Good prophets are rare ...

Monday, Jan 11, 2010. Good prophets are rare - even today. When we look back into the year 2009 with the financial crisis and the current world economic crisis, we would have liked to have good prophets who saw the difficulties and warned us ahead of time. For our economies and our financial institutions, we need people who can forecast the future development, who know how the present strategic measures will influence the developments to come.

But good prophets are rare. There are always those who forecast disaster. And there are always those who forecast a wonderful world. But where are the people who see deeper, who can analyse the developments, who know what will help and what measures need to be taken today?

What are prophets? Are prophets “those who can tell the future”? Our usual idea of a prophet is like that - someone who knows what will come. But the prophets in the bible are different. Sometimes they know what will come, but that is not their main role. Prophets are those who know what God thinks. They are those people who tell what the Lord wants to tell. They are those who know truth and justice, mercy and love, justice and solidarity. Prophets are people of the Lord, who search his heart day and night. Prophets are those who are humble in their spirit, who are his children. They do not act for personal gain, but to live with him, with the eternal creator and almighty God.

Good prophets are always of healthy influence. That does not mean that they forecast a healthy future. If you are on a way which leads to destruction, a prophet should tell you. If you are on the path of faith, a prophet might speak about God's faithfulness towards you. Prophets are important parts of the community of people of faith - in the past as well as today. Today, of course, we have much more than the Old Testament prophets had, we have the canon of the biblical books, we have texts and prophecies written over several thousand years. With this rich treasure of ideas about God's heart and God's way to see things, our prophets today do not need to create the basics of faith. It's all there! But they need to interpret the basics of faith in changing circumstances, they need to speak the word of the Lord in our modern and post-modern times.

Good prophets are rare - today as in ancient times. Who has a broad view, a balanced insight into God's great mind? Who knows how to judge and interpret our modern streams of theology, our streams of social philosophy, our scientific dogmas and insights? Who knows to bring all this together with faith, with the presence of the eternal God and savior? Who can explicate God's actions and God's directions today, for the complete body of Christ, for the many Christian churches in this world, from orthodox to catholic, from protestant and Lutheran to pentacostal or charismatic, from baptist to Anglican?

Prophets will always be personal. Christian faith is not a political philosophy. It is about a life in close relationship to God through Jesus Christ. It is about a renewed heart, about changing our life step by step and day by day, to live in the spirit of the Lord. [R.W.E.P., jesusnetwork.eu]

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