What is a prophet? What is prophecy? What do they mean?
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What is a prophet? What is prophecy? What do they mean?
The Hebrew word prophet literally means to bubble up or pour forth. The idea is that the prophet inspired of God bubbles forth and pours out the words of God. God defended Moses as a special prophet in Numbers 12:6-8:
Then He said, “Hear now My words: If there is a prophet among you, I, the Lord, make Myself known to him in a vision; I speak to him in a dream. Not so with My servant Moses; He is faithful in all My house. I speak with him face to face, Even plainly, and not in dark sayings; And he sees the form of the Lord. Why then were you not afraid To speak against My servant Moses?”
In Deuteronomy 18:18-22 tells us more about prophets and who they were. They were people that God raised up to speak on His behalf. They were also supposed to speak the truth and not lie. If they misled the people, they were to be put to death for speaking wrongly in the name of the Lord. However, the people were supposed to listen to them and follow their message. Their sign was that they would prophecy about the future and if their words came to pass then the people knew they were a prophet.
The word prophet also came to mean someone who speaks on behalf of another. In Exodus 7:1-2, God told Moses, “See, I have made you as God to Pharaoh, and Aaron your brother shall be your prophet. You shall speak all that I command you. And Aaron your brother shall tell Pharaoh to send the children of Israel out of his land.” God made Aaron the prophet, or spokesperson, for Moses.
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). Nathan then announced that David’s child would not live. Elijah prophesied against the prophets of Baal at Mt. Carmel and had them put to death for being false prophets (1 Kings 18).
Most of the time, however, a prophecy foretold of things that were going to happen in the future. God said that this is the test of a true prophet and also a test that the prophecy itself came from God. In Isaiah 41:22-24 God challenges the false gods. He says:
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. 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. Indeed you are nothing, And your work is nothing; He who chooses you is an abomination.
God’s point is that He is the only God who tells them of things that happened long ago, what will be the consequences of present action, and what the future has to hold. So prophecy can be about the past, present, or future. The point, however, is that the prophet speaks on behalf of God.
What does prophecy mean? It means that God has inspired his men and women to prophecy for Him to mankind. That their words are God’s words and we should listen to them. Today, Jesus is that Prophet to whom we all must listen. Peter says as much in Acts 3:22-26.