Minor Prophet Musings

Having completed a semester of teaching the "minor" prophets, otherwise known Book of the Twelve, one aspect that was made clear in the past week is the consistency of some of the themes between the Minor Prophets (otherwise Old Testament) and the teachings of God through more recent prophets (otherwise New Testament).

The first theme, and the topic of this blog, is that of God's sovereignty. Defined by Webster's as "supreme power or authority", it is too common to think of this trait as simply 'power or authority' and forget the 'supreme' element. Webster's describes supreme as "superior to all others" in regard to authority. Thus the idea of God's sovereignty is that this deity, and none other, holds the authority over creation that is second to none, indeed it is not merely better than others, it is superior to all the others. Indeed, the concept of superior is quite difficult to consider in a democratic society where no one is supposedly 'superior'.

However, in both Testaments of the Christian canon, the sovereignty of God is proclaimed. The book of Hebrews espouses the superiority of Jesus to a list of other options, including prophets, angels, Moses, Joshua, Abraham, the priesthood and the temple.  The preliminary question I rather superficially (don't act so surprised) impose on each prophet of the twelve to be asking is "who will follow YHWH?" The answer in terms of God's sovereignty is this: the one who recognizes and submits to that supreme power and authority.  The New Testament writers ask the very same thing: submit to God and to His Son.