The Prophetic Writings

Good afternoon, everyone. Happy Sabbath.

Imagine that God has an important message for humanity. He chooses a messenger, gives him the message, and instructs him to write it down. But the messenger doesn't simply take dictation. He uses his own vocabulary, writing style, experiences and personality.
Sometimes he employs a secretary. Sometimes he records what others have witnessed. Sometimes he writes years after the events have occurred.

Now consider the question: When you read those words, whose words are you actually reading—God's or the prophet's?

That is not a trivial question. It takes us straight into the fascinating relationship between divine inspiration and human expression.

We often speak of the Bible as the Word of God, but how often do we stop to consider the human process through which that Word reached us?
Did God dictate every sentence?
Did the prophets understand everything they wrote?
Why did He use different literary styles, personalities and even secretaries?
And what should we do when a passage seems difficult, contradictory or open to different interpretations?

Here is another uncomfortable thought: Could we sometimes be so anxious to defend the inspiration of Scripture that we become reluctant to examine how it was actually written?

For this lesson, we are going behind the printed page. We will explore the oral messages that became written records, the people who assisted in recording them, the different forms of prophetic writing, and the relationship between the divine message and its human messenger.

But there is something we must remember as we begin: Inspiration does not eliminate the human element, and acknowledging the human element does not diminish the divine origin of Scripture.
Our task is not merely to defend the Bible. It is to understand how God chose to communicate through it—and to become better readers of the message He has preserved for .

Let's get beneath the surface of the written Word as tomorrow we discuss “The Call to Write”