THIS IS PART OF AN ONGOING SERIES ON THE GIFT OF PROPHECY. Click here for the rest of the series.
“It is no leap in the dark to expect God to speak and to expect to speak on behalf of him.”
The relationship God sought to establish with his people was predicated upon them hearing his voice.
When the Israelites left Egypt, God did not primarily desire to legislate his presence to them through the law. It was the Israelites that rejected the call to a relationship with God:
Exodus 20:18-19 Now all the people witnessed the thunderings, the lightning flashes, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking; and when the people saw it, they trembled and stood afar off. Then they said to Moses, “You speak with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us, lest we die.”
Additionally, we each carry the capacity to hear the voice of God, not the least because responding to the gospel requires hearing the call of God. Every person has the potential to hear from God because God came to save the whole world:
John 3:16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
The message of Jesus was given to everyone, that whosoever would respond would receive (this is not a commentary on predestination, that is not the scope of this study. The point is that everyone has the capacity to respond).
Romans 10:14 How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?
The gospel is not responded to in the head, it is responded to in the heart. It is not mental assent to a particular set of ideas (though that is an aspect of Christianity), rather, it is a life-changing encounter with the Spirit of the living God. If Christianity was primarily about engaging with a particular set of doctrinal beliefs, it would have been said that Christ dwells in the mind. But it does not.
Paul said: Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith (Ephesians 3:17). This is far more fundamental to the core of your life than the simple mental assent to a few beliefs. Your heart has the capacity to respond to his voice. In fact, every heart does:
Psalms 33:13-15 The Lord looks from heaven; He sees all the sons of men. From the place of His dwelling He looks On all the inhabitants of the earth; He fashions their hearts individually; He considers all their works.
He has fashioned every heart, the way in which he speaks determines the individuals’ willingness to hear his voice:
Matthew 13:13-14 Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: “Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, And seeing you will see and not perceive.”
These people have the capacity to hear, but their hearts have precluded them from being able to hear. In another place:
Hebrews 3:7-8 Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: “Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, In the day of trial in the wilderness.”
It is not an inability to hear the voice of God that keeps them from hearing the voice of God, it is an unwillingness to hear. This unwillingness is called hardness of heart.
That every person is given the ability to hear God seems clear based upon Romans 2:11:
“For there is no partiality with God.”
God does not give one person the ability to hear and not the other. On the most basic level, every human being must be able to hear in order to respond to the call of the gospel. And now, all those that have responded and received the Spirit are given the Holy Spirit in order to receive from the Spirit:
I Corinthians 2:12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.
If you do not hear God today you are living in a truncated version of the relationship God always intended to have with you.
At some point, we will look at the voice of God throughout history, but suffice it to say for now, this is not some new idea. Language may change from church age to church age, but the principle that God continues to speak has never changed. He truly is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
So how can Paul say that everyone at the church of Corinth could prophesy?
I Corinthians 14:31 For you can all prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be encouraged.
Was it because Corinth was particularly special? Did Paul know that every person in the church of Corinth was called to be a New Testament prophet? That type of thinking would seem to then make large swaths of Paul’s writing inapplicable to anyone outside of that particular church.
It is much more likely that Paul could say this because of one simple fact: everyone can hear the voice of God. If everyone can hear the voice of God, and the Spirit has come broadly to the church, and the Spirit would reveal the mind of God and things to come, then anyone who received the Spirit should thereby expect to hear the voice of God and speak on his behalf. It is no leap in the dark to expect God to speak and to expect to speak on behalf of him.