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

Makeup: Traits That Characterized a Prophet

four daughters who prophesied. My observation of my own four chil dren and other children I have observed in churches through the years bears this out.

Prophetic Categories and Periods

Generally someone who mentions the prophetic books of the Old Tes tament is referring to the sixteen books from Isaiah to Malachi. (Some would include Lamentations as well.) These books are further subdivided into the four major prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel) and the twelve minor prophets. As H. L. Ellison explains, "The distinction between Major and Minor Prophets is first found in the Latin churches, and Augustine rightly explains that it means a difference in size, not in value. " 15 The breakdown in the Hebrew Bible is different. It is divided into the Torah (Law), Neviim (Prophets) and Ketuvim (Writings). The second section, the Prophets, consists of eight books (books in two parts count as one book): Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings (the former Prophets); and Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and "the Twelve" (the latter Prophets). 16 Daniel is not included, being considered more apocalyptic than prophetic. (Note, however, that in Matthew 24:15 Jesus calls Daniel a prophet.) Usually the lists refer to the prophets whose written books appear in the Scripture as "canonical prophets," "classical prophets," "writing prophets" and "major and minor prophets." The prophets can also be categorized by actions, time periods, kings, objectives, miracles, themes and locations. My chart on page 62 identifies thirteen time periods and lists some of the key prophets in each period. Prophetic progression con tinues through these various periods, right up to the present day. A com mon conviction gripped them all: They believed they brought a word from God. Sometimes prophetic roles are duplicated in different time periods, so we would be wrong to pigeonhole a certain kind of prophetic activity and hold it to just one time slot. Amos, for instance, is called the first of the writing prophets, yet we know that earlier seers also did writing. Daniel is not famous like Elijah for working miracles, yet his bout in the lions' den and prophetic statesmanship to four kingdoms can hardly be classi fied as nonmiraculous! Isaiah wrote history, predicted the future and was involved with miracles. The best approach is to accept the prophets, each in his or her own time zone, as serving God faithfully in the discharge of the duty given and the needs of that particular time frame. Some were obscure and little 61 ■