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]
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.]
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[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
[v] Flynn, cited on page 53
[vi] Baxter, cited on page 99
[vii] Packer, Keep in Step with the Spirit, p. 217
[viii] Anthony Coppin, Article in Reformation Today, Number 97, May/June 1987, p. 22
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