Tag: Scripture

A Caution Against Clever Interpretation

pastortravislv

This will be short, but I think it is important. Watch out for teachers who attempt to show you they are clever in how they find meaning in things that the Bible does not declare. Watch out for your own temptation to find meaning in something that the Bible does not define.

Let me give an example. In a daily reading, I found myself in Luke 4, which begins with the temptation of Jesus immediately after his baptism. What caught my attention rather quickly was the fact that Luke and Matthew present the temptations in a different order. Matthew begins with the devil telling Jesus to turn stones to bread, continues with the devil calling Jesus to throw himself from the temple in front of people, and concludes with the devil calling for Jesus to worship him. Luke reverses the order of the latter two.

Natural human curiosity makes us wonder why. What was God up to there in his inspiration of the text? Is there a message there? And if you go read sermons or commentaries, you will surely find people who will give you an answer.

But here is my caution. God does not tell us why he inspired these authors in the way he did. There is no biblical context clue to tell us why Matthew and Luke have differing orders. There is no other biblical author that indicates to us what this might be about. And there is no guarantee that this is about anything at all. Thus, any answer any preacher or scholar gives is a guess. The guess may be accurate. The guess may be dead wrong. But it is a guess.

We are unwise, friends, to make anything like a real doctrine or even a real sermon point out of a guess. It seems clever. It scratches an itch to have our curiosity satisfied. We love to have something to say that others have not said before. But there is no real reason to do this. If Scripture does not tell us why something happened, if there is nothing like a context clue here to define it, we are just talking to talk at that point.

Let me remind us that the Scripture has a clarity to it that God intends we not lose. We have enough work cut out for us in understanding and applying clear doctrines, things that are taught but not easily accepted or understood, that we do not do ourselves any favors by finding doctrines in passages that make no claims to teach us something. Let the Scripture speak for itself. Do not give into the very understandable desire to be clever by teaching the reason that the two authors changed the order of the events when nothing else in Scripture tells us why they did so.

We’re In Trouble Now

pastortravislv1 Comment

When Josiah took over as king in Judah, it had to be like a breath of fresh air. Finally, on the throne of David, there was a king who, like David, desired to follow God with his whole heart.

During Josiah’s reign, he was presented with a book. It turns out that the book of the law of God, what we now think of as the first five books of the Bible, had been lost. The priests were doing their own thing in the temple, but the Bible that should have guided them was forgotten, misplaced, gone.

2 Kings 22:11-13 – 11 When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law, he tore his clothes. 12 And the king commanded Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam the son of Shaphan, and Achbor the son of Micaiah, and Shaphan the secretary, and Asaiah the king’s servant, saying, 13 “Go, inquire of the Lord for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found. For great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us.”

When Josiah heard about what had happened, and when he finally understood what was in the book of the law, he was terrified. Josiah realized that, for years, decades, maybe longer, the people had been living according to their own standards and violating the covenant that Israel had agreed to with God at Mount Sinai. But that covenant, the covenant with national Israel, contained in itself judgments for the nation when she violated the terms of her agreement with God. So Josiah knew that the nation needed to repent right now.

Josiah, of course, makes great changes in the nation. But his changes come too late to stop the judgment that the nation had earned under leaders like King Manasseh. So, though much changed, at Josiah’s death, the nation would begin its fall toward captivity in Babylon.

What got my attention as I read through this account in my daily reading is this question: How many churches have lost the word of God just as Judah did before Josiah? I wish that was a ridiculous question, but it is not. The sad difference is, the priests of Israel actually physically lost the book. In our day, churches and supposed Christian groups are led by people with Bibles in their hands. But it appears that many groups have lost any concept of the meaning and authority of the Bible they hold and even quote from time to time.

If we are to be the people of God who please the Lord as his church, we must never lose his word. That means that the Bible has to be front and center in all we do. It means that we need to know the word, respect the authority of the word, and obey the word. Even when the world around us rejects the word, we need to unashamedly proclaim the word of god as truth and authoritative, even if our culture thinks it outdated or offensive.

Has your church lost the word? Think well. Are the messages you hear preached actually fully dependent on the word, or are they dependent on the preacher’s own cleverness and advice? Is your pastor preaching through books of the Bible, or are his sermons borrowed from books by human authors? Is the Bible your standard for all things, or does your church compromise her actions based on what will make the church look good to the culture around her? May we not be people who have lost the word.

Just Because You Say You Heard from god Does not Mean I have to Believe You

pastortravislv

How do you know if something is the command or desire of God? This is a big question, a significant question. Many people refuse to ask it, but the failure to have a standard here is utterly destructive.

If a person tells you that God wants them to do something, what do you do? Do you immediately assume they must have heard from God? Why? What would make you take their word for it?

If someone tells you that something is truth, do you automatically believe them? Why? Do a person’s feelings form in your mind an unquestionable argument? Why?

To live and survive in the world we are in, you and I need to be a thinking people. We need to actually be willing to at least ask a couple of questions about the knowledge claims that others make. WE need to be wise enough to question even the passionate beliefs of others. Doing so is not mean. Instead, doing so is required for us to lovingly point people to the Lord.

If a person tells you that they believe God is pleased with what they are doing, you have to ask why. What makes them think that the Lord has approved their choices? If they tell you that they know God has approved their choices simply because they feel approved of, that is not a satisfactory answer. After all, people of other religions may say the same thing.

Let’s make this simple. Imagine that I say to you that I feel, deep down in my heart, that the sky is yellow. Does that make my claim so? It depends, of course, on whether or not color is a real thing. If color is a real thing, then my claim about the color of the sky can be either correct or incorrect. But how strongly I feel about the color makes no difference. The actual color, the measurable color, that is the thing that matters.

Let’s see an example from Scripture. During the days of Hezekiah, the king of Assyria send an army to Judea. And he claimed that he was doing so based on the command of the Lord. Notice the two claims in these verses.

2 Kings 18:22, 25 — 22 But if you say to me, “We trust in the Lord our God,” is it not he whose high places and altars Hezekiah has removed, saying to Judah and to Jerusalem, “You shall worship before this altar in Jerusalem”? … 25 Moreover, is it without the Lord that I have come up against this place to destroy it? The Lord said to me, Go up against this land, and destroy it.’ ”

The Assyrians claimed first that Hezekiah had displeased the Lord by tearing down the high places in Judea. That is a truth claim. We must ask, “Is it true?” It depends. Is there any source of truth to which we can appeal to find out? Yes. The Bible has been clear all through 2 Kings that the high places dishonored the Lord. God did not command the people to build them. Instead, the high places were a mimicry of pagan religions. The high places were often places for evil, pagan, religious rituals to take place. No, God was not mad at Hezekiah for taking down the high places. God’s word tells us that the high places were sin. Thus, the claim of the Assyrian leader goes against objective truth as established by Scripture.

In verse 25, the Assyrian king says that God sent his army. “God told me to come and do this.” Is that true? First, we do not know for sure, as there might be more than one reason God would send in this army. God could well have told the king to go to Judea, but God’s purpose may be to gain glory by the overthrow of that Assyrian army, which will happen as we read further. But it is a certainty that God did not command the
Assyrian king to come and conquer Israel, promising him victory. That was not what God did. And we can know this from a look at truth that is outside of the man’s internal claim.

What we must see is that, when a person claims to know what God is saying or what God wants, we must hold that subjective claim up against the light of objective truth. The Bible is the word of God. The Bible is where we turn to see what God has commanded. Anytime someone tells us that God wants them to do what his word clearly commands that people not do, we know that person is mistaken at best, lying at worst.

What about when someone claims a “leading” from God that is not related to a Scriptural command, when what they are saying God wants them to do is in line with his word? That does not mean we have to assume they have a message from God. But, if their desire is in line with the objective revelation of God, we also do not have to battle them. If a person wants a thing that God has said is OK in his word, we do not need to oppose them, unless there is something else in their plan that is clearly unwise.

We could talk about this forever, but we need to gain a truth from what we see in the word in 2 Kings 18. Just because a person claims they are doing something for God or in God’s name or even according to a personal call from
God does not mean they really are. A person’s subjective experience does not equal the weight of objective revelation from God in his word. We are first and foremost submitted to the word of God as his infallible, inspired revelation.

We Fail When We Start from the Wrong Place

pastortravislv

I was recently listening to a podcast that discussed issues related to apologetics, and in an interesting combination, the issue of addiction and counseling. The speaker shared with us a reminder that is tremendously significant for Christians who want to help others either with the gospel or with counsel. If our conversation does not begin with a biblical understanding of humanity and the human condition, or if our conversation does not begin with a biblical understanding of the reality of the world we live in, our conversation will not lead where we want it to go. Or, if our conversation does get us where we want to go, it will be in spite of and not because of our strategy.

That thought came again to me as I was reading through Psalm 89. Verse 11 says, “The heavens are yours; the earth also is yours; the world and all that is in it, you have founded them.” In the middle of the psalmist discussing what was going on with the world around Judea and the throne of King David, he lays down this glorious truth that has to be our starting point for genuinely helpful thinking. The world belongs to God. God made it. God owns it.

Consider how different your thinking is when you start from that point. God created the universe. The earth and all that is in it belong to him. Consider the moral issues that people want to debate. They ask why this is not OK or how we can dare say that another thing is the only way. While we can argue back and forth for a long time, the answer is bound up in two truths. First, God owns us all. WE are made by him and for him. We owe him our allegiance. And second, God has revealed his ways to us in his word.

So, why is Jesus the only way? God made us and that is what God chose to do. Why are certain actions sin, even if the world around us says differently? God made us, and his word tells us that he calls such things sin.

I’m not here suggesting that we be nasty to people as we have these conversations. Nor am I suggesting that we will do well to refuse to engage in discussions that go further than these points. But I am suggesting that, for you and me as believers, if we start from a different place, if we start from a worldview that is other than the claim that God is our Creator who has spoken to us in his word, we will have a hard time ending up in a place of truth.

And for you and me as Christians, even outside of evangelism, apologetics, and counseling, we need to remember that those starting points are big for us too. Why worship? Why sing if we do not enjoy singing? Why read the Bible if we do not enjoy reading? Why attend church if we are not feeling up for it? The answer begins with the fact that God created the universe, God is our Lord, God owns everything. The answer continues through the fact that God has revealed how he will be worshipped in his word. And we submit to our God who has spoken in his word. That is our source of joy and life.

No dispensation for Disobedience

pastortravislv

“I know this is wrong, but…” “I know the Bible says, but in my case…” “I know that Scripture says not to, but I’ve been praying about it, and…”

WE love to look for ways to get around clear commands of God. In general, we are pro-Scripture. But what do we do when those verses call us to sacrifice? What do we do when those verses show us that the thing we want to do, the thing we desire, is wrong? How often do we look for a loophole? How often do we try to find a way to excuse what we want, in our circumstances?

I can think of a woman, a believer, who was in a marriage that had become frustrating. She was not abused. Her husband had not committed adultery. She just was not getting all she wanted out of the marriage. The wife let others around her know that, she had prayed about the situation, and God had given her a peace about divorcing her husband to marry another man she thought would satisfy her more. She claimed that the Lord had told her, in prayer, that his commands about marriage, divorce, and remarriage simply did not apply, and he was giving her special permission to do something else.

In many cases, we want such a dispensation for disobedience. We want to be able to go our own way and have God tell us, “Oh, it’s OK for you.”

This all came to mind in my reading through 1 Kings 13. There is a really odd little passage here about an unnamed prophet who went from the southern to the northern kingdom to prophesy against Jeroboam. God gave that prophet a clear command not to eat or drink within the borders of the northern kingdom. But then along came another man who said he had heard something different.

1 Kings 13:15-18 –

15 Then he said to him, “Come home with me and eat bread.” 16 And he said, “I may not return with you, or go in with you, neither will I eat bread nor drink water with you in this place, 17 for it was said to me by the word of the Lord, ‘You shall neither eat bread nor drink water there, nor return by the way that you came.’ ” 18 And he said to him, “I also am a prophet as you are, and an angel spoke to me by the word of the Lord, saying, ‘Bring him back with you into your house that he may eat bread and drink water.’ ” But he lied to him.

The unnamed man of God knew he was not allowed to eat while on this mission. The other prophet flat lied. The unnamed man of God knew what his marching orders were. But he decided that he would rather have his restrictions lifted. So he chose to believe a lie.

What happened next? The unnamed man of God was killed by a lion as a result of his disobedience. And we all feel it was not fair. But we have to learn that God is showing us all that his actual commands are binding. His word is our command. And we do not get a special dispensation from him to disobey him when we find it convenient.

Thankfully, we live in the era of a closed canon of Scripture. That means that God is never, no not ever, going to speak to a Christian a command that contradicts anything that he has already commanded in his word. During the days of the unnamed man of God, new revelations were still forthcoming. It would have been tremendously hard to know if someone might have a new word from God. But, thanks be to God, we are not getting new words from God today. His perfect, completed, inspired words have already been written. Our job is to know, love, and obey those written words of Scripture, and not let anybody throw us off by claiming that God has given them permission to disobey the word.

A misinterpreted Proverb We Need to Reclaim

pastortravislv

Proverbs 29:18

Where there is no prophetic vision the people cast off restraint,
but blessed is he who keeps the law.

I have often heard the first have of this verse ripped out of context in a dangerous way. It is usually quoted from the King James, “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” Then the one quoting it will use it as a tool to preach a sort of visionary leadership. Perhaps the person will be charismatic, and will be leading the people to listen to his own personal visions. Or perhaps the person is a pastor who wants to control his congregation by claiming that he is the visionary they must follow or perish.

The problem is that we are not letting the verse do what proverbs are supposed to do. This is a great example of an antithetical parallel. The verse has two halves that are intended to contrast. This is nothing new. A great many proverbs say to us, If A then something bad, but if B, then something good. A and B in that example are contrary positions that lead to very different outcomes.

Keep the antithetical parallelism in mind with this verse. When there is no prophetic vision, something bad is coming. What is the opposite? Is the biblically given opposite a call for charismatic giftings or visionary leadership? The verse says in the second half, “but blessed is he who keeps the law.” The good side of the parallel is that the blessing of God is on the one, not who has a vision, not who has a visionary leader, but on the one who keeps the law of God. Stop, think that through, and then move on.

The proverb is not telling us to seek out new prophets or find visionary leadership. The proverb is telling us that if we do not want to perish, we must be people who cling to and obey the word of God. The word of God rightly taught and applied is the prophetic vision that prevents the people from perishing. Wise people who want to spiritually live love the word of God and keep it. That is the point of this proverb.

So, please, dear friends, if you hear someone use this proverb out of context, be ready to help. It does not take a lot of exegetical heavy lifting to get it right. Just draw out the parallels and show that the issue here is that people perish when the pastor turns from Scripture, not when he lacks charismatic gifts or modern, visionary leadership skills.

The Most Dangerous Thought Ever

pastortravislv

What is the worst thing you can allow yourself to think? What is the kind of thinking that is destined to lead you to destruction? What is the worst possible thought to chase in your mind?

 

OK, there are actually a lot of really dangerous thoughts out there. And so I’ll not try to make them battle this morning. But, there is a thought, a kind of thinking, that always leads us to extremely deadly, extremely dangerous spiritual ground. And, as I watch our world, I am becoming convinced that this very well may be the most dangerous thought ever.

 

Watch this little confrontation between Jesus and the Pharisees to see an example of the thought.

 

Matthew 15:1-9 – 1 Then Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, 2 “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat.” 3 He answered them, “And why do you break the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God commanded, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ 5 But you say, ‘If anyone tells his father or his mother, “What you would have gained from me is given to God,”6 he need not honor his father.’ So for the sake of your tradition you have made void the word of God. 7 You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said:

8 “ ‘This people honors me with their lips,

but their heart is far from me;

9 in vain do they worship me,

teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”

 

The story is easy to understand. The religious leaders want to confront Jesus for not following their traditions on how to ceremonially wash before eating. Jesus points out that these men are willing to condemn him for ignoring their preferences when they are willing to ignore the word of God.

 

And it is in that ignoring of the word of God we find the dangerous thought. It is dangerous, deadly, and destructive to allow yourself to think that you, in your wisdom, have the ability to come up with truth that is equal in weight or superior in value to the word of God. Whenever we allow ourselves to think that we can evaluate Scripture by our own standards or evaluate the actions of god by our own preferences, we are thinking in the most dangerous way possible.

 

How do we know God is good? He tells us in his word. How do we know that God’s judgment of the lost is right? He tells us in his word. How do we know that Jesus is the only way to God? He tells us in his word. How do we know what marriage is supposed to be? God tells us in his word. How do we know what a church is supposed to do? God tells us in his word.

 

If God has indeed revealed himself to us in his word, how dangerous must it be for us to have that revelation, and then hold it up to some other standard to see if we approve of it? What are you saying when you do such a thing? If you take the word of God and measure it by your own standard to determine whether or not you approve of it or will obey it, you are declaring yourself and your standard to be above the word of God. To declare yourself and your standard to be above the word of God is for you to declare yourself to be above God. For you to declare yourself to be above God is for you to actually declare yourself to be deity.

 

All through the Bible, God makes it clear that he will not stomach idolatry. God will not allow anyone or anything to get away with pretending to be God. That includes you and me. So we should be careful not to ever elevate ourselves to the level of deity. And thus, we cannot measure God’s commands and God’s ways by our own standards as if we have the right to approve or disapprove of anything God has said or done. To assume that you can judge the commands of God, the ways of God, or the actions of God is for you to think one of the most dangerous thoughts people can possibly think.

A Dangerous and False Imitation of Christianity

pastortravislv

Issues of the true faith are issues of great importance. We are dealing here with the honor and glory of God. We are dealing here with the eternal souls of men and women. It matters a lot.

Sadly, there are many who would claim the faith who are misled, either intentionally or unintentionally, to a kind of faith that uses the Bible, that claims to be Christian, but which is an almost exact opposite of the true faith. People who follow this faith meet in buildings they call churches. Sometimes they sing the same songs that other Christians sing. They speak prayers. But their ultimate belief system is a perversion of the faith.

I am speaking here of the believers in versions of what is often called the prosperity gospel. This might be followers of Joel Osteen and his ilk, or it might be embracers of a sort of liberation theology. Either way, we are here talking about people who take Scripture out of context, who rip from the Bible the heart of the meaning of the words of God, and who pollute any form of the genuine faith with a superstitious claim to health, wealth, and prosperity. It involves people who think Christianity promises them worldly wealth, and it includes people who think that Christianity will allow them, as an oppressed people group, to rise up and conquer. But neither of these views is biblical.

Often prosperity preaching people will claim a verse like Deuteronomy 28:12-13a as their promise.

Deuteronomy 28:12-13a – 12 The Lord will open to you his good treasury, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands. And you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. 13 And the Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you shall only go up and not down…

Boy, that all sounds good! If we belong to God, we get good all the time. We go up and never down. We lend but never borrow. We are the head and not the tail. We are rich. We conquer. We rule!

Before even pointing out the interpretive error, let me say that such a view is a way to play on mankind’s most sinful desires and to mask it as a form of the faith. Adam and Eve sinned in the garden by rejecting the rule and authority of God for selfish rule. All human sin, at some point, is the intentional throwing off of the authority of God for my own desires. And every human-centered, godless religion out there tells us all to focus on self, to fulfill our own desires, to see ourselves as great.

But look again at the verses, this time with the incredibly important clause at the end of verse 13.

Deuteronomy 28:12-14 – 12 The Lord will open to you his good treasury, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands. And you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. 13 And the Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you shall only go up and not down, if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God, which I command you today, being careful to do them, 14 and if you do not turn aside from any of the words that I command you today, to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.

Yes, God told a particular people that he would promise them prosperity. But he told them that they could have this prosperity if, and only if, they would fully obey his commands. They could have prosperity if and only if they would have God as their God, their Lord, their Master. And, to let you in on a little secret, the people to whom God spoke these words never really obeyed. Instead, they proved that humanity, left to ourselves, will always rebel against the ways of God and bring to ourselves destruction.

Here is the truth. Mankind is naturally rebellious against God and destined for destruction. In the Old Testament of the Bible, we proved that we would not obey God, not even for clear promises of blessing. And we proved that we will not obey God, not even in the light of promises of terrible punishments for disobedience (see all of Deuteronomy 28-30.

Deuteronomy 30:19-20 – 19 I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, 20 loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life and length of days, that you may dwell in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.”

That is the promise God made to Israel through Moses. Obedience and faithfulness would be met with unbelievable blessing. Rejection of God and his ways would be met with similarly unfathomable cursing. And Israel did not obey.

But what about the modern Christian? Should we claim half of the Deuteronomy verses as our own? Should we say that we get all the blessings if we just speak positive words and think positive thoughts? Of course not.

The Lord has given us a different kind of promise. The Lord has promised us in this life his presence and his blessing. He has also promised us hardships and persecutions. God calls us to believe in Jesus and turn from sin. God calls us to obey his word in the here and now. And God calls us to set our minds and hearts, not on earthly reward in this life, but on the eternal life that he has promised us and proved to us through the resurrection of Jesus.

If your church is telling you to “claim” a promise of health and wealth in this life, your church is misleading you. If your church is telling you that God has promised you an easy life of any kind this side of the resurrection, your church is misleading you. If your church is telling you that, if you just believe, you can have all the money you want and live in selfish luxury in Christ, your church is misleading you. If your church is applying to you partial Old Testament promises without any sort of biblical context, your church is misleading you.

Yes, there is glory and joy in Christianity. There is life, blessing, peace, and hope. But these are part of a life that is also a battle for sanctification, a battle through persecution and sorrow and suffering. The promise of God is that he will sustain us in this life with the joy of his glory as we press on in obedience to his word toward the ultimate prize of being conformed to the likeness of Christ. That promise is not that we will win an election, that our particular people group will prosper, or that we will have a nice house or a healthy body. The promise is eternal life in Christ as we bow to him in faith and yield to him as Lord.

What True Prophets Do

pastortravislv

What is a prophet? How can you tell if someone is a prophet? On television, there are charismatic faith healers who claim the gift of prophecy. There are prosperity preachers who use a supposed prophecy to bilk their followers into giving them loads of cash. But what are we to think of prophecy and supposed prophets?

 

If we look at Deuteronomy, we can see a couple of standards regarding prophecy as well as what God says about those who speak falsely as they pretend to be prophets.

 

Deuteronomy 18:18-22 – 18 I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. 19 And whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him. 20 But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.’ 21 And if you say in your heart, ‘How may we know the word that the Lord has not spoken?’— 22 when a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him.

 

Looking at this section, we see that God promised to raise up a prophet like Moses for the people of God. This is both a promise of a future leader like Moses, Joshua, who will carry the nation forward into the land and a Messianic promise of one who will bring the true word of God to all his people. Jesus is that prophet in ultimate fulfillment as God in flesh, the Son of God, the Messiah who came (cf. John 6:14; Matthew 21:10-11).

 

Notice that, when God talks about a true prophet to come, that one will speak God’s word to God’s people. Before the canon of Scripture was closed, it was possible that such a man would speak to the people a new word from God. Now that the canon of Scripture is complete, however, a true prophet of God will speak to the people and clearly communicate the already articulated word of God. If that seems new, go back and look at the words of the prophets throughout Scripture. Quite often, prophets did not predict the future or give new words from God. Instead, regularly, the prophets would cite already given revelation from god, words of the law, and apply them to the present generation. Prophets would warn of the coming judgment of God on the people for disobeying the law of God, but that judgment had already been promised in the law.

 

While true prophets communicate the word of God to the people of God, there will be, as Moses tells us, false prophets who will communicate lies. There will be a temptation for a person to try to elevate himself above others by claiming a supernatural gifting from God that they do not have. Like fairground psychics or fortune-tellers, these people will claim a mysterious knowledge that others lack in order to get others to do what they want. But God gives us a couple of ways to see if they are false.

 

First, here in Deuteronomy 18, the word of God is clear that a supposed prophet who claims to speak a word from God must be tested. If that word they speak does not come to pass, the prophet is false. If they predict a future event, and if that event fails, the prophet is not from God.

 

There is a second way to test a prophet, though, that is not related to success in predicting a future outcome.

 

Deuteronomy 13:1-5 – 1 “If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, 2 and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’ 3 you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. 4 You shall walk after the Lord your God and fear him and keep his commandments and obey his voice, and you shall serve him and hold fast to him. 5 But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has taught rebellion against the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of slavery, to make you leave the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

 

If a prophet predicts the future, and his prediction actually comes to pass, and then the prophet directs the people of God to disobey the word of God, the inspired Scripture, that prophet is also false. Thus, while failing to accurately predict the future proves a supposed prophet to be false, accurately predicting the future does not prove a prophet to be true. Rather, what has always made a prophet to be true is that the prophet, gifted by God, directs the people of God to follow the clearly inspired, already-given word of God. A prophet of God will direct people to the Bible and clearly communicate its commands and standards to the people so that they will obey it and honor the Lord.

 

What does God think of those who claim to speak for him but who are false? In both Deuteronomy 18 and 13, God gives the same command regarding false prophets. In ancient Israel, to claim a word from God that was not a word from God was to earn the death penalty. That nation was not to tolerate, even for a moment, a person who claimed to speak for God but who did not. God hates it when people claim he said something he did not. And even in the New Testament, even as late as the book of revelation, Jesus demanded that his church not tolerate false prophets. (cf. Revelation 2:20-23).

 

Now, let us tie this all together. Prophets speak the word of God. Quite often, prophets, even when the canon of Scripture was incomplete, simply cited and applied the word of God. Now the canon of Scripture is complete. Thus, prophets today are those who will rightly cite and apply the already-spoken word of God for the people of God to understand and obey. God is very strongly opposed to anyone claiming that he said anything he did not say. And god commands his people not to put up with those who claim that God said things God did not say.

 

Our test for those claiming the gift of prophecy is simple. Is what they are saying found in Scripture or in Scripture rightly applied? If what a person says is found in Scripture rightly understood and applied, follow that word. If what a person says is simply mystical and non-scriptural, you have no calling to follow it or the one who claims it. Let us learn to follow the Lord by holding high his perfect word just as did the true prophets of old.