Why Prophecy in Place of Love
Question:
Why do some not spend more time teaching the love of Jesus-the most important part of the Bible-instead of teaching the doctrines and the prophecies?
Answer:
�We have also a more sure word of prophecy; where unto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts.� 2 Pet. 1:19. The prophecies, therefore, create love for God in the heart of the student as nothing else can.
If, moreover, the prophecies are less essential than other portions of the Scriptures, why then, did the Lord cause His servants to write so many of them? Obviously, they are as important. The book of The Revelation, which is addressed directly to the people who are to be living just before the Lord�s coming, is made up of symbolical prophecies, concerning which the Lord says:
�Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.� Rev. 1:3. �Behold, I come quickly: blessed is he that keepeth the sayings of the prophecy of this book....For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.� Rev. 22:7, 18, 19.
True, the love of Jesus is the supreme need, but preaching about it to the exclusion of the doctrines and the prophecies, will profit one nothing, for through the prophecies and through the doctrines one learns not only of the love of Jesus but also how to serve Him. �All scripture� says Paul, �is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.� 2 Tim. 3:16, 17.
Had the churches today taught the prophecies and the doctrines to the exclusion of the love of Jesus, then of course we would have dwelt even more extensively on the love of Jesus than on the prophecies. But as the opposite is the case the love of Jesus being magnified to the neglect of the prophecies, then of course our first and supreme need is to study the love of Jesus through the doctrines; afterward, our greatest burden will be thus to teach it.
While the gospel of love inspires us to love the Lord, the doctrines teach us the right way to love Him, and the light of the prophecies guides our feet in the strait and narrow path along the way to the city of God, just as at night the lights of an automobile show us the way home. Without them, we would inevitably soon lose the way, crash, and pile up in the dark---a mass of wreckage and death, perchance. Thus while we need the one, we just as much need the other. We therefore combine both, teaching the love of Jesus through the doctrines, and the way to the Kingdom through the prophecies.