If we want to hear God more and in greater, deeper ways, we need to learn how to walk in His peace and break the cycle of prophetic drama in our lives. We are prophetic—being aware of sin comes with the territory. But what we choose to do with that revelation will either help build the Kingdom or help tear it down.
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Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things. Seeking the peace of God is not just a good idea—it will keep you from burning out.
Look for the Plans of God The point of the prophetic gift is edification, exhortation and comfort 1 Corinthians It exists to take the weak and make them strong, to help the strong grow stronger and the great greater. That is how the Kingdom of God advances. It is not as if God is surprised by the sin we see in other people. He knows exactly what is happening within them, just as He knows what is happening within us.
God has good plans, even when the people in those plans are making bad choices. He is waiting for them to repent and accept His ways. His plans still exist for them, and He longs for those plans to be fulfilled. It is the kindness of God that leads us to repentance Romans 2: No matter where we find the captives—in the Church or outside of it—we are called to set them free and build them up, not tear them down. We are called to seek peace and demonstrate the heart of God on the earth. In so doing, we avoid negative cycles in our own lives and see the Kingdom come in power and redemption.
Intimacy with Jesus is about closeness and true understanding. It is about relationship. How well do you know Him? Some of us tend to fall in love quickly, while others have a harder time with commitment. It can be much easier to take a puddle and simply make it wider, not deeper. Digging a well requires work, dedication, desire and sweat, but widening a puddle is easy.
We could stand in it and not get wet, because there is no depth.
- 7 Ways to Discern Between False and Flaky Prophets — Charisma News?
- Assemblies of God (USA) Official Web Site | Apostles and Prophets (Official A/G Position Paper).
- The ways God communicates with us (How we might hear God speak).
We need to be wells, not puddles. What produces depth in our relationship with God? What brings our hearts to life and really teaches us how to live every day with Jesus? How to Dig a Well 1. The point is not, Wow. You are such a sinner. The point of repentance is not our sin; it is living a lifestyle that allows us to be close to Jesus at all times, because He is our choice in this world.
Michelle McClain, Charisma: Are Prophets Still Important?
We want Jesus, even if it means we need to bend , change our ways or let go of things we used to enjoy to become more like Him. Godly sorrow produces repentance, and true repentance produces vehement, unyielding desire 2 Corinthians 7: Humility Humility is like reading glasses. Only when we look through the lenses of humility do we see ourselves clearly and realize how much we need Jesus. Without Jesus, we have nothing good. The apostle Paul says that even our faith in Him is a gift Ephesians 2: It is His faith giving us faith.
The moment we set our hearts to understand and to humble ourselves before Him, our words are heard Daniel Spiritual Disciplines When I practice spiritual disciplines, I see more of the supernatural. It begins to operate in my life at incredible levels. Unfortunately, some of the Church has started to believe that practicing spiritual disciplines is a form of religious bondage. Yes, it is possible to make your relationship with God about rules and legalism.
That is a trap to avoid. However, without spiritual disciplines, you will have nothing but a wide puddle. Prayer, fasting, studying His Word, making Him a priority in your life—these things produce depth within us. Too many of us are happy with puddles. Delight is a satisfaction in God so complete that we lose desire for anything that disturbs our contentment in Him.
How do we learn to delight in God and find our contentment in Him? We spend time with Him. Some people call this waiting for Him, and often it looks like certain spiritual disciplines—sitting in His presence, seeking Him out, making Him a priority in our lives. The point is to be with Him and get to know Him more.
Great peace comes from delighting ourselves in the Lord. We realize He is our treasure. The Power of Desire Psalm That is who our God is. That is His promise: He is the Desire Satisfier. It is in the delight stage that we obtain what we have wanted all our lives. As we delight ourselves in the Lord, He becomes our gold—He becomes what we desire, and in turn, He gives us the desires of our hearts Psalm We find our souls fulfilled and content, and the well grows deeper and deeper.
It is not learned, earned or forced. It is not calculated with points for and against. Holiness is the result of a relationship with someone who is holy. As we draw close to the One who is holy, we start acting holier. It is similar to holding a nail to a candle flame—the nail will heat up. The closer we are to Jesus, the holier we become. If the key to holiness is intimacy with the Holy One, the answer to the question of holiness is time spent in His tent: For You have been a refuge for me, A tower of strength against the enemy.
Let me dwell in Your tent forever; Let me take refuge in the shelter of Your wings.
Apostles and Prophets
When we find something that works, we try to make it into a pattern we can follow the next time, so we can predict the outcome. But a relationship with anyone, including God, is an amorphous thing with ebbs and flows. Patterns do not work with holiness.
The moment we start trying to define holiness, we get ourselves in trouble, because the ways of God are far above our own. Isaiah used imagery to show the difference between humanity and the Divine, writing that as far as the heavens are above the earth, so far are the ways of God above our ways.
We are human; we cannot make ourselves holy. It is the objective of this article to attempt to bring a distinction between a flaky and false prophet. By "flaky," I am referring to a prophetic leader who has serious flaws in their ministry, but their heart and motive is generally right before God. By a "false" prophet, I am referring to a person who is not only erroneous in some of their methodology, but in their motive and ambition. This is the kind of person I believe Jesus was referring to when He told His followers to beware of false prophets who come in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravening wolves Matt.
In my opinion, frequent patterns of mistakes and or subjectivity can be a sign of a flaky prophet, but a pattern of intentional deceit for self-promotion shows this particular prophetic person to be false. The former has to mature, get mentored and grow in their prophetic role—the latter has to repent, or they will face the judgment of God and be exposed or removed from their ministry. Get Spirit-filled content delivered right to your inbox!
3 Ways to Grow Your Self-Discipline — Charisma Magazine
Click here to subscribe to our newsletter. I hesitate to call these people truly prophetic people; however, for the sake of the argument in this article, I will leave it as is. Their words are so general and ambiguous that it is really hard to judge them and even tell if it is accurate and or inaccurate perhaps some want it that way. In my estimation, those who regularly pronounce this sort of prophetic utterance even though they may mean well show signs of flakiness. I have read numerous supposed prophetic words from so-called prophets that essentially prophesy after the fact—or after it is clear a church or cultural issue or person is trending a certain way.
This kind of prophetic word is a waste of time, in my opinion, and demonstrates a certain amount of flakiness. I have been in numerous meetings wherein the prophetic words given were so symbolic and mystical that the recipient of the words did not understand, nor could they properly interpret them. When prophetic people don't give practical, applicable words or teachings easy to be understood and interpreted, then in my opinion, their ministry is flaky.
I have observed so-called prophetic people who go around giving generic words who never had enough focus to dig down and build anything substantive. All they do is go from conference to conference or church to church with no tangible fruit regarding the transformation of lives. This to me is a sign that they are flaky and need some serious mentoring and spiritual growth.
I have sat under some so-called prophetic people since the early s who regularly teach without using any scriptural text as a foundation for their message. Instead, all they do is subjectively share what they feel which is good to a point , but the Bible is clear that it is the Word of God that is able to equip us, prepare us and make us wise unto salvation 2 Tim. Hence, a person who has no word ministry but simply goes from place to place "sharing what they feel or sense" is a person that is not teaching the saints how to apply the Word, but merely teaching how people can hear "their words"—which simply is not enough to build up the body of Christ.
Teaching without a strong foundation on Scripture is flakiness, in my opinion. They think every natural and political catastrophe is a sign of the last days. Every time there is a natural disaster like devastating earthquakes, wars, rumors of war, a financial crisis or political turmoil, there is somebody either writing an article and or a book about how this fits biblical prophecy and how the end is coming near. Since the early church, almost every generation thought that they were the last generation.
This happens generally because of a mishandling and or a hyper dispensational interpretation of the passages of Matthew 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21, as well as other books like Revelation, Daniel, Ezekiel and more. Myself and most believers I speak to are sick and tired of these ridiculous last days pronouncements and take the approach of Jesus when He told His disciples to focus on the primary mission of the church and not on the times and the seasons the Father has determined by His own authority See Acts 1: When a prophetic person is constantly imposing current events on the text of Scripture, speculating about the end times and making corresponding prophetic pronouncements that never come to pass , I would not say they are false prophets in the way Jesus described them see Matt.
Although you can call their prophetic word false in the sense that it did not come to pass. They always have extraordinary existential supernatural experiences with no fruit in their ministry. I have heard several people telling me that they are always being caught up into heaven one man even told me I can reserve a trip into heaven to meet Jesus via Facebook , seeing angels, talking with Jesus, the departed saints and so on. Through the years, I have even had some of these people in our church! Rarely did I ever see any noticeable, practical fruit in their life.
Now, of course I believe it is possible to be caught up into heaven Paul was caught up into the third heaven, as we see in 2 Cor.
However, even the apostle Paul did not seem to have these experiences as regularly as some of the believers and prophetic people claim to have them today.