Prophecy, Pathos and the birth of the Revolution

Abraham Joshua Heschel in his book, The Prophets, said this regarding the prophet Hosea,

"The marriage of Hosea was no symbolic representation of real facts, no act of recreating or repeating events in the history of Israel or experiences in the inner life of God. Its meaning was not objective, inherent in the marriage, but subjective, evocative. Only by living through in his own life what the divine Consort of Israel experienced, was the prophet able to attain sympathy for the divine situation.... [the marriage's] purpose was not to demonstrate divine attitudes to the people but to educate Hosea himself in the understanding of divine sensibility.
"The tragic disturbance in the relationship between God and Israel must have determined decisively his attitude and outlook. Hosea, who again and again emphasized the unchanging devotion of God to Israel, was not simply an advocate of the people. His mind was powerfully affected by the embitterment of God, echoed in his own sympathetic experience."

Later in the book, Heschel calls this divine sympathy by the Greek word pathos. This is the source of our word 'pathetic' though it doesn't have such a negative connotation in the way he uses the word here. Pathos originally meant deep feeling or empathy with something beyond yourself. (Yet it is interesting to note, that while the word originally meant a sympathy with a transcendent experience, these experiences messed people up to the point where the victims of this pathos ended looking a lot more pathetic than they probably would have liked. Look at Jerimiah)

Anyway, Heschel's point is that the hallmark of prophecy is pathos with the heart of God. In order to hear God, you must know Him and His heart. And I'm learning that such pathos is the crux of a good relationship with Jesus. Knowing His heart, what He thinks and feels and values, what keeps the Lord up at night, and what helps Him sleep soundly, helps us hear what He is trying to say.

In John 10:27, Jesus tells His disciples that, "My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me." Knowing the Lord, and hearing the Lord, and following the Lord are all facets of the same diamond. This inspires love for God and love for others. I would dare say intimacy, being at the heart of love, is at the heart of the Gospel (Mark 12:37, Matt 22:33). The Lord called us to that intimacy. And this is all nothing new. If you find yourself at this web's even, then its probably a given that you know all this. So what's the point?

The point is: being intimate with Jesus changes things! The idea that God is always speaking, always working and always loving people is new to me on practical level, and it is a lot easier to preach it theologically then it is to live actually. Yet if these ideas are true, then they change (and maybe sanctify) everything. Things happen! This is why it says in First Corinthians 14:27, that if all prophecy and an unbelievers comes in, then God is seen to be in our midst. The guy will fall on his face and worship the real and present Lord. Intimacy with God, pathos with the risen Christ's passion for the world, prophecy in the truest sense of the word, really can change everything because we meet God here and He can change everything. Intimacy is the impetus for our faith!

God really exists, not just on a theological level, but an actually level. If you believe this, that God exists and earnestly rewards those who seek Him (Heb 12), then go live like it! That's all there really is to life.

Daniel