Posted by Michael Bunker
editor@lazarusunbound.com
“So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another. Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith; Or ministry, let us wait on our ministering: or he that teacheth, on teaching; Or he that exhorteth, on exhortation: he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity; he that ruleth, with diligence; he that sheweth mercy, with cheerfulness” (Rom 12:5-8).
December 26, 2005 – I want to expand upon the teaching I have done previously concerning Prophets in my commentary on the book of Isaiah.
The true body of Christ is one body made up of diverse members with diverse functions (called gifts); each of these functions are to be performed diligently according to the faith given and according to the purpose for which God has placed each elect individual within the body. Let us quickly examine our study verses. As an amplification and explanation of what has been said before concerning our different and varied purposes within the functioning body, there are ways in which each part of the body is to engage their specific functions. These functions are not to be confused or confounded, nor should they be haphazardly handled without a clear understanding of the means and methods, prescribed by God, for the performance of them. If one is called as a prophet he should prophecy according to (and only according to) that which has been given to him by God. Likewise, if one is called to minister to the needs of the poor or to widows on behalf of the Church, that person should focus his attention on diligently doing that which he is called to do. Next the Apostle speaks to those who are called to teach or to exhort, which duties are here divided to show that they are often, but not always, held by different people in the body (see Pastors and Teachers in Eph. 4:11); one is called to teach principles precept upon precept, while another may be called to exhort, implore, encourage, scold, rebuke or challenge. Paul next speaks to “he that giveth”, addressing those within the body who are entrusted to disseminate aid, helps, or information to the Body of Christ; this person should do so with sincerity and singleness of mind. Next, “he that ruleth”speaks of those who “go before” or those who lead by example. These should do so diligently with an understanding of the responsibility entrusted to them. He who “sheweth mercy”, or who is sent by the Church to visit the afflicted on behalf of those who cannot go, should do so cheerfully and not as if he is performing a despised duty.
Now we see in these verses that God has distributed to his true Body diverse gifts and that each gift is different and necessary and should be handled according to the Word of God. Notice that in these verses, and in the verses in the 4th Chapter of Ephesians, that the duties and callings of “prophets” and “teachers” are quite different. While it is true that there are prophets who teach and there are teachers who often prophesy, we should not confound the duties just because God may have occasionally performed His will in both areas through a single man. My purpose in this article is to describe the differences between the responsibilities and duties of the prophet and of the teacher; to help Christians rightly identify these personalities and ministries; and then to extrapolate out an understanding of what our purpose is as a ministry and as a Church to the world today.
The Prophet
It is very difficult in this apostate age to try to clarify something that has been so misunderstood and so erroneously taught as has the position of the prophet. Modern charismatic “prophets” (ignorant of the Bible, Bible Doctrine, Christian History, or true Christianity) are presently running to and fro, spewing fictional fantasies and calling themselves “prophets” of God. Ironically, this phenomena has been promised concerning the age in which we live. I cannot tell you how many “prophets” and “apostles” have contacted me with their visions, dreams, fantastical prognostications, etc. These men (as a whole) have one glaring thing in common... They are virtually NEVER right. If they do get something right, it is usually something a teenager with a laptop, a sense of history, some light knowledge of the times and a Bible could have figured out. Almost every one of these “prophets” fall into two categories:
They never really say anything at all. They try to speak King James English, and they go on and on about something or other “pouring out” and something or other coming to pass... but they never really say anything you can put your finger on. They speak very generally about the “Lord's Spirit” doing something or other (generally a “new thing”) and they mumble on about ambiguous things coming to pass. They then tell you how pitiful it is that no one ever listens to them or understands them... but then, they are like the prophets of old and no one understood them either... right?
They say some very specific things which never come to pass. They put out tapes and emails, recordings and newspapers that list what they say absolutely must happen based on their latest “figurings”; but those things never happen. Then they explain how it is not necessary that they be right, and that really, really they were right if you just look at it from a different angle, and besides... once they fix the little problem they had with their math, then they'll be right back with some more figurings.
Neither of these types of people are “prophets” (they are false prophets though). The thing these false prophets usually have in common is that they either a) don't know their Bibles, or b) have read their Bibles with some huge, false presuppositions that have tainted their understanding of what they have read. Let us look at what a Prophet is, and then it will help us steer clear of the false ones.
The word “prophet” is made up of two root words:
“pro” - which means “forth”
“phemi” - which means “to show”
So a prophet is primarily one who shows forth the divine will of God. Only secondarily did the term signify someone who might occasionally foretell future events by the power of the Spirit of God.
The great Bible commentator John Gill had said that true prophets are:
“...not private members of churches, who may all prophesy or teach in a private way; nor ordinary ministers of the word; but extraordinary ones, who had a peculiar gift of interpreting the Scriptures, the prophecies of the Old Testament, and of foretelling things to come; such were Agabus and others in the church of Antioch, Act_11:27” (John Gill Commentary)
Foretelling things to come was not to be understood as the kind of “christian” soothsaying and false prognosticating that goes on today in the name of prophecy. Rather, true Prophets were gifted and sent to declare the divine will of God and to show forth the divine purposes in events. The prophet is sent to declare the moral law of God, to frame a proper foundational worldview, to insist upon the performance of all spiritual duties, and to declare plainly the penalties of God upon those who disregard truly Biblical warnings. Remember that the Prophet differed greatly from the Priest, and can best be understood by contrasting their duties. The Priest stood before God (facing God) as a representative of the people. The people were literally IN the Priest since the Priest was the representative of the people. We see this most beautifully fulfilled in Jesus Christ who “became us” and stood in our stead before the throne of the Father. The Prophet, in contrast, stood before the people as a representative of God. Where the Priest spoke to God on behalf of the people; the Prophet spoke to the people on behalf of God. The Prophet was to make known the truth of God, regardless of whether the people listened or actually learned anything (This is a stark contrast to the duty of the teacher). The Prophet issued instructions and/or exhortations, interpreting God's divine will and threatening God's retribution for those who ignored the warning. The Prophet was quite often a teacher... (think of the most perfect prophet - Jesus Christ). God sent men based on His own will, and only when they were necessary to fulfill His purposes in the Creation.
The Teacher
The teacher is tasked to teach the fundamentals and doctrines of Scripture to the people. His duty is to engage students, help them grow in grace, instill principles that can help the student to rightly determine God's declared will; and to guide students wisely and in a familial way towards some degree of spiritual maturity. The teacher must struggle along with the student, study extensively, and be prepared to teach complicated concepts, each one “precept upon precept”. The teacher was to form a familial relationship with the student, giving of himself for the care of those for whom he would give an account. In response, the teacher's needs are provided for in the law. The Bible commands all students to provide for the needs of their teacher. Those who learn from a teacher are commanded to “communicate” with them which means that they were to carry their burdens and provide their necessities (Galatians 6:6...*read closely because it is followed by a threat). Those who labor and toil in teaching the “word and doctrine” are commanded to receive “double honour”, which means they were to be provided for more abundantly. Now, these things are not true of the prophet. This is an important distinction. The teacher is provided for by law, and all those who partake of true Bible teaching and who do not communicate with the teacher are lawbreakers. Every professing believer who learns from a teacher, regardless of how they are personally motivated one way or another, is commanded to carry the burdens of the teacher. The prophet, however, is generally a castaway of the people. He is hated by the world, and most especially by religious people. For this reason the prophet is divinely (even if minimally) provided for by God. God has one way of providing for the teacher... his plain, written command that their needs be met by those who learn from them. This is so very important to understand, because the prophet, historically and Biblically, relied totally on God to make provision for him. He didn't receive a salary, and was generally not accepted by “professing” religiousites. Now, generally the prophet was going about alienating the people (by telling them the truth), most of whom were immature and were busy too busy rejecting what he was saying to conceive that the might be responsible to provide for his needs. God, then, miraculously motivated those who He sovereignly would use to feed and provide for the prophet. You can see this in the lives of most of the prophets, and most clearly in the life of Elijah who was fed by ravens and by widows. The point to remember here is that the teacher is provided for in the law, while the prophet is provided for by the Spirit. Some men in the New Testament Church were also, at times, church leaders or elders; though they evidently (by their writings and life) were prophets of the Most High God. We find this to be true most specifically during times of Reformation, or when the professing Church is entering into a time of apostasy. This is all to say that one of the identifiers of a prophet is that he comes to speak to the people on behalf of God; to declare His divine will to them whether they like it or not and despite the fact that he was not being supported by the apostate “church” he was sent to rebuke. Remember that God killed priests, but the people killed the prophets. If you will remember this, it will help you to understand what the Church is to be doing in our day according to Jesus.
So we have explained the differences between priests, teachers and prophets. Other confusions might arise from the fact that often many people who were not prophets prophesied (think of King Saul in 1st Sam. 10, the High Priest Caiphas in John 11:51 and Phillip's four daughters in Acts 21:9). As we read earlier in the John Gill quote, God may, at any time, utilize any person to bring forth a point of Biblical truth that might have been overlooked by the Church. However, everyone who prophesies is not a prophet.
There is a grave danger in having a wrong view and understanding of prophecy today. The Bible teaches that God has, in the past, spoken to us at sundry times and in various ways through the prophets, but that in these last days he has spoken to us through his Son (Hebrews 1:1-2). This does not say that God does not speak to us any more by prophets (if we rightly look at what a prophet is), but that that which God has to say to us has been revealed to us through His Son Jesus Christ, who is made known and revealed to us in the Bible. So no prophecy by any prophet is to be taken as a “new” revelation by God to man, since God has given us all that He intends us to have in His Word (which is the written revelation of Jesus Christ). It is an evil tendency in man to assume that God has supernaturally spoken to him (outside of what plainly is taught to us in scripture) based on whatever bizarre imaginations or personal experiences convince him that this is true. Multitudes of people now order their affairs according to the word of self-professed prophets, because they believe that that “prophet” has a supernatural communication with God that they themselves do not have. But the test of true prophecy is the plain and contextual declarations made in the Bible.
These modern “prophets” continue to prophesy because they have no fear of a just and holy God. If you say God told you something (or showed you something, or gave you some “truth” - and it turns out that He did not speak to you at all, then you have not only deceived yourself, but you have likely deceived others (2 Tim. 3:13). The Bible calls these “prophets” evil men and seducers. According to the Old Testament law, this false prophet was to be killed!
So I am dealing here in this article with the concept of the “prophet” as one who declares the divine will of God (including those threats and/or promises made relating to spiritual duties) to a people who likely are not made willing to hear it.
Just what is the duty of the Church?
So we have shown that the duty of teaching takes place within the Body of Christ by those who are called and prepared to teach the precepts of God to those who are made willing to learn. So why has the modern “church” taken the position that the Church itself is tasked with being a teacher to the world? This is one of the reasons I found this article necessary. Some people constantly criticize and attack this ministry (and me in particular) because they believe I should shut up about responsibility, separatism, judgment, etc. and just teach. “How are we going to 'leaven' the world if we are always condemning it”?
Let us look at what Jesus said about the relationship between the world and the true “Church”, and keep in mind what I wrote earlier about the way that prophets are treated by the people:
“Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets” (Luk 6:21-23).
Jesus compares His people to the prophets who were killed by the fathers of those who persecute them.
“If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also. But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they know not him that sent me” (John 15:19-21).
Again Jesus compared the work of His people to that of the prophets, claiming that the world would hate them because it hates Him. Jesus chose out His people (in Him) that they might be sent out to show forth His righteousness to a world that He promises will hate them. God's true church is accounted as sheep sent out to the slaughter (Romans 8:36), and this because they experience “tribulation”, “distress”, “persecution”, “famine”, “nakedness”, “peril”, and the “sword” (verse 35). Now, are these things true of a teacher? Of course not. Are they true of the prophet? Absolutely. It is the prophet who is thusly treated by the world. The problem with “christians” today is that they expect the Church to be a passive, kind, peaceful, teacher... surviving off the kindnesses of a world that hates God and is supposed to hate them. The modern “church” is paid by the world (their students) according to the law. For the most part, the result of this has not been more (or better) Christians, but rampant apostasy.
The Church today is supposed to be a prophet to a dead and dying world, declaring the ways of God and His divine will. But instead the Church has decided to become priests and teachers, missionaries and monks – preying on a world that doesn't hate them at all. In fact, the world loves the “church” today and would hardly hate it, since that same “church” is in the business of soothing consciences. The professing “church” and the world today share an identical culture and worldview, the only competition we see is over who is going to sit on the throne of this world. Many professing “christians” cannot wait until the world loves them enough to put them more overtly in power.
This should not be true of people who carry around Christ's name.
I am your servant in Christ Jesus,
Michael Bunker
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