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How to Judge Prophetic Messages
I was coming to peace with Deuteronomy 18:18-19, but the next verse still gave me reason to pause.
But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.
The weight that this verse gave to accuracy in prophecy put a serious damper on my desire to speak it. I knew that no one would put me to death if I was wrong, but did I really want to take a chance with making a mistake that God at one time declared to be worthy of death? Though the vast majority of Christians don’t believe we should push for biblical civil penalties, they do believe that most death penalty crimes are a big deal. Which of us would treat murder (Leviticus 24:17) or adultery (Leviticus 20:10) as small sins?
Why should speaking presumptuously in the name of the Lord be different? Was there something about saying “Thus says the Lord” in the New Covenant that was different than saying it in the Old?
When I considered this question, I realized that the context of Deuteronomy 18:20 gave me good reason to believe there was. In Deuteronomy 18, Moses was clearly speaking about the Old Covenant, in which God’s people were not brought near to Him and were not ready to hear from Him directly.
The LORD your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. Him you shall hear, according to all you desired of the LORD your God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, “Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God, nor let me see this great fire anymore, lest I die.” (emphasis added)
You go near and hear all that the LORD our God may say, and tell us all that the LORD our God says to you, and we will hear and do it.’
Then the LORD heard the voice of your words when you spoke to me, and the LORD said to me: ‘I have heard the voice of the words of this people which they have spoken to you. They are right in all that they have spoken. Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever!’
Are we still cowering at the foot of the mountain? Are we still calling for God to be quiet? The New Testament makes it clear we are not.
For you have not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned with fire, and to blackness and darkness and tempest, and the sound of a trumpet and the voice of words, so that those who heard it begged that the word should not be spoken to them anymore.
The environment in which prophecy is spoken has definitely changed. We are in a New Covenant in which all can come near to God and hear from Him.
Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect,
Moses was the first to point out the Old Covenant’s lack when it came to prophecy.
… Oh, that all the LORD’s people were prophets and that the LORD would put His Spirit upon them!
In Israel the average person didn’t hear from God like the prophets did. Mount Horeb (or Sinai) was a symbolic picture of that fact. But with the coming of the Messiah Jesus, this has changed. The Spirit gives the gift of prophecy liberally.
”In the Last Days,” God says, “I will pour out my Spirit on every kind of people: Your sons will prophesy, also your daughters; your young men will see visions, your old men dream dreams. When the time comes, I’ll pour out my Spirit on those who serve me, men and women both, and they’ll prophesy.”
(Acts 2:17-18, The Message)
I believe the seriousness of a false prophecy in the Old Testament was tied to the separation between God and the Israelites. At a time when each individual didn’t have the fullness of the Holy Spirit, it was extremely dangerous for someone to misrepresent the word of the Lord. Those who heard didn’t have the tools we do today to listen to God for themselves and disagree. Today, each of us can have the Holy Spirit teach us.
But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him.
The gift of the Holy Spirit is one change from the Old Covenant to the New. A second change is that the written revelation we have today is far superior to what existed in the Old Covenant. Before Jesus came, the Scriptures weren’t complete. The Living Word hadn’t yet fully revealed the Father’s heart. This put the Israelites in a place of ignorance in which a false prophet could more easily mislead them.
Even worse, there was a threat that a false prophecy might have (for a time) been mistaken for Scripture, polluting the revelation by which we test every other revelation. God’s strict punishments concerning false prophecy helped prevent this.
Our situation today is different. We are no longer waiting for the Prophet, the Holy Spirit, or the complete Scriptures. Jesus has given us the New Covenant and has inspired His apostles (and a few others) to describe it in His book. The full truth that we are required to believe has been recorded and can be used to judge everything else.
With the changes Jesus has brought, we should all desire to prophesy.
Pursue love, and desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.
Paul’s words would have been difficult to follow if the early Christians had been told they would be put to death (or seriously rebuked) for making a mistake in obeying them. Who would want to risk being wrong? And yet Paul expected people to sometimes be wrong. Why else would he have told the church to judge the prophecies (1 Corinthians 14:29).
It seems clear that we now have a new approach. A serious rebuke for every false prophecy is no longer necessary. Wise correction is sometimes needed, but God is no longer thundering from a dark cloud, frightening us away from His voice. He has called us to come close to Him.
So, friends, we can now – without hesitation – walk right up to God, into “the Holy Place.” Jesus has cleared the way by the blood of his sacrifice, acting as our priest before God. The “curtain” into God’s presence is his body. So let’s do it – full of belief, confident that we’re presentable inside and out.
(Hebrews 10:19-22, The Message)
When we walk right up to God, He sometimes speaks to us – and sometimes He asks us to share His words with others. We should desire spiritual gifts, and especially that we may prophesy.
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