Psalms 74:9

74:9 We do not see any signs of God’s presence; ¹ 

there are no longer any prophets ² 

and we have no one to tell us how long this will last. ³ 

Amos 8:11-12

8:11 Be certain of this, ⁴  the time is ⁵  coming,” says the sovereign Lord,

“when I will send a famine through the land –

not a shortage of food or water

but an end to divine revelation! ⁶ 

8:12 People ⁷  will stagger from sea to sea, ⁸ 

and from the north around to the east.

They will wander about looking for a revelation from ⁹  the Lord,

but they will not find any. ¹⁰ 

Matthew 9:38

9:38 Therefore ask the Lord of the harvest ¹¹  to send out ¹²  workers into his harvest.”

Ephesians 4:11

4:11 It was he ¹³  who gave some as apostles, some as prophets, some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, ¹⁴ 

[74:9]  ¹ tn Heb “our signs we do not see.” Because of the reference to a prophet in the next line, it is likely that the “signs” in view here include the evidence of God’s presence as typically revealed through the prophets. These could include miraculous acts performed by the prophets (see, for example, Isa 38:7-8) or object lessons which they acted out (see, for example, Isa 20:3).

[74:9]  ² tn Heb “there is not still a prophet.”

[74:9]  ³ tn Heb “and [there is] not with us one who knows how long.”

[8:11]  ⁴ tn Heb “behold” or “look.”

[8:11]  ⁵ tn Heb “the days are.”

[8:11]  ⁶ tn Heb “not a hunger for food or a thirst for water, but for hearing the words of the Lord.”

[8:12]  ⁷ tn Heb “they”; the referent (people) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[8:12]  ⁸ tn That is, from the Mediterranean Sea in the west to the Dead Sea in the east – that is, across the whole land.

[8:12]  ⁹ tn Heb “looking for the word of.”

[8:12]  ¹⁰ tn It is not clear whether the speaker in this verse is the Lord or the prophet.

[9:38]  ¹¹ sn The phrase Lord of the harvest recognizes God’s sovereignty over the harvest process.

[9:38]  ¹² tn Grk “to thrust out.”

[4:11]  ¹³ tn The emphasis on Christ is continued through the use of the intensive pronoun, αὐτός (autos), and is rendered in English as “it was he” as this seems to lay emphasis on the “he.”

[4:11]  ¹⁴ sn Some interpreters have understood the phrase pastors and teachers to refer to one and the same group. This would mean that all pastors are teachers and that all teachers are pastors. This position is often taken because it is recognized that both nouns (i.e., pastors and teachers) are governed by one article in Greek. But because the nouns are plural, it is extremely unlikely that they refer to the same group, but only that the author is linking them closely together. It is better to regard the pastors as a subset of teachers. In other words, all pastors are teachers, but not all teachers are pastors. See ExSyn 284.