Christians are Superior to Old Testament Prophets
I have spent a while thinking about the relationship between the New Covenant Christian and the Old Testament Prophet.
With this article I want to talk about how the Christian is superior to the prophet of the Old Covenant.
Another way to say this is the Old Covenant Prophet was handicapped but the Christian is whole.
Christians are Like Prophets
First lets recall our last insight about why a Christian is utterly similar to prophets in the Old Testament:
1. Prophets [and Christians] have an intimacy with God that allows them to ignore all authority which bucks or resists the authority of God. This includes religious authorities "in the name of God" who resist the truth. Prophets, in other words, have no middleman between they and God. Neither does the Christian.
2. Prophets [and Christians] have authority directly from the Lord. This does not mean "thus says Prophet So-and-So" [the power to boss someone around], but rather the prophet [and the Christian] say "thus says the Lord." The prophet does not speak in the authority of JudiaISM, nor the Christian in the authority of ChristIANITY, the prophet and the Christian walk in the authority of God. To resist the prophet walking with God is to resist God, likewise the Christian walking in step with the Holy Spirit.
A Christian is Superior to The Prophets
Lets just review some texts to prove the subtitle I used there: the Christian is superior to the Old Covenant Prophets:
“Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist! Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he."
Matthew 11:11
Thus John the Baptist, "greatest man born of woman" is inferior to the black sheep of the genuinely Christian family ("least in the kingdom").
—
Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully,
inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories.
It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.
1 Peter 1:10-12
Thus you see that the prophets were inferior to the Christian for the following reason, they were the opening act to the permanent work of God. The church is the creation of Sons of God in former sinners. This is superior even to the great hand of God in the days of faithful Judaism. So you see the Prophets could only look forward to what God would do through the Church, Sons of God from every tribe of Jew and Gentile.
So you can see Jesus calls the lowliest Christian greater than the greatest prophet of the Old Covenant, and the Apostle Peter calls the Christian superior because he is a more final work of God than the Judaic covenant. Finally, the Christian is superior to the old covenant prophet because of his relationship to God.
One with Christ, One with God
While the Prophet as the prior text informs us, had "the Spirit of Christ" in them, they had a veil between they and God. They were still "prophet Jeremiah," or "prophet Isaiah," or "prophet Amos."
Meanwhile the Christian is so close to God, it is as though he is a shadow and God is mysteriously existing through him:
For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Colossians 3:3-4
and
Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
Romans 6:3-4
You see in these texts, Paul states the Christian is a goner.
He died.
He's no longer in the land of the living.
Now Paul is not saying the Christian has no breath or heartbeat humanly. Paul means the spiritual software making a Christian mortal and a person on the earth changes at the moment of their conversion so that really it's just God himself living in the Christian.
Look at the texts:
"Christ who is your life"
and
"your life is hidden in Christ"
and
"baptized into Christ"
Versus:
"For you have died"
and
"baptized into his death"
The Christian is superior because there's nothing to the Christian. In fact, it's because God is superior to all humans, but not superior to himself that the Christian is superior to the prophet.
It is as it were like the prophet is perpetually in his office declaring the word of the Lord ("thus says the Lord"). When the prophet of the Old Covenant is declaring the Word of God, he is indistinguishable from God. God is there with him, speaking. To resist the prophet there is to defy and sin against God himself.
The Christian isn't like that only when he's preaching on any day of the week, the Christian is like that all day, every day.
Because the Christian is a shadow, God is the substance.
A Christian is adopted into the family of the Godhead. The Christian is not "a God," he is "in Christ," and "one with Christ." He is merely a partaker of God, but as his flesh rots away by the Holy Spirit's sanctification, what do you have left but God's nature?
Why Do Christians Seem Pathetic But Prophets Seem 'Cool'?
So you have the lowly Christian, maybe not as riveting as Elijah rolling through the desert in camel's hair throwing fire at his enemies, but I assure you the Christian will one day scoff at that small display of power by Elijah.
The Christian has a greater share in God than the Prophets.
I don't know what the hierarchy will be like between Moses and average Christians in the World to Come, but I do know this: God ordered each soul in Judaism from Moses to Elijah, but also every Christian great or small.
And it is God in Christ who said the Christian is greater than John the Baptist ("greatest man born of woman").
The Christian seems lowly and not death-defying like many of the prophets mostly because the Christian is modeled after Jesus, not Elijah or Moses.
Jesus was God, clothed in an impoverished carpenter's body.
He did not do as many supernatural wonders as many of the Old Covenant prophets did. That wasn't his mission on earth - to do wonders. Rather Jesus came to die, and so does the Christian.
The Christian is unspeakable wonder clothed in a jar of clay.
But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair;
persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed;
always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.
2 Cor 4: 7-10
and
Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is.
1 John 3:2
The Christian's unveiling will look like the following: "like Him" [Jesus].
Indeed the whole creation will change when the genuine Sons of God are revealed:
For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.
And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees?
But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
Romans 8:20-25
So this period when the Sons of God don't have a lot of cool tricks like Elijah, Moses, Elisha, and Joshua is to be short lived. When we are perfected, nations will drop their weapons and take up farming:
He shall judge between the nations,
and shall decide disputes for many peoples;
and they shall beat their swords into plowshares,
and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war anymore.
Isa 2:4
Not only that, when we are finally perfected, we can burn the following phrase in hell:
"There's no perfect church, and if you ever find one, you'll ruin it if you join…”
Because:
And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.
And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb.
By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it,
and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there.
They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.
But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
Revelation 21:22-27
That's right, the only thing the world is missing is a perfected Christianity.
That's why the Christian is greater than the prophet.
The Christian is God's solution for everything.
S.D.G.