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

A Profile of the Ancient Hebrew Prophet

because some man willed it [to do so]-it never came by human impulse but as men spoke from God who were borne along (moved and impelled) by the Holy Spirit." Second Peter 1:20 clarifies the nature of this Holy Spirit moving: "No prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation" (KJV). Human beings, acting independently and alone, are not the prime mover in either the production or interpretation of Scripture. Alan M. Stibbs says: "For true prophecy has never emerged, except when men have been taken up into an activity of the Spirit of God, and borne along to the place, or into the circumstances and the conditions, where they gave utterance to words of which God was the primary originating cause." 29 A writing prophet was "carried along" (that is, sustained in a certain mental state or condition), held by the Spirit in a receptive mode that allowed divine impartation, keen memory retention and an unctionized delivery. Certainly if God could invade the mind of Nebuchadnezzar, the worldly king of Babylon, He could bring words and visions to His ser vants the prophets. No question existed in the minds of the New Testament writers that the Old Testament Scriptures were actually the Word of God. Old Testa ment quotations are introduced in the New Testament with this absolute conviction. In Romans and 1 and 2 Corinthians, the apostle declares with finality, "It is written," or, "As it is written," then gives a quotation. Some times the New Testament quotes an Old Testament prophet, then attrib utes the very words to God as the author ("He says"-referring to God). 3 0 The writer of Hebrews quotes the Old Testament prophets by stating that God or the Holy Spirit "says" or "has said" or "is saying" something. 3 1 The book of Acts attributes words from various prophets to the Holy Spirit. 3 2 In Matthew the Old Testament quotations are said to be "through" the prophet Isaiah 33 or Jeremiah 34 or Zechariah. 3 5 Writers of the New Testament considered the sacred Scriptures of the Jewish canon to be the actual words of God. They believed God "breathed" these words into the prophets as He "carried them along." The same inspiration is claimed for the apostles and writers of the New Testament. The Church includes these writings along with the Hebrew Scriptures to make up the aggregate of written Scripture. The inscrip turated words of Paul and other New Testament writers are accorded the same status as that of the Old Testament prophets; their words are the very words of God. 3 6 These references are clear in this matter: The Actual Words of God

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