Every Prophecy from the Minor Prophets

Part 1

Tim Moore: Well, Nathan, in your book you made the same outstanding application about that humble little door. What do most people think of the 12 Minor Prophets?

Nathan Jones: Well, minor, little, strange, unimportant, unused, dusty.

Tim Moore: Yeah, but the premise of this book is that the 12 Minor Prophets are anything but unimportant. As a matter of fact, even though they make up only 7% of the Old Testament, they have tremendous relevance to us today.

Nathan Jones: Oh, I agree. And that’s why it is so important to write. Let me just read you two paragraphs that I think summarizes the impetus of why we wrote this book. It says, “When one truly digs into the life of the Minor Prophets, one will discover not something strange or minor, little, unimportant, unused and dusty, but the real life stories of 12 men who were thrust into quite perilous situations. They will discover these guys were everyday people, just like so many of us, they hailed from diverse backgrounds, they were farmers, and construction workers, some were clergy, and a few aristocrats, a mix of age from teens up to senior citizens. But what ties them all together, was a specific call by God to wear the burdensome mantle of prophet and deliver His messages.
And what messages they were! So full of fire from the pain of betrayal, and the joy of fatherly love that their ears must have been burning upon hearing them.” And here’s the reason: “Those impassioned messages revolved like planets around the sun, all around one key subject, faith.” And this is what I want people to learn how to grow in their faith. Faith can be described as that strong or unshakable belief in something, especially with little or no proof or evidence. The Bible itself defines faith simply as “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1, right. Faith is primarily tied to the idea of trust, and confidence, confidence, reliance, credence, belief, trust, we can all use some of that in our relationship with God.

Tim Moore: We certainly can. But you talk about this being 12 faith journeys. So, before we dive into the prophecies in particular, one of the techniques you use is you discuss the actual faith journeys, how these men, all from diverse backgrounds, came to understand they’re call of God from their own background, blended in their personality to what God revealed to them, and they shared with us. But you do that through 12 fictionalized accounts of their life story, as you are preparing the reader for what you’re going to present in each chapter. So, what would be one of your favorite stories of one of these prophets?

Nathan Jones: Okay. Well, I was and we had a guest on our TV show a while back, Carl Gallops, I was driving him to the airport after we did a TV show. And I said, “Carl, you’ve written a few books. I’m writing my first book. I don’t feel like I’m connecting the Minor Prophets to the audience.” He says, “Well, in my books I use a fictionalized story, you know, it’s called historical fiction.”

Tim Moore: Jonathan Cahn does the same thing.

Nathan Jones: He does it all the time, to connect them to the readers. So, he said, “Why don’t you lead each chapter with a fictionalized account, from evidence obviously, in each of the books and bring them to life. And, you know, that was some of the best advice I ever got. Of course we have twelve, and one for each of them. My favorite has got to be Hosea, it is a little long so I’m not going to read Hosea’s.

Tim Moore: So, what is the gist of his story that that brings him to life, even for a modern day reader with all the challenges, sometimes relationally in our own day?

Nathan Jones: Well, Hosea dealt with having a heart that was shattered. God told him go marry a prostitute, basically, and she was going to be betraying you all the time. Now the prophets, we have the writing prophets, obviously like the 12 Minor Prophets. We have the oral prophets who didn’t write like, say, Elijah or Nathan. And then we have the acting prophets that they would sometimes write, but the Lord would have them act something out. So, Hosea’s life became a living symbol of Hosea acting out, He was the faithful husband, God, and Gomer was the unfaithful Israel, the wife. And so, just a beautiful story of her on the auction block and how Hosea is buying her off the auction, and he forgives her just as God forgives us of our sins. And so how did Hosea deal with a shattered heart? Because he loved Gomer, he wanted to bring her back. It was a good symbol, a good testimony to the people of Israel. I’m a loving husband, you’re an unfaithful wife, I’ll redeem you back if you come back to me.

Tim Moore: And that’s a powerful story for each of us individually. It’s obviously a powerful story, even for God’s relationship to Israel. Because we can say as a group, they have not always been faithful, even though called and chosen, and yet God as the bridegroom, the faithful husband, He will redeem a great remnant of His chosen people just as He’s redeemed us individually. Well, you also make a great point that each prophet’s message and main points is relevant to our readers here in the 21st century, anybody that picks up the Word of God. So, with the time we’ve got left, let’s go through these 12 prophets, because you like to bring out the prophecies that they offer up in each book, and you tell us what percentage and how many have been fulfilled, have been partially fulfilled, and await fulfillment. So, let’s just step through them if we could, starting with?

Nathan Jones: Okay, of course, obviously Hosea.

Tim Moore: Obviously Hosea.

Nathan Jones: There are 197 verses in Hosea, 96 of them are prophetic, and there is a prophetic percentage of 49%. Now the prophets did two things, they foretold the future, and that’s what the prophecies are listed here, but they also forthtold or warned society about coming back to God and being in the right relationship with God. So, I think I’ve heard you say that each book is 100% forthtelling, but foretelling, telling the future is 49%.

Tim Moore: Right, I would assert that all of Scripture is forthtelling. So, you could make the claim that 100% of the Word of God is prophetic. And that’s why even these Minor Prophets, and you’ll see some of them dip in terms of their percentage of foretelling, but all of it has a revelation of God through these 12 men. And so, they’re prophetic from beginning to end. So having said that, Nathan has identified the percentage of foretelling, and that has a great value to us. It did for me as a reader. So, keep on with Hosea.

Nathan Jones: Okay, well, here’s a prophecy Hosea 1:4-6. “Then the Lord said to him, ‘Call him his name Jezreel, one of his sons, for in a little while, I will avenge the blood shed of Jezreel in the house of Jehu, and to bring an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel.” Now, this was a prophecy prophesying that King Jehu, that his dynasty would come to an end, and it was historically fulfilled when Assyria came and destroyed the line of Jehu. And you can find that in 2 Kings.

Tim Moore: So, that one was fulfilled. Give me an example of one that is awaiting fulfillment perhaps.

Nathan Jones: Oh, absolutely. All right.

Tim Moore: So, we can talk for let’s say about, Hosea 2:14-17 where, “It shall be in that day, says the Lord, that you will call Me, my husband and no longer call me my master, for I will take from her mouth the names of the Baals,” in other words, all the false gods, “and they shall be remembered by their name no more.” So that prophecy is promising that a whole remnant of the Jewish people will come to salvation in the fullness of time. We haven’t reached that point yet, so that one is awaiting fulfillment.

Nathan Jones: Yeah, awaiting fulfillment. And there’s also prophecies that are partial fulfillment. Where the Lord had a soon fulfillment, but there would also be a future farther fulfillment as well. So you can find a number of those, for instances Hosea 1:10-11, which is a prophecy about Judah and Israel being reunited as one nation again. Well, that happened on May 14th, 1948. So here we’ve got Hosea about 2,700 years ago prophesying that the northern and southern kingdoms would one day be one nation. Now who knew it would take almost 3,000 years for it to happen? But it has.

Tim Moore: And only faithful Christians reading these verses would say, well, I don’t know how it’s going to happen, but I believe God, and I trust that it will happen. Well, moving along, let’s go to Joel. He is a prophet that talks about some tremendous devastation in the nation. But you say he has a pretty high percentage of foretelling and then all of his prophecies yet lie, if not partially fulfilled in the future.

Nathan Jones: Yeah, at 73 verses, 48 of them prophetic; that makes 66% of the book of Joel. The book of Joel very much points to the Day of the Lord or the Tribulation. A lot of the prophecies revolve around there. For instance, Joel 1:15 “Alas for the day! For the day of the Lord is at hand, it shall come as destruction from the Almighty.” There was a partial fulfillment in Joel’s times, 2 Kings 18:13, but there’s also a future fulfillment, which we read about 2 Thessalonians 2. Joel 2:1-11 “Blow the trumpet in Zion and sound an alarm in my Holy Mountain, let all the inhabitants of the land tremble for the Day of the Lord is coming, for it is at hand.” And that was quoted by Jesus in Matthew 24:29. You know, when people say that the Old Testament is irrelevant, or the Minor Prophets in particular are irrelevant to the New Testament, there are over 250 quotes from the New Testament of just the Minor Prophets. And here Jesus quoted Joel 2:1-11.

Tim Moore: Well, we’ve taken off from Joel chapter 3. Obviously you highlight 9-16, but in verse 14 alone it says “Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision for the day of the Lord is near, in the valley of decision.” And we’ve applied that to our own modern era because whether it is hearkening to the ultimate fulfillment in the Valley of Jezreel, what we call the Valley of Megiddo or Armageddon, or for individuals, that valley of decision is something all of us go through and you must decide who you will serve. Well, let’s go on to the next prophet, because we’re going to run out of time otherwise. And that is, of course, Amos. So, what about Amos?

Nathan Jones: Well, Amos had to deal with the fires of injustice. He was sent up to Israel, and he was actually dragged out of town. He was kicked out; they didn’t want to listen to his prophecies. Amos you could find that there are 146 verses, it’s a little longer, 84 prophetic. That makes up 58% of the book of Amos points to the future. And there’s quite a number of prophecies in the book of Amos. I love in particular 5:27 “Therefore, I will send you into captivity beyond Damascus, says the Lord, whose name is the God of host.” Since they rejected Amos’ message, they rejected God, Israel will be sent into exile. And that was historically fulfilled by the Assyrians in 722 BC.

Tim Moore: It certainly was, obviously of all the prophecies, you list a total of 19, but you say 12 of them in Amos have already been fulfilled. Well, this brings us to one of the most interesting books of the Bible, because it is arguably the shortest book of the Old Testament, and that, of course, is the book of Obadiah. And yet you managed to spend 17 pages discussing this little book, Nathan, so you had more to say about it. What’s the highlights from Obadiah?

Nathan Jones: Alright, I’ll give credit to Steve Howell he wrote the Obadiah chapter. But 21 total verses, real short, 8 prophetic verses, that means 38% of Obadiah is prophetic. Obadiah dealt particularly with the Edomites who were constantly persecuting the Jewish people. Obadiah 1:5, 9 & 10 “Then you mighty men, O Teman, shall be dismayed, to the end that everyone from the mountains of Esau may be cut off by slaughter.” And that was a prophecy of the end of the Edomites, so they would be dismayed at their time of destruction. Malachi 1:3 is the prophecy, prophetic fulfillment, it was done and there are no more Edomites. So it’s a short book, but it gives the Jewish people a sense of justice because the Edomites were so, they are their distant cousins through Esau and they persecuted them greatly. Obadiah brought hope that the persecution would end.

Tim Moore: And so two prophecies fulfilled, two to be fulfilled. Well, this brings us to one perhaps of the most famous of the Old Testament prophets, because every young person hears about this in Sunday school, and that’s the prophet Jonah. And yet he had a very unusual calling because he didn’t speak primarily to the Jewish people, who did he go to?

Nathan Jones: He went to the dreaded Assyrians, particularly the capital of Nineveh. These people were horrifically cruel, I mean think of ISIS marching its way through the Middle East, that’s what the Assyrians were like. Jonah obviously didn’t want to go.

Tim Moore: Yeah, he was a reluctant prophet, to say the least.

Nathan Jones: He went the other way. But what’s interesting, even though he’s called a prophet, this is one of the Minor Prophet books that has almost no prophecies in it. It is 48 verses, there might be considered three if we go to 2 Kings 14:25, which is a reference to Jonah giving a prophecy. It says “He, Jeroboam restored the territory of Israel from the entrance,” and he goes and gives a details, “through his servant, Jonah, the son of Amittai.” So this prophecy is King Jeroboam, the son of Joash, would enlarge the borders of Israel, it happened.

Tim Moore: But there’s another important prophecy that really—

Nathan Jones: Yes, tell us about that one. That’s huge.

Tim Moore: Well, I think the most exciting is that Jesus Christ Himself said, your sign will be the sign of Jonah, because He was referring to the prophet being three days and three nights in the belly of a great fish. We don’t know that it was a whale, there’s not many whales in the Mediterranean, but some kind of sea creature that he subsided in the belly for three days. And Jesus Christ foreshadowing His own death, said, “Such will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights.” And I believe that was very literally fulfilled in the life of Jesus Christ. And so, again, bringing relevance of this prophet into our understanding of the Gospel. Jesus was crucified, He was dead, He was buried for three days and three nights, we can talk about that timing another time, and then He indeed was resurrected. A tremendous, fulfilled prophecy in the life of our Savior.

Nathan Jones: And it is proof that the Holy Spirit wrote the entire Bible because the Lord quotes the Old Testament, Jesus, never thought the Old Testament was irrelevant. He constantly pointed to it. Why? Because the Godhead wrote it.

Tim Moore: Amen.

Nathan Jones: Jesus wrote it.

Tim Moore: Exactly like the Apostles, as they would preach. All right, take us all to Micah.

Nathan Jones: Micah, now Micah is one of my favorite prophets because he is very relevant for today. I mean, what do you do when your government has failed? When government is so corrupt that it fails in its purposes. It sounds just like right out of today’s headlines. 105 verses, 55 of them are prophetic. 52% of the book of Micah is prophetic. Micah 1:3-4 for instance, “For behold, the Lord is coming out of His place; He will come down and tread on the high places of the earth. The mountains will melt under Him, and the valleys will split like wax before the fire, like waters poured down to a steep place.” This is a prophecy of when Jesus Christ returns, not His First Coming, but His Second Coming, there will be a worldwide cataclysm on that day. So it is a future prophecy.

Tim Moore: It certainly is. And really we get into an accelerating sense of future prophecies. We go to Nahum who is also a relatively short prophet, short winded I should say, in terms of writing. But his percentage is very, very high, 85%, arguably the highest in the foretelling prophecies of any of the Minor Prophets.

Nathan Jones: Yeah, so Jonah was able to bring the Ninevites to salvation, 150 year later the Ninevites had fallen back, God was going to judge the Ninevites who were very cruel to the Jewish people. So Nahum 1:12-14, for instance, is a prophecy about the destruction of Nineveh. Sure enough, the Assyrian empire was destroyed by the Babylonians in 612 B.C, so that prophecy was fulfilled. But there is of course, there’s a theme throughout, even though God is calling the Jewish people back to repentance and they’re refusing to repent, He gives future prophecies that show that He will bless them. So each of these Minor Prophets has prophecies for the Jewish people to say, hey, I know you’ve fallen from Me, but I am faithful and I will go through. For instance, “For the Lord will restore the excellence of Jacob, like the excellence of Israel,” Nahum 2:2. That’s a future fulfilled prophecy that Israel will be restored. It’ll have a prominent position in the Millennial Kingdom.

Tim Moore: It certainly will. Well we come to a prophet that we have referenced often here on Christ in Prophecy, that of course being Habakkuk or Habacuc , if you speak a little bit of Hebrew I’m told. And so Habakkuk is relatively short and is a prophet that brings great angst to the destruction that is about to befall the Jewish people back in that day. And yet he is a prophet that clings to tough faith. So tell us a little bit more about Habakkuk. How much of his book is foretelling and how many of his prophecies remain to be fulfilled?

Nathan Jones: Well, I think you like him because you like to say Habacuc.

Tim Moore: I do like to say Habacuc.

Nathan Jones: 56 verses, 60 of them are prophetic, so it’s only about 29%. But Habakkuk had the question, his challenge was: How do you have faith when you’re confused? The Lord gave him a prophecy, he says, you know there’s all this evil around me. How do we fix it? And God says, I’m going to send the Babylonians to destroy you. And he’s like, what? What kind of answer is that? So he was very confused. And when the Lord tells us stuff that doesn’t make sense to us, how do we maintain faith when the Lord gives us confusing and sometimes it seems conflicting, but it’s not, prophecy. So Habakkuk 1:5-11, “For indeed I am raising up the Chaldeans,” the Babylonians, “a bitter and hasty nation.” And He says they’re going to destroy you, and sure enough, it was historically fulfilled.

Tim Moore: And one of the keys that is recorded in Micah is the righteous will live by faith. And so it is our faith in Christ, our faith in the Lord God that allows us to persevere, even when circumstances around us seem so horrific. And that is a very applicable message to today.

Nathan Jones: I like, before we move on Habakkuk 2:14, “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.” Can you imagine living where the whole world knows the Lord? I can’t wait until Habakkuk 2:14 is fulfilled.

Tim Moore: I’m looking forward to that day. All right, so that brings us to Zephaniah. Another one that is not often referenced in many a sermon series, but very important in its own right.

Nathan Jones: Zephaniah had to deal with peer pressure. He was an aristocrat, he was related to the king, but he had to bring a message of condemnation against a king that he loved, a relative he loved. 53 verses, 47 are prophetic, that is 89%. Zephaniah has the highest level of prophecy in any of the Minor Prophets. Zephaniah 2:7, “The coast shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah; they shall feed their flocks there; in the houses of Ashkelon they shall lie down at evening. For their Lord God will intervene for them, and return their captives.” So it’s a prophecy that Israel will eventually possess a greater land than what they even have today. And that’s awaiting possibly a Psalm 83 War, or at least the Gog Magog War.

Tim Moore: Yes, it certainly is. All right, we’re going to pick up speed. What about Haggai?

Nathan Jones: All right, well Haggai lived in a time period where the exiles had returned, a faithful remnant had come back. But the people were discouraged. They were constantly–they were guilty for not building God’s house. They had decided oh, I better build my own house first. So God blighted their land, so there were no crops. So they said, hey, what’s the deal? And Haggai came out and he presented, 38 verses, 8 of them prophetic, that’s 21%. For instance Haggai 2:9, “‘The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former,’ says the Lord of hosts. ‘And in this place I will give peace.’” So we’re talking about when the Messiah returns, this second Temple, they were so disappointed when they finished building it. It was not as good as Solomon’s Temple. It would not be as good as Herod’s Temple. But the Millennial Temple that Jesus will build, the glory in that! Because Jesus will be right there, is amazing. And Haggai prophesied that.

Tim Moore: Well, that brings us right to Zechariah. I love Zechariah because he has so many prophecies related to the Second Coming. Obviously 64%, as you identified of his verses deal with a foretelling, and there are 25, 25 prophecies awaiting fulfillment, even though by your account 5 have already been fulfilled, 7 have been partially fulfilled. But Zechariah is the one who tells us that in the day that is to come, Jesus will save His people and bring them back from the land of the East and of the West, and they will be His people. Speaking specifically of the Jewish people. He also says that in the end times He will come and reign from Mt. Zion. And so Zechariah is just so full of prophecies that we look forward to. When I go to the Mount of Olives, I’m sure you did the same thing, I’m using many verses out of Zechariah because He promises that He will save His people Israel, and He will come to reign upon the earth from Mount Zion.

Nathan Jones: Vic Batista who does The Truth Will Set You Free podcast with us, he calls the Book of Zechariah the mini Revelation, because it really is the book of Revelation as a mini form in the Old Testament. There are so many wonderful prophecies, about how the Lord will come and defeat Israel’s enemies. A remnant will be regathered, and Jesus Christ will rule and reign in Jerusalem for a thousand years. It’s an exciting book to read.

Tim Moore: Well, I look forward to the fulfillment “that in that day a fountain shall be opened for the House of David,” that is the Jewish people, “and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanliness.” We know that fountain has already been opened, but that it will wash over those, that remnant in the fullness of time. Well, this brings us to our last book. I won’t mispronounce his name this time, but—

Nathan Jones: You like it, go ahead.

Tim Moore: Oh, no I won’t. Malachi with my Italian accent. But Malachi who really closes out the canon of the Old Testament and yet has great relevance to us today.

Nathan Jones: It’s really sad because the Lord exiled the Jewish people out of Israel for 70 years, brought a believing remnant back decades later, during the late 400’s during Nehemiah and Ezra’s time. There was a revival amongst the Jewish people. By the time you get about 400 B.C. in Malachi’s time, the Jewish people are just going through the motions. And so here you got Malachi, who was a priest at the temple, and he’s watching the people bring up diseased, and blemish, and even stolen animals for sacrifice. And he challenges the people on it. And the people are like ah, it doesn’t matter. And what about your belief in God? Ah, it doesn’t matter. So Malachi’s faith was questioned. He didn’t go along with the flow there. 55 verses, 22 were prophetic that’s 40%. And Malachi has some wonderful, wonderful passages in it because it says, for instance, “They shall be Mine,” says the LORD of hosts, “On the day that I make them My jewels. And I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him,” 3:16-18. He’s calling the Jewish people His jewels. So even though they’ve abandoned Him, He hasn’t abandoned them. But this is what He does, He will spend the next 400 years not talking to them, until Malachi 4:5-6, “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.” Elijah the prophet did come in the form of John the Baptist. He likely will come as one of the two witnesses before Jesus’ Second Coming. So that means that the Minor Prophets don’t end the Bible, they just begin the next chapter.

Tim Moore: Let’s face it, Nathan, 400 years of silence. But if a person doesn’t open the Scripture today, it is silent. So the only way you can glean the understanding that God wants you to have through His revelation, including the Minor Prophets, is by opening the book and reading it. Well, Nathan, how can our viewers get a copy of your wonderful new book, “The 12 Faith Journeys of the Minor Prophets: Prophecy Edition?”

Nathan Jones: You can get the updated prophecy edition copy of the “12 Faith Journeys of the Minor Prophets” by calling the number you see on the screen or visiting our online store. For a gift of only $20 or more, we’ll be glad to send you a copy.

Tim Moore: We sure will. And let me be very clear, even if you have a copy of the original edition of the “12 Faith Journeys of the Minor Prophets,” you’ll want to get this prophecy edition as well. It’ll be a great resource for you, your Bible study group, or even to give to friends and family. Well, Nathan, this has been a wonderful dialog about all of the Minor Prophets and the relevant topics that they apply to our lives today. I hope that you’ll keep writing.

Nathan Jones: Well, I enjoy it. And I learn so much when I do.

Tim Moore: Well, I think we all learn more, even than our readers, when we write.

Nathan Jones: Yes.

Tim Moore: But I also hope you’ll come back and be on Christian in Prophecy again sometime. Well, like, maybe next week.

Nathan Jones: Okay, there you go.

Tim Moore: All right, very good. Well, actually, folks, we hope that you’ll join us again next week for another engaging episode of Christ in Prophecy. Until then, let’s all commit to heed Micah’s advice to watch expectantly for the Lord, waiting for the God of our salvation. Godspeed.

End of Program