Our pastor gave a helpful message today that mirrored my experience this week. He spoke on Psalm 119:25-32. He had two main points; 1. A desperate soul in prayer, 2. A determined soul in prayer.
The Psalmist is weary, he feels laid low in the dust. But he chooses to pray and to meditate on God’s wonders and on his word, his decrees, his law, his truth. By the time he gets to the eighth verse of this stanza, he is running because the word has set his heart free.
Earlier in the week I felt low, discouraged, even depressed. I’m not one of those eternally joyful, happy people. I’m more melancholic. Down through the years God has taught me that when in such a state I should turn to the Word, so he can speak to me words of comfort and uplift.
Somehow, he reminded me again about the uplifting power of the word. I sat down and read through the whole of First Peter. And slowly God spoke—through the word about having received the new birth “into a living hope…into an inheritance that can never perish…kept in heaven for you” And about “imperishable seed through the living and enduring word of God.”
And on and on I read Peter’s epistle, full of so much truth and comfort. God spoke through the living and enduring word of God! God changed my attitude. And he has done that innumerable times during my 70 years as a Christian. God speaks to us today—through the Word. We must be people of the Word. We must be daily in the Word. Remember, like the Psalmists, we are often waylaid by our own natures.
Because of warnings about a big storm, we had stayed home. Interestingly, after listening to our church online we almost accidentally tuned in to a discussion between John Lennox and Dr James Tour. Their subject focussed mainly on the way God speaks to us through the Bible. They gave many illustrations from their own lives and that of Bakht Singh and others. Look it up on UTube.
Whether seeking to read the entrails of animals or interpret the stars, mankind has always aspired to the prophetic gift. A yearning to slay fear of an unknown future has energized this search down through the centuries.
The quest for this mystical gift continues today–often dressed up in pseudo-scientific jargon. An article about the work of Dr. Kary Mullis, a California molecular biologist, reports his assertion that, “Genes can ‘see’ child’s future.” Dr. Mullis predicts that in ten years we will be able to read a child’s whole future within a few hours of birth. He claims that the DNA in a single cell contains “everything about the child.”[i] According to Dr. Mullis, all we wait for is the technology to read the future as already encoded in the DNA.
Jean Dixon has been making predictions for years. She supposedly foretold the assassination of John F. Kennedy four years before he was elected President, the death by airplane crash of Dag Hammerskjold as well as the Communist takeover of China. But in a CBC radio show, the Great Randy (Mr. James Randy) talked about the research of the National Inquirer into 364 of her prophecies. They found that only four had come true. The quality of these four was of the order of, for instance, there will be a “great medical breakthrough this year,” and “there will be a scandal in Hollywood this year.”[ii]
Some modern evangelicals seem to hunger after prophecy. A sincere young man in a congregation I was pastoring startled me by claiming that I was hindering the Spirit by not encouraging prophecy. Quoting from First Thessalonians, “Do not put out the Spirit’s fire, do not treat prophecies with contempt,” he explained that I was hindering the Spirit by discouraging “a word of prophecy.” Fortunately discussion and prayer led this young man to moderate his evaluation. But the pressure to seek a fresh and “authentic” word from God in the form of “a word of prophecy,” continues to increase.
Pentecostal and charismatic circles, particularly, face this challenge. Let me say at the outset that I view most charismatics as fellow evangelicals. J.I. Packer spent considerable time seeking to ascertain just what charismatics meant by prophecy. He concluded: “By prophecy I mean the receiving and relaying of what purports to be a divine message. Prophecy is a regular feature of charismatic fellowship. The usual beliefs about it are (1) that it is a direct revelation from God of thoughts in his mind, which otherwise would not be known; (2) that it frequently includes specific directions by God, concerning his plans for the future; (3) that its proper verbal form is that of Old Testament oracles, in which the one who speaks is regularly God himself; and (4) that it was a sign gift in the apostolic church, which, with the other sign gifts, was in abeyance in the church from the mid-patristic era till the twentieth century. But all of this is doubtful.”[iii]
Most of our charismatic friends believe that God continues to issue revelations. However, belief that God has continued to reveal himself in prophecy has been rarely held in church history. It has been confined mainly to the fringes of orthodox faith. The term Quakers use for continuing revelation is inner light. George Fox, founder of Quakerism, taught that Christ continues to bring revelations directly to the hearts of his people.[iv]
Throughout history consensus about prophecy and revelation has ruled the theology of main-line Christians. The vast majority agreed that the gift of prophecy is NOT an endowment through which God inspires new revelations. This unanimity has generally continued among traditional evangelicals and reformed believers.
There consensus ceases and a variety of opinions proliferates. Does the gift of prophecy continue in any sense? Calvin believed that prophecy continues, not as ability to foretell the future, “But the science of interpreting Scriptures, so that a prophet is an interpreter of the Will of God.”[v]
LEAD Technologies Inc. V1.01
C.H. Spurgeon, on the other hand, believed that the gift ceased. In his view prophets occupied a peculiar office. They served as “link between the glories of the Old and New Testament.”[vi] J.I. Packer believes that prophecy as revelation has ceased but that the prophetic ministry continues in prophetic preaching.[vii]
Modern confusion about prophetic revelations, has even spread to reformed circles. Anthony Coppin writes about attendance at a Reformed and Renewed Pastor’s Conference in Hertfordshire, England in an article, “Life in the Spirit.” He was obviously taken aback by the charismatic practices and beliefs he saw there. He reports that Bernard Thompson, one of the leaders of the conference, describes prophecy as, “startling and a little frightening. We can,” he tells us, “claim inspiration but not inerrance for words of revelation which Spirit-baptized believers bring!”[viii]
This confusing new definition of inspiration and revelation departs violently from the traditional view. Traditionally, (upon solid biblical grounds) revelation has been considered inerrant. How could a product of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit be otherwise? It is unthinkable to attribute error to a process that owes its origin to the superintendence of the perfect God!
All around us fuzzy theological thought is blurring the definitions crystallized after centuries of painstaking biblical research. Christians talk of words of knowledge, prophecies and revelations. They invest these communications with divine authority. They charge those who refuse to acknowledge the authority of these declarations with hindering the Spirit. Those who bring “prophecies” assert that they have the same weight as Scripture because God is their author. On the other hand, as we will see in the next instalment, the proponents of modern day prophecies admit their fallibility. But how can any believer attribute fallibility to a direct word from God? A fuzzy understanding of the implications of these claims pervades the modern charismatic movement, particularly those in the third wave. (The third wave is a term popularized by John Wimber and the Vineyard movement. In their view, the first wave was traditional Pentecostalism, the second, the charismatic movement and the third is a more moderate and generally evangelical movement.)
We face, then, great diversity of opinion about the gift of prophecy. I’ll seek to harmonize Scripture on this gift in the next segment. [Excerpted from Church No Spectator Sport available from Amazon.]
(Let me know your thoughts on this subject. If you appreciate this blog, please pass it on. If I can help you spiritually, let me know. Further articles, books, and stories at: Facebook: Eric E Wright Twitter: @EricEWright1 LinkedIn: Eric Wright ; Eric’s books are available at: https://www.amazon.com/Eric-E.-Wright/e/B00355HPKK%3Fref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share)
[i] Marilyn Dunlop, Article, Toronto Star, May 2, 1987
[ii] Radio Program, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Toronto, May 29, 1987
[iii] J.I. Packer, Keep In Step With The Spirit, Old Tappan, N.J.: Fleming H. Revell, 1984, p. 215
[iv] George Fox,”Christ is come to teach his people himself,” Christopher Rule writes that; “Fox sometimes seemed to think himself infallible . . . . He advised a woman not to tell Parliament that the King would be restored, but seemed to have accepted it as true prophecy. He also said he had premonitions of Cromwell’s death and the fire of London, but his Journal was written years later. Hindsight can change the perspective . . . .”George Fox and Early Quakerism, Ariticle in Reformation Today, Number 95, p. 15
A serious Christian is a praying Christian. But what do we pray about? Everything, of course. But shouldn’t we have specific requests in mind? The Lord’s prayer gives us six categories that include worship, the extension of God’s kingdom, the embracing of His will, the meeting of our daily needs, the forgiving of our sins and our deliverance from temptation. Besides these important categories, we will also want to intercede for the people and ministries we know.
Unless our memory is as prodigious as the apostle Paul’s, that means writing out a list. Somehow, although he had never been to Rome, Paul lists 35 different people plus their households in his Roman epistle! Unfortunately, my memory is not like his.
For decades I’ve used a series of prayer cards combined with prayer lists sent from various organizations to guide me in prayer. On each card I have space for one day of the week: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and so on. Some cards list family members, reminding me, for example to pray for 3 grandchildren on Mondays. Then I have cards for various other categories: cards listing relatives, missionaries I know, churches where I’ve ministered, unsaved friends who need the Lord, and organizations needing prayer.
But from time to time, going through my list becomes mechanical, almost like spinning a Buddhist prayer wheel. Bless Joe. Be with Mary. Encourage Sam. Provide for Grace Mission. Amen. And sometimes, I’ve caught myself speeding through the list with the unconscious goal of getting through quickly so I could move on to other “productive’ work. Surely, praying like that is useless.
Should the problems we encounter with a prayer list lead us to abandon the practice? After all, God looks on the heart and He values that which is genuine and passionately felt. Empty ritual, as we see again and again in the prophets, arouses God’s anger. Then, why not just leave our prayer life open to daily bursts of spontaneity?
That may be okay for the angels who cry holy, holy, holy in His presence or for perfect saints but I find myself in neither category. My memory is flawed and my discipline needs a continual upgrade. I suspect that, for many, out of sight is out of mind. Failure to have any kind of prayer list will leave those who are not intimately involved in our lives the target of our prayer only when their Christmas card or missionary letter arrives. This leaves missionaries especially vulnerable—at a time when the missionary prayer meeting has almost disappeared.
Perhaps the answer is to mix spontaneity with discipline. Have a detailed prayer list but ask the Holy Spirit to keep us daily open to spontaneity. Allow our daily Bible reading to guide us during the first part of our prayer time. Then pause with each item on our list and ask the Spirit to impress on our hearts what particular issues need prayer. Praying through our prayer list while stuck in traffic can be a great boon. Sometimes, we need to set our list aside and become open to pressing issues in world affairs, troubles in a friends’ life or challenges at church.
Whatever we do, let’s not give up praying for people and organizations that don’t show up on our daily radar. For that we probably need a list.
(Let me know your thoughts on this subject. If you appreciate this blog, please pass it on. If I can help you spiritually, let me know. Further articles, books, and stories at: Facebook: Eric E Wright Twitter: @EricEWright1 LinkedIn: Eric Wright ; Eric’s books, including Doctrine in Denim, are available at: https://www.amazon.com/Eric-E.-Wright/e/B00355HPKK%3Fref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share)
Country Inspiration 