Old Testament Prophets

This Blog was originally written in September 2014 but was never posted.

Recently our university hosted Palmer Chinchen, author of The Barefoot Tribe, on campus. During a very pleasant conversation over a Vietnamese dinner, he began to mention his focus on Justice. The word itself echoes powerfully in the ear of the reader who has spent time in the prophetic books of the canon. Justice is a critical theme for the prophets; it has to do with setting the world aright under God’s plan.

Therefore, return to your God,
Observe kindness and justice,
And wait for your God continually. (Hosea 12:6, NAS95)

The justice Palmer mentioned was surprising to me since he used no modifier in front of it as so many proponents use: Social Justice, Economic Justice, Legal Justice, etc. Later in a hallway conversation with James Bryan Smith, the two recognized that they are using different words to propose the same concept: Christ-imitating behavior.

Take away from Me the noise of your songs;
I will not even listen to the sound of your harps.
But let justice roll down like waters
And righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. (Amos 5:23-24. NAS95)

 The role of the prophet in the Old Testament was to help others confront false narratives. The basic narrative needing correction was that Israel’s powerful, important people (kings) were not gods, as many nations around them held their kings to be. Instead, they were to be God’s representatives on earth to insure that powerful, wealthy and influential individuals did not allow selfishness and personal ambition to overrun the status and personhood of their weak, poor, and common countryman. In other words, the King was to insure Justice. The prophet’s role was to remind the ruler of his duty to enforce justice.

Another role of the prophets was to remind the rulers (that’s normally who they talk to!) that there was one and only one God in Israel. Idolatry was not going to go unpunished since it eroded the people’s participation in their covenantal obligations. Idolatry by the leaders was mirrored among the common people. The prophet served as the moral compass and conscience for the nation when they forgot their spiritual center.

What, then, can we learn today from the prophets of old, if anything, about spiritual formation?

First and foremost, God indicates through the prophets that the activity of his people is to protect the rights of the poor and helpless. Those who are engaged in spiritual formation to be shaped into the likeness of God and his son Jesus must consider their treatment of the less fortunate as a primary responsibility.

‘Dispense true justice and practice kindness and compassion each to his brother; and do not oppress the widow or the orphan, the stranger or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.’ (Zechariah 7:9-10, NAS95)

Second, the role of the followers of Jesus is to remind their sojourners of the danger of beginning to lose sight of the holiness of God. The culture in which we live offers a multitude of attractions a follower of Jesus can pursue if he/she becomes stagnate in his/her life or relies on the activity of God at an earlier time of life to substitute for a living encounter with God’s presence in the now time.

Followers of Jesus must serve a prophetic role within their community of co-followers and gently encourage one another to return to a trusting, enlivening relationship with Jesus. More importantly followers of Jesus must be willing to build transparency within their community that allows them to listen and respond to brothers and sisters who bring a word of correction through the Spirit of God’s leaning. We do not walk alone!

 And just as He called and they would not listen, so they called and I would not listen,” says the LORD of hosts. (Zechariah 7:13, NAS95)

Christmas Musings 2011

It's been a wonderful week for thinking about Christmas.  Isn't it amazing that our first question is "what did you get" instead of "what did you give" for Christmas? Christmas is about giving, indeed it is a celebration about giving.  I've been fortunate to be reminded of that on several occasions this week.

Most of you aren't familiar with Wichita radio stations on Sunday morning, but I was asked to be a guest of Steve McIntosh for a Christmas morning broadcast.  I can't count how many times he said, "that's amazing" as we talked about the first Christmas, what we know, what we don't know and other options about the birth of this one later named Jesus.  You can catch the podcast at http://audio.knssradio.com/a/49962759/issues-2011-12-25-11.htm?

So what should I say about Christmas morning, our celebration and the Minor prophets?  It may be a stretch, but we should focus more on giving to the poor and needy and focus less on getting more toys that we call 'necessary.'  We should probably look to the widows and orphans, or in modern language those who don't have any one to care and protect them in times of crisis.  We should also look to meeting the needs of the suffering, those who are ill, aged, unemployed, and even those who have been abused by the powers of the world we live in.  I will be the first to admit that I don't frequently visit those corridors.  I am thankful that many of my students are wanting to visit those corridors and make them home!

Christmas is a holiday when we can be around family, enjoy one another's company, and realize our blessings.  Too often it becomes a time for old feelings to be trampled upon, for complaints to be voiced, once again, for what someone else has not done in the past, and a time to fulfill our own selfish gratifications.

I hope that you and yours have a very, merry Christmas.  I hope that as you reflect on the year gone by that you will focus on the blessings received through your acts of kindness and generosity and not focus on the ways in which you may have been wronged.  I also hope that you will take time to reflect on what you have been given, and what you give in turn to others.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

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.

What is Justice?

Sorry for the delay. Teaching Greek for a year gets me out of the habit of posting relevant comments.  Now we are in the Minor Prophets. What a refreshing change, both for myself and for my students. I think some are adding to their view of God every day.


What is Justice? Great question.  It is NOT social justice, it is NOT economic justice, it is NOT (add your modifier here) justice.  Those are small subsets but are NOT justice. Amos 5-6 is a great place to look for justice. Amos 5:7 starts, "You who turn justice to wormwood, and cast down righteousness to the earth" while Amos 6:12 ends "But you have turned justice into poison, and the fruit of righteousness into bitterness." If all the parallelism of Hebrew Poetry hasn't made it clear, this inclusion passage should make it clear: Justice IS Righteousness.  


God is righteous, God is just.  Righteousness and Justice are what the righteous and just ones do.  Justice is what God does.  The people of God are to act like God. It really is that simple.


What's the problem? Views of God held by an individual that are contradictory, especially to the biblical text.  More on that later.

It's Getting Scary

What does one do when, while teaching a class on the Minor Prophets, one's pastor starts preaching from HOSEA? Is there an echo in the house??? Having moved away from Hosea some 4 weeks ago and progressed through six prophets and one hundred years of history in class, is it possible that HOSEA has something to speak to the society today?

What are the idols that modern American "people of God" are having affairs with? Is it possible that we use the resources provided to us by God's loving care to "run off to Vegas with a whore?" Wouldn't it be simpler if we simply built temples and had ticket booths, oops, did I really say that, I mean if we had specifically declared offerings that were to be given so that it would be easy to NAME that IDOL. But, since we don't have any idols in the modern world, does Hosea actually have anything to say to us today?