Witnesses to the Creative Power of Prophecy

In his poignant personal essay, “Hope, Fear, & Creation: Living in Response to Prophecy,” my friend Don Bradley shatters the brittle glass of fatalism that often encases religious futurism. Weaving the heartbreak of losing his son, Donnie, with the historical rigor of his research into Joseph Smith, Don crafts a conclusion that is central to the practical faith advocated by Mormon Transhumanists: Prophecy is not a forecast of unalterable doom, but rather a “blueprint for creation.”

The Negated Negative

Don draws our attention to the story of Jonah, noting a paradox that I’ve called the “negated negative.” Jonah proclaims to Nineveh, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” No conditions attached, it’s a statement of fact about the future. And yet, when the people change, God “repented of the evil” and spares the city.

The purpose of prophecy isn’t to be right. The purpose of prophecy is to be effective. Frightening or ominous prophecies, even if expressed without conditions, are warnings that we should render obsolete by our response. Even while revering them as inspiration from God, we must not concede to interpretations of prophecy that would shackle our agency.

We are confronted today by dark visions associated with terrible risks – technological, environmental, and social. But as Don affirms, such visions are “not a statement of fate.” We have scriptural precedent for courageous hope that if we repent, if we change our behaviors that exacerbate risks, we won’t be destroyed.

Forth-Telling Not Fore-Telling

Don observes that Joseph Smith did not merely stumble into the fulfillment of Isaiah’s “sealed book” prophecy. But rather he acted as a “conscious collaborator” with God. This reminds me of the distinction between forth-telling and fore-telling.

Too often, we treat prophecy as fortune-telling: a passive prediction of events that we must simply witness, enjoying the good and enduring the bad. But true prophecy, effective prophecy, is forth-telling. It articulates a vision that provokes contemplation and channels action to interactively co-create the future.

Don rightly argues that “scripture is a script.” And we are called to perform its best verses, as moved by the sublime esthetic of the Holy Spirit. We do this, not as passive observers to the dance of the Gods, but rather as active participants. We’re invited actually to dance, to be moved and to move, to join in creation of truth through our intention and action.

Mandate of the Co-Creator

Ultimately, Don’s essay is a call to embrace our nature as co-creators with and in God. He concludes that we are created to “join in completing the creation of the world.” This is the heart of the New God Argument. We have a practical and moral obligation to trust in our creative potential – even our superhuman creative potential.

This trust requires us to use all the means God has given us. And we should not, we cannot practically, shy away from the tools of our age. Already we use technology to build, relate, console, and heal in ways our distant ancestors imagined only God capable. And these increasingly powerful tools facilitate increasingly compelling, increasingly substantiated, visions of the future.

Donnie Bradley saw the “path of light” through doubt. He saw that hope is not a passive wish, but an active project. We honor that vision by refusing to resign ourselves to the destruction of our world. We honor it when we work, using all the means provided by the grace of God, to realize visions of transfiguration, resurrection, immortality, and the creation of worlds without end.

May we love and build bravely in this prophesied day of transfiguration.