Until today, I would read the huge jeopardy placed upon the OT prophet (in this declaration of Moses – verses 20), and shudder at their accountability, back then:
Deuteronomy 18:15-22
A New Prophet Like Moses
15 “The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. Him you shall hear,
16 according to all you desired of the Lord your God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, ‘Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, nor let me see this great fire anymore, lest I die.’
17 “And the Lord said to me: ‘What they have spoken is good.
18 I will raise up for them a Prophet like you from among their brethren, and will put My words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I command Him.
19 And it shall be that whoever will not hear My words, which He speaks in My name, I will require it of him.
20 But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.’
21 And if you say in your heart, ‘How shall we know the word which the Lord has not spoken?’—
22 when a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him.
Verse 20 is confirmed, in the physical, when Jeremiah found himself in conflict with a cadre of false prophets who were prophesying easy times ahead during a period when God had other plans:
Jeremiah 28:15-17
15 Then the prophet Jeremiah said to Hananiah the prophet, “Hear now, Hananiah, the Lord has not sent you, but you make this people trust in a lie.
16 Therefore thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, I will cast you from the face of the earth. This year you shall die, because you have taught rebellion against the Lord.’ ”
17 So Hananiah the prophet died the same year in the seventh month.
Hananiah’s teaching of rebellion was actually Hananiah proclaiming God moving on behalf of Israel and breaking the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar. It sounded like a good thing, except it flew in the face of the stronger, more difficult, and less popular words of Jeremiah. Jeremiah was likely less of a draw at the conferences than Hananiah.
It also should be noted that there were many other false prophets during the OT days, and we do not have accounts of all of them prophesying-and-dying either on the spot or within the year (like Hananiah) of their foolishness, so one might be inclined to (I’d think rightly) conclude that their deaths may have been in a spiritual sense, like Adam and Eve, who died the day they sinned. Sin will do that to you.
Genesis 2:17
17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
Adam and Eve physically lived for lots more years. But they were spiritual zombies – the walking dead – for the rest of their physical lives.
QUES: SO WHAT RECENTLY CHANGED IN MY PERCEPTION OF THIS (DEUT 18) WARNING TO THE OT PROPHETS?
ANSWER: I AM MORE AND MORE OF THE MIND THAT THIS WARNING MIGHT INDEED BE TO ALL PROPHETS IN BOTH TESTAMENTS.
I come to that conclusion because the verses of Deut 15 are one ongoing and uninterrupted communiqué from God to mankind, via Moses, in which God is speaking into the future, about when Jesus makes His appearance.
ONE MORE TIME:
(Deut 15):
17 “And the Lord said to me: ‘What they have spoken is good.
18 I will raise up for them a Prophet like you from among their brethren, and will put My words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I command Him.
19 And it shall be that whoever will not hear My words, which He speaks in My name, I will require it of him.
20 But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.’
That later-to-be-raised-up Prophet is Jesus, as identified clearly by Peter in his call to repentance. That same portion of scripture is also mentioned by Stephen, in his one and only recorded sermon – to the religious leaders:
PETER SAYS:
Acts 3:22-23
22 For Moses truly said to the fathers, ‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things, whatever He says to you.
23 And it shall be that every soul who will not hear that Prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people. ’
STEPHEN SAYS:
Acts 7:37
37 “ This is that Moses who said to the children of Israel, ‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear. ’
A while back I wrote an article called UNTEMPERED MORTAR pertaining to this topic. But as things heat up, I feel a reconsideration of this matter is in order, for our safety and accuracy, and also for our effectiveness in accomplishing the purposes of God.
The let’s-have-fun-and-prophesy days need to be done and gone. We should be trembling at the word of God, DEFINITELY anticipating and allowing Him to move through us and speak through us, BUT very carefully and prayerfully moving in this arena.
The true and accurate prophetic voice is being called forth in this critical season, and I believe we will see a greater confirmation of the words of the true prophets, and a more obvious exposure of the false prophets, the goofy prophets, the well-intended but inaccurate prophets. I further believe we will see the corrective hand of our Lord on the prophets who prophesy falsely, hoping something will happen, instead of hearing from the Lord and setting forth that which they’ve heard, no more and no less.
Here’s the promise of increased spiritual activity as we come closer to the end of the age: Joel 2:28 and Acts 2:17.
Especially with that increased activity, the warnings must be heeded.
Ezekiel 13:3-10
3 Thus says the Lord God:“ Woe to the foolish prophets, who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing!
4 O Israel, your prophets are like foxes in the deserts.
5 You have not gone up into the gaps to build a wall for the house of Israel to stand in battle on the day of the Lord.
6 They have envisioned futility and false divination, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord! ’ But the Lord has not sent them; yet they hope that the word may be confirmed.
7 Have you not seen a futile vision, and have you not spoken false divination? You say, ‘The Lord says, ’ but I have not spoken.”
8 Therefore thus says the Lord God: “Because you have spoken nonsense and envisioned lies, therefore I am indeed against you,” says the Lord God.
9 “My hand will be against the prophets who envision futility and who divine lies; they shall not be in the assembly of My people, nor be written in the record of the house of Israel, nor shall they enter into the land of Israel. Then you shall know that I am the Lord God.
10 “ Because, indeed, because they have seduced My people, saying, ‘ Peace! ’ when there is no peace —and one builds a wall, and they plaster it with untempered mortar
Jeremiah puts it this way, and even discloses the ever and always popular message of ones who prophesy from their own hearts:
Jeremiah 6:14
14 They have also healed the hurt of My people slightly,
Saying, ‘ Peace, peace! ’
When there is no peace.
That of course does not mean true prophets will not speak kind and good messages as well. They will, and the must, when they hear such words. There is no validation of office in harshness or heaviness of message. The issue is not the TOPIC. The issue is the fact that a prophet heard it from God.
HEY WAIT – Didn’t Paul declare ALL CAN PROPHESY?
Of course he did:
1 Corinthians 14:31-32
31 For you can all prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be encouraged.
32 And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets.
The potential is there for us to all prophesy. All CAN. But WILL all pay the price of obedience to prophesy accurately? The activity of that potential is contingent upon our deep relationship with the Lord, and us having ears to hear.
Is that all-can-prophesy proclamation a NEW THING, only a NT THING?
Numbers 11:29
29 Then Moses said to him, “Are you zealous for my sake? Oh, that all the Lord ‘s people were prophets and that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them,
God’s heart has always been that all of His people might be in the place of deep relationship with Him, hear His voice, understand His ways, and prophesy. THAT would be the nation of priests the Lord originally intended for Israel, and then made a way to happen by the blood of our Savior.
But let’s face it – we’re all not yet walking in all that the Lord has provided for us to walk in, and God in this season is allowing and even causing things to happen to drive and draw us to the place of deeper intimacy. So let’s expect more true prophets to rise up – even while the noise of the false prophets will understandably increase.
We hear lots of prophetic words and see lots of prophetic activity that sounds good, but much of which does not come to pass. The ones who would continue to ignore the instruction and warning of scripture, walking around proclaiming the “words of the Lord” when they are not the words of the Lord, constitute the Dead Prophet’s Society.
Thank God for repentance, and for resurrection in Christ. God is wanting us all to get this thing right. And by His grace, we can.
I believe the more we understand who God is, how He operates, what He says, and what His word says, the safer we will be and the more confident we will be when we indeed hear His voice. We will be more able to discern not only what is of Him, but also what is not of Him.
I totally believe the Lord is OK with us learning, and growing and maturing – which would mean even making some “prophetic mistakes”. But I do not see where the Lord has ever been pleased with people making believe they are prophets when they are not. In fact, I don’t scripturally see the Lord pleased with anyone ever making believe they attained to any title or office, when they have not.
To the contrary.
I read of a greater accountability upon us all in the NT dispensation, not a lesser one.
Hebrews 12:25
See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. For if they did not escape who refused Him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if we turn away from Him who speaks from heaven,
Jeremiah 23 (good reading) both WARNS the prophet to exercise extreme care in their activity, and at the same time CHARGES the ones who hear from God to speak forth that which they hear from the Lord and recognize as being public words. Some things we hear from God are for us to pray into, and not proclaim. Another topic. He shares His heart with His servants.
There is no safe-place-in-silence. There is only a safe place in obedience. There’s times to be silent, and times to speak.
All this said, Peter puts it this way:
1 Peter 4:11
11 If anyone speaks, let him speak as the oracles of God. If anyone ministers, let him do it as with the ability which God supplies, that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belong the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.
All scripture NJKV
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