The Schools of the Prophets [Booklet]

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May the Spirit be manifested in the church in all His varied gifts for its present need, and in all His manifold grace, that the name of the Lord may be magnified!

Excerpt- As in the case of the prophets, Jehovah had His servants among those brought up in the schools of the prophets—so surely the Holy Ghost as the sovereign dispenser of gifts of ministry, has raised up many from universities and academies to bear witness to Jesus; but always with the grand characteristic of His teaching, the setting aside, and in the back ground, of all advantages derived from such sources, on account of the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, which He teaches. We may smile at the disputations and subtleties of the schoolmen of a former day, but the principle is the same. It is not whether better instruction is afforded in the schools now, but whether the schools themselves are not institutions of man, for the provision of that which the Lord Jesus most jealously keeps in His own hand. It is not to the purpose to say that many of the most faithful ministers have been raised up out of these schools; this is not denied: because the Holy Spirit will not allow human arrangements to interfere with His own sovereignty. But if these schools furnish a supply of men accredited as ministers, they must necessarily exert a powerful human influence, much more so than perhaps we are disposed to allow. We have seen the Lord raising up prophets, and men having prophets of their own; and the prophet of the Lord brought into instant collision with the prophets of the people. Jesus, as ascended, gives teachers to the church, and men have provided for teachers. in the church. May we not then most reasonably expect that the teachers the Lord has given will find the greatest hindrance from those whom man has provided for himself?

The prophet was not an integral part of the former dispensation, but only came in on the failure of the priesthood; but ministry is the very power of this dispensation (Eph. 4); “pastors, teachers, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.” Now if God has provided this in one way, even by distinct gift of the Spirit, and man has substituted another way, we see what necessarily must be the result, even the most fearful form of apostasy. “The beast and the false prophet” go together, the former could not prevail without the help of the other.