This is what makes discernment so difficult…

Baldo by Hector D. Cantú and Carlos Castellanos for June 25, 2009

Is the found wallet temptation or an answer to prayer? A good example of the difficulty of discernment. One of my favorite examples of this Deut. 18:22.

If a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD but the thing does not take place or prove true, it is a word that the LORD has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; do not be frightened by it.

The problem: you have to respond to the prophet’s words (Deut. 18:19) before you know the outcome. Hananiah in Jer. 28 is a great case since I am willing to bet that most of us, in that circumstance, would find ourselves siding with Hananiah, or at least hoping he was right. (Hananiah said the LORD the God of Israel is more powerful than Babylon and will break its yoke from upon Judah, who wouldn’t want that to be true? Even Jeremiah hoped it would be so, Jer. 28:6.) In the Episcopal Church USA right now there are a lot of people claiming to be “prophetic.” God is calling his people back to his Covenant. God is a revealing a new path. You get the idea. When I read Jer. 28 I have very little faith that I would have gotten it right then and most didn’t. How will we get it right now? Only in hindsight, so says Deut. 18:22, will we know for sure.

Discernment is a difficult and dangerous thing.

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