why we hate prophets

this is the sermon I preached yesterday. I don't usually do this and I don't expect to get in the habit of doing this regularly, but I did it tonight....

grace & blessings!
pjim

I’m one guy who feels for Donavan McNabb. Not so much because the eagles lost, but because of the incredible amount of heat he’s taking for it. I was listening to philly sports talk radio on Monday and he was getting absolutely tarred and feathered. McNabb is good! He’s not a bad guy, yet the hatred he receives in Philadelphia is unreal.

I can picture him walking down the street in Philly and getting cursed at. Just minding his business, getting a hamburger, and having to hear people yell, “You’re a bum. You stink. We hate you!”

The guy did nothing wrong and all of Eastern PA treats him like the enemy.

But he is a professional athlete. He gets paid a lot of money, so I guess that’s part of the deal. It’s kind of the same with politicians. Go to youtube and search “bush booed” and take your choice—the guy was even booed at the inauguration!

Got me thinking about jobs where a person is hated just because he’s got the job:
---repo man, professional wrestling villain, telemarketer, dentist, pig farmer, principal
(can you think of others?)

and you can add prophet to that list

We’ve been talking about prophets and so far we’ve said that a prophet is one who tells the truth—who tells God’s side of the story. And last week we talked about the nature of the message the prophets delivered
that it was negative—that God was unhappy

There’s an interesting little verse in 2 Chronicles that points to this. Two kings, Jehoshaphat and Ahab were talking about prophets when Ahab says this:
2 Chronicles 18:7


If you look at the writings of the prophets in the bible, you can see three distinct parts to their message:

1. God is not happy
sin/rebellion/forgetting poor/relying on other nations

2. God will judge
disaster coming/lift protection/send in army

3. God will redeem

Sometimes 2 and 3 are grouped together as options. #1 would be there, God is not happy. And if you do nothing than #2 would happen—but if you repent, than you’ll get #3. The future is wide open, which one will you choose?

The problem the prophets had was that the people were so upset after hearing the first two, they were unable to hear the third.

Because of #1 and #2, the prophets were hated. And this is across the board, you see this everywhere you read the prophets.
Jeremiah 20:1-2, 7-8
Amos 7:10-13
2 Chronicles 18:23
even Jesus alluded to this Matthew 23:37

Sometimes I see churches advertising that they have a special prophet coming to speak—like they are inviting people to come. That always puzzles me, because no one ever wanted to hear the OT prophets. They weren’t invited anywhere. Generally, they were asked to leave. And when the did draw a crowd, it wasn’t for the right reasons.
Ezekiel 33:30-33

Unless you enjoy being mocked, asked to leave, or getting slapped in the face, being a prophet was a tough job and here’s why:

You basically told people that they were responsible for their own problems.

Who wants to hear that? Who wants to hear that the struggles you face are the consequence of your actions? It’s so much better to blame somebody else.

This is why no one listened to the prophets. Basically, they were failures. No one took them seriously.

The prophets spoke to the people of Israel and Judah during some very troubling times; times when their nation was losing wars, when corruption ran rampant, times when people were suffering greatly.

In times like these, you cannot help wondering why; asking “God, why is this happening?” Well, God was providing an answer in through the prophets, but it was not the answer the people were looking for. They were outraged/offended at the notion that God would be mad at THEM. In their eyes, this was unthinkable—and there were two reasons why:

1. they were surrounded by more sinful/pagan nations
2. they believed the right things/performed the right (religious) actions

Aram, Edom, the Babylonians, the Philistines, Egypt, the countries that surrounded Israel were wicked. They worshipped false gods, they mocked the Jews. They were God haters and sure enough, the prophets spoke out against all of these nations…but they were not responsible for Israel’s problems.

It’s easy. It’s too easy to look around and see the flaws and sins of those around us and conclude that it is because of them your are being brought down.

Check out this passage from the prophet Isaiah
Isaiah 58:6-10

This is a very interesting chapter. It begins with Israel complaining that God has abandoned them. To which God says, “No, that’s not true” and goes off telling them what He’s really looking for. I love vv. 9-10.

“if you do away with the pointing finger and the malicious talk…

This pointing finger thing grabs me and doesn’t let me go. God says that one of the reasons why you are not experiencing my blessing is because you’re pointing the finger at everyone else. The people of Israel couldn’t hear this. “Why are you dwelling on us when they’re so bad?” For this they rejected the prophets.

You cannot address what you cannot see. And you cannot see your issues when you’re busy pointing out everyone elses. This hold true for husbands and wives, parents and children, and country against country.

Does this apply today? Why is the United States struggling? Because of liberal judges? the gay rights movement? Because of radical islam, religious pluralism? Because of Godless people who hate Jesus?

We hear that stuff and our tendency is to be like “yeah! If they weren’t so bad, things wouldn’t be so bad for the rest of us.” And it gets our blood boiling and we end up hating and the devil is sitting there going, “yeah, it’s their fault-you should be so mad at them!”

And the prophet Isaiah comes along and says the same thing to us that he said way back when…
Isaiah 58:6-10

Your spouse might have issues, and I’m not here to tell you that you should tolerate them, but if you are walking around thinking that that’s the reason for all your struggles, you will miss God’s prophetic for you just like the people of Israel did.

I’m not here this morning to tell you that things like the ACLU and radical Islam and liberal judges are good and that you should tolerate them, but if you’re walking around condemning them for the problems in America and the church in America, than you will reject God’s prophetic message for you just like the people of Israel did.

Matthew 23:37

Another reason why the Jews rejected the prophetic writings was because they had the right theology; the right religion. “How can God be mad at us when we pray in his name; when we sings songs about Him; when we go to the right church and do all the religious things he told us to do?
We’re God’s people-how can this be our fault?

Here comes Isaiah with that chapter 58 again
Isaiah 58:2-4

When you’re convinced you are right, it is hard to see how you can be at fault. The people of Israel were the people of God in their day. They saw themselves on the right side. They were the good guys. When you do what God wants, how could he possibly have a problem with you?

But God did have a problem with them. It was all empty. “Yes, they read the bible. Yes they were at church last Sunday. Yes they offered the required sacrifices, but it was more jumping through religious hoops than anything else.”

This is going to be the subject of a sermon later in this series, but let me just say this right now…
The Jews missed God’s word for them because they were convinced of their own righteousness. And the men that were sent to them to call them back were ignored, rejected, and killed.

The prophets were hated because of the message God called them to deliver. Because they were the tough love instruments of God.

The goal was to call people back, but in order to do that they needed to face reality and repent. They didn’t think they had to and went elsewhere for answers. They rejected God’s answer.

2 Timothy 4:3-4
No ones ears are itching to hear God tell THEM that they need to repent.

Perhaps you’ve been jumping through religious hoops.
Perhaps you’ve been overworking the pointing finger.
Perhaps you had a God-experience 10 years ago and are content to surf from here on out.

Will you let the prophetic word of God speak to you this morning?

Matthew 23:37
Will you be willing?