In September, last
year, I wrote a blog about the Book of Nahum and God’s judgement on the city of
Nineveh. See Link I noted
that the judgement was carried out without any additional warning, and was
total. I could have added that the instrument of the destruction of Nineveh was
an external cause or force, as opposed to internal decline.
In that blog, I
concluded that if we are still standing, and have a dispute with God, then
there continues to be time to put this right. However, when God says that it is
the end, then it is too late.
But how do we know if
we have a dispute with God? We do not even think about Him most of the time. In
fact, we may deny his existence or if we accept that there is a possibility of
his existence, then He is too remote to be of relevance in our daily lives.
If this is the case,
it is for God to make the move, to indicate that all is not well. How exactly
He might do this could be a subject of another blog. Grumpy’s brother first
blog had a crack at this, March last year, entitled the “The CommunicationQuestion” See link.
The Old Testament also
records that He sent His Prophets to tell them that what the people of Israel
were doing was bad and why, what was going to happen to them and what they
needed to do. What was going to happen to them was usually bad, unless they
changed their ways.
Of course, it was
usual to ignore these Prophets. They usually dressed strangely, behaved oddly,
and told people all kinds of things that were at least inconvenient and what
they certainly did not want to do. Therefore in the Old Testament, the usual
response was for the People of Israel to imprison them, beat them up or even
kill them, after which Israel wondered why their enemies defeated and conquered
them. (Those of you who read Deuteronomy 28 will recognise this pattern.) Start
at verse 15 and just keep going. See Link
In my search on Old
Testament themes, I was looking around for a prophet in today’s world. I am not
thinking of those who tell us that the Eurozone is going to collapse into
recession tomorrow and that more money is needed, which at the moment is
everyone and every day. Rather the people who say that this is happening
because God is speaking to us, and demands something from us, that this or that
needs to change in the way we behave towards God and to each other.
Having said that,
there are plenty of websites and TV channels devoted to Religion generally, and
Christianity in particular, including messages of impending disaster. Not all
are credible, but more importantly, none are read or watched by those for whom
the message is needed. The Prophets of the Old Testament were public and
well-known figures. The People of Israel may not have been interested in what
they were saying, but they heard it and were in no doubt about what they were saying.
I am not sure if we
would recognise these prophets if we were to see and hear them today. How could
we? What do they look like? I don’t think that ordinary people listen to the
church generally, and if they did, would they hear a clear message. Anyway, the
church these days has not found a way of reaching the general public in a
credible way, other than through its leaders on some occasions. Even then the
message, at least as it is reported, tends to be of a social, rather than
spiritual message. (The most recent Queen’s Christmas message was an exception). See Link
Who do I think these modern
Prophets might be? Where might they come from? I am into highly speculative
territory here. However, to speculate further for a moment, the Old Testament suggests
that this would come from a well-known and respected religious organisation
e.g. from the senior hierarchy of the Church of England, and would make
themselves a nuisance, through persistence and consistency in the clarity of
the message.
They would not be
popular.
