An Evaluation Of Wayne Grudem’s View Of NT Prophecy - By Steven Kring

Excerpted from here. Our comments in bold.
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The author is going to evaluate some other teacher's ideas. Though he quotes a good deal of Scripture, he's not going to teach the Bible, he's going to teach his cessationist doctrine. He make many of the standard cessationist arguments, but add little new light.

Which is a wasted opportunity, especially considering the article weighs in at a hefty 5200 words. Surely with such an opportunity the author might make some thorough biblical analysis, perhaps even having it evaluated by a hostile witness.

Then his arguments might have been a little better. Otherwise, this is just Bad Bible Teaching.

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Simply stated, a prophet is someone who speaks the words of another. (Only the first sentence and already the author is in trouble. Prophecy is prophéteia, 

discourse emanating from divine inspiration and declaring the purposes of God, whether by reproving and admonishing the wicked, or comforting the afflicted, or revealing things hidden...

The word is found here:

1Co. 12:10 to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy...

The author would have us believe that prophecy is akin to being a press secretary, or maybe reading a script written by another. His is a particularly superficial and unhelpful definition.)

Consider Moses and Aaron. When Moses complained about being slow of speech and slow of tongue, this is what God said with reference to Aaron, "Now you shall speak to him and put the words in his mouth. And I will be with your mouth and with his mouth, and I will teach you what you shall do. So he shall be your spokesman to the people. And he himself shall be as a mouth for you, and you shall be to him as God... So the Lord said to Moses: See, I have made you as God to Pharoah, and Aaron your brother shall be your prophet." (Ex. 4:15; 7:1).

Aaron was Moses’ "prophet". (No, he wasn't.)

He spoke Moses’ words to Pharoah. (No, he didn't. He spoke the words God gave to Moses. Moses was the prophet.)

Therefore, when anyone is the Lords’ prophet, he must be someone who speaks the word of the Lord to the people. (The author shifts the definition from a kind of PR guy to someone who literally recites what God told him. The two ideas are not the same.)

As we read in Deut. 18:18, "I will raise up for them a Prophet like you from among their brethren, and will put My words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I command Him." A true prophet, therefore, speaks the pure word of God with divine authority. (This of course is the description of prophecy in the OT. The author will now need to establish that the NT gift of prophecy is the same.)

Is it possible that this view of the nature of prophecy is wrong or at best only partially true? This is what some scholars even from a reformed tradition are suggesting in our day. So, as I began my study for this assigned paper with my Greek NT open to 1 Corinthians 14:1, I felt the need to more thoroughly investigate this new position on prophecy. I had heard Wayne Grudem's name mentioned several times in this regard. I also gathered from Don Carson’s comments on 1 Corinthians 12 - 14 that he basically agreed with Grudem’s position. It was time to check out the rumours I had heard. This paper is my report to you of that investigation. May it and our discussion of it be to the edification of the church.

Wayne A. Grudem is an associate professor of biblical and systematic theology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois. He is active in a Vineyard-affiliated church and is one of their chief defending theologians. You may be familiar with his book on systematic theology and the one he co-authored with John Piper on biblical manhood and womanhood.

Grudem has written two books on the subject of NT prophecy. The first is The Gift of Prophecy in 1 Corinthians, which is his Ph.D. dissertation submitted to Cambridge University in 1978 with slight modifications. This came out in 1982. A similar, more popular work, is The Gift of Prophecy in the New Testament and Today, published in 1988. The main thesis of these books has received the approval of such men as Philip E. Hughes and Vern S. Polythress of Westminster Theological Seminary as well as Don Carson, also of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. J. I. Packer writes on the cover of The Gift of Prophecy in 1 Corinthians, "Careful and clear; a very valuable contribution".

A CONFESSEDLY NOVEL VIEW

In the preface to his first book Grudem writes:

I found that a detailed study of the biblical text led me to a definition of New Testament prophecy which was somewhat different from the teachings of many within the charismatic movement, but also different from the views of those, especially within Reformed and Dispensationalist circles, who have expressed objections to or skepticism about claims to prophecy found in charismatic groups today. But even though I do not agree fully with either group, I hope that in my somewhat new definition of the nature of Christian prophecy both pro-charismatics and anti-charismatics may be able to find a "middle ground" with a considerable potential for reconciling their current differences. 

 

For someone to suggest a new definition of a biblical truth after hundreds of years of church history have elapsed is rather bold to say the least. Is it warranted? Let’s take a look.

GRUDEM STATES HIS POSITION

In his first major summary statement, Grudem concludes:

...Paul thought of prophecy at Corinth as something different than the prophecy we see, for instance, in Revelation or in many parts of the OT. There, a divine authority of actual words is claimed by or on behalf of the prophets. But the prophecy we find in 1 Corinthians is more like the phenomena we saw in extra-Biblical Jewish literature: it is based on some type of supernatural "revelation," but that revelation only gives it a kind of divine authority of general content. The prophet could err, could misinterpret, and could be questioned or challenged at any point. He had a minor kind of "divine" authority, but it certainly was not absolute.

Again, he says:

...I am asking those in the cessationist camp to give serious thought to the possibility that prophecy in ordinary New Testament churches was not equal to Scripture in authority, but was simply a very human - and sometimes partially mistaken - report of something the Holy Spirit brought to someone’s mind.

Another key element in Grudem’s position is the assertion that in the NT, the counterpart of the OT prophets are the apostles, and not the NT prophets. He states:

...those who are viewed as divinely authoritative messengers in the NT are most often called not "prophets" but "apostles." This is significant for our investigation because if the NT apostles are frequently seen as the counterparts to the OT prophets, then NT prophets might often be something quite different.If this position is accepted, then changes must be made in the thinking of both cessationist and charismatic non-cessationist believers. The charismatics would need to stop using a "Thus says the Lord" introduction to their prophesying, since, according to Grudem, this kind of "authority of words" prophecy is limited to the OT prophets and NT apostles. A more humble, "I feel the Lord has shown me...", would be more appropriate to the status of NT prophets.

On the other hand, the cessationists would now be free to accept the ongoing, less authoritative nature of NT prophecy without feeling that the finality and supremacy of the NT scriptures are being threatened.

STANDARD FOR COMPARISON USED BY THE EARLY CHURCH

Let’s back up a bit. We know that following the day of Pentecost, there was a proliferation of prophetic activity in the early church. "Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy..." (This is Acts 2:17) provides evidence of the pouring out of the Holy Spirit. At the same time, the early church has to face the growing problem of false prophecy. "Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many," Jesus warns (Mt. 24:11). John tells us that this indeed happened, for "many false prophets have gone out into the world," he states (1 John 4:1).

Because of this, the early church needed to exercise care and discernment. Prophets and their prophecies must be tested. Paul exhorts, "Do not despise prophecies. Test all things; hold fast what is good" (1 Thess. 5:20, 21). The Corinthian church is told, "Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others judge" (1 Cor. 14:29). John adds, "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God...every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God" (1 John 4:1-3). (This group of Scriptures together seem to conclusively refute the author's premise that prophecy ceased. Let's see what he does with this. We will find that he simply reinterprets them according to his preconceived doctrines.)

As the early church sought to carry out this activity of discernment in evaluating NT prophets, what did they frequently use as their standard of comparison? Let's check out church history. Here the work of F. David Farnell is quite helpful. Farnell is the chairman of the Department of Ministerial Studies at Southeastern Bible College in Birmingham, Alabama. In the first of a four-part series on NT prophecy printed in Bibliotheca Sacra, after referring to a number of references in Eusebius, Justin Martyr, Epiphanius and others, Farnell states, "Thus the early church used Old Testament prophets and prophecy as a model for New Testament prophets and prophecy...Here the understanding of a direct continuity between Old Testament and New Testament prophets is seen in the early church." (So the early church view the gift of prophecy as a continuation of OT prophecy? But the spiritual gift ceased! How could they have this view if there was no prophecy at all?)

As the early church combated false prophecy in Montanism, (The author does not appeal to the Bible.

"Montanism began in the late second century AD, primarily in Phrygia..." This is well after the death of the last apostle, which cessationists use as the marker for the cessation of the "supernatural" gifts. 

Asterius Urbanus, a contemporary of the Montanists, wrote

“…this person was carried away in spirit; and suddenly being seized with a kind of frenzy and ecstasy, he raved, and began to speak and to utter strange things, and to prophesy in a manner contrary to the custom of the Church, as handed down from early times and preserved thenceforward in a continuous succession.”— Asterius Urbanus, The Extant Writings

Notice that Urbanus did not deny the existence of the gift of prophecy, which would have been the appropriate thing to do if prophecy had ceased. Rather, his complaint was with the nature of the prophecy, not the existence of it.)

Epiphanius in Panarion 48.2 indicates that an important argument against Montanism was that prophecies of true prophets must be fulfilled exactly. (Epiphanius wrote the Panarion in the late 300s A.D., centuries after the practices of the early church. How could he be an acceptable authority as to what constitutes proper church doctrine?

We read everything in the Panarion about Montanus, and could not find the information cited by the author. 48.2 is about a completely different topic.

At the risk of appealing to non-biblical sources ourselves, we present some counter claims for the reader's edification. These quotes demonstrate the author is in error:

• Justin Martyr (100-165): “For the prophetical gifts remain with us even to the present time. Now it is possible to see among us women and men who possess gifts of the Spirit of God.”

• Irenaeus (125-200): “In like manner we do also hear many brethren in the church who possess prophetic gifts and through the Spirit speak all kinds of languages. ... Yes, moreover, as I have said, the dead even have been raised up, and remained among us for many years.”

• Tertullian (150-240): “For seeing that we too acknowledge the spiritual charismata, or gifts, we too have merited the attainment of the prophetic gift ... and heaven knows how many distinguished men, to say nothing of the common people, have been cured either of devils or of their sicknesses.”

• Novation (210-280): “This is he [the Holy Spirit] who places prophets in the church, instructs teachers, directs tongues, gives powers and healings, does wonderful works ... and arranges whatever gifts there are of the charismata; and thus making the Lord’s church everywhere, and in all, perfected and completed."

• Origen (185-284): “Some give evidence of their having received through this faith a marvelous power by the cures which they perform, invoking no other name over those who need their help than that of the God of all things, along with Jesus and a mention of his history.”

• Augustine (354-430): In his work The City of God, Augustine tells of healings and miracles that he has observed firsthand and then says, “I am so pressed by the promise of finishing this work that I cannot record all the miracles I know.”

What we have here is dueling historians. We prefer the author would restrict himself to the biblical case.)

This is precisely what the OT requires if a prophet has the right to claim he is the Lord’s (cf. Deut. 18:20, 22). (Let's quote the actual passage, including the intervening verses: 

De. 18:18-22 I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers; I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything I command him. 19 If anyone does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name, I myself will call him to account. 20 But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded him to say, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, must be put to death.” 21 You may say to yourselves, “How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the LORD?” 22 If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the LORD does not take place or come true, that is a message the LORD has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously. Do not be afraid of him.

The author offers this as the same standard to apply to NT prophetic gift. But if the standard applies, what about the "put to death" part? Does it not apply? Is the author picking and choosing his requirements?)

Surely it is not going beyond the evidence to suggest that the early church did not adopt a lower standard of evaluation or accept a different definition of the nature of New Testament prophecy. (Well, yes. it is going beyond the evidence, sir.)

New Testament prophets had to have 100% accuracy, just as their Old Testament counterparts.

NO DISCONTINUITY BETWEEN JOEL 2 AND ACTS 2

In Joel 2:28 we are told, "...Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy..." This is spoken by an Israelite prophet to a people who were well aware of the nature of OT prophecy. It is this passage that is quoted by Peter as being fulfilled on the day of Pentecost. The New Covenant would be inaugurated by a proliferation of prophecy, greater than what was experienced under the Old Covenant. There is not the slightest hint that prophecy under the New Covenant would be inferior to that in the Old, as would surely be the case if New Testament prophecy by its very nature was often a mixture of truth and error. Neither Joel nor Peter indicates the least qualitative difference in the nature of this prophecy. (This is nothing more than an Argument From Silence. That is, the author draws his conclusions from what Joel and Peter did NOT say.

And by the way, the author just breezes past the implications of this, that prophecy would be widespread and common, not restricted to a limited group of people. The lowly and those of no stature would prophecy in the New Covenant. But the author has nothing to say about this.)

NOW CONCERNING AGABUS

In Acts 21:10, 11 we read, "And as we stayed many days, a certain prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. When he had come to us, he took Paul’s belt, bound his own hands and feet, and said, "Thus says the Holy Spirit, ‘So shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man who owns this belt, and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.’"

Grudem uses this prophecy as a typical example of NT prophecy, which can contain mistakes and errors. He looks at Acts 21:27-35 and suggests that neither of Agabus’ predictions came true. "Paul was not bound by the Jews but by the Romans, and far from delivering Paul over to the Romans, they tried to kill him, and he had to be delivered from the Jews by the soldiers." Grudem further comments:...it is not that Agabus has spoken in a totally false or misleading way; it is just that he has the details wrong. But this kind of minor inaccuracy is exactly compatible with the type of prophecy we found earlier in 1 Corinthians, in which the prophet receives some kind of revelation and then reports it in his own words. He would have a "divine authority of general content" (Paul would be imprisoned at Jerusalem), but with the details wrong.

D.A. Carson also states with reference to Agabus, "I can think of no reported Old Testament prophet whose prophecies are so wrong on the details."

Someone is surely wrong here, but I would suggest that it is Grudem and Carson, not Agabus or the Holy Spirit. Let’s look more carefully at this prophecy. To begin with we are dealing with a prophet whose reputation precedes him. In Acts 11:27 he "showed by the Spirit that there was going to be a great famine throughout all the world, which also happened in the days of Claudius Caesar." At the very least, the accuracy of this prophecy leads us to expect the same from his next prophecy. (Perhaps the author has this expectation, but we don't.)

Next, note the continuity with Old Testament prophets as is reflected by the graphic symbolism of Agabus’ binding of his own hands and feet with Paul’s belt. Not only does it put this prophecy on a level with Isaiah 20, Jeremiah 13, and Ezekiel 24, it also is an indication of the certainty Agabus must have felt regarding its fulfillment.

Especially telling, however, is the introductory phrase, "Thus says the Holy Spirit", followed by what the Holy Spirit said. In the NT the formula "Tade legei" ("these are the words of") is only found here and in Rev. 2, 3 at the beginning of each of the seven letters to the churches in Asia. In the LXX, this is the common rendering of "Thus says the Lord". Agabus was surely quite aware that by his symbolic actions and introductory words he was placing himself on the same inspired level as the holy men of God of the Old Testament who were borne along by the Holy Spirit.

But what about the "mistakes" Grudem alleges? Let’s consider the second one first. Contrary to what Grudem says, the Jews did deliver Paul over to the Romans. They might not have done it willingly at first, but they still did do it! This is supported by Paul’s own statement in Acts 28:17, "...I was delivered as a prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans..." But did the Jews bind Paul? Surely they did, (Arguing from silence again. But who bound Paul is an important detail, especially in the mind of Paul, who responded,

I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. [Ac. 21:13]

So Paul goes to Jerusalem and causes an uproar:

Ac. 21:30 The whole city was aroused, and the people came running from all directions. Seizing Paul, they dragged him from the temple, and immediately the gates were shut.

The uproar reached the ears of the Roman commander: 

Ac. 21:33 The commander came up and arrested him and ordered him to be bound with two chains.

Waaait. Why would the commander order him bound if he was already bound?)

in the sense that it was because of their hatred that Paul was bound to start with. It was at their insistence that he not be released, but remain a prisoner at Caesarea (Acts 24:27). The Jews at Jerusalem were just as responsible for Paul’s being bound as earlier Jews were for Jesus being crucified. They may not have personally and literally done the job, but their hatred brought it about (in the plan and purpose of God). (Waaait again. The author previously wrote, "New Testament prophets had to have 100% accuracy, just as their Old Testament counterparts." Yes, it's just a detail, but Agabus clearly got it wrong.)

If Grudem demanded this kind of rigid literalism in the fulfillment of OT prophecy, (No, it's the author who demands 100% accuracy.)

what would he do with "I will send you Elijah the prophet" (Mal. 4:5)? Did Malachi only have an "authority of general content" at this point? Was he, like Agabus, mistaken? (These two items are on completely different levels. The expression of how Elijah might manifest is a much deeper prophetic expression than the simple mistake of saying how Paul would be bound.)

Or does the fulfillment explain what God meant when He inspired the prophet to say what he did? Surely the latter is the case with Malachi, and, I submit, with Agabus as well.

FEELING THE PRESSURE OF EPHESIANS 2:20

This text reminds us that the church is "built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone". Our focus is on the inclusion of the prophets with the apostles as the foundation of the church. That these prophets are NT prophets cannot be seriously questioned, especially in the light of Eph. 3:5 where the apostles and prophets again are found together as recipients of the revelation of the mystery that the Spirit has "now" made known.

If we accept Grudem’s description of a NT prophet, then this text presents two main problems. The first problem is that Eph. 2:20 gives NT prophets a rather high and exalted position in God’s plan for the church. They are placed right up there (or down there! - foundation) with the apostles. This is not really appropriate for those whose "word from the Lord" may and often does contain a mixture of truth and error that needs to be sorted out by the hearers. While the gift of prophecy to the church was to be eagerly sought, yet, from Grudem’s perspective, it would hardly place its recipient next to the apostles in founding the church of Christ. (The author mistakes the specific NT office of prophet with the generalized spiritual gift of prophecy.)

The second problem relates to the clear implications of the imagery of being the "foundation". Once a foundation is laid, it does not need to go on being laid. This clearly points to the temporary nature and cessation of the office of apostle. (This is a nonsense statement. No true Christian, charismatic or not, is trying to keep building the foundation.)

This poses no problem for Grudem and company. However, the same reasoning would also indicate that like the apostles, so the NT prophets were raised up to serve in the founding of the church. Once this task was complete, this office, like that of apostle, was no longer needed. (This is not a biblical argument, it is a speculation based on the metaphor of a foundation.)

This very definitely is not in line with Grudem’s view.

(...) Yawn...

ON TO 1 CORINTHIANS 14

One of Grudem’s main arguments for nonauthoritative congregational NT prophecy (as opposed to OT/apostolic authoritative prophecy), is 1 Cor. 14:29 where Paul instructs them, "Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others judge." Grudem explains

:...one can conclude that 1 Cor. 14:29 indicates that the whole congregation would listen and evaluate what was said by the prophet, forming opinions about it, and some would perhaps discuss it publicly. Each prophecy might have both true and false elements in it...Now this process is understandable only if there is a difference in the kind of speech envisioned by the OT and that in 1 Cor. The OT prophets claimed to be speaking God’s very words. But it is inconceivable that Paul or the Corinthians thought that God’s words needed to be evaluated to see whether or not they were true or useful. So the prophets at Corinth must not have been thought to speak with a divine authority of actual words, but rather with just a divine authority of general content, which made the prophecies subject to evaluation and questioning at every point.

As far as I have been able to determine, this is Grudem’s main beam upon which he rests his case for this new view of the nature of NT prophecy. Can it fairly be said to bear that kind of weight? You be the judge.

Why does Paul need to instruct the Corinthian church to evaluate/judge/distinguish when it comes to prophecies/prophets? (The author is referring to

1Co. 14:29 Two or three prophets should speak, and the others should weigh carefully what is said. 

"Weigh" is diakrinó; I separate, distinguish, discern one thing from another; I doubt, hesitate, waver. ...to learn by discrimination, to try, decide. 

In the gathering of the assembly, all the people (the others should weigh carefully what is said.) "distinguish/separate" the words and "decide/discern" the good from the bad.)

(...)