‘There He is!’ do not believe it. For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you ahead of time.” Matthew 24:23-25

From the Book of Jeremiah:

Therefore this is what the Lord Almighty says concerning the prophets:

“I will make them eat bitter food and drink poisoned water, because from the prophets of Jerusalem ungodliness has spread throughout the land.”

This is what the Lord Almighty says:

“Do not listen to what the prophets are prophesying to you; they fill you with false hopes.

"They speak visions from their own minds, not from the mouth of the Lord. They keep saying to those who despise Me, ‘The Lord says: You will have peace.’ And to all who follow the stubbornness of their hearts they say, ‘No harm will come to you.’”

“But which of them has stood in the council of the Lord to see or to hear his word? Who has listened and heard His word?”

See, the storm of the Lord will burst out in wrath, a whirlwind swirling down on the heads of the wicked. The anger of the Lord will not turn back until He fully accomplishes the purposes of his heart.”

“In days to come you will understand it clearly. I did not send these prophets, yet they have run with their message; I did not speak to them, yet they have prophesied.” Jeremiah 23:15-21

And finally from the Law and the Book of Deuteronomy:

The Lord said to me: “What they say is good. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their fellow Israelites, and I will put My words in his mouth. He will tell them everything I command him. I myself will call to account anyone who does not listen to My words that the prophet speaks in My name. But a prophet who presumes to speak in My name anything I have not commanded, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, is to be put to death.”

You may say to yourselves, “How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the Lord?” If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the Lord does not take place or come true, that is a message the Lord has not spoken (18:17-22).

There are other verses regarding the matter of true and false prophets but you can get the point. We know the Lord chooses people to be His prophets and we also know that there are false prophets out there, those who pronounce their messages are from the Lord when they aren’t. We also know there is a way to discern a prophet’s legitimacy.

With these truths in mind, we turn to the eleventh “Do This!” statement, drawn from the Apostle Paul’s closing words to the church in Thessalonica:

Do not treat prophecies with contempt but test them all (5:20-21a).

Why this command?

Because it would be easy for a person to just reject all prophecies as a safeguard against being misled. As we find in this order from the Lord, that’s not what He expects from us because He tells us to test all prophecies for legitimacy.

So how can we do this? How can we test messages from people who claim to be speaking on the Lord’s behalf to make sure they are true?

One way we can do this is to pray, turning to God with the prophecy delivered and ask Him to verify of nullify it. We can always be assured that He will hear our request and provide us with the right guidance.

We can also rely on the work of the Holy Spirit in these instances. We know that when we place our belief in Jesus as Savior, the Holy Spirit comes to dwell within us and lead us in the ways of righteousness so our lives can be Christ-like. When we receive a message that a person claims came from God, we can allow the Holy Spirit to reveal whether or not the message is genuine or not. Like the Lord’s counsel through prayer, the Holy Spirit will never lead us astray.

Prophecies have been happening since biblical times and you can be sure they will continue right up to the day when Jesus returns. Today’s “Do This!” command makes it clear that we aren’t to reject these messages but rather test them so to know whether they are from the Lord or not. 

Tomorrow, we will finish this series with message #12. 

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to Gods4all@aol.com