Sabbath School

Adult Sabbath School Bible study guide.

People often think of a prophet as someone who predicts the future, but this is only one aspect of a prophet’s work. A prophet’s work encompasses much more. Prophets lead people back to God’s Word and provide counsel, warning, and encouragement.

Besides helping people know about and prepare for future events, why do prophets predict the future? See Jer. 28:9, 15–17.

Fulfilled predictions are another way to test a prophet. The predictions of a true prophet should happen as prophesied: “ ‘When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him’ ” (Deut. 18:22, NKJV). This test can be challenging to apply because some prophecies are conditional; that is, they might not come to pass as predicted by the prophet if the conditions are met.

We see this principle with Jonah and his warning against Nineveh. Jonah’s sermon seems fairly short and pointed: “ ‘Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!’ ” (Jon. 3:4, NKJV). Yet, that did not happen as he predicted. Why?

Read Jeremiah 18:7–10. What does this teach us, too, about conditional prophecy?

Conditional prophecies are prophecies that depend on how people respond to God’s messages. If the people change their attitude and behavior, the predicted event may not happen. The people of Nineveh took Jonah’s prediction to heart and changed their ways, so God did not destroy them (Jon. 3:10). When later generations forgot this prophetic warning, and Nineveh again became an evil, cruel place, God destroyed it. God knows the future, but we don’t. Our choices greatly determine our future realities.

Why is it important to understand the concept of conditional prophecy? How could this understanding greatly help us better grasp biblical truth?

Supplemental EGW Notes

In the annals of human history the growth of nations, the rise and fall of empires, appear as dependent on the will and prowess of man. The shaping of events seems, to a great degree, to be determined by his power, ambition, or caprice. But in the word of God the curtain is drawn aside, and we behold, behind, above, and through all the play and counterplay of human interests and power and passions, the agencies of the all-merciful One, silently, patiently working out the counsels of His own will. . . . Amidst the strife and tumult of nations, He that sitteth above the cherubim still guides the affairs of the earth. . . . . The history of nations that one after another have occupied their allotted time and place, unconsciously witnessing to the truth of which they themselves knew not the meaning, speaks to us. . . . The history which the great I AM has marked out in His Word, uniting link after link in the prophetic chain, from eternity in the past to eternity in the future, tells us where we are today in the procession of the ages, and what may be expected in the time to come. All that prophecy has foretold as coming to pass, until the present time, has been traced on the pages of history, and we may be assured that all which is yet to come will be fulfilled in its order. . . . We need to study the working out of God’s purpose in the history of nations and in the revelation of things to come, that we may estimate at their true value things seen and things unseen; that we may learn what is the true aim of life; that, viewing the things of time in the light of eternity, we may put them to their truest and noblest use. Thus, learning here the principles of His kingdom and becoming its subjects and citizens, we may be prepared at His coming to enter with Him into its possession. The day is at hand. For the lessons to be learned, the work to be done, the transformation of character to be effected, the time remaining is but too brief a span.—Education, pp. 173, 178, 184.

The above quotations are taken from Ellen G. White Notes for the Sabbath School Lessons, published by Pacific Press Publishing Association. Used by permission.