Prophetic Voice-Intro
May we look upon our treasure, our furniture and our garments. And try to discover whether the seeds of war are nourished by these, our possessions. John Woolman, Quaker Wisdom
Gregg’s Reflection
Throughout the Old Testament, the prophetic word comes from unusual sources. The prophets were not rabbis, they were outsiders who always lived at the edge of the inside, closer to the poor than the powerful, able to critique a system they were a part of. People rarely listened, and the powers that be always attacked and dismissed them. The prophetic voice never comes from where we expect to hear it.
In the Sounds of Silence, Simon and Garfunkel tell us:
And the sign said, "The words of the prophets
Are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls
And whispered in the sounds of silence"
Saint Francis was a prophet whose life touched many in his time, and continues to resonate deeply with people today. He grew up son of a merchant, went off to war, was captured and imprisoned for a year. Reflecting on his life, he had seen the beauty of nature all around, and was awakened to a deeper journey. A dream called him to serve the Lord.
He walked away from his family wealth, kissed a leper he encountered in the countryside and found love entering his heart. Praying before a crucifix in a church ruin, he heard Christ tell him to ‘go and repair the church.’ He sold everything he had to fulfill that call. It became his home. In his own words, he ’left the world’ and married Lady Poverty. Clare of Assisi joined his band of followers. Francis started the Franciscan order, and Clare followed, founding the Poor Clares.
During the Crusades, he traveled to meet the Sultan, crossed no man’s land with only one companion and met with the leader of the Muslim Armies to talk peace. It was a model of Muslim/Christian dialog that is a beacon to us today. Francis was a prophet, and his Franciscan order drew Richard Rohr early in life.
I didn’t grow up in church, and what I saw of the church was summarized by saying, “People dress up and go to church on Sunday. Then from Monday to Saturday you can’t see much evidence lived out in so many.” As an Enneagram 8, the Challenger, I could see the brokenness of the church in my teenage years.
Genie and I saw the movie Brother Sun, Sister Moon about St Francis and Clare. It made a huge impact on me. I was struck by how closely they imitated the life of Jesus in their lives and ministry. That was the really real. We have drifted so far from this example. Yet, some fifty years later, no one wants to hear about the brokenness of the American church.
In the Living School, I got to ask Richard Rohr this question one day: I find that the prophetic voice often evokes defensiveness. I find very little learning happens when people become defensive. So, how do we communicate prophetic messages without causing defensiveness and shutting down learning? He responded:
You have to move to soft prophecy, encouraging movement to the better, not condemning the present. Avoid all accusatory language. The accusatory voice is Satan. The voice of God never works through guilt and shame. We all get tired of being judged, railed at. They are zealots. The best critique of the good is the practice of the better.
My pastor in Atlanta, Scott Armstrong says, “You never invite the prophet to dinner twice.” Ponder that for a minute. Let us wade into the Prophetic Voice of the Saints and Mystics across history and try to see the world as God sees it.
Blessings, Gregg
Journaling Prompts
Have you found voice to critique the brokenness of the system around us? In what ways has God given you ’eyes to see’ more deeply that the superficial view our cultural religion gives us? Peter Drucker said, “Culture eats religion for lunch.” Contemplate what that means in our world today.
Scripture
I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their fellow Israelites, and I will put my words in his mouth. He will tell them everything I command him.
Deuteronomy 18:18
The the Lord reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, “I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant.”
Jeremiah 1:9
Then what did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet.
Matthew 11:9
And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare the way for him, to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.
Luke 1:76-79
After the people saw the signs Jesus performed, they began to say,“Surely this is the Prophet who is to come into the world.”
John 6:14
For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.
2 Peter 1:21
Ancient Writings
It is necessary for the perfection of human society that there should be men who devote their lives to contemplation.
Thomas Aquinas
There is not in the world a kind of life more sweet and delightful, than that of a continual conversation with God; those only can comprehend it who practice and experience it.
Brother Lawrence
May we look upon our treasure, our furniture and our garments. And try to discover whether the seeds of war are nourished by these, our possessions.
John Woolman, A Plea for the Poor (1763)
Modern Writings
Save me from the curse that lies dark across the modern clergy: the curse of compromise, of imitation, of professionalism. Save me from the error of judging a church by its size, its popularity or the amount of its yearly offering. Help me to remember that I am a prophet—not a promoter, not a religious manager, but a prophet. Let me never become a slave to crowds. Heal my soul of carnal ambitions and deliver me from the itch for publicity.
A.W. Tozer, Voice of a Prophet: Who Speaks for God?
Jesus seems to have taken every possible opportunity of getting away to a quiet and lonely place for prayer and reflection. “In the morning, while it was still very dark,” Mark 1:35 tells us, “[Jesus] got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed” (see also Mark 6:46 and Luke 4:42). Luke 5:16 says he did this regularly. Before choosing his twelve apostles, he spent the whole night in prayer, we are told (Luke 6:12).
What interests us here is the powerfully simple way in which prophecy and mysticism form an inseparable whole in the life and spirituality of Jesus. Traditionally prophets were mystics and mystics were prophets. Any idea that one could be a prophet calling for justice and social change without some experience of union with God was unthinkable. Equally unthinkable was any idea that one could be a perfectly good mystic without becoming critically outspoken about the injustices of one’s time.
Albert Nolan, Jesus Today: A Spirituality of Radical Freedom, p. 72
Prophets are never mainstream. They hold a completely different vision of life than do most. In fact, they hold the rest of the vision of holiness, the part that seldom is taught in the same breath as charity or morality or good citizenship. They are the other half of Christianity, the forgotten half of the spirituality of the Christian world. They see what’s missing in the world around them and set out to see that the world supplies it for those who need it most. They value other ends in life than the ones toward which most of the world strains for too much wealth, too much power, and too much distance from the dailiness of the daily.
The prophet in this day facing a world where rugged individualism reigns and those who can’t make it on their own are easily forgotten now must do more than simply serve. They must lead this world beyond its present divisions of race and gender, of national identity and economic class. Yes, the prophet is always out of step with the average response to pain or want or loss or oppression. They are always disturbingly different, always stirring up the consciousness of those left behind, always confronting a world that obstructs them, always on a path toward the Kingdom rather than the palace.
Joan Chittister, The Time is Now: A call to Uncommon Courage
Most of the prophets seem to be ordinary people who find themselves with a gift. Prophecy in the Bible is not a matter of foretelling, but to play with the English language a bit it’s forth-telling. Prophecy is speaking with such a forwardness of truth, direction, and passion that, after the fact, we say the prophet foretold it.
It’s not that they’re really predicting something, it’s just that they have immense spiritual insight. The original Hebrew word for a prophet meant simply that: one who sees. A prophet is a seer who sees all the way through. The reason prophets can speak so clearly and strongly in the now is because they judge the now from, of all places, the future. Prophets have seen the future. In other words, they have seen where God is leading humanity. They have seen and drawn close to the heart of God and they know God is leading us somewhere good.
Since they know the conclusion and where it is that we’re heading, they become impatient and angry at the present state of things. If we know where history is going and what God is leading us toward; if we know what our lives could and should be, why are we wasting time with all this violence and all this stupidity? The prophets judge the present by the perspective of the future. Perhaps that’s how we began to think that prophets foretold the future because they forth-told the future.
They were the original futurists. The fancy, theological word for this is eschatology. The prophets live out of this futuristic vision of God’s dream for the world, where God is leading history, and where it’s all headed. Prophets become so infatuated with that final ideal goal and vision that they become passionately sad and angry about what we’re doing now. Once we experience the universal being of God, the present becomes so dissatisfying and disappointing. We wonder how people can be satisfied with so little and content with such tawdry lives.
Richard Rohr, Way of the Prophet (Albuquerque, NM: Center for Action and Contemplation, 1994)
And so we need the prophets, the far-seeing ones, the dreamers in broad daylight, the long-distance high beams that show us glimpses of where we are going and what the outcome of our choices and lifestyles will be. One way to define a prophet is a person who sees so clearly what is happening in the present moment that he or she can tell us what is going to happen if we don’t change immediately and radically. God is not indifferent to or far from anyone’s life, but rather draws near to those who know pain because of the sin and indifference of others. The prophet loudly insists that God is not impartial and that God will not allow anyone who professes belief in the Holy to harm another.
Megan McKenna, Prophets: Words of Fire, p. 19, 22.