Prophet-ting with God

 

“It is the vocation of the prophet to keep alive the ministry of imagination, to keep on conjuring and proposing futures alternative to the single one the king wants to urge as the only thinkable one.” Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination

 

Yesterday in church, we began to learn from and listen to the prophets.  We often have the job description of a prophet as a fortune-teller peering into and predicting the future.  However, prophets are more concerned about the present moment.  The prophets were less prognosticators and more pragmatists.  More than just pointing out the brokenness, the prophets sought to call people to reform and repent, to return to a relationship with God.  The prophets are calling us to keep God at the center, which is difficult. The prophets wanted people to stop putting all their trust in kings or fame or fortune (perhaps this sounds eerily familiar in a world where we are still shaped by politics, economics, marketing, and indivisible analytics online that want your attention to keep clicking on another story). 

 

There are four major prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel) and twelve minor prophets (Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi).  The distinction between major and minor has nothing to do with some earned status, nor is this meant to rate or rank the importance of what each prophet.  The classification and categorization are based on length.  Sorry, I totally spoiled the conspiracy theory or quieted the defense attorney who wanted to have Amos assigned to the major class.  The twelve minor prophets tend to be a few chapters in length and can be read in less than an hour.  The major prophets span several chapters and take longer to read ~ we will see that in September with Jeremiah.

 

What, if anything, do you remember about the prophets?

 

Maybe you think of Isaiah 11, the Peaceable Kingdom, where the wolf and lamb frolic and are friends.  Or hearing Isaiah 9 at Advent in December as foretelling Jesus as the “Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”  Or perhaps you remember the flannel board in Sunday School as you heard about Daniel in the lions' den or Jonah swallowed (gulp) by a whale, only to be burped out on the beach of Niveah ~ the place he did not want to be!  Reminding us that God has a wicked sense of humor.

 

What other stories do you remember about the prophets?  Maybe Jeremiah is talking about being a child, unable to preach, or how he goes to the potter’s house as an act of prophetic imagination that God isn’t finished with the clay called “our life” yet.  Maybe you remember Ezekiel and dem dry bones, which you will now be singing all day!  You are welcome.

 

How do those above stories mesh or make sense with a prophet who isn’t only trying to predict but also reform and reframe the present?  God is restoring our broken bones of life, shaping us like clay right now, calling us to connect with people we don’t want to care about (our neighbors or enemies), which can feel like we are in a lion’s den.  How is Christ’s presence giving us a vision of a different way of living ~ not in some future lightyears away, but here in this place and moment?  Ponder with me the prophets’ role as ones who want to awaken our imagination to live in the possible of this less-than-perfect/polished present moment.  Amen.