Thank you for joining us for our five days per week wisdom and legacy building podcast. We are broadcasting from our studio at The Big House in Marietta, Ohio. Today is Day 941 of our trek, and it is Wisdom Wednesday.
Creating a Biblical worldview is important to have a proper perspective on today’s current events. To establish a Biblical worldview, you also have to have a proper understanding of God’s word. Especially in our western cultures, we do not fully understand the Scriptures from the mindset and culture of the authors. In order to help us all have a better understanding of some of the more obscure passages in God’s word, we are investing each Wisdom Wednesday reviewing a series of essays from one of today’s most prominent Hebrew Scholars Dr. Micheal S. Heiser. He has compiled these essays into a book titled I Dare You Not to Bore Me with the Bible.
What does it take to be a Prophet of God? Today’s essay will lay out the qualifications as we explore…
Most people think a prophet is someone empowered by God to foretell the future. No doubt, prophets announced God’s intentions, but forecasting future events wasn’t their primary job description. A prophet’s chief task was to serve as God’s mouthpiece to His covenant people Israel and to her enemies. So how did someone become a prophet? Was there some sort of heavenly qualification? In fact, there was.
You might think the standard for a prophet was whether their words came to pass exactly as uttered as described in Deuteronomy 18:15-22. That is actually a by-product of the real litmus test, which we read about in Jeremiah [23:18] & 22.
“Have any of these prophets been in the Lord’s presence (or the council (sod))
to hear what he is really saying?
Has even one of them cared enough to listen?
If they had stood before me (the council (sod)) and listened to me,
they would have spoken my words,
and they would have turned my people
from their evil ways and deeds.”
What does it mean to “stand in the council”? The one essential test of a prophet—that preceded their ability to deliver a divine message was that the prophet had to see and hear God in His...
