Please turn in your Bibles to the book of Exodus, chapter 18. I mean, book of Deuteronomy, sorry. Deuteronomy 18. I might say we've been doing a series on the themes of the Pentateuch, and as we prepare for Communion, we'll be doing a series of three on the prophet, priest, and king. I'm going to let you do a lot of the work of thinking about how Christ relates, and just show you what's often involved in those three offices. So Lord willing, next week we'll be doing priests, and then the following week the idea of the kingship, and you'll need to be thinking about how those all relate to Christ, and I'll let you do that. jump forward to Deuteronomy and the verses that speak about the prophetic work and the office of the prophet. You might say to the children, you might just draw something that you'd like to know about the future. It might be who you'd marry, what career you have, where you live, what kind of car, whatever it is that would be of interest to you, that you would like to know that's in the future. So on page 239, Deuteronomy 18, beginning with verse 9. When you enter the land which the Lord your God gives you, You should not learn to imitate the detestable things of those nations. This should not be found among you, anyone who makes a son or a daughter pass through the fire, one who uses divination, one who practices witchcraft, or one who interprets omens or a sorcerer, or one who casts a spell or a medium or a spiritist, or one who calls up from the dead. For whoever does these things is detestable to the Lord. And because of these detestable things, the Lord your God will drive them out before you. You shall be blameless before the Lord your God. For those nations which you shall dispossess, listen to those who practice witchcraft and to diviners. But as for you, the Lord your God has not allowed you to do so. The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your countrymen. You shall listen to him. This is according to all that you ask of the Lord your God in Horeb on the day of December saying, let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God. Let me not see this great heart anymore. lest I die. And the Lord said to me, they have spoken well. I will rise up a prophet from among their countrymen like you, and I will put my words in his mouth, and he will speak to them all that I command him. And it shall come about that whoever will not listen to my words, which he shall speak in my name, I myself am required of him. But the prophet who shall speak a word presumptuously in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, but which he shall speak in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die." And you may say in your heart, how shall I know the word which the Lord has not spoken? When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not come true about come about or come true, that is a thing which the Lord has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You should not be afraid of him." And then going to the end of Deuteronomy, the final verses, a summary of Moses and who he was. as a man of God, verses 9-12, chapter 34, page 262. Now Joshua, the son of Nun, was filled with the spirit of wisdom, for Moses laid his hands on him, and the sons of Israel listened to him, and did as the Lord had commanded Moses. Since then, no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face, for all the signs and wonders which the Lord sent to him to perform in the land of Egypt against Pharaoh, all the serpents and all the lambs, and for all the mighty power and for all the great terror which Moses performed in the sight of all Israel." There is a sermon outline on the back cover of the bulletin. I remember reading quite a number of years ago a story of a man who claimed to have really some sort of psychic power to predict the winners in certain football games. Now, I think this is a true story. It's been probably 20 years ago, but I remember reading about it. that he would send out to various people a letter on about the first week of the football season. He would say, you know, I'm better than all the others in predicting the football game outcome. They're right, maybe two-thirds or 70% of the time, but I'm always right. To show you that that's the case, and then he'd pick one particular game, he'd say, on this team. Take a hundred dollars out of savings and bet on it, and you'll win. Then maybe a week later, these folks would get another letter saying, those who took my advice, who bet on the first game, had doubled their money. Now, I usually charge quite a bit of money for this service, but I will again, to show that I'm true to what I'm saying, I'll tell you who to pick. And he'd tell them to pick another game, which team, and to bet on it. Then, another week later, there'd be another letter. And he'd emphasize how he'd got the first game right. And I had gotten the second game right. And if you wanted to double your money again to vote, I'm still another team. They selected. And this went on for six weeks. And various wands would get these letters telling who to pick, and then afterward they'd get a letter saying, I was right. And so if you got that seventh letter, he would remind you that week one I told you to pick this team, and they won, and week two, and week three, and week four I told you about their subset, and they were right, and week five, and week six. If you'd taken my advice and had bet $100 and kept betting it, you now have over $3,000. And he said, give you one more prediction. But this time, having proved how accurate I am, if you want to know which team to bet on, you need to send me $100 and I'll tell you. It's fascinating to think about this. How many of your neighbours, how many of your co-workers would be interested in that? with this track record of always seeing the future, of being able to predict, time and again, the right team. And incidentally, he had been doing that every year since then, and would have been just as accurate. And it's too bad that he was arrested and cut short from doing that. But there's something about that that fascinates us. How could this person, this stranger, write to me week after week telling me who's going to win a particular football game? Somebody's good at really, you know, probably handicapped football, maybe could do that several weeks, but they always mess up. How could he do it week after week? Does he have some sort of special insight? some sort of special knowledge, in some ways a psychic about football. And we're fascinated by wanting to know the future. And those who claim that they can see the future, that's because of society. That fascinates us. You just think of how many TV shows or movies or books have had a counterpart, a character who maybe sees a little bit of the future or knows something or has a premonition and it comes true. How many people around us can really make a living by saying they can see the future? And we can go around Bloomington and see. places where fortune tellers and psychics have set up shops, where people will come in and pay them $25 or $50 to tell them about the future. And all you have to do is pick up the local newspaper, or really just about virtually any newspaper in the land, and what do you have? You find a horoscope. And most would say, well, yeah, it's not scientific, but they read it. and they're curious as to what it says about their day. And it's regarded as somehow great to have this knowledge that others don't. How good it would be to be able to see the future, even to have some sort of premonition, that if a disaster is going to happen, that you'd be aware and could adjust what you do. or in the sky, as he tells you who's going to win the football game, to go out and to be able to bet, and to take a second mortgage out on your house knowing that you're going to win the bet. At least it seems that way. And all of this, this knowledge of the future, intrigues society that may intrigue us. Are there those who know the future? And what characterizes that? Well, to help us understand, we can go to the Old Testament and look at what it says about prophets. And the first point that we can see as we do that is that the Old Testament makes it clear that there are legitimate prophets, there are true prophets, but also there are false prophets. Though there are those who claim to know things that others don't know, who are false. And they're not to be listened to, and we need to be careful about it. And the first point that we can see, as we would look at Deuteronomy 18, is that God's people are not to seek special knowledge in the wrong way. And if you look at verses 10 and 11 there, it goes and lists all the different ways that the nations round about try to gain some sort of special knowledge of having the sons and the daughters pass through the fire. And it seems like that's a reference to child sacrifice, that if you would offer your child, you would hope to have some special favor, a word from God, a sign from God. and then practicing divination, witchcraft, interpreting omens, sorcery, casting a spell, being a medium, being a spiritualist, one who calls up the dead. Now a lot of these terms overlap, but what we have as you read that list is an all-encompassing list. Whatever form, whatever variety is out there of people who climb by some sort of magical method, some sort of superstitious method to gain greater insight, greater knowledge than what the people have, is wrong. All of these things are designed by the person who does them to say, I know something that you don't know. I know something about the future. I know something that I can tell you, what the will of the gods are, what your fate is going to be. Unless we think that these things are openly related to Baptist Moses today, we have these very same things going on today. We have the fortune teller looking into the crystal ball, saying that she can tell you what's going to happen. As a palm reader, as one who reads tea leaves. You have seances and spiritualists who claim to be able to contact the dead. You have people using Ouija boards and horoscopes and astrology and all the rest. You have psychics of all sorts that you can call and get a message. And we now have witches who are actually part of the chaplaincy of our armed forces, being recognized. But they're false. And how is that man able to correctly choose seven weeks in a row the right football team, and how could he do it year after year? Word's very simple. He took a mailing list of 10,000 people, and 5,000 he said Team X is going to win, and then the other five he said Team Y is going to win, because they're opponents. Half the people got the right answer. And so he took that mailing list and he divided it in two, and 2,500 he said Team Z is going to win, and Team Q is going to win. And each time, half would be right, half would be wrong. He'd discard the half that was wrong, but he'd then focus on the half that was right. And by the end, he had about 200 people who had been right. He had been with them for six weeks, had been right every time, and now he's making his appeal. Send me the money. And he's hoping that enough people will send him enough money that he's able to live comfortably for a whole year. Now the government authorities concluded that was fraud. It's very clever. If you were the one that had gotten the right answer for six weeks in a row, you might think this guy is on to something. But is this a fraud? And we need to be discerning because there are all sorts of people out there who claim to have special knowledge and don't. And notice in Deuteronomy 18, especially verse 9, it talks about these things are the testable to the Lord. And in verse 12, it's even stronger, the one who does these things is the testable to the Lord. Or it could be translated abomination. to the Lord, and the ones who do these types of things are abominations to the Lord. Why are these things so detestable to God? Well, it's basically saying there's some other source of power, some other source of knowledge, some other source of wisdom that can really help, that I can call upon in this situation and will give me what I need. It's a rejection of the God of the Bible. It's a rejection of the way in which He communicates with us. It's looking to some other power, other than God, for our answers. It's really a rebellion, an idolatry against God, of looking to somebody else having that special power. knowledge of the future than the God of the Bible. Secondly, we see that God does speak through his legitimate prophets. Verse 15 says, it's really a promise that there's going to be a line of prophets, that God is going to be raising up again and again for his people, those who would be legitimate prophets. They will hear and speak on behalf of God. They will say with authority, thus says the Lord. Because they have a message from God. And it's to be listened to. And how can you know a true prophet from one who would be false, one who would be claiming to be a prophet but is not? Well, really in these verses there are three tests given. First is in verse 20. If he speaks in some other name, is that he claims to be prophet, but speaks in any other name, any of the names of the Canaanites, any of the other religions today, such a one is a false prophet by definition. Because the true prophet is going to point you to God, is going to point you to the covenant God, is going to point you to the covenant relationship. And anyone who points you in any other direction is pointing you in the wrong direction. It's a false prophet. He's not to be listened to. He's not to be feared. In fact, he's to be put to death for his sins. What if a person claims that he's speaking in the name of the Lord? A very simple test. You look at what he predicts. If it comes true, he's a true prophet. If it doesn't, he's not. The true prophet of the Lord will speak to God's people a message that's understandable, And there were prophets around in that day, most prominent was the Delphi Oracles, that had these speaking, but nobody could understand what they were saying. And so they had a second section that interpreted what they were saying, and that sort of thing. So the truth, the prophet would speak very forthrightly, giving details. You know, next year, there'll be a drought. to go from this city to that city, and there'll be three months when it never rains. And the people could understand it, and they could look back and say it happened or it didn't happen. If it did come true, then he's a true prophet, and if it didn't, he's focused presumptuously. He's not a true prophet. And the third test is implied in those words in verse 15, like me. That that prophet was to resemble, was to be like Moses. And part of that is to come from within the people. He wasn't to come from outside, from outside. In effect, what it's saying is that Moses is a If you want to know what a true prophet looks like, look at Moses and what you see true of him, you should see true of anyone else who comes along in that line of prophets. Now there is a difference as we read in verse 34, verse 10. No prophet has arisen that is like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. So if Moses was the greatest of all of Israel's prophets, he had an intimacy with God, or seeing God face to face, that none of the others had. But he's also that one who is a pattern. And what we see being true as Moses, as he was a prophet, is true. And for all the later prophets. Second point. We need to see, as we look at the Old Testament, there are four terms that are used to describe this prophetic office. And each one gives us a glimpse, a little insight into what's involved in being a prophet. One of them is found in Jeremiah 7.25 and other places, where God refers to the prophets as My servants. My servants. The prophets were servants of God. They weren't fulfilling their office in order to gain an advantage for themselves, to earn a reputation, to enjoy a comfortable life. They were doing it in service to God. And if you look, many of the things they were called to do were difficult, were hard. But they did it because they were serving God and not themselves. You might think of Elijah and Elisha going to the kings and bringing them in a popular message of having to stand before the king and rebuke him. Ezekiel having to lay on his side, his left side. for 390 days. And then he has to turn over and be on his right side, but only for 40 days. Or Hosea, having to marry Gomer, a prostitute. They did some incredible things, some incredibly hard things, but they did it because they were servants. of God. And serving God was the most important thing to them. The second term that is used is man of God. It's used 29 times in the scripture for the prophet Isaiah. 15 times it's used in 1 Kings 13 for that unnamed prophet of Judah. He goes up to the northern kingdom and speaks against it. That term, man of God, would express the idea of a close relationship to God. Now, all of God's people are to have a relationship and to seek to have a close relationship with God, but there were some who were specifically identified as being men of God, of being close to God, of being known for being with God. And the prophets were those who fell in that category. A third term is the word seer. It's used three times in 1 Samuel 9 and some other places. There it's used to refer to Samuel, that early prophet. And that term is used for the ability of the prophet to see. To be able to see in the future, to be able to see things that others couldn't. In that very chapter, as Saul is out there and looking for some lost Dantes, we see Samuel demonstrating that whole aspect, as he says, well next day you're going to go back, and at such a place you're going to meet some men, and they're going to tell you that the Dante is okay, and now your dad is worried about you. He could see all that was going to happen the next day. And so the word seer is used to regard to that vision, that ability to see beyond maybe the circumstances, what was on the surface, but often to the future. And the fourth term is the one that's used most often. It's translated prophet nearly 400 times in the Old Testament. And it's related to the word call or proclaim. And we're not sure whether it's passive or active. In some ways it doesn't matter. If it's active, it's one who proclaims. And if it's passive, it means one who is called. But both have the idea that they're proclaiming a message from God. They've been called by God to proclaim that message. And so it implies that the message they speak is God's Word. The message is not their own. It's their thinking about what's going on in society, and the injustices that are taking place, and thus they speak. No, they're speaking because God is concerned about the injustices, how the slaves are being treated, and they speak on God's behalf. The third point to see is the work of the prophets. Again, I say it's all patterned in some ways after what we see here in terms of Moses. He's the template. And we can see six things standing out. First of all, the prophet received a specific and personal call from God. The initiative in making a prophet rests with God. And so we click on Moses. When was Moses called to his work as a prophet? We read about it several weeks ago and talked about it in that encounter of the burning bush, where God calls him and sets him apart to be the one who is his spokesman to the nation of Israel, but to Pharaoh and the Egyptians as well. And we can go through and see that same pattern. And Isaiah 6 called to be a prophet. Jeremiah and Jeremiah 4, Ezekiel and Ezekiel 1, chapters 1 to 3, and on and on. These men didn't take the office on themselves, but God called them to be a prophet. And part of that calling And you'd look and you could look through all those places, and we looked at it in terms of Moses at the burning bush. They're called, first of all, into the presence of God. They're called to be aware of who God is. They're called to be a prophet, to go and to serve. It's as they first encounter God that they understand who it is they're standing before. that when Moses goes and stands before Pharaoh, it's as one who's been in the presence of the living God, who knows the living God, and can thus not be afraid of the most powerful man in the world, because he's been with someone infinitely more powerful. And so he's called first into God's presence, and then to be a spokesman. Second thing we can notice is the prophets had a prophetic awareness of history. I read a very apt quote that said that Israel alone of the ancients had a sense of history. Others recorded the history and could record events and and when a battle took place, or when there was some big catastrophe. But Israel, and begins with Moses, records history not just as history, but the significance. And you could go through the whole book of Deuteronomy. Because there Moses is recounting what's happened. But he's just not telling the facts. He's also telling the significance of what was going on. And down the line is of course the fact that Yahweh, the God of the Bible, is the God of history. And so he was directing what was going on. And those plagues that came upon Egypt weren't just some random events that took place, but were part of God's judgment. And so, you could look, and as you'd look, there'd be two major themes in the history. One would be of judgment, and the other is salvation, in various places. one or the other may be highlighted and pointed to as they recount the history. Third thing we can see about the prophetic office is it involved speaking to ethical or moral issues and social issues of the day. It dealt, yes, with a relationship with God, and we won't go into that. That's central. But it also dealt with a relationship with a fellow man. And that was close behind that first one. And so as you read Moses and he gives these words, he's talking about justice being done. How the poor to be helped. Addressing the needs of the fatherless and the widow. And if you go into Isaiah and Jeremiah, and they maybe predict the captivity. It's related to the social conditions of the time, the lack of justice taking place in the nation, how the slaves are being exploited and therefore you're going to go into captivity and feel what it means. Fourthly, there's a combination of both proclamation and prediction. We often think in terms of the prophet as predicting the future, where Jesus is going to be born. In Bethlehem or some similar things. And that takes place. That foretelling. But it's in the context of a foretelling. There's some traditions going on that causes the prophet to foretell the future, and it's related to what's going on. It's related to the rebelliousness of the people, and their need for a savior, and then we get the prediction of where the Messiah is going to be born. Or we can think here of Deuteronomy 18, that we looked at this great prophecy that Moses gives of a coming prophet. Well, if you look, it's rooted in his day, what's going on. Because the question in that whole chapter is, where is Israel going to go for guidance? Are they going to go to the nations? Are they going to go for all these practices around about them, or not? And they're forbidden to do so. They're to go alone. The only place is through this line of prophets. But then there's a realization there's going to be one great process in that line of process. A fifth feature of the prophetic office were actions that really demonstrated the power of God, that pointed to God being at work. Now sometimes those actions were just outright miracles. the ten plagues, the hymn, the name, the leper, of withholding rain for years, of raising someone who's been dead. But sometimes, too, those actions are more of a symbolic action. You know, Moses having his hands lifted up, and when they give Israel one, and when they get down, Israel is being defeated. Or we could look at Ezekiel and see him building a little siege model in the sand, as a command for the prophet, for the king, to pound on the ground a certain number of times to strike the ground. But in all these things, God was showing that he was active, that he was at work in his And finally, the last part of the prophetic office is intercessory prayer. Praying for God's people. We can think about that in the terms of Moses as he comes down to the mountain of the Ten Commandments and they've built the golden calf. As he throws down those tablets, what does he do? He goes back, falls on his face. He prays for 40 days. He intercedes for the people. And they can think of the next great prophet to come along, Samuel. And as the people demand a king, and as he speaks to them, and as he does anoint Saul, and yet he does so rebuking them and telling them what they have done is sinful, the people say, well, pray for us. In his words in 1 Samuel 12, 23, moral rest for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for you. That as a prophet he was continually in prayer for the people of God. And we often think of the prophets in terms of their ability to predict the future, but that's only one small part. of a much greater whole of the work they were called to do. The fourth point, and I'll let you fill in the gaps here, but just to realize the ultimate fulfillment of this prophecy is found in Jesus Christ. We read in Acts 3, where Peter is specifically making the point that that prophet to come, that one great prophet like Moses, and greater than Moses, was Jesus Christ. And as we read in Matthew 12, Jesus points out that one greater than Jonah was here. He's really saying there's a prophet greater than the Old Testament prophets, and that was of course himself. Jesus Christ was the last and the greatest of the prophets. The Old Testament prophets, and we can see that in Acts 3, look forward to what Christ was going to do. They spoke about the salvation He would bring. But Jesus Christ was the one who brought that salvation. He accomplished it. And so He is the prophet. without equal, that all scripture points to. For application, we're called upon, in Deuteronomy 18, 19, to listen, to realize, as the prophet speaks, He's not speaking his own words, he's speaking the words of God. And so we dare not neglect or fail to heed those words. And we have those words of the prophets recorded for us now in the Bible. We no longer have a need for prophets to come along and say, thus says the Lord, because it's been recorded for us in the scriptures. But we need to be careful to pay attention to those words. And secondly, to pay attention to the great prophet. To heed the words of Jesus Christ. And specifically, as they call us, to repent of our sin and to believe in Him, that that would be the foundation for our lives and the choices we make. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we give You thanks that we've seen Jesus Christ, that one that was spoken of thousands of years before by Moses, that there would be a line of prophets, but then there would be one great prophet who accomplished all that the Old Testament predicted. And we see that being true in Jesus Christ, that he is the one that not merely talked about salvation, not merely talked about what God would do in bringing salvation to men and women, but he accomplished it by his death on the cross, and we give you thanks for that. And the implication that it has, that just as ancient Israel was not to neglect the words of the prophet, because they were your words, that we're not to neglect in any way the words of Jesus Christ, the words that we have recorded for us in the scriptures, because they are your word as well. Give us ears to hear and hearts to take in your word and apply it in our lives. We pray these things in Christ's name. Amen.