Michigan Camp Meeting 2016: The Harvest is Great

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Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

Minor in Size, Major in Message

Rahel Schafer

Minor in Size, Major in Message- Part 1

Lord, thank you so much for the privilege we have of talking about your Word and digging deeper today.

I just ask that you be present here with us.

There's so much, Lord, in just these tiny little prophetic books.

We are only going to be able to scratch the surface, but I just thank you for the chance we have to talk about them and think about them and just review your grace and your goodness and your kindness to us.

I teach in the undergrad religion department.

I've been able to have the privilege of every year teaching the prophets class to the theology majors there for the last 5 years.

I've found that this is really my favorite class to teach.

And we, of course, include Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Lamentations, et cetera.

But I usually spend a week on each of these prophets.

So trying to figure out how to fit them into 3 days was, and even that is not enough.

I mean I'm just like I need more time, these are amazing.

So I always tell my students you know you just have to you just wet your appetite so that you want to study it more.

We're going to just give kind of an overview of just profits in general and then you know the personalities of profits and then talk about some of the things that are relevant to the themes of these minor profits.

And then we're going to start today with 2 of them.

And then the day after that, we'll do another 2.

We'll see how quickly we get through them.

I should actually look at a handout to make sure I'm not missing anything that I'm saying there.

I'm going to do a lot of reading from them because I think this is...

This is what we often don't do is read the prophets.

I mean I remember when I took my first prophets class in seminary I was like I never really read these books very much.

I mean you read them when you read through the Bible but you don't really understand them because the language is so crazy and there's all these imagery and you're like, what is going on?

Or I always, like, I loved Psalms reading when I was a kid and growing up.

But I've come to really love the prophets because they speak to us today about the same issues that we're dealing with.

And I think the reason, 1 of the reasons at least we don't read them is because they do speak to us.

They speak to the situations we're in, the secular world that we live in, the sin and corruption that we face even in the church, the mess of the world that we're in, and they speak strongly to it.

And they are not afraid to say things that we are like, I don't know if I could say that, I'm not sure I can say these things.

So I find that often we don't read them also because they speak to us.

So we'll address some of that but I want you to get a feeling for the personality of the prophets a little bit.

So I'm going to read some passages, you can follow along with me.

The first 1 is they are sensitive to evil.

There You can see that on the handout, their personality.

So often we tend to, even when you hear the big evil things, you're like, oh that's terrible, but then tomorrow you forget it because there's something else that's happened in your life.

They are sensitive to not just the big evil things, but even the little things that go wrong in the world.

And they are broken by it, and they're hurt by it.

So turn with me to Amos 8, if you want, or just listen.

I have tried to, as I read the prophets, imagine their personality, their passion for God and his truth.

So this is a vision that Amos is receiving and it starts in verse 1, thus the Lord God showed me behold a basket of summer fruit and he said Amos what do you see I said a basket of summer fruit and the word for this is kaitz so in Hebrew so that's only significant because of what God says next.

Then the Lord said to me, the end, which is Ketz.

So he sees this kaitz, basket, and it's going to remind him always of the end, the Ketz.

The songs of the temple should be wailing in that day." So this is God's, the praises to God, and instead it's gonna be this wailing.

Says the Lord God, many dead bodies everywhere they should be thrown out in silence.

Hear this, you who swallow up the needy and make the poor of the land fail, saying, when will the new moon be over, that we may sell grain, and the Sabbath, that we can trade wheat?

I love the Sabbath, but if you've got something big happening and you're working on something, you're like, I just...

Oh, shoot, now I can go do, you know, I mean, this is talking to us.

This is the same kind of struggle that we face.

Making the ephah small, the shekel large.

So just little problems that we do, just little tweaks that we don't quite do right.

Falsifying the scales by deceit that we may buy the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, even sell the bad wheat.

Surely I will not forget any of their works.

Shall not the land tremble for this and everyone mourn who dwells in it?

All of it shall swell like the river, heave and subside like the river of Egypt.

It shall come to pass in that day, says the Lord God, that I will make the sun go down at noon, I will darken the earth in broad daylight, I will turn your feasts into mourning and your songs into lamentation, and will bring sackcloth in every waist and baldness on every head.

I will make it like mourning for an only son and its end like a bitter day.

Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, that I will send a famine on the land, not a famine of bread nor thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord." Why?

Because God doesn't want them to hear it?

And this is what the prophets speak hard about.

They said God wants to bring his word but you don't care.

So they are sensitive to evil, luminous and explosive language.

For sake of time, I'm not going to read another 1 for that.

You can hear that even in the 1 I just read.

The language is difficult to hear because it's very vivid.

And there's a lot of the prophets that speak like this.

And when we start talking about Hosea, we'll read some in Hosea 2 where he's describing their harlotry, their adultery against God, and he describes it in graphic terms.

I think it's because this is the last chance God has with these people.

He's doing everything he possibly can to reach their hearts.

It's not that God speaks harshly most of the time.

Minor in Size, Major in Message- Part 2

Lord, I thank you so much for your mercy to us, your blessings.

Thank you for the chance we have to talk more deeply about your Word.

Please just continue to refresh our hearts with your grace and your love.

So we spent some time yesterday talking about the personality of the prophets.

We read through a variety of the different prophetic things.

I think 1 of the main things there is that They're close partners with God.

They experience what he experiences, and so they have the same emotions as he does, and the same struggles and difficulties as he does.

We spent time talking about God's original plan, which was for Israel to bless the world so that prophets were not really something that God planned.

They, they were something that came about later when he needed to warn his people and to warn other people of their sin and the judgment that was going to come if they didn't obey.

So these prophets were clustered right before Israel fell, the northern kingdom, and then right again before Judah fell.

It's actually a very small period of time.

Their focus, the ones we're focusing on, was a more local, national focus, but through that they also saw application of what they were talking about to the Messiah to come and then also to the end of time.

So, but they were looking at that through the lens of their time and what they hoped would happen.

We talked about what poetry is like and how it's difficult.

All prophets are in poetry, and I think it's 1 of the reasons people don't read it, because they get lost and confused in trying to understand it.

It's difficult in English as well, so we understand that.

But a little bit of how to read it, and then the themes of the different prophets.

There's a lot more, but these are some of my favorite ones that help me understand best who the prophets are.

And then we went through Jonah and Hosea.

So now we're gonna go through, actually 6 today.

Amos, Micah, Zephaniah, Nahum, Obadiah, and Habakkuk.

And then tomorrow we'll finish up the last ones.

I said 5, so you know, but it's actually 6.

I put Nahum and Obadiah together because they are speaking similarly about similar things and they're short and it'd be easier for us to deal with them together.

So I want to again just say This is my favorite, favorite stuff to talk about.

As I was reviewing these ones again that I'm doing today, this morning, just being reminded of the immense privilege of talking about God's Word and feeling inadequate.

I feel that every time I talk about the prophets, I think because they're so, they just, they speak God's heart.

And it's, I never feel like I say it well.

So, you know, I spent a lot of time in prayer this morning and just...

So I would ask for you to pray with me again now as we go into these, because I think it's talking...it's sharing the hope of the gospel, but also God's love and hope for everyone in this world, not just his chosen people.

And I think my words are inadequate, but God is faithful and he can speak in spite of that.

Lord, your word is rich and deep and we're just scratching the surface.

Lord, I ask your presence again here now with us as we very briefly but hopefully powerfully dig into your word.

Speak through your prophets again to us today because you do speak through them.

We are Israel too through you, through your sacrifice.

Please help us to hear their message and your message to us.

We spent a little bit of time when we were reviewing the characteristics of the prophets in Amos, but I want to go back there now that we are kind of focusing on him.

He was again this prophet at the beginning, that first cluster, right before the Northern Kingdom fell.

So right before Israel fell, he was speaking to the people and he starts off with this list of nations and that's actually B-I there in your thing, but 7 nations.

So he goes through these 7 nations, and if you look at the beginning of Amos, he starts, he says, the Lord roars from Zion, and then he starts this listing of nations.

Thus says the Lord, for 3 transgressions of Damascus, and for 4, I will not turn away its punishment, and then he lists these transgressions.

Then he goes on to Gaza, for 3 transgressions of Gaza, and for 4, I will not turn away punishment, and then he lists the transgressions of Gaza.

So you'd think, is he really talking to Israel?

But he's actually zeroing in, so he's doing this target thing.

Where's Damascus in relationship to Israel?

West, okay, so he's going north, then west.

East, okay, north, west, east, he's honing in.

Then he goes to Amman, which is again kind of east, a little bit north, more north than Edom is.

But these are relatives, so he starts off with far people away, Damascus, Gaza, then he's narrowing in, Edom comes from who?

Esau, right, so relative, then Ammon, and Moab, who are who?

Lots, children, right, Through incest with his daughters.

And then finally in 2 verse 4, who does he go to?

Seventh nation, perfect number, but then he doesn't stop there.

So it's this sneaky way of getting to them.

They think they're off the hook and he says, no, actually, you're the ones I really want to focus on.

So he hones in on Israel and he tells them that they have been completely unjust and terrible.

So let's read what he says to them at the very beginning here in 2 verse 6.

Thus says the Lord, for 3 transgressions of Israel and for 4 I will not turn away its punishment.

They sell the righteous for silver, the poor for a pair of sandals.

They pant after the dust of the earth which is on the head of the poor and pervert the way of the humble.

A man and his father go into the same girl to defile my holy name.

They lie down by every altar on clothes taken in pledge and drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their God." These are God's people.

This is like the worst stuff, and this is what God's people are doing.

Yet it was I who destroyed the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was as strong as the oaks.

I destroyed his fruit above and his roots beneath.

It was I who brought you up from the land of Egypt.

I led you 40 years through the wilderness to possess the land of the Amorite, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

I was the 1 who blessed you, and you've turned and turned my blessings on their heads, thank you, and instead have become utterly the opposite of what I'm wanting you to be.

But God is gracious and he doesn't stop there and he says he wants restoration with them.

Minor in Size, Major in Message- Part 3

Lord, I thank you so much for the privilege we have of knowing you, of serving you, of following you, of reading your word.

So many people in this world don't have that privilege.

Lord, help us to be grateful and to continue to dig deep into your word and get to know you better.

You are the God who inspired these prophets, who spoke through them.

And Lord, as we go through the last 4 minor prophets today, I just ask that you be with us here present, that your grace and your strength and your hope and your truth may be seen.

Those of you who weren't here the first couple days, I do have the other handouts.

If you are watching them, I can give those to you.

So Joel is very uncertain as to where to place him, so thematically and time-wise.

Doesn't give us any information really about where he comes.

I personally think he comes after the exile, which is why I've placed him here, simply because of Joel 3 when it seems to talk about, in the very first couple verses, that God's going to gather back his captives, okay, that have been taken into other lands.

So that's my best sense of when he comes.

But there are some who put him very early, 1 of the very earliest prophets, and there's the evidence for that I would think would be the connections with some of the early prophets like Jonah, Hosea, he has connections with those.

He also has connections with some of the later ones though too, so it's difficult to know.

But at any rate, Joel is a, 1 of my favorite books.

I actually got to write on a whole chapter on Joel and part of my dissertation.

So I'm going to try to keep it short because it's, yeah, I could talk forever about Joel.

So if you remember what a chiasm is, what's a chiasm?

Like a mountain climbing structure, right?

So it's got 2 of them and they intersect each other.

So there's different centers in the book and they intersect each other.

And the best way I know of to describe Joel, well and there's also what I have here, many chiasms and then there's also a cycle.

So you've got these 2 mountain climbing structures and then you also have a cycle that occurs several times through the book and this cycle starts with a call to here and then it goes into horrors of devastation or a reversal of that devastation and then cosmic signs.

It doesn't occur in the first cycle but occurs after that, and then a call to repent and then a response or return.

So we're going to read a couple of them in here in a minute.

But what I find significant about this is this cycle as well as the 2 chiasms helps us understand what the Prophet is trying to say about the end of time.

So we read Joel 2 28 to 32 often, the New Testament quotes it a bunch, shall come to pass afterwards, I will pour out my spirit on all flesh.

How can we apply that to the time of Jesus?

It's not very clear if you just kind of read through, but the structure helps you understand that.

I'm not going to read all of these verses that I have there, but some of them.

So the very, the first chapter is really a historical description of the locust plague.

So he goes through, first he says, you know, he calls out for them to Listen, and then he goes through this horrible things that these locusts have done.

So it's, it, it ended up in the destruction like the dust bowl of, of America here.

And that was the idea, just everything green is gone.

If you imagine looking outside and it's, it's all gone.

This is the horrible things that has happened.

He just goes through this horrible destruction, everything that's happened, and it's very clearly these are literal locusts.

No 1 really debates about chapter 1, are these literal locusts or not, okay?

Well, a few people do, but most people don't.

I think it's pretty clear from the text that these are literal things.

Then you don't have the cosmic signs there either in chapter 1, okay?

It just goes into, straight into C or D there, which is the call to repent.

So 1.13 and 14 is like repent, repent, everyone should repent.

And then there's this promise of restoration and this response.

Interestingly, the response in chapter 1 is only the animals.

Okay, so The animals are the ones that cry out to God.

There's debate in verse 19, is that talking about the prophet?

It's either the prophet or it is a representative animal calling out to God.

They're saying, God, will you please come and save us?

And in chapter 2, God answers the animals too, as well as the people.

Even though the people don't cry out to God in chapter 1.

So that's chapter 1, it's kind of, it's more clear.

Then you get into chapter 2, and it's, I actually have my students do this.

If you look at chapter 2, are these real locusts or are they not?

There's elements of them that seem real, where they're, you know, they march like locusts and they do all sorts of things, but then there's elements of them that are not like locusts at all.

They crawl into people's houses, they march in ranks, locusts don't do that, they have weapons of destruction and they fight like people would fight.

I just got out of Jay Gallimard's class, and when we talked about the locusts, we talked about the green grass, we talked about all of that, and their locusts are forces in Revelation, does that parallel this?

I believe so because of chapter 2 not chapter 1 because what I think is happening here is in chapter 1 you have a very and this is getting into the second section but that's fine, so you have a historical event of locusts attacking everything.

So he then starts describing this apocalyptic army that's going to come.

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Minor in Size, Major in Message

Minor in Size, Major in Message- Part 3

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