Prophetic

From Neoredemptive

Long before Post-Modernity emerged onto the theological scene, the western church began playing word games with its theology to protect the illusion that its forms, structures, offices, and functions resemble those of the first-century church. (Shocked that there's nothing novel about post-modern word games? Some say that's not all that's old news.)

Perhaps the most obvious such word game has been (and is still being) played with the word "prophetic".

Literally, "prophetic" means "pertaining to either a particular prophecy or prophet, or to prophecy or prophets in general". And what is prophecy, in the context of the Church? The New Testament consistently portrays prophecy for the Church era (present day included) as (roughly) utterances, spontaneously and directly inspired by the Holy Spirit, not necessarily authoritative, through which God moves to strengthen, encourage, and comfort His church. (See God's Empowering Presence, Paul, the Spirit, and the People of God, and The Gift of Prophecy in the New Testament and Today).

That prophecy (and, by extension, prophets) are to continue until that time when the "perfect" has come is irrefutable scripturally (1Cor 13, Eph 4). So when Reformation-era leaders and thinkers noticed that "prophecy" (per the Biblically faithful definition) was completely absent from the day-to-day life of the liturgical church, something had to be done. (After all, if the regulative principle truly has sway, prophecy - through two or three prophets, no less - is clearly mandated in 1 Corinthians 14.)

Their response was in the stream of the best of post-modern rhetoric. Rather than allowing themselves to be challenged to conform to the Scriptures, these well-meaning theologians deconstructed the word "prophecy" and replaced its old meaning with a new one more agreeable to the comfortably established practices of their own day.

For a time, "prophecy" and the "prophetic ministry" became synonymous with preaching. Preaching (done properly) is indeed an utterance, reflective of revelation given by the Holy Spirit (via Scripture), which strengthens, encourages, and comforts the Church. However, it is missing the definitive characteristics of spontaneity and direct inspiration by the Holy Spirit; preaching is more commonly and clearly reliant upon the Spirit's revelation in and through Scripture. (Which is not to say that these two will ever disagree - they will not.) Combined with an overstated doctrine of the Sufficiency of scripture and fear of the slippery slopes surrounding it, the case seemed closed.

Continuing this tradition in our own day, many liberal protestant movements and denominations have taken to calling themselves "prophetic" whenever they endorse contrarian theological, sociological, and ecclesiological positions; by "prophetic" they mean simply "boldly opposing some status quo". While it is certainly true that a person speaking on behalf of God will, almost invariably, be boldly opposing the status quo, it does not follow that any bold opposition of the status quo is necessarily of God and therefore prophetic (see wikipedia:Fallacy of the undistributed middle). Furthermore, the fact that many of these "prophetic" declarations are suspiciously agreeable to the prevailing winds of secular thought and defiant of the historic doctrines and traditions of the Church (not to mention the words of scripture itself) suggests that these "prophetic" declarations are boldly opposing the legitimate message and work of Christ (see Isaiah 8:20), and that the "spirit" behind them probably has more to do with the zeitgeist than the Holy Spirit.

The pentecostal and charismatic movements have been pushing to re-capture a vibrant and scripturally viable understanding of prophecy and all things prophetic, albeit often with mixed results. The urge to cheerlead or manipulate emotions under the guise of prophecy is strong, and is too often succumbed to. This does not invalidate the prophetic ministry in general any more than the worst abuses of preaching and the Eucharist invalidate those ordinances; however, the fact that we are struggling to come to a broader consensus on the parameters around the "right" practice of this ministry suggests that those who would prophesy must continually guard their hearts and hold themselves humbly accountable to men wiser than themselves.