Prophecy
God’s Continuing Conversation
Globalization and increased means of travel make it easier for loved ones to live apart from each other. Long distance relationships are on the rise, be it partners stationed overseas for work or a child moving interstate to study.
Unsurprisingly, Skype has become one of the most popular Internet tools in the world. In May last year, the company announced a milestone: 35 million concurrent users on Skype—a mere week after announcing a milestone of 34 million users.
When it comes to the people we love, we want to keep in touch, regardless the distance. While Seventh-day Adventists believe prophecy is a “prediction of what will happen in the future,”1 we also know that it has to do with much more—it has to do with God’s deep desire to stay in contact with the people He loves—us.
Throughout history, God used prophets to provide His beloved children with comfort, guidance, instruction and correction. When they lost their way, He sent “prophets to the people to bring them back to him.”((2 Chronicles 24:19)) When they started to despair, He sent prophets to encourage.((2 Chronicles 15:1-8)) And when they needed someone to talk to, God listened and replied through his prophets.2
God’s prophets are His messengers, appointed to speak His words.3 Our human nature made it impossible for us to see God face-to-face. But just because we have to keep our distance does not mean He must remain silent.
Adventists believe prophecies are God’s way of continuing His conversation with us. And ultimately, “it is the Spirit of prophecy who bears testimony to Jesus”4, the epitome of God’s message of love—that He would die for us to save our souls.
- oxforddictionaries.com [↩]
- The Book of Habakkuk [↩]
- Deuteronomy 18:18 [↩]
- Revelation 19:10 [↩]
Death is an active part in our lives here on Earth, and God gave us the Bible to help us understand. The Bible answers all our questions about death, even starting from the beginning:
“Sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned” (Romans 5:12, ESV).
This verse refers to when Adam and Eve sinned (Genesis 3), and reminds us that death entered into the human experience as a consequence of sin, Adam’s sin (Romans 5:12).
But before we get into that, let’s briefly see what Jesus said about death. A compelling story in the Bible gives us a glimpse at how we should view death.
Luke 8:51-53 tells how Jesus went to a man’s house to heal his sick daughter, but she died before Jesus arrived. Mourners had already gathered and were wailing outside. Upon his arrival, Jesus told the crowd to stop crying.
“She is not dead but asleep.”
The crowd laughed at him because they knew she was dead. But Jesus went into the house and raised the girl to life.
Jesus understood death to be like sleep; an unconscious state that renders the person no longer a participant in this life. And in following His example, that is also how Adventists view death.