Chapter 8
THE PERMANENCE OF PROPHECY
By
The Man Who Saw God Face To Face
Raphael Okechukwu Nweze
GOD IS GOD OF PROPHECY
He foretells His future plans, and He Himself fulfills all of them. He rules with prophecy. This is understandable. Every wise king would like his people to know what is happening or that will happen in his kingdom. God is the Supreme Being and the Creator of the Universe. He is God of prophecy. He is a prophet.
God testifies:
8 I am the LORD, that is My name;
And My glory I will not give to another,
Nor My praise to carved images.
9 Behold, the former things have come to pass,
And new things I declare;
Before they spring forth I tell you of them."
Isaiah 42: 8,9
God established prophecy as one of His major attributes, nature or virtue. In many places where He spoke of what He can do or where He compared Himself with the gods and idols, He remarks prophecy as His distinguishing characteristics and ability.
Isaiah 46:5-10 upholds:
5 "To whom will you liken Me, and make Me equal
And compare Me, that we should be alike?
6 They lavish gold out of the bag,
And weigh silver on the scales;
They hire a goldsmith, and he makes it a god;
They prostrate themselves, yes, they worship.
7 They bear it on the shoulder, they carry it
And set it in its place, and it stands;
From its place it shall not move.
Though one cries out to it, yet it cannot answer
Nor save him out of his trouble.
8 "Remember this, and show yourselves men;
Recall to mind, O you transgressors.
9 Remember the former things of old,
For I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is none like Me,
10 Declaring the end from the beginning,
And from ancient times things that are not yet done,
Saying,’ My counsel shall stand,
And I will do all My pleasure,' Isaiah 46:5-10
Isaiah 41: 21-24 compares:
21 "Present your case," says the LORD.
"Bring forth your strong reasons," says the King of Jacob.
22 "Let them bring forth and show us what will happen;
Let them show the former things, what they were,
That we may consider them,
And know the latter end of them;
Or declare to us things to come.
23 Show the things that are to come hereafter,
That we may know that you are gods;
Yes, do good or do evil,
That we may be dismayed and see it together.
Isaiah 41: 21-24
Isaiah 48: 5-6 informs:
5 Even from the beginning I have declared it to you;
Before it came to pass I proclaimed it to you,
Lest you should say, 'My idol has done them,
And my carved image and my molded image
Have commanded them.'
6 "You have heard;
See all this.And will you not declare it?
I have made you hear new things from this time,
Even hidden things, and you did not know them.
7 They are created now and not from
the beginning;
And before this day you have not heard them,
Lest you should say, 'Of course I knew them.'
Isaiah 48: 5-6
Evidently, the first church established by God, the sabbatical Israelites, was a prophetic order. The teachings of Jesus Christ, upon which Christianity is based, are full of prophecies. The early church, after the death of Jesus, was of prophecy. Through revelation, Jesus confirms that God is God of prophecy and that prophecy is eternal. In truth, every church of God in the modern time must be a prophetic one.
God makes it a point of duty to reveal the future to His people. Therefore, He does not do something without first revealing it to His prophets. He reveals the future problems and how to solve or prevent them. He reveals future prosperity and how to maintain them. He does not allow His children to grope (search blindly) in darkness.
There is hardly any one God calls for a lofty assignment, to whom He will not first reveal it, whether the person believes or not. When Jeremiah was still a boy, God revealed to him that he will be a prophet.
4 Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying:
5 "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you;
Before you were born I sanctified you;
I ordained you a prophet to the nations."
6 Then said I:
"Ah, Lord GOD!
Behold, I cannot speak, for I am a youth."
7 But the LORD said to me:
"Do not say, 'I am a youth,'
For you shall go to all to whom I send you,
And whatever I command you, you shall speak.
8 Do not be afraid of their faces,
For I am with you to deliver you," says the LORD.
Jeremiah 1:4-8
The boy, Joseph, knew that one day he would become a king.
5 Now Joseph had a dream, and he told it to his brothers; and they hated him even more. 6 So he said to them, "Please hear this dream which I have dreamed: 7 There we were, binding sheaves in the field. Then behold, my sheaf arose and also stood upright; and indeed your sheaves stood all around and bowed down to my sheaf."
...
9 Then he dreamed still another dream and told it to his brothers, and said, "Look, I have dreamed another dream. And this time, the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars bowed down to me."
10 So he told it to his father and his brothers; and his father rebuked him and said to him, "What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall your mother and I and your brothers indeed come to bow down to the earth before you?" Genesis 37:5-9
King David was anointed in his boyhood, 1 Samuel 16:1-13. But, he became a king after so many years.
In fact, God is not a God of chance, mistake, opportunity or emergency. He plans and provides adequately for the future. He makes this clear.
26 "Did you not hear long ago
How I made it,
From ancient times that I formed it?
Now I have brought it to pass,
That you should be
For crushing fortified cities into heaps of ruins.
27 Therefore their inhabitants had little power;
They were dismayed and confounded;
They were as the grass of the field
And the green herb,
As the grass on the housetops
And grain blighted before it is grown.
Isaiah 37:26-27
The Universal Mind is the Omniscient Spirit of God. Some call it Cosmic Consciousness, Cosmic Mind or Universal Intelligence. It is the Omnipresent Spirit which embodies all knowledge. It is this mind that is called “Akashic record” – Records of Primary Substance, God’s Book of Remembrance.
The universality of God’s spirit proves why truth cannot be hidden or confined. Truth is everywhere manifest. So, two scientists working at different places, at different times, can arrive at the same true scientific conclusion, law or discovery without learning from each other.
JESUS WAS, IS AND EVER SHALL BE A PROPHET
It has been shown that prophecy is an attribute of God, by which He distinguishes Himself from gods and idols. Invariably, the same holds true of Jesus, who was a prophet. And it was through Him that all the prophecies of the Old and New testaments were given and fulfilled. His life alone was a fulfillment of several prophecies in the Old Testament. Thus, the New Testament is the fulfillment of the Old Testament which has so many prophecies. When Jesus was on earth, He came not to abolish the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfill them.
17 "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. 18 For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. 19 Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 5:17-20
He upheld the teachings and revelations of the old prophets, and confirmed that the prophets were sent by God.
He made several prophecies about the future and the end-time. The Book of Revelation is a record of prophetic message delivered by Jesus through Angel Gabriel. Thus, He proved that prophecy is a divine attribute and an everlasting practice.
HOLY SPIRIT IS THE SPIRIT OF PROPHECY
The Holy Spirit is the spirit of prophecy. As such, it is prophetic in nature, service and endowment. He is the spirit of truth mentioned by Jesus:
12 "I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 13 However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. 14 He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. 15 All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you. John 16:12-15
It cannot be otherwise, since the Trinity is one in nature and characteristics. Besides, the Holy Spirit is the Omnipresent Spirit of God.
EVIDENCE OF THE TRANSFIGURATION
First, Jesus prophesied about it before it took place. He told his disciples. “I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before the see the son of the man coming in his kingdom.” Matthew. 16: 28
In the transfiguration the Trinity was fully present. Jesus was physically and spiritually present. God spoke, hence His voice was heard saying, “This is my son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him,” Matthew. 17:5. The light of Holy Spirit shone.
Besides, two of the old Major Prophets, Moses and Elijah, were present in the manifest kingdom. The two, with Jesus, all being prophets - signify the importance of prophecy in the kingdom of God. Their presence and cooperation indicates that the Lord is God of the Prophets.
The transfiguration was a prophetic glimpse of the coming kingdom. During the events, the three manifest prophets were doing their work as prophets, as they discussed the eventual departure (the future suffering, death and resurrection) of Jesus Christ. Luke 9:31