Our catechism asks us, how does Christ execute the office of a prophet? But before we can answer that question, we need to ask, what is a prophet? We often think of a prophet as one who tells the future, but that is not necessary to a prophet's task. The historical books of the Old Testament (Joshua, Samuel, and Kings, for instance) were originally called the "former prophets." A prophet is one who speaks forth the word of God. Or perhaps better, a prophet is one who speaks a divine message by divine authority. Not all prophets give special revelation. There were many prophets in Israel that we have never heard of. We hear of the schools of the prophets in the Old Testament, but few of them were ever selected by God to deliver special revelation. Most true prophets in the Old Testament were dependent upon previous revelation. They would speak the Word of God to the people, calling on them to repent of their sins, believe the promises of God, and do what God had already told them.

But sometime after the year 400 B.C., the prophets fell silent. And for 400 years Israel waited for the voice of the Lord. Amos had spoken of these years as a famine: "Not a famine of bread, nor thirst for waters, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord. They shall wander from sea to sea, and from north to east; they shall run to and fro, to seek the word of the Lord, but they shall not find it" (Amos 8:11-12). And through those years the faithful waited for a new prophet. They knew that God had promised a prophet like Moses. Samuel may have been the closest they had known. Samuel was a prophet, a priest, and a judge all at once. Samuel had anointed both Saul and David, establishing the monarchy in Israel. But even Samuel fell short of the stature of Moses. Moses was a prophet who had delivered the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt. The judges, and especially the house of David, had defended Israel from their enemies, but that fell short of Moses. Moses had spoken to Pharaoh, and the Word of the Lord had destroyed his land. Likewise, Moses had spoken forth the Word of the Lord from Sinai, delivering the Law of God. Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel had expounded and applied that law, interpreting it in the light of God's new revelation. But that could not compare to the glory of the Torah itself. Most of all, Moses had known God face-to-face. Moses had interceded for the people and God had listened to him. No prophet like Moses had ever appeared in Israel.

Until now.

"Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power."

Hebrews 1 makes it clear that Jesus Christ is a prophet unlike any prophet before him. He is not merely a messenger delivering a message from God. He is the Son who reveals God himself. As Jesus put it, "he who sees me has seen the Father." (John 14:9) The coming of the Son heralds the arrival of the last days. This is the day that Moses had promised. Indeed this is the day that Moses had longed for, when he cried out, "Oh that all the Lord's people were prophets, that he might put his Spirit on all of them!" (Numbers 11:29).

So let us see how Christ executes the office of a prophet, so that we might see how you who are in Christ partake of that office yourselves.

Q. 23. What offices doth Christ execute as our Redeemer?

A. Christ, as our Redeemer, executeth the offices of a prophet, of a priest, and of a king, both in his estate of humiliation and exaltation. 

Q. 24. How doth Christ execute the office of a prophet?

A. Christ executeth the office of a prophet, in revealing to us, by his Word and Spirit, the will of God for our salvation.

Jesus declared himself to be a prophet at the beginning of his ministry in the synagogue in Nazareth. [Luke 4:16-21] Jesus quotes from Isaiah 61, where the Servant of the Lord declares the gospel of salvation. Isaiah had uttered these words first, but now Jesus makes them his own. Jesus declares that "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." Jesus is saying that he is the one who will proclaim the gospel of deliverance. He is the prophet who will reveal the way of salvation, the year of the Lord's favor. It's interesting. The catechism doesn't say that Jesus executes the office of a prophet by predicting the future. Jesus did speak of the future, but that isn't what makes him a prophet. Jesus is a prophet because he reveals to us the will of God for our salvation. He proclaims liberty to the captives, good news to the poor, sight to the blind. Jesus' prophetic office is exercised through his proclamation. This proclamation comes in several forms: He is, as John declares to us, the Word of God. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He is, in his being as well as in his incarnation, the proclamation of God. But this proclamation is communicated to us through the scriptures, and through preaching. And Jesus exercises his prophetic office in both these ways. Jesus Christ is not only the subject of Scripture, he is also the speaker of scripture. And here is where the work of the Spirit comes in. Some people complain that our Confession doesn't have a separate section on the Holy Spirit. But if you watch as we go through the catechism, you will see that the Holy Spirit is everywhere in it. Because the work of the Holy Spirit is inseparably bound to the work of the Son. This is what Jesus himself said in John 15:26: "But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me." The Holy Spirit was sent to the church in order to testify to Jesus. Jesus, by his Word and by his Spirit, speaks to his church.

Plainly we must start with the apostolic witness, the scriptures. Jesus said that the apostles would receive power after the Holy Spirit came upon them, and that they would be his witnesses in Jerusalem, and in Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). The book of Acts records the fulfillment of this promise, but the ending of Acts indicates that this promise was not only for the apostles. The gift of the Holy Spirit, after all, was not merely for the apostles. Nor was it merely for prophets and preachers. As Moses had cried in Numbers 11, "How I wish that all of the Lord's people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his Spirit in all of them." This is in fact what the prophet Joel declared would happen when God redeemed his people. When God brought his people out of exile, he promised "I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy.... Even on the male and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit" (Joel 2:28, 29). And this is what happens on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2). On the day of Pentecost, Jesus spoke. On the day of Pentecost, Jesus performed his first great act as exalted Prophet. He had spoken as a prophet throughout his life, in his humiliation; but now he spoke as a prophet in his exaltation. He poured out his Spirit upon his church, unleashing the power of the exalted Messiah throughout the earth. Until that day, there had been a famine of hearing the Word of the Lord. Now the Word of God would go forth with power to the ends of the earth. When Jesus speaks, his Word carries with it the power to change those who hear.

But, you might ask, how does Jesus execute the office of a prophet today? The same as he ever has--by his Word and Spirit. My feeble preaching partakes of his glorious prophetic work. The encouragement that you give to one another does as well. I think some of the charismatic churches actually do this rather well (in part). Have you ever listened to charismatic "prophecies"? Some are wacky. When they try to predict the future, they invariably make a mess of things, and when they try to play psychic ("there is someone here with a headache!"), they trivialize the Word of the Lord. But most charismatic prophecies sound something like this: "God wants you to know that he loves you, And that he will never leave you or forsake you!" That is true prophecy. You and I do not receive new revelation from God. But we are prophets. And Jesus Christ speaks to his church through us. All believers share in Christ's offices of prophet, priest, and king, therefore you speak the Word of God to each other. Indeed Paul says that ministers of the gospel are gifts from the exalted Christ to the church, in order to edify the body, to build up the church (Ephesians 4:11). The preaching of the Word is a prophetic act. William Perkins, a 16th century English Puritan wrote a book entitled, "The Art of Prophesying." It was a manual on preaching. Every time a minister stands up in the pulpit to preach, every time a Christian speaks faithful words, Jesus Christ is fulfilling his office as a prophet.

Our catechism does not exhaust the work of Christ as a prophet. There is another aspect to Christ's prophetic office that we must mention. Because prophets do not merely speak the Word of God to man. Prophets also speak on behalf of man to God. Remember Moses? It was Moses who interceded with God to preserve Israel from destruction. It was Elijah who prayed and asked God for rain. It was Jeremiah who frequently begged God for mercy upon Judah (Jer 12, 14, etc). More than half of Habakkuk consists of the prophet's speech to God. Jesus is the great prophet who stands before God and pleads for mercy. Some have included this in Christ's priestly ministry, but this is not a priestly task. A priest's intercession consists of sacrifices. The priest holds up the blood of the sacrifice, and prays for mercy based on that sacrifice. The prophet reminds God of his promises. In this respect, Jesus' prayer in John 17 should probably be called, the great prophetic prayer, rather than the high priestly prayer. John 17 speaks of Christ's prophetic work: "I have revealed your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world.... For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you" (John 17:6, 8). Jesus asks that the Father will remember his promises (just as Jeremiah had done), that he might "sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth" (John 17:17). Jesus's great prayer in John 17 is that his prophetic task might be completed. "I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word" (v20). Jesus's intercession for us, therefore, is both priestly, through offering his blood for us, and prophetic, through speaking to God on our behalf. Therefore our task, as we share in the prophetic office of Christ, is to speak the Word of God to those around us, and to speak to God on behalf of others.

Copyright © 2003 Peter J. Wallace