(Part 2 of 3)

2.

I will not argue whether or not God was in the second coming of Buhari, but to the little measure of my study of Cyrus, I am unable to ascribe his name to one who has not supported the rebuilding of Jerusalem or its Temple but, on the contrary, in speech and by body language, has been on the side of the destroyers of the temples and the people of God. That God said somebody was coming does not also mean that God was the One sending them; that He said somebody was coming does not also mean that He said He was the One sending them. Compare 1 Kings 19:15 and 2 Kings 13:3, 7; 8:2. For example, the word of God elaborately tells us about the coming of the Anti-Christ in the last days; are we to say therefore that the Anti-Christ is coming from God or is being sent by God because God had spoken about that coming? God told King Hezekiah that he would certainly die. Did that king understand that message from God to mean that he was to climb into his bed and await the death? No, he faced the wall and prayed, turning the case around to his benefit (2 Kings 20:1-6). Did that mean that Prophet Isaiah who had brought that message did not hear God properly? No.

3. Perception and Discernment

Nineveh the capital city of Assyria received a prophecy: “Yet forty days, and Nineveh SHALL BE overthrown” (Jonah 3:4). Did the Ninevites understand that message to mean that the looming overthrow of their city was the great pleasure of God to be welcomed with fireworks and fanfare? No, they took steps of spontaneous national repentance, which averted the ‘coming’ of judgment (Jonah 3:10). A message and its interpretation are not always the same. That one has correctly received a word does not always mean that they have correctly interpreted  that word. That was where the prophet Jonah also made his mistake.

It is important not only to be able to receive but also to be able to properly discern a message, because it is possible to wrongly communicate a message rightly received; it is possible to wrongly interpret a message righty received, and the fact that the interpreter himself had been the receiver does not make the wrong interpretation right (Jeremiah 1:11-12; Genesis 35:18; Acts 8:30-31). A watchman was put on duty with instructions to “declare what he seeth” (Isaiah 21:6). As he watched, he saw chariots of domestic animals: horses, asses, and camels; but as he “hearkened diligently with much heed” to discern what he had been perceiving, he announced something different from what we had all seen with him; he declared: “A lion!” (vv.7-8). We all know that that was not what he had seen, but it is we who had been wrong. What had been disguised to seem to us as domestic animals was an approaching predator; a lion. Such watchmen don’t always make sense to everyone, not especially to those who also think they can see with their eyes; but such sincere watchmen may save us before the lion arrives that we had thought by our ‘seeing’ eyes was a burden-bearing ass.

A right word not fully understood and not rightly interpreted leads to wrong instructions, which is dangerous. For example, Moses had often heard God clearly, but on one occasion, he was instructing the people to stand still when God wanted them to keep moving, even though following God’s interpretation of the moment had seemed they were going to be marching stupidly and suicidally into open danger (Exodus 14:13-15). Secondly, the fact that one had previously prophesied rightly never means that every other prophecy thereafter should be unquestionably swallowed. The next could be a word from Satan, as Jesus teaches us from the experience of Peter (Matthew 16:17, 22-23).

My worry now is not whether Buhari was a Cyrus, a Pharaoh, or a Nebuchadnezzar, all of whom were prophesied ahead of their coming.   I have read a minister of God who would rather call him a Hazael, whom God named to Elijah but whom that prophet did not anoint, whom Elisha anointed in proxy but in tears at seeing the troubles that he would bring upon the people of God. God had said Hazeal was coming upon the throne of Syria, and in fact that he should be so anointed, but the prophets wept about it; they did not celebrate it, and they tried to dodge that anointing, because that ‘coming’ was readmore

Continued in part 3: