Prophets Not Fortune Tellers

Is Nostradamus the most infuriating person who ever walked the earth, or what? His prophecies are tantalizingly vague enough to apply to just about any historical event anywhere on the planet. I am so sick of his supporters saying that he predicted WWII or the Kennedy assassination, blah, blah, blah. Why didn’t he just say it clearly and succinctly? Why didn’t he just say that America will invent a big bomb and drop it on the people of Japan? He could have added the words – ba-da-bing, ba-da-boom, and I would have understood it perfectly. But he couldn’t do that – because that is not how prophecy works. And I am here to tell you why.

If you look up prophet in the dictionary there are two definitions. The first is that a prophet speaks the word of God. This idea is testified to in The Urantia Book. The book says that the true prophets of old knew God and spoke words of truth (21.1; 23.3; 35.5). It says that the prophets revealed truth relevant to their time periods (41.2). Prophets served God through their unselfish ministry to the people they came into contact with (1000.3). And because of their teaching they help people to develop spiritually (1128.2). The book does point out that prophets are not perfect. Prophets make mistakes like everyone else (60.1). And many people called prophets have distorted the truth and misinterpreted history (1071.4). But overall The Urantia Book is supportive of the great prophets over the expanse of time teaching and preaching God’s advancing truth.

It’s the second definition of a prophet that causes a lot of confusion. And that would be – prophets foresee the future. The Urantia Book says that prophets have been given visions of the first Mansion World (553.4). This was a vision of a real time event. It says that a prophet saw Lucifer cast down (601.5). This was not a prediction of a future event but a vision of what had already happened. John the disciple was granted a vision of the Mansion worlds, but that too was a real time event, not a future prediction. Apocalyptic predictions attributed to him are discredited in The Urantia Book (1555.7). Melchizedek continued to work with prophets between his mission on earth and the arrival of Michael. He kept the truth alive through an unstated form of communication with prophets (1024.6). These prophets were told that Michael was coming – however this does not sound like forecasting the future when this information was announced to great fanfare throughout the universe (1316.5). Once again, the prophets were told of the announcement of Michael’s coming and the announcement was a past event not a future one. Had a date been given – information known only by God – that would have been a prediction of a future event. If I tell you that I am going to the mall tomorrow that would not be a prophetic statement. These passages are used by supporters of The Urantia Revelation to verify the validity of prophets and prophecy. As you can see, none of these true visions from on high were predictions of future events.

The confusion comes from the idea that foreknowledge is the same as fortune telling. That being able to see into the future is the same as predicting a specific action at a specific time. The difference is subtle but there is a difference. The Urantia Book says that a wise person lives by carefully evaluating past experience and looking into the future to evaluate the impact of today’s decision (1295.4). “In the maturity of the developing self, the past and future are brought together to illuminate the true meaning of the present. As the self matures, it reaches further and further back into the past for experience, while its wisdom forecasts seek to penetrate deeper and deeper into the unknown future (1295.5).” What its saying is that predicting the future is not predicting specific events, rather it is envisioning the future impact of today’s decision making. The way we treat our children impacts their future, and so a wise parent thinks about what his/her children will learn and bring forward with them as he/she decides how to respond to the challenges childrearing brings. The emphasis in these passages is not on predicting future events. The emphasis is on using past experience and future foresight to make wise decisions now. True prophecy is always a benefit to the people of the present. A real prophet is trying to help people now, not 2,000 years from now. God is interested in you and I living a life of faith right this very moment – and when we do the future will take care of itself.

Prophesying or foreseeing the future as described above does not step over the line into fortune telling because if it did it would take away the power that God has given us through free will choice. God is omnipotent but not omnificent – which means to make all things (1299.4). God is not the cause of all of the events that occur in the universe. I can go out and drive my car or I can sit here and write this paper. Neither event has been caused by God. God limits God-self in order to give us the opportunity for unlimited spiritual growth. And though God is not limited by time, and therefore sees the past, present and future all at once, this does not take away the free will of God’s children (49.4). I would argue that telling us what we are going to do or what is going to happen would take away our freedom of action. Therefore the true visions and prophecy’s throughout history are limited to real time events happening in the far flung universe (the Michael bestowal announcement) and events on earth that anyone with a good amount of godly wisdom can foresee (the people of Judea getting into a war with the Romans and losing). God helps us in anyway possible as long as it doesn’t take away our ability to choose for ourselves. I believe that giving us advance notice of a future event steps over the line.

My friend, you are the master of your own future. And you can look into that future, not to predict whether or not you will win the lottery, but to get an idea of the impact your daily decisions will have on the world around you. The prophets were given great gifts to help the people of their time, but they are not the only ones thus gifted. We are given the same powerful gifts – Thought Adjuster; Spirit of Truth; Holy Spirit – as well as our own unique personalities. Our job is to use these gifts to be prophets in our time. Nostradamus did not predict a single thing that has happened or will happen in your life – because your future is yours to make.

God Bless You,

William Whitehead