Your Sons & Daughters Shall Prophesy - Prophetic Gifts Today In The New Testament Church

A Profile of the Ancient Hebrew Prophet

which He spoke through his servant Ahijah the prophet" (1 Kings 14:18). 5. Watchman. Ancient cities employed alert sentinels who stood on the city walls to warn when enemies approached or catastrophe was imminent.They manned their posts even at night while others slept. Like them, the prophet was to watch the events of his time from the high wall of spiritual dedication.Even when the people were lulled to sleep by their own indifference, the prophet was to remain alert! He or she represented a warning voice, a caretaker of God's inheritance, a guardian, one who awakened the people to action 10 (Psalm 127:1; Isa iah 21:6; 52:8; 62:6; Jeremiah 6:17; Ezekiel 3:17; 33:6-7; Hosea 9:8; Habakkuk 2:1). Jeremiah's call to ministry began with the symbolic vision of a branch of the almond-the first of the fruit trees to blossom.In the Central Val ley of California, many acres of these trees burst with white blossoms when it seems that all nature is still asleep.The almond is a harbinger of coming life.Matthew Henry called it "the hasty tree." John Skinner comments: "The almond, which blossoms in January, was poetically named by the Hebrews the wakeful tree, as the first of all the trees to wake up at the touch and promise of spring.Looking at it, the prophet is impelled to pronounce its name: Shaked, 'awake.' What does it sig nify? The answer comes unbidden: 'I am wakeful [Shoked] over My word to fulfil it."' 11 Before anyone else realizes what is happening, God is declaring through His prophets what will be! But the almond merely announces spring, whereas God is involved in both predicting and bringing His prophetic word to pass. 6. Interpreter. This rare term is found in Isaiah 43:27 (Interlinear Bible; Rotherham; NKJV and NASB margins). Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament says, "The interpreters in Isaiah 43:27 are the teachers of Israel, God's priests and prophets who have sinned by refusing to give out God's word as he first gave it." 12 This insight from Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible is helpful: "The name ...is descriptive of the position of the prophet in regard to his tory and God's providence.God speaks in events, and the prophet inter prets Him to men.Prophecy arises out of history, keeps pace with it, and interprets it.God is the author of Israel's history, and His meaning in it, His disposition towards the people as expressed in it, reflects itself in the prophet's mind....History is a moral current, and at whatever point the prophet stands he feels whence it has come and whither it is flowing." 13 58