One of the weaknesses, I see, of much of modern Christianity has been that it has lost touch with the Hebrew Scriptures, the Old Testament, and in particular with the Prophets and the Prophetic Literature of the Old Testament! I had the distinct privilege of studying under the Rev. Dr. Philip King, who was a scholar and Biblical archaeologist, and whose classes at Boston College were always filled with Rabbinic students as well as Christian students. Fr. King always told us that when we lose the sense of the prophets and their vision, we enter into a very overly spiritualized interpretation of Christianity, or a view of Christianity that is based on ecclesial laws. The prophets, he said, kept the Word of God earthy. They kept it whole. They kept it real and true. They would not let us divide earth from heaven. They put heaven and earth together and they said, “It’s all one.”
The prophets, King taught us, speak out of a deep experience of God who called them to be His messengers who come holding a mirror for us to look into and to listen to the promise of God, and if we ignore the mess we see within — there are consequences for which we can blame no-one but ourselves — or if we embrace the mess we see within, and change, there are consequences from which we can only credit the grace of God! The voices of such true and Godly prophetic words come from the heart of God. They prophets of God are bold enough and brazen enough to dare to say, “I’ve seen God. I’ve heard His voice, and I know what God wants to say to you. I’m going to tell you what God thinks and what He is calling you to do.”
It takes the surprising grace of God — not personal inspiration — to be able to show others how they are living, and to speak with the certainty that the Jewish prophets spoke. I think what they give us are hope and the command of God. They give us new images by which we can capture and grasp the Truth of life.
It seems to me that a failure of the modern church, maybe of the church in every age, has been a failure of hope. The prophets explode our hearts and minds if we can only learn how to listen to them and learn to understand the images and metaphors with which they speak. Hope is largely a matter of God’s grace enabling to re-image our life in new ways. It is, as Paul says, a certain hope! It is not to be caught up in or trapped by our images and experiences of hopelessness. When we’re trapped in the despair of sin, we keep living out of hopelessness, fighting against our sinful ways, failing to resist temptations and sin, and even saying to ourselves that nothing works! The prophetic voices in our lives oftentimes give us opportunities to create or even accept new images of hope, and living out of those new images.
The prophets give us a sense of the possible and of God’s desire to forgive and help. They give us a sense of the impossible! That’s why, frankly, prophets are so hard to listen to — because they explode our minds and hearts and push back the limits of our current journey of life. The prophets in our life increase our capacity to feel, to breathe, to weep, and to promise God our faithful living. They intensify our capacity for suffering for the sake of God, and that perhaps is why people don’t want to listen to prophets, because prophets increase our ability to feel what God is feeling. To feel God’s pain, God’s desire, God’s longing, and even God’s anger, if you’ll allow. To feel God’s love!
The prophetic voice in our life is an invitation of God to take the journey into the heart of God. This is why we pray: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner!
From the Bible:
“We have this hope, a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters the inner shrine behind the curtain, where Jesus, a forerunner on our behalf, has entered…” Hebrews 6:19-20.
“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope” Romans 5:13.
“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen”
Hebrews 11:1.
“But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint” Isaiah 40:31.
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