...for a reason

We are called to be God’s prophets, speaking for the truth and right,

Standing firm for godly justice, bringing evil into light.

Let us seek the courage needed, our high calling to fulfill,

That we all may know the blessing of the doing of God’s will.

---Thomas A. Jackson, 1973

Prophet. When I see the word, my mind goes to seers, oracles, fortune-tellers, or at least future-tellers. Some guy dressed in outrageous rags with a more outrageous hair-do, straight up giving the king the business. Same dude, few days later, found tossed off the city heights or ripped limb from limb ‘under mysterious circumstances’. Is that your mental image, too? This does not sound like a highly sought-after gig, my people.  

In actuality, the word means something less spectacular, and more applicable to our lives today. A prophet is one who speaks a fresh word from God for the world. You see my meaning? We could all be called to be prophets, listening to the guidance of God as we share a fresh message of hope to the world. We could be the ones called to envision and embody the reign of Christ in the world. We could be the ones called to speak hope to despair. Strength to fear. Love to apathy. Welcome to mistrust. Plenty to scarcity.  Sound daunting? It does to me, too. But our help and courage comes from our close relatedness to Jesus and his message. Prophets. I am, and you are. All of us are called. And brothers and sisters, we have these voices for a reason.