The prophet's handbook

Her heads judge for a bribe, her priests teach for pay, and her prophets divine for money. Yet they lean on the Lord, and say, “Is not the Lord among us? No harm can come upon us.”(Micah 3:11 niv) Anatomy of Prophecy Technical Prophetic Information In an effort to provide a solid biblical basis for prophecy, here is a lecture that anatomizes it for the prophet who wants to thoroughly grasp the mind of God on prophetics. To begin, one word for prophecy helps us understand its meaning, the purpose it serves, and its aim. Found in 1 Chronicles 9:25, it is the word nebuwah, which means “a prediction given orally or in writing.” It defines a specific prophetic word, whether true or false. Another prophecy term employed in the Old Testament is naba. You may also see it spelled nava. This word is a verb, “to prophesy.” As a root term it identifies prophesying in song. Naba can apply to psalmism or a predictive discourse, lyrical or not, through a genuine or false prophet. Whatever is the case, the gist is that the message delivered is unquestionably under the direct influence of a divine spirit. (See 1 Chronicles 15:8 and Nehemiah 6:12.) For the nabi prophet, which we discussed at length elsewhere, Daniel 9:24 is a good scriptural reference. It defines nabi as “a prophet, a person who is an inspired messenger.” The word includes “the specifically declared prophecy that comes from the official prophet as the spokesperson of a deity, true or false.” When the nabi pertains to prophesying, it stresses the prophetic message that specifically comes from the one in the prophet’s office that, when uttered, establishes the messenger as an authentic prophet. There is another helpful word for prophecy that is especially significant answers the experience of the weight of the prophetic word from the Lord. It is identified in Scripture as a prophetic burden. The word is massa, and Proverbs 30:1 and 31:1 passages both distinguish it as “prophecy that is carried as a burden.” Massa transmits the essence of what we would call a prophetic burden as a weighty word from the Lord. Such prophecy flows from an accompanying spiritual charge from the Lord that is felt with the natural senses. It is recognized by utterances in definitive, concrete, or symbolic terms. Generally, massa prophecy is likely to use figurative (parabolic) language that expresses God’s intellectual desires or reflects the prophet’s intelligent cognition of a cause that is