1. The Prophets: Bearers of Challenge and Hope

2. Prophets and their Common Characteristics
Who is a PROPHET?
A biblical prophet was not who could tell the future
A prophet was a person chosen by God to communicate a message of salvation
What is a PROPHECY?
A message communicated by prophets on behalf of God, usually a message of devine direction or consolation for the prophet’s time.
Some messages might be fulfilled in the future

3. Why do the Israelites need Prophets?
When the Israelites strayed from their covenant relationship with God – God sent leaders to encourage a return to the covenant
A prophet was used to help the Israelites when they lost their way back to the source of all life and hope, God
Prophets play an important role in the cycle of redemption
God creates/enters in to a covenant, it is good
Humanity falls in to idolatry, resulting in disease, war and grief
God sends teachers, kings, prophets or others who lead the people to repentance
The people return to following the Covenant
Peace and God’s healing return

4. Characteristics of the Prophets
They obeyed God
Hebrew word for obedience meant “listening” or “hearing”
An obedient person heard God’s Word and followed it (Ex 15:26).
To be obedient was simply to align oneself with God’s will
They know that God wanted his people to treat all people with justice
“justice” also translated as “righteousness” and “judgment”
Divine justice calls for fair and equitable distribution of life’s needs
Based on the idea that “all humans have a dignity and worth and are children of God
God’s love for all creation is shown with Love in Action

5. Continues… They lived good, moral lives themselves.
Committed to ethical responsibility
Ten Commandments are the fundamental rules of conduct for God’s Chosen People
They understood that God wanted his people to come back to him with their whole selves.
The prophets needed to be able to ask the Israelites to return the Covenant in body, mind and spirit
Israelites were unsure of how to accomplish this
God chose men and women who were committed to a relationship with God, and to be his voice among the people

6. Does the characteristics sound familiar?
Who else had these characteristics?
The Judges and Kings

7. Class directions Come in quietly Submit HW to turnitin.com Word Doc –
Reflection title: I feel jealous
Check you file
Be ready for prayer

8. I feel jealous -
Why do you think we feel jealous of what others have? Does this jealous effect the way you behave around some people?

9. Major and Minor Prophets
Old Testament prophets are grouped in different ways because there are so many of them
The prophets in 1st and 2nd Samuel and 1st and 2nd Kings are sometimes know as non-writing prophets because they left no written record of their own outside of these 2 books
Samuel – Nathan – Gad – Elijah – and Elisha
The writing prophets have biblical books named after them that contain their writings
Divided into 2 groups
Major (4 prophets) and Minor ( 9 prophets)

10. Nine minor prophets -
Hosea Joel
Amos Obadiah
Jonah Micah
Nahum Habakkuk
Zephaniah Haggai
Prophets are called former and latter based on how each book was written
Former wrote in prose – Samuel, Nathan, Gad, Elijah and Elisha
Latter wrote in poetry – major prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, & Ezekiel) and minor prophets (Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi)
Prose – the ordinary language people use in speaking and writing
Poetry - :  writing that formulates a concentrated imaginative awareness of experience in language chosen and arranged to create a specific emotional response through meaning, sound, and rhythm