Despise not prophesyings

IThess5:20

By Michael Bahjejian

The verse we are studying tonight comes from the book of 1 Thess. This letter, written by Paul has for theme ‘the return of Jesus’. In Chap 5, we learn that Jesus will come as a thief in the night and believers are advised to be self controlled and alert. Among many other recommendations that are useful to the Christian walk, the readers are advised not to despise the prophecies.

Do not despise prophesying RSV
Despise not prophesyings KJV
Do not treat prophecies with contempt NIV

1. What is it to despise?

According to the dictionary, to despise is ‘to considerer as unworthy of attention or interest’. In Kiwi slang, you would say, ‘I couldn’t care less’ for example and there are many other ways to express despising. In Jesus time, Publicans were despised by the Jews because they were the tax collectors working for the invaders, the Romans. In France, during the last war, collaborators with the Germans were despised by the population. In India, Untouchables are despised by all the other people and in Pakistan or in Egypt today, Christians are despised by Muslims. We could say that to despise something or someone is to reject them as soon as possible and as far as possible. It is therefore a very strong term. How come then, is it possible to despise a prophecy that is supposed to be a special message from God?

2. What is a prophecy?

The Illustrated dictionary of the Bible, p875, defines a prophecy as a special message from God, often uttered through human spokesmen, which indicate the divine will for mankind on earth and in heaven. I think that the type of prophecies mentioned there is similar to the prophecy given to Timothy about himself in I Tim 1:18
This charge I commit to you, son Timothy, according to the prophecies previously made concerning you, that by them you may wage the good warfare ,…
This is a prophecy about someone, yourself or someone else. As Tyrone asked us recently, we have all been given some prophecies some day that might have been a promise or a warning. We might have forgotten them, but God always remembers His words.

3. How is it possible to despise a prophecy?

There is a paradox between people’s apparent eagerness to ear God’s voice as we sing it ourselves when we sing “let me hear your voice” for example and the obvious difficulty that people have to accept and remember prophecies, even when they are positives and concern themselves. It is true that we can forget and we often forget things that are spiritual. However, I don’t think that forgetting is despising; it is just neglect.
For example, when Jesus meets the disciples on the walk to Emmaus, it seems that these disciples have forgotten all the promises. Jesus then takes the time to remind them about the promises and they can feel their hearts burning within them (Luke 24:32b).

To despise is more than forgetting. It is an active word requiring an active act of reject. A prophecy can be frightening, as it happened to Moses at the burning bush, making us feel inadequate for the task and we tell God, ‘Sorry God, I am not the right person, please choose someone else’ as if God didn’t know who we are and what we can do in His hand. It can seem unreasonable as it happened to Jonah. ‘It is not fair!’ can be our judgement, or it is not legal, as it happened to Peter when he was asked to eat the impure animals. It can be difficult to believe, supernatural, like being promised a child when you are not able anymore to carry a child anymore as it happened to Sarah or without knowing a man as it was announced to Mary. Sarah laughed at the prophecy and then she did not laugh anymore as she realised that it was serious but Mary just believed. A prophecy can be about doing something we really don’t want to do or going somewhere we wouldn’t like to go, but I think that what make a prophecy despicable is that it comes most often through the mouth of a human being, someone who is a sinner as we all are. It is then up to us to discern when it comes from God and when it doesn’t.


4. What are the ways to avoid a bad attitude?

A special message of God, whether it is good or bad, whether we like it or not is something rare and precious. It is worth trying to remember it and not let the devil rob us and the church of God’s messages. Let us remember that a prophecy doesn’t depend on the person who gives the prophecy. Good on you if it is given by God personally or an angel like Gabriel or even an official prophet like Ezekiel. But keep aware that God can also use ordinary people, believers or not and as a last resort he can make a donkey talk to you. So you see, there is no easy exit door to judge about the authenticity of a prophecy. It is most of all a question of fear of God that gives discernment. The Bible provides us with magnificent people who can teach us about dealing with prophecies properly.

Ps 62:11 David
God has spoken once, Twice I have heard this: That power belongs to God.
Ps 119:11
Your word I have hidden in my heart, That I might not sin against You!
Luc 2:19 Mary
But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart.
But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.

It requires courage. Paul encourages us to be his imitators as he is Christ’s in
Acts 26:19
"Therefore, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision,
and
Act 9:15-16
15 But the Lord said to him, "Go, for he is a chosen vessel of Mine to bear My name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel.
16 "For I will show him how many things he must suffer for My name's sake."

5. A word of conclusion

A last advice: if you hear prophecies that concerns you, write them down as soon as possible and keep them in a safe place even, if you don’t dare reading them for a few years.

May God bless you

THE SEVENTY WEEKS

Daniel 9:24-36

By Odon Bulamba (summary only - 23 March 2004)

It is a bit difficult when you read this passage but it is very easy to understand because it was a prophecy and things are being fulfilled so we can see them. When Jeremiah wrote this, people didn’t know what would come on earth. When Jeremiah wrote about what is going to happen to the people of Israel, people didn’t know anything. At that time there was a man called Daniel and he said it would be better to read what the prophets wrote. Although he didn’t know the meaning of his message, I will try. Daniel started to read these prophecies and he saw that Jeremiah prophesized that the people will be in slavery for 70 years and he saw that this was something difficult for him and his people. Although the 70 years were finished they were still in slavery and Daniel asked, ‘why that? 70 years have gone but we carry on suffering, has God forgotten us or not?’

He prayed to ask for forgiveness but instead of God answering his prayer, God gave him another message different from his prayer. How many times have we read the books of the prophets and how long do we take to read these books? And how many churches on earth talk about prophecies? I know churches that teach only from the book of Mathew, Mark, Luke and maybe from the book of Genesis. I also know some servants of God who twist what are the prophecies and they avoid talking about it. But if we don’t talk about prophecies, how will the people of God know what is going to happen? We need to know so we can get ready for the future.

At that time the angel Gabriel talked to David and he talked about the 69 weeks. The first seven weeks and then 62 weeks that follow. The Bible talks about 69 weeks. Don’t forget that in the book of numbers, and also in first Peter that one day for God is a thousand years. And when we talk about a week we see 7 days and if we think 69 weeks we can multiply it by 7 and it gives 483 days. The Bible says that everything that God does is according to a plan and nothing is done without God knowing about it. And when God talked to Daniel about these 70 weeks, He said, “During that time sanctify your self and repent and try to get stronger because on the 70th week I will destroy this nation. Don’t build Jerusalem, I will destroy you and everything that happened from the beginning until the 69 week was all about Israel”.

This was about these people with the 12 tribes of Jacob (not the 12 tribes of Esau). And on the 69th week grace came because people sinned, people committed all sorts of sins and God was most unhappy about it so God stopped on the 69th week and He said, I’ll go and help other nations because they might understand the future and what is going to happen. At that time Jesus was on earth, He preached and was crucified. I’m not talking too much about these 69 weeks because to understand them we first must know what is in Rev 10, 11 and 12. But we will go back to that one day so that we can know better about Israel.

So God gave us a time of grace and Jesus came to set us free because the heaven, His own, protected Him and He turned His face towards other nations (us). God wanted this bracket between the 69 weeks and the 70th week so that we could all have a good opportunity because what we have is a grace and it is a grace because it was not included into the 70th week.

If us today as Christians we talk about grace, it’s because we were not included into God’s program with His people. If we didn’t have this time of grace, today the world would not exist anymore but God wanted to help us so that we could understand His message. Because we are now in the time of the church of Laodicea, soon there will be the rapture. Soon Jesus will be back, soon things will change on earth and soon we will start the last week, so that the 70 weeks will be fulfilled. So those who will be ready in the Lord they will be gone but those who are not ready, will stay to see all that will happen on the 70th week. And that will be the horrible week, during that week even the roots of the trees will shake. Because it is a week and the week is made of days, and a day is made of hours and we cannot have an hour without minutes and the same with minutes we also have seconds. So before this week finishes, we’ll see the little signs of these seconds and these signs are here.

SUMMARY

- A thousand years is like one day for God
- We are living in the 69th week (the week of grace)
- Christ is coming back soon, the signs are there
- We have to make ourselves ready for His return