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Not everyone who prophesies is automatically walking in the office of a prophet just because he or she operates in the gift of prophecy.

Disagreement In the Prophetic Camp Among Good Prophetic Teachers

There seems to be confusion regarding a few areas of the prophetic these days, and we know that God is not the author of confusion. But I do not believe that there would be many Christians who would disagree with me when I say that every word written in the Holy Scriptures is true, for it is impossible for God to lie. Therefore, we must understand from where this confusion is coming. There is only one Author of the Scriptures; the Holy Spirit is the only true Teacher, and He is the only One who can give us the truth regarding His Word.

The First Epistle of John reveals this truth:

"But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him" (1 John 2:27).

"But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you" (John 14:26).

The problem is not the Holy Scriptures or God. The individual interpretation of the Holy Scriptures is where the problem seems to always begin. Using the Words written in the Holy Bible to manipulate the people of God is wrong and carries a strict judgment, as stated in James: "My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment" (James 3:1).

Now that we have laid a foundation for Whom the Author and Teacher of the Holy Bible is, and have pointed out the cost of misappropriating God's Word, let us go forward into this teaching on God's prophets and the gift of prophecy.

Prophets and Prophecy For Today

First of all, I do not think you would be reading this article unless you believed that God is still appointing prophets to His Church. By reading 1 Corinthians 12:28, you will find the verse clearly establishes this fact, and I do not believe you can find an equal verse that says God has removed His prophets from His Church. Therefore, let us take a look at the difference between the prophets of the Old Testament and the New Testament.

Most people say there is a difference; I, on the other hand, disagree.When discussing this topic with others, I find a quick referral to the verse that gives us the definition of what prophecy is as we read from 1 Corinthians 14:3: "But he who prophesies speaks edification and exhortation and comfort to men."

However, I believe we can all agree that Apostle Paul prophesied in Acts 13 when, "...filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him [Elymas] and said, 'O full of all deceit and all fraud, you son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, will you not cease perverting the straight ways of the Lord? And now, indeed, the hand of the Lord is upon you, and you shall be blind, not seeing the sun for a time.'"

IN THIS CASE – This word Apostle Paul prophesied was not edifying, exhorting, or comforting. He spoke of blindness being put upon another, so what gives?

In 1 Corinthians 14, Apostle Paul is giving instruction about the gift of prophecy to those who are NOT walking in one of the ascension gift ministries found in Ephesians 4:11-12: "And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the Body of Christ..."

We see in the Book of Revelation that there will come a time when prophets will prophesy plagues upon nations, probably in our lifetime.During the war between the two realms, this world and the spiritual, we find miracles exploding in the open streets. Now this sounds more like Old Testament prophets, but in fact, it is New Testament writings:

"And I will give power to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy one thousand two hundred and sixty days, clothed in sackcloth...if anyone wants to harm them, fire proceeds from their mouth and devours their enemies. And if anyone wants to harm them, he must be killed in this manner. These have power to shut Heaven, so that no rain falls in the days of their prophecy; and they have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to strike the earth with all plagues, as often as they desire" (Revelation 11:3-6).

We Serve a God Who Is Not Double-Minded

My point is this: Prophets of the New Testament are the same as the Old. Our problem is that we have restrained the miracles of the New Testament prophets from coming forth.

When we study more about the prophets of the Old, we find they raised the dead, outran horses, called fire down from Heaven, found lost animals, multiplied food sources, had bionic ears to spy on the enemy, and even after death their bones could raise the dead.

However, when a prophet of God, even in the New Testament era – makes a prophetic proclamation that God has released, it is possible for entire nations to rise or fall based upon His spoken word.

We serve a God who is not double-minded and does not have to comply with our demands. To think that if He sent someone to give me a word of prophecy, and if I did not like the word I could just not believe it and it would go away, makes prophecy a bit useless.

I cannot count the number of times someone has told me their word did not bear witness with their spirit, therefore, they just tossed it aside and forgot about it, only to call me a couple of years later to let me know they were doing exactly what the prophetic word they received proclaimed – and to ask if they could get a copy of the original word.

I believe if a word from God is given, a recorded or transcribed copy of it should be made whenever possible and kept safe to allow time to test the word. Over the years I have held on to hundreds of copies of prophecies I have sent out. Any word of prophecy is worth recording and keeping, even if you do not understand it.

Is It Prophecy Or a Word of Wisdom?

One thing I have noticed that we have done with the gift of prophecy is we group a short list of other spiritual gifts from First Corinthians 12 (word of knowledge, word of wisdom, prophecy and gift of faith) into "the prophetic word" and call all these things "prophecy" then try to explain it as one single function. This too has brought confusion into the Body of Christ. For example, to say that a word of prophecy is conditional upon us believing the word or praying over the word we received just doesn't add up.

Do we really think that God needs our help in making His Word come to pass or is it just another way to protect the person giving the prophecy?

The CONDITIONAL "Word of Wisdom"

The only time I have heard a word having conditions within the structure and meaning I found it not to be prophecy at all, but rather a word of wisdom, which does have a choice, or conditions, within its contents.

Usually, the word will go something like this: "If you put your house up for sale it will sell; however, you will not be able to finance another and your rent will be more than what you are paying now." The recipient (person receiving the word) now has a decision to make but the outcome laid out in the spoken word should give them the answer to the question they were seeking which was: "Should I sell my house because I do not think I can keep making the payments?" 

However, if they just want to pay more each month they could go ahead and sell their house – for the word of wisdom is clear that they will pay more than what they are paying now. 

I have tried my best to never to tell someone what to do when I give a prophetic word. For often, a seasoned prophet should not tell you what to do, he will only tell you what to expect...  

A prophecy is foretelling of something that is going to take place in one's life that they are not required to believe for it to come to pass, i.e. Peter and the rooster. Did Peter have to believe he would deny knowing Jesus before this prophecy came to pass? My answer would be no, for Peter had just told Jesus that he would never deny him. But... 

Jesus said to him, "Assuredly, I say to you that today, even this night, before the rooster crows twice, you will deny Me three times." Mark 14:30

One more thing: you do not have to be an apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, or teacher to operate in any of the spiritual gifts, for the Holy Spirit chooses both who will speak and who shall receive what is spoken.

I see a lot of the same ministry safeguards being adopted into the prophetic movement as what the faith movement implemented in the latter years of its heyday. What I mean is that if enough conditions are required before a personal prophecy can come to pass, then when the word doesn't come to pass we can just say they did not pray right, or they did not believe hard enough, or they sinned and lost the promise within the prophecy.

Well, I must ask these questions: Is God all-knowing? Don't you think that He knows well in advance what you are going to do before He uses someone to speak a prophetic word into your life? What kind of father would tell you of the great and wonderful things he is going to do for you only to later take it all back?

Ministering In Spiritual Gifts

Now, let me back up here and give a defense for those who are on the frontlines giving prophetic words. I have said this a thousand times, for it is true: It is not enough to hear the voice of God. You must know what He means.

If we struggle with interpreting the written Word of God, how much more difficult is His spoken word? It is much more challenging to know the ways and thoughts of God when He is speaking to you Spirit-to-spirit than having the words to read. People ministering in the gifts are expected to interpret it with accuracy, delivering a clear word exactly as the Holy Spirit is revealing it to you. This is not an easy task.

Many times, the problem isn't that the person giving the prophetic word did not hear God – but rather they lacked the ability to fully understand the word's meaning and thus properly interpret what He meant. This takes years of experience learning from your mistakes.

Too many are quick to judge the person giving the word rather than the word itself; we could use a lot more grace in this area. Time is the true test for every prophecy; to assume you know if the word is correct OR NOT before time reveals it, then that is to despise the prophecy.

Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise prophecies. Test all things; hold fast what is good. 1 Thessalonians 5:19-21

One of the major reasons people who are ministering in the gift of prophecy feel they have failed when giving someone a prophetic word is because they are afraid they will mess up someone's life. You cannot help but respect a person who is that concerned. However, allow me to speak to you if you are one of these types of prophetic people:

You must trust the Holy Spirit with everything within you that He will not misguide you. You cannot mess up if you put your mind in neutral and speak or write only what He puts into your thoughts and spirit.Prophesying all starts with just one word; and once you speak or write that one word, everything else will begin to flow.

War Over the Prophetic Word

Another quick word of advice: When you give a prophetic word, YOU, the person prophesying – must fight for that person's prophetic word, for the devil will try to get you to come under doubt and agree with him that the word you gave was not from God. Yes, I said that correctly! It is the person who delivers the word that must have the faith in order for that word to come to pass. Most people tell the person receiving the word they must have the faith to believe; not so. Let us look at the instructions found in Romans 12:6 for those who minister in prophecy:

"Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to our faith."

So how does faith come? "...Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God" (Romans 10:17).

Here we learn that the prophetic minister is the one held accountable to believe for a word from God to come to pass, not the person receiving the prophetic word.

When Will My Word Come To Pass?

In closing, the best way to see your word come to pass as fast as possible is to take your word and put it on the shelf and wait for a month or more and then go back and re-read it. If you received your prophetic word on a voice-recording device, try transcribing it into text format and you will see a difference in the meaning, for it will speak to you in a new and different way. Your word is going to come to pass when God has planned for it, so just stay out of His way.

I have discovered that about 80% of the prophetic words I have given over the past 24 years come to pass in about two years. This too might interest you: Most of those people forgot what was in their prophecy until after what was spoken had come to pass. When they went back and listened to their prophetic word, they were shocked. You can work all you want, trying to figure out how God is going to make your word come to pass.

However, usually in the end you will see that He will fulfill His word in a way you never thought possible. For He is a God of the impossible!