God’s Judgment: How It Works – Part 25

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God’s Judgment: How It Works – Part 25

God spoke through prophets, then He spoke through His Son (Hebrews 1:1-2). Jesus, the Son of God, taught His apostles in person, then sent the Holy Spirit to speak truth to and through His apostles. It is because of the prophets that we know what God said in the Old Testament about His future judgment. It is because of the apostles that we know what God said in the New Testament about His future judgment.

In the last part of our series, we looked at what God said through the prophet Isaiah about His coming judgment on various nations and people groups. In this part, we will look at what other prophets said and wrote.

Judgment and the Prophets

You’ve probably heard the terms “Major” and “Minor” prophets in the Bible. Those terms address the length of the prophetic writings, not the importance of the prophets. Every prophet that God used to speak His word was important because every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God is important.

The Bible tells us how to tell if someone is a “true” prophet of God.

They received a call from God
They received a word from God (e.g. direct communication, dreams, visions, revelations)
They spoke the words God gave them to speak
They did what God told them to do
They worked miracles in fulfillment of God’s Word
They prophesied to God’s people (e.g. instruction, direction, warning)
They prophesied to other nations (e.g. primarily warning)
What they prophesied came true in the past and will come true in the future

The Bible lists many true prophets of God. We know some of them by name. Some we do not know by name. Here are some examples.

Named Prophets (Male and female)

Noah
Abraham
Jacob
Joseph
Moses
Aaron
Miriam
Joshua
Deborah
Huldah
Samuel
King David
Gad
Nathan
King Solomon
Ahijah
Asaph
Elijah
Elisha
Shemaiah
Hanani
Micaiah
Oded
Azariah
Jehu
Iddo
Jahaziel
Eliezer
Jonah
Amos
Hoea
Isaiah
Micah
Nahum
Jeremiah
Zephaniah
Daniel
Ezekiel
Habakkuk
Obadiah
Hagai
Zechariah
Malachi

Unamed Prophets

Prophet spoke to the children of Israel (Judges 6:8-10)
Man of God spoke to Eli (1 Samuel 2:27-36)
Prophets of 1Samuel 10
Old prophet who lived in Bethel (1 Kings 13:1-32)
Prophets killed by Jezebel and prophets protected by Obadiah (1 Kings 18:4)
Prophet spoke to Ahab king of Israel (1 Kings 20:13-22)
Man of God spoke to the king of Israel (1 Kings 20:28)
One of the sons of the prophets spoke to his neighbor and King Ahab (1 Kings 20:35-43)
Sons of the prophets who were at Bethel (2 Kings 2:3)
Sons of the prophets who were at Jericho (2 Kings 2:)
Prophet spoke to Amaziah (2 Chronicles 25:5-16)

Prophets Warn the Nations

God made a specific promise to Abram when He called him to leave his home country and travel to “a land that I will show you” (Genesis 12:1). God promised Abraham —

I will make you a great nation
I will bless you And make your name great;
And you shall be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you
And I will curse him who curses you
And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

We will see the full power of God’s blessings and cursing on all the families of the earth in the final judgment. While many prophets in the Bible prophesied about God’s judgment on Israel, many prophesied against other nations. We saw in our last study about Isaiah’s prophecies that he mentioned several nations including —

Egypt – Isaiah 19:1-17
Ethiopia – Isaiah 18:1-7
Syria – Isaiah 17:1-3
Moab (modern Jordan) – Isaiah 15 & 16

God spoke to nations through other Old Testament prophets as well. Some of those nations no longer exist because of prophecies God pronounced on them through His prophets. However, many nations and people groups will remain at the time of the God’s judgment of the nations. Here are some examples of what’s coming for them —

The Lord is at Your right hand; He shall execute kings in the day of His wrath. He shall judge among the nations, He shall fill the places with dead bodies, He shall execute the heads of many countries. He shall drink of the brook by the wayside; Therefore He shall lift up the head. Psalm 110:5-7

Egypt shall be a desolation, And Edom a desolate wilderness, Because of violence against the people of Judah, For they have shed innocent blood in their land. But Judah shall abide forever, And Jerusalem from generation to generation. Joel 3:19-20

For the day of the Lord upon all the nations is near; As you have done, it shall be done to you; Your reprisal shall return upon your own head. For as you drank on My holy mountain, So shall all the nations drink continually; Yes, they shall drink, and swallow, And they shall be as though they had never been. But on Mount Zion there shall be deliverance, And there shall be holiness; The house of Jacob shall possess their possessions. Obadiah 1:15-17

The nations shall see and be ashamed of all their might; They shall put their hand over their mouth; Their ears shall be deaf. They shall lick the dust like a serpent; They shall crawl from their holes like snakes of the earth. They shall be afraid of the Lord our God, And shall fear because of You. Micah 7:16-17

For Gaza shall be forsaken, And Ashkelon desolate; They shall drive out Ashdod at noonday, And Ekron shall be uprooted. Woe to the inhabitants of the seacoast, The nation of the Cherethites! The word of the Lord is against you, O Canaan, land of the Philistines: ‘I will destroy you; So there shall be no inhabitant.’ Zephaniah 2:4-5

Then the Lord will go forth And fight against those nations, As He fights in the day of battle. And in that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, Which faces Jerusalem on the east. And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two, From east to west, Making a very large valley; Half of the mountain shall move toward the north And half of it toward the south … And this shall be the plague with which the Lord will strike all the people who fought against Jerusalem: Their flesh shall dissolve while they stand on their feet, Their eyes shall dissolve in their sockets, And their tongues shall dissolve in their mouths. It shall come to pass in that day That a great panic from the Lord will be among them. Everyone will seize the hand of his neighbor, And raise his hand against his neighbor’s hand; Judah also will fight at Jerusalem. And the wealth of all the surrounding nations Shall be gathered together: Gold, silver, and apparel in great abundance. Such also shall be the plague On the horse and the mule, On the camel and the donkey, And on all the cattle that will be in those camps. So shall this plague be. Zechariah 14:3-4, 12-15

A Word to the Wise

The nations of this world are not listening to God’s prophets. If they were, here’s a word to the wise.

Now therefore, be wise, O kings; Be instructed, you judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, And rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, And you perish in the way, When His wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all those who put their trust in Him. Psalm 2:10-12

Next Time

Christians will be eyewitnesses to God’s final judgment of the nations. What will we see? More on that in the next part of our special series, God’s Judgment: How It Works.

Judgment and Justice

God’s future judgment will be based on His justice. That’s why we have connected this series with one titled God’s Justice: How It Works. You can read the first part of that series here.

If you have not read all of the parts of this study we’ve published so far, we invite you to do that now for the Scriptural background to Christ as Judge.

Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Part Five
Part Six
Part Seven
Part Eight
Part Nine
Part Ten
Part Eleven
Part Twelve
Part Thirteen
Part Fourteen
Part Fifteen
Part Sixteen
Part Seventeen
Part Eighteen
Part Nineteen
Part Twenty
Part Twenty One
Part Twenty Two
Part Twenty Three
Part Twenty Four

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God’s Judgment: How It Works – Part 25