Our Great Prophet
Our Great Prophet
"A prophet is not without honour." (Mt 13.57)
"Anyone who receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet's reward." (Mt 10.41)
"To me Muri Thompson was and always will be New Zealand's great prophet...God's benchmark for all generations to come."
I made this claim in an interview some years ago, and was somewhat taken aback by the reaction. My statement generated a bit of huffing and puffing as I recall, with some dear folk objecting to my evaluation. This reminds me how shot-through the contemporary Pentecostal, Charismatic and Revival Movements are by selfish ambition, jealousy and rivalry!
"The acts of the sinful nature are obvious...discord, jealousy...selfish ambition, dissensions." (Gal 5.19-20)
"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves." (Php 2.3)
"For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice." (Jas 2.16)
Ironically, Muri would have found such a debate over his standing an irrelevant comedy and farce, as he was humble to the core. Labels and status-identity interested him not at all; his great concern was a life lived in obedience to the commands and decrees of Almighty God. He was deaf to the applause of the Faithful, coveting instead Jehovah's benediction.
Few New Zealanders would know that his biography is contained in a substantial book called "Ambassadors for Christ" (Moody Press), which profiles "Christians whose service for the Lord has ignited the flame of love and hope throughout the world". In this volume, his name sits comfortably alongside such luminaries as James Hudson Taylor and Dr. Billy Graham.
Muri Thompson was born with a hole in his heart in 1930, in the little Northland settlement of Mamaranui, close to Dargaville. In spite of setbacks to his health throughout his life, he did not spare himself as a servant, determining to "burn out rather than rust out". In the 1950s he was a pioneer evangelist with Open Air Campaigners, travelling to Chicago and Toronto to plant that Mission in North America. Returning to New Zealand and still struggling with his health, Muri prayed, "Lord, if You give me my life, I will serve my Maori people by preaching the gospel to them." God did...and Muri Thompson did, conducting crusades "up and down New Zealand" in the 1960s and early 70s.
In 1970 he witnessed first-hand, stoked the fires of, and preached in the Solomon Islands' Revival. In one village of 150, he witnessed a building hastily constructed to hold 2000, filled and overflowing with people and the Holy Spirit's power. During that same decade he was the "catalyst and driving force" behind the "Jesus Marches" which mobilised tens of thousands of Christians in 12 major cities, to take to the streets and demonstrate for "a moral and spiritual revival" throughout New Zealand. Outside Parliament in Wellington, Muri told the rally of 20,000, "We are not here telling the government what to do. We are telling the government and the nation what we intend to do." He did however call on the then prime minister to appoint a day of "prayer, fasting, repenting and self-humbling".
Muri was "typically" prophetic in that he did "hear" from God, and prophesied to and over individuals, with (sometimes frightening!) penetrating acuteness and power. But as important and impressive as this is, it is not what makes a prophet, a prophet...as is all too quickly and popularly imagined these days! What sets a prophet apart from a Christian leader with the gift of prophecy, is that the prophet carries about in his person and being, authentic "national concern and national responsibility"...for the Church, the State, or both. Elijah "summoned the people from all over Israel" to meet him on Mount Carmel; people went out to John the Baptist "from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan".
In Muri's case, it was God's burden for national revival, and for his Maori people. Sadly, too many of his people accused him of being a "sell-out" to the White Man's religion. Also tragically large numbers of European Christians feared and criticised his identification with Maori language and culture, as spiritual compromise?
The prophetic burden which he then carried, is still valid and very much "alive and kicking" today. In 1961 he challenged thus, "The Maori can fulfill a role in the affairs of the nation, the world...but this is not happening. Why has the voice of the Church been muted? Is it no longer the champion of the underdog, the guardian of human rights and dignity?
"The disintegration of the Maori is the sin not of a race, but of a nation that has sold its soul on the altar of greed and selfishness.
"To accuse one race is to denounce both; to censure one is to rebuke the other. To heap reproach on one can only be another form of self-accusation, for both peoples are wedded in a common way of life and destiny.
"Only the impact of a spiritual rebirth and (spiritual) revolution can truly determine the future of this people, for it is righteousness that exalteth a nation: sin is a reproach to any people."
Muri collapsed and died while ministering at a theological college, on a Sunday evening early on in 1992. Towards the end of that same year, I resigned from being a pastor in a church in Auckland. And then, at the beginning of 1993, I launched out as an itinerant preacher. Through these 18 years of travelling far-and-wide, I've come across people who claim to be Muri's "spiritual sons", or have a dramatic tale to tell of their closeness to "the great man"! But curiously, I can't remember them among the very thin trickle of visitors during his final winter, when the cold and wet worked against his failing health.
I do not recall seeing them in the hall where his body lay, even as his spirit approached The Throne. Nor can I call to mind their faces among those gathered around his open grave at Mamaranui, where the rain fell and beat against pages 100-101 of my "Book of Common Order" and its prayers of committal, "We have entrusted our brother Muri into the hands of God, and we now commit his body to the ground..."
Why mention this? Because, talk is cheap...and while a considerable part of exercising prophetic responsibility is about words, the "walk" is at least as (if not more) important as the "talk".
"The false and the genuine prophet," according to the 1st C book of Church practice, 'The Didache', "will be known by their ways. If a prophet teaches the truth but does not practise what he teaches, he is a false prophet."
There's more to being a prophet than running around conferences, being handed "Jeremiah 1.5" on a plate, and then making a lunge for the spotlight and headlines by spouting gazumping "precognitions".
"You have asked me a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it shall be done for you, but if you do not see me, it shall not be so." (2 Ki 2.10)
"But Jehoshaphat asked, Is there not a prophet of the Lord here, that we may enquire of the Lord through Him? An officer of the king of Israel answered, Elisha son of Shaphat is here. He used to pour water on the hands of Elijah (that is, he was Elijah's personal servant)." (2 Ki 3.11)
Muri Thompson was a prophet of God, singularly devoid of airs and graces, and worldly ambition. He was neither a poseur nor a pontificator. But he did constantly thirst and seek the Presence and Unction of God, and was uncommonly and startlingly jealous for the honour and integrity of the Word of the Lord...no matter how unwelcome or out-of-sync with popular demand and expectation. He appeared (so far as I could personally observe) to accept humbly and philosophically being deliberately marginalised and discredited by church leaders...some of whom actually owed their ministries and position to his prophetic endorsement and encouraging mentoring. He sincerely, diligently, intelligently and perpetually worked to build the Body of Christ and establish the Kingdom of God. He did not waste valuable time trying to build a throne to sit himself on; he did not have his hand in the till. (Two customs which seem to attract plaudits these days, rather than condemnation?)
That's the "benchmark for all generations to come", of which I spoke. Take it, or leave it!
"Every cycle has its prophets - as guiding stars; and they are the burning candles of the Lord to light the spiritual temple on earth, for the time being. When they have done their work, they will pass away; but the candlesticks will remain, and other lights will be placed in them." (Antoinette Doolittle, Shaker Elder, 19th C)
"The meek and mild mediocrity of most of us stands in sharp contrast to that volcanic, upheaving, shaggy power of the prophets, whose descendants we are meant to be." (Thomas Kelly, Quaker, 1893-1941)
"A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country, and in his own house." (Mt 13.57)
