Home | About | Subscriptions | Contact us | Search
New this month | Back issues | Other publications | Other sites
Back to Special Issue contents

THE MORE SURE WORD OF PROPHECY

TONY BENSON

THE words which form the title of this Special Issue occur in 2 Peter 1:19. The question immediately comes to mind, More sure than what? The Apostle Peter has just written of the wonderful foretaste of “the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” which he was granted at the transfiguration. We can be sure that the wonderful experience which the apostle had shared with his Master on the mount would have remained vividly in his memory for the rest of his life. Yet this experience was exclusive to Peter and his fellow apostles, James and John. Were other disciples of Christ to consider themselves deprived by not having had such an experience? By no means, says Peter for there is available to all disciples something more sure than a visual experience on a mountain top, and that is the prophetic Word.

At the conclusion of the chapter Peter witnesses, in words frequently quoted by us in lectures about the inspiration of the Bible, to the fact that “prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit”. Was he then referring to all Scripture rather than just to predictions about the future, which is how we usually use the word ‘prophecy’? There is certainly no distinction to be drawn between the writings of the Old Testament prophets and the histories, or laws, or psalms which appear in the Old Testament; all are equally inspired by God. Moreover, a prophet was not simply one who foretold the future; he was one who spoke forth the Word of God, which involved giving God’s view of Israel as they stood at the time.

Yet the message of the prophets always brought in the future. When a prophet castigated the people for their sins there was always the threat of judgement to come, and beyond the judgements there were prophecies of the Kingdom when all would ultimately be well. There were prophecies too of the Promised One, whose task it would be to remove sin and its effects from the earth. Other parts of the Old Testament also concerned the future. The Law of Moses was to teach men and women principles concerning God’s purpose with the Coming One; books of history contained within them vital promises for the future and accounts of events which typified the future; and the poetical writings play their part in foretelling the future too. In the New Testament there is much emphasis on the fulfilment in Jesus Christ of that which was spoken in the Old, but there are also further predictions of the future, coupled with an emphasis on living life with the future Kingdom in view rather than present benefits.

It has been well said that the gospel is in fact a matter of prophecy, for the gospel is the gospel of the Kingdom, and the Kingdom is a matter of prophecy yet to be fulfilled. The work that Jesus Christ has already done qualified him to be King of that Kingdom, and enables sinful men and women to be forgiven their sins and live for ever in that Kingdom. It is the means and not the end; the end is the establishing of God’s eternal Kingdom on earth. Apostate Christendom almost entirely forsook any belief in the gospel of the Kingdom, however. The gospel became a matter of going to heaven at the instance of death, with no waiting for the Kingdom to come. Today the mainstream churches have largely forsaken a firm belief in a future life at all, and the gospel for them is a matter of improving man’s lot here and now. A great gulf therefore exists between Christendom and ourselves as to what is the gospel.

Prophecy is thus a far more important thing to us than it is to Christendom at large, to whom it is but an interesting side issue. The faith which saves us is our belief that what Cod has said He will do will surely come to pass. We believe that Cod will establish the Kingdom, and that through Jesus Christ we can live forever in that Kingdom. Here is a living faith, principles which, truly believed in, will affect our attitude to this life, for if we truly look to the Kingdom to come then the things of this life become matters of little importance in comparison.

The words that follow the title of this Special Issue are puzzling if we think about them. What does Peter mean when he talks about the day star arising in our hearts? The verse makes more sense with a parenthesis inserted: “We have also a more sure word of prophecy; where unto ye do well that ye take heed, (as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise) in your hearts”. We take heed to prophecy in our hearts. It is not an optional extra, meant for those intellectually inclined to study it, a matter of academic interest only. All believers need to take heed to it. Without it we are in darkness. The dawn will eventually break, the Kingdom will come, and then prophecy will be needed no more. In the meantime only prophecy can lighten our darkness.

Prophecy reveals to the believer the future, and illuminates the present. Through prophecy the believer not only understands God’s purpose to set up His Kingdom, he also is able to see whereabouts in God’s prophetic timetable he stands; he is able to see the significance of the major events of his own time. For a robust faith we need prophecy. Of course, not everyone can achieve the same level of understanding of prophecy, in the same way that some are able to plumb the depths of our basic first principles to a greater extent than others; but an understanding of the basic principles of prophecy is necessary. However, as part of a decline in the appreciation of our fundamental doctrines and practices in part of the Brotherhood today there has been a loss of understanding of the basic principles of our prophetic understanding. This Special Issue is devoted to a consideration of these important principles.

We have in these remarks referred to prophecy in its broadest sense, that of revealing God’s Word to man. As such it covers all that God has told us in His Word. We have referred to prophecy in the sense of foretelling the future and shown how the basic gospel message about the Kingdom is a matter of prophecy in this sense. This Special Issue is certainly concerned with prophecy in the sense of foretelling the future, but not in the sense of dealing with the basic doctrines about the Kingdom; a knowledge of these is assumed. Furthermore, we are concerned, not so much with the details of what has been revealed, but rather principles to do with prophecy, how it should be interpreted, and what place it should have in our lives. The intention is to give a good foundation of which readers can develop a better understanding of what God has revealed for themselves.

There are some words of Peter in the passage from which our title is taken which have not been quoted. They read: “no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation”. To some churches this means that the church decides what people may believe; the people cannot study the Word for themselves. Some sects impose an interpretation of every verse of Scripture upon their members on the basis of this verse. We know that this is not justified; no individual or group of individuals has been bestowed with the ability and the authority to do this. Yet prophecy cannot be regarded as the sort of area where all opinions, however wild, are valid. It is not valid for prophecy to be given interpretations which conflict with other scriptures. There ought to be principles of prophetic interpretation established and agreed amongst us, even if they are not matters of fellowship, and it is hoped that this Special Issue will reinforce some of these as well as encouraging a general interest in prophecy.

Next Article in this Issue

Home | About | Subscriptions | Contact us | Search
New this month | Back issues | Other publications | Other sites
Back to Special Issue contents