What is a prophet? What is prophecy? What do they mean?
A prophecy could be any word from God, but we have come to understand the word specifically as applying to events in the future. The prophets of the Bible often prophesied of current events often calling attention to the sins of the people and telling them to repent. Nathan prophesied to David that he had murdered Uriah so that he could commit adultery with Bathsheba, an event that was in the past (2 Samuel 12).