Major and Minor Prophets
-T’Naya Edwards
Since we began this journey of learning the overarching story of scripture, we have learned that God is God alone and exists as Father, Son and Spirit. We learned of the creation account and what it means to be made in God’s image and to follow His mandate to be fruitful and multiply. We got to learn the biblical definition of sin in regards to the fall in Genesis 3 and what that means for us as humans born after Adam and Eve. We learned there is hope of redemption in God’s sovereign promises as He works to restore what sin has destroyed. We’ve learned that God made the way for relationship with His people by establishing covenants with them. (Abrahamic, Mosaic, Davidic, etc.) We learned that God is the true King over all His creation and when His people chose not to submit to Him as such and they turned from Him, He allowed the wrath of their decisions to consume them. Last week we learned about the Wisdom books and how “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 111:10) and how we must have hearts and minds that truly love and desire God first and most of all.
Tonight we dive off into the deep end as we explore the Major and Minor Prophets and take a glimpse at the dawning of a new covenant. The major prophets being Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, and the minor being Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zecahriah, and Malachi.
If we shift back to the historical side of things, we will see that the actual Old Testament books of the prophets weren’t written until the Kingdom was divided into the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah. However, God’s prophets had existed since the beginning of the Book.
So let’s take a minute and talk about what and who a prophet is.
A prophet is anyone called by God to speak on His behalf to His people and sometimes even to other nations if they were tied to Israel in some way at the time. In a sense, a prophet was a sort of preacher, but they were even more so a “whistleblower” for the nation of Israel when they had departed from the law of the Lord and were doing “what was right in their own eyes” just like we saw in Judges. Anytime the people of Israel had strayed or started to stray from their partnership with God that they committed to in the beginning, a prophet would emerge and warn of God’s judgement and attempt to lead them back into a right relationship with God. The prophet's role was to speak for God, confronting the people and their leaders with God’s commands and promises.
In the Old Testament, there are what are considered the “written prophets” such as Isaiah, Malachi, Hosea, etc. but there are also those who didn’t pen entire books, such as Gad, Nathan, Elijah and Elisha, etc. These prophets were scattered throughout the historical books.
Essentially Moses was God’s prophet and led God’s people out of slavery from Eygpt and even spoke of the “prophet” who was to come, Jesus, in Deuteronomy 18:15. These people were a mess from the get go as we have covered in earlier lessons and continually turned away from God and God used these Prophets everytime they strayed not only to warn of His judgement but also to remind them of the HOPE he had promised them. Some would predict the future such as Joseph, preparing the people for 7 years of plenty and the impending years of famine. But prophets weren’t mere fortune-tellers. Some were given visions of God’s glory, such as Isaiah and Ezekiel, recorded in the books they penned. Sometimes prophets were referred to as “seers” because they could “see” as God gave them insight like in 1 Samuel 9:9.
There weren’t any particular requirements for the role of prophet as God used anyone He chose. We even read of how God told Jeremiah specifically that He had chosen him before he was formed in His mother's womb to do His work. (Jeremiah 1:5) They came from a variety of backgrounds and professions, had unique style, and different audiences for the messages they were given. Most of the prophets we read of were men but there were also prophetesses such as Deborah during the time of the judges, Miriam, who was Moses and Aaron’s sister, and Huldah who helped to interpret scrolls in 2 Kings.
A key insight as to whether someone was a prophet came with the announcement that “the word of the Lord” came to the individual. From there it was the prophet's responsibility to deliver God’s message with precision and the test was 100% accuracy of what was said according to Deuteronomy 18:22 which says “when a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him.” If any prediction made by a “prophet” didn’t come true he was not a prophet of God at all because “God never lies” as we are told in Numbers 23:29. God gave this requirement for His spokespeople because He knew there would be “false prophets” that would arise with their own or other people’s worldly agendas. We see this in 2 Chronicles 18 and 1 Kings 22, when we read of King Ahaz of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, consulting 400 of his own prophets saying he would be victorious in battle, and the one man God had appointed as His prophet, Micaiah, saying Ahaz would surely die. King Ahaz even goes as far to mention that he hates Micaiah because “he never prophesies good concerning him but always evil.” Wonder why? Micaiah definitely got it right when he said, “As the Lord lives, whatever my God speaks, that I will speak.” Nothing more, nothing less.
We see the consequence of the decision for a prophet to go their own way in the story of Jonah, who refused to go to Nineveh and put his life and others around him in grave danger. In another instance of the unnamed prophet in 1 Kings 13:15-24, the true appointed prophet of God disobeyed the word from God and listened to a false prophet who contradicted the word he had received from God, and his consequence was being killed by a lion as he attempted to return home.
Because the messages the prophets were tasked with delivering were messages with judgement and a certain measure of doom and coupled with the professions they already held, their job was no walk in the park and their message generally wasn’t well received . Think of your own children and their initial response to your correction; it isn’t usually received right off the bat and there is generally some backlash. The same thing is true with people of Israel. Ezekiel was sent to a “rebellious people” (Ezekiel 12:2). Isaiah dealt with a people “ever-hearing, but never understanding (Isaiah 6:9) and ultimately was murdered for his efforts. Elijah’s life was sought by the queen of Israel (1 Kings 19:2), and Jeremiah was thrown into a cistern and “sank down into the mud”(Jeremiah 38:6) In Acts 7:52, the disciple Stephen asked the condemning question, “was there ever a prophet your ancestors did not prosecute?” and Jesus Himself, said the people of Jerusalem were those “who kill the prophets and stone those [God] sent”
God’s people had forsaken Him and had forsaken their privilege in living in community as a distinct and holy people of God set apart from the nations. Instead they chose to blend in and participate in every vulgar and lewd thing. King after king and priest after priest fell short of being what God intended for them to be and ultimately the Northern Kingdom of Israel became the captives of Assyria and the Southern Kingdom of Judah fell captive to Babylon.
As daunting as all of that sounds, GOD’S JUDGEMENT WAS NEVER HIS FINAL WORD. Remember the covenants God had made with His people? No matter what His people chose, He was going to make good on His word to bring down the kingdoms of oppression and corruption and establish His perfect Kingdom and extend His blessing to ALL NATIONS as promised to Abraham.
Instead of trying to summarize all of the written prophets messages, to wrap up I want to focus on Isaiah’s message.
Isaiah was a man with his eyes set on God. In chapter 6 of his book, we learn that Isaiah had a vision where he was taken before the throne of God and it was there he realized just how unworthy and unclean he was set before the very throne of God. But he was met by a cherubim with a burning coal representing God’s mercy and atonement for his sin. It was from this vision that his message for God’s people sprang forth- that God is both merciful and holy, full of wrath and love, He is both just and gracious, and that God is sending a Messiah to save sinners from his holy wrath and to atone for their sins and remove their guilt.
Not unlike the other prophets, Isaiah came with a message of accusation and judgement, warning that Israel’s rebellion would come at a cost and a plea for repentance. The kingdom to the North had fallen captive to Assyria and Isaiah was to let Judah know they were next to fall into captivity of a foreign enemy. His message was coupled with the good news of hope I mentioned earlier as well. Isaiah had seen the glory of the Lord and knew others would as well. It was His job to urge them to have the appropriate response of confession and repentance as Isaiah had done in his vision.
Isaiah’s message can be split into two parts:
Words of Judgement (1:1- 39:8)
Words of Comfort and Hope (40:1-66:24)
When Israel turned to foreign nations for help from their oppressors, Isaiah was outraged and tried to tell them that repentance and trust in the One True God was the only thing that would save them. It was clear that attempts to make an alliance with anyone but God Himself, was an invitation for a downfall and destruction.
Isaiah was one of God’s chosen prophets in the reign of four different kings and was executed under the rule of King Manessah. This is an interesting fact because from Chapter 40 on of His book, he addresses Israel when they would have been freed from the captivity of the Babylonians which hasn’t even happened yet during his lifetime, just to again emphasize the prophetic nature of his message. Isaiah had died 150 years before Israel was freed.
It is toward the end of his writing that we read of the Hope and good news of freedom from Babylon. It is at the beginning of Chapter 40 that God announces to the people that their sin has been dealt with and they can return home, where God will establish His Kingdom over all the nations. The prophet Isaiah hopes that the people will respond and take on the role of servant, and share with all nations the good news of who God truly is after experiencing His justice and mercy for themselves. But initially, the people of Israel are angry and attempt to accuse God of neglect for allowing their captivity, but God shows them it was actually His judgement and it was for their benefit. Their proper response should have been repentance and reposturing to acknowledge Him as the King of all nations, BUT they were still a rebellious people and didn't choose God just like their ancestors before them. But just because God’s chosen people refuse to cooperate with His plan, God doesn’t stop working out His promises and says He is going to do a NEW THING(Chapter 48) and send His own SERVANT. God gives us more of a glimpse into His plan of sending His Living Hope.
We are told this Servant will be empowered by God’s Spirit, He will restore Israel back to God, and would be a light to all the nations, just as was mentioned of the Messianic King from Chapter 9. He would bring God’s news and establish God’s Kingdom.
Then we are told of HOW this servant King would accomplish all of this. He would be rejected and beaten and killed by his own people. He would die as a sacrifice on behalf of His own people as atonement for their sin. Then we read that the beaten servant would be alive again and that through His death and resurrection He would provide a way to declare people righteous before God once again.
We are then told of two responses that all people can have to this servant and what He has done. They can humble themselves and repent taking up the title of “servants” for themselves and experience the promised blessing of the messianic Kingdom OR the people can reject and deny The Servant and his servants and are called “The Wicked”.
The servants inherit God’s Kingdom The suffering servant King creates a covenant family of ALL nations who await with Hope for God’s Justice and renewed Creation. Isaiah ends with the predicted future fulfillment of all of God’s covenant promises, even those that speak of Jesus second coming.
But as we read on in the other prophets' books, we learn that their exile and restoration of God’s people back to their established dwelling place was insufficient in keeping God’s people on track in obedience and devotion to Him.
From the writings of Haggai and Malachi we find the people still in a miserly state of disobedience and apathy concerning rebuilding the temple which had been destroyed during the Babylonian captivity. The people are found living unaware of God’s love.
Malachi is the last prophetic book which concludes with the prediction of the forerunner of Christ, whom we know as John the Baptist. Malachi also distinguishes between people robbing God and those who are considered the “faithful remnant”. The last chapter of Malachi ends with the announcement and warning that the Sun of Righteousness was coming.
It is from this writing that we fall into what is sometimes known as “The Silent Years”. From Malachi to Matthew, God revealed nothing new through any prophets, and was seemingly “silent”. But to be clear, God was not silent at all. The Israelites had the Word of God. They knew what was required of them and how God wanted them to live. This alone should have been enough, but it wasn’t, and that when Jesus enters the scene and the fulfillment of all the messianic prophecies begin to take place! It truly is a marvel to cross reference them and see the glory of how perfect and exact they all are!
The summation of the Prophets' works is to tell the story of how God would use the epic failures and exile of his people and turn them into a story of Hope and restoration for all people and all nations!