Despise Not Prophesyings

Text: 2 Kings 7:1–11,16,17

Central Verse: "Then a lord on whose hand the king leaned answered the man of God, and said, Behold, if the Lord would make windows in heaven might this thing be? And he said, Behold, thou shalt see it with
thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof." [2 Kings 7:2]

Disbelief of prophecy is a characteristic of modernity. Even throughout the body of baptized believers there is a shocking skepticism about the efficacy of the prophetic word. Liberalism of
course denies all that is supernatural; yet even many a Fundamentalist
contends that the prophetic gift—although genuinely manifested in the
bible days—has disappeared with the close of "the apostolic age." They
misread 1 Corinthians 13:8, and claim that Paul predicted the gift
would fade away. They contort Hebrews 1:1,2 to support a conviction
that God speaks through the closed canon of scripture to the exclusion
of prophets.

Interestingly, there is no plainly worded passage that can be offered to support the notion that prophecy is dead, but
several that say it is a gift to the church. 1 Corinthians 12:28 and
Ephesians 4:11–13 similarly declare that prophets were given to us by
God—that they have a Holy Ghost-inspired ministry of edification. We
can even refer to the New Testament prophet Agabus as a model of how
modern prophets edify, in his case by warning the church of approaching
adversity [Acts 11:28, 21:10]. God can still speak to the immediate
situations of his people, as he did through Agabus, and it would not
challenge the primacy of scripture as our guide and measure.

It is difficult to ignore how doubters today resemble the trusted
counselor to the king of Israel in our lesson text. At this time,
Samaria was enduring a lengthy siege that had brought a calamitous
famine. The king and his court blamed Elisha (and, by extension, God)
for provoking their Syrian enemy to come down upon them so hard. They
were therefore dismissive of the prophet's prediction that provisions
would be sold at the city gates in a day's time. The disparaging words
of one unfortunate counselor caught the ear of Elisha, and the seer
added to his prophecy that that man would see the deliverance but not
be able to enjoy it.

The remarkable events that led to the flight of the Syrian host would have been impossible for any human
being to have imagined unaided by the Spirit. Nonetheless, the doubters
should have recognized that Elisha was a tested prophet of the
most-high God; he would not have spoken without divine authority. True
to the words of the prophecy, Israel was able to spoil the tents of the
Syrians, and to sell their abandoned supplies of flour and barley at
the gates of Samaria. Moreover, the king's counselor was trampled by
the crowds desperate to buy food, proving the prophecy against him
personally also true.

It is frankly dangerous to be despise prophesyings. There needs to be a certain wariness of showing contempt
for any variety of God's word. This does not mean we should lay
ourselves bare to charlatans and frauds: We are instructed to "believe
not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they be of God" [1 John
4:1]. We are to apply our own discernment to a unknown prophet. But we
must not, in the process, become dismissive of the prophet's office,
without risking the loss of a valuable conduit of information to
believers.