How do I know if I have the Spiritual Gift of Prophecy?

in addition to healing uh there are prophets and or prophecy in first corinthians 12 28 and ephesians 4 11. what's a prophet what's a prophecy well like a male delivery person who does not write or edit the mail but collects and delivers it the prophetic calling combined two ministries first prophets receive specific revelation directly from god second they spoke that revealed word to people with the expectation of an obedient response to god the prophets communicate either by speaking or in writing that's how we get books of the bible people with a prophetic gifting more easily spot compromise sin and error desire immediate change they preach repentance it's about immediate immediate obedience and action for christ they tend to be bold sensitive to sin is why they get killed i place a very high value on biblical behavior and telling the truth no matter what the cost now when the bible was written about 25 of your bible was prophetic in nature meaning it was anticipating prophesying declaring the future events that would come to pass in addition there are whole genres of literature in your bible called the major prophets and the minor prophets the major prophets are isaiah jeremiah who also wrote lamentations ezekiel and daniel minor prophets are hosea joel amos obadiah jonah micah nahum habakkuk zephaniah haggai zechariah and malachi so the bible has whole categories of literature by genre that is the prophetic writings in addition when a prophet spoke in the old testament they would often say thus saith the lord or the word of the lord came to me hundreds of times and what they're saying is i didn't write the mail and i'm not going to edit the mail i'm just delivering the mail and it's his mail this is a word from god in jesus ministry he's called a prophet back in the old testament book of deuteronomy there was a promise that a prophet was coming like moses but only greater and then jesus is called the fulfillment of that prophetic promise that jesus is the prophet that he comes to proclaim the word of god and repentance of sin to the earth now in prophetic ministry i believe there are three functions one is ceased it is in the old testament certain people would be raised up by god to either speak or write the literal perfect what we would call inerrant word of god this is how we get the old testament prophetic books of the bible these were unique individuals filled with the holy spirit given that authority to give us the word of god that function is completed the bible is written there are no new books of the bible being written the canon meaning measuring rod is closed so that function of the prophets and prophecy it is completed and there will not be a prophet like that bringing forth with that level of authority something that would be equal to a book of the bible so that to be clear anybody comes along and says i've got a new book of the bible no you don't we've got all that we need the canon is closed number two sometimes uh prophetic ministry and prophecy is taking god's timeless word and applying it in an incredibly timely way it is just a perfect fit and this has been my experience in 25 years of bible teaching that i will tend to organize my preaching calendar upwards of a year in advance and i'll just lay out a book books of the bible and here's where i'm going to be and i don't know what the future holds but it's amazing and i've seen this over and over and over and for those of you that have been part of our church family for any length of time you've seen it things happen in politics or culture or the world or in our church family or in our city and there's a there's an issue that arises that week and then boom we're in the bible we're going through a book of the bible it is like a sniper shot from heaven boom absolutely hits the target you're like that was the perfect scripture to hit that issue that we're dealing with this week that's prophetic it's taking the timeless word of god and then preaching it in a timely way because god's word is timeless it's always timely and sometimes prophetic ministry is not new revelation it is applying it to new circumstances and new needs and new crises in new times so that it awakens with freshness and we've seen this like we were in the book of daniel and looking at you know christians being driven underground and church being closed in government you know not allowing god to be worshipped and then covet hits and we're halfway through daniel and now we're living daniel it's like oh my gosh this is the perfect book for what we're dealing with how do we still be god's faithful people under a government that is making it harder to gather and worship our god god's timeless word is timely and what i'm saying is sometimes prophetic ministry is not new revelation but it is eternal revelation that is uniquely appointed to speak to a time in a season the third function of prophetic ministry would be special information or revelation regarding the future god knows and rules the future this is not at the same level of authority as the bible the bible is our supreme court of highest authority we check everything by the bible but the bible does say that god uses secondary additional modes of revelation there's general revelation there's common grace there's visions there's dreams there's angels there's prophecies there's god showing up to speak through other servants there's god speaking directly from his unseen realm i've got all of this again in the free book you can get on spiritual gifts but the bible does tell us that there are other ways that god speaks and reveals all of those are under the authority of god's word and to be tested by the final and highest authority of god's word but occasionally the god who knows and rules the future will reveal it to prepare his people for it and those are times of prophetic insight where god is saying here's what's coming and i need my people to be prepared um we see this a lot in jesus ministry how about you do you have this gift are you deeply burdened by lies apostasy false teaching and injustice you're like when people say that they're speaking for god and they're not i just kind of lose my mind a little bit you have the prophetic gifting are you the kind of person who says what needs to be said no matter what are you one of those people you're like it's true i don't care i don't care what they think i don't care what they say i don't care what they do it's just true and somebody needs to tell the truth you may have a little bit of a prophetic gifting do you struggle with being loving and not just truthful being merciful and not just just sometimes those of us that have a prophetic gift we tell the truth but we forget to have the heart of god and the love of god communicated with it okay jesus came full of grace and truth the truth absolutely but delivered with a heart of love and grace and sometimes the prophets struggle with that and you get upset when people do not immediately obey god's word people that have more of a prophetic mindset they're like if god says it you do it if you're sinning knock it off if he says to go go do it and sometimes people that prophetic gifting they don't understand why people don't just immediately spring to obedience well if god told you to do it why aren't you doing it well that's what the bible says what's taken so long there there can tend to be an impatience there's a sense of urgency and passion with those who are a bit more prophetic now a warning is this jesus paul john others in the bible they warn against false prophets there are false prophets now let me say this sometimes what happens is a gift will not just be used but abused and then others will say well see that gift was abused therefore we should not use that gift the abuse of a gift does not negate the use of a gift in the same way i would say that the gift that is abused the most might be teaching there's a lot of terrible bible teaching but it doesn't mean we get rid of teaching it means we have good teaching so that people can overcome bad teaching the way we overcome false prophets is by listening to the true prophets and when it comes to false prophets and false prophecy three things i would give you to look for number one the messenger do they love the lord do they have the fruit of the spirit do they have the character of christ you know are they godly people look at the messenger if they're an open sin or rebellion um if they're apostate if they're teaching things that are contrary to the word of god then that's a false prophet look at the messenger number two listen to the message does it agree with the bible like that's not what the bible says and or if they say something is going to happen does it come to pass like every once in a while there's somebody comes out who's like i figured out when jesus is coming back he's coming back on this month on this day on this year they tell the whole world this is the day of the second coming of and if he doesn't come guess what that's a false prophet we had a lot of false prophets in the most recent election there are a lot of christians are prophesying the outcome of the and it didn't happen well that's false prophecy you look at the messenger do they love the lord are they filled with the spirit do they have the character of christ are they one of god's children and then listen to the message does it agree with the bible and if they say something is going to happen does it happen and if it doesn't happen then it was false thirdly in addition to the messenger and the message i would encourage you to look at the motive there's the messenger there's the message and then there's the motive why there's always a way to profit in popularity in being a false prophet being a false prophet is popular and profitable there are always people who want to do something that god forbids and if you stand up and say actually let me tell you why god's okay with it now he's changed his mind he's evolved you know he sort of moved on from that primitive teaching in the new testament and now we have new revelation let me tell you let me tell you how god's changed his mind and now you can kind of do what you want to do if you will preach on behalf of god against god that's very popular and it's very profitable there are certain people are like i just want you to tell me that i get to do what i want to do and i don't have to do what god tells me to do and if you'll tell me that i get to do what god tells me not to do i will pay a lot of money for that i'll pay for that conference i'll pay for that seminar i'll buy that book i'll buy that i'll pay for that degree if you will just let me rebel against him and pretend to be godly you will get my affection and also my financial contribution this is the motive of the false prophet they have popularity and profit now i'll give you an example um sometimes people struggle with these signed gifts and the supernatural gifts because they've seen them abused this is what drives some people toward cessationistic theology let me say this there are closed handed issues and open-handed issues on the sign gifts the supernatural gifts they're in the open hand you can disagree with us we love you and you can be part of our church family but we want to discuss and dialogue it maybe even debate it without dividing over it nonetheless sometimes people are very fearful of the supernatural because they've seen the abuse of a gift and i saw this firsthand some years ago i was teaching in another country i won't say the country or the group or the denomination and i was i was on a preaching tour i think i preached like 36 sermons in 10 days in three cities with multiple flights i i literally just about killed myself but i was speaking with one group of leaders and pastors and i met their leader so the person that had their apostolic gift he would be the pastor of the pastors the leader of the leaders the movement leader the network leader the chief theologian the convener of the conferences the writer of the books he was that guy and he was a good bible teacher obviously loved jesus i really liked him he's a he's a good man we're having lunch and he started talking to me about the sign gifts and especially prophecy and he was he was very he was very strong which i'm i'm fine with um that's that's my spiritual gift too so we're kind of we're kind of doing it and i finally looked at him and i said it your passion seems to indicate your pain it seems behind your passion is some pain i said you're very concerned when i say god told me or god spoke to me or god showed me when i say that you get very sort of bristly and resilient and resistant i said what happened to you he said i want to talk about it no no i do i said just be honest with me he said well i grew up in a pentecostal tradition where they had nights of healing and prayer and miracle and prophecy or at least that's what they said and he said we had a prophet come a prophet come to town i put that word in quotes and he said the prophet came up to me and said said god's got a calling on your life for ministry and he was a little boy and he said but you're not going to experience it because you're going to die at a young age this is a little boy and i think that this quote-unquote prophet told this little boy you're going to die like at age 13 or 14. he actually gave him a death sentence he's putting a curse over a little boy and so he said he's now an a grandpa he's an elderly man he's still alive today he's a very elderly man and he said i lived in sheer terror as a little boy growing up thinking that i was going to have a death sentence at a certain age i think it was around 13 or 14. he said and i was paranoid and i was paralyzed i was like he said then that birthday came and i was fine he said now i'm an old man he said and that was a false prophet and that was a false prophecy and he cursed me and he emotionally traumatized me and i said you're right that's wrong that's false he was a counterfeit i don't know if he knew the lord but in that moment he wasn't speaking for the lord the point is that there are false prophets they are going to say things that are not true and sometimes they cause great pain and harm and some of the people that i have seen that are the most devoted to what i would call cessationism their passion is motivated by their pain you need to heal from your pain and you need to let god's word be true and every man a liar and the abuse of a gift does not negate the use of a gift in fact the best way to overcome the abuse of a gift is the right use of a gift now i've seen in my life real prophecy this will be controversial but i'll share two examples from trinity church and our experience my wife grace and i were considering moving to arizona to start a church after god spoke to us audibly and released us even though we were welcome to continue at a job that we had been enjoying serving in for many years and god spoke to us audibly in the house in two separate rooms and released us and so that was the word of the lord to us and then we were praying about what was next and some of you know the story i was in florida and i was at a pastor's conference and um i went to get some time with the lord and i got turned around couldn't find a coffee shop so i ended up in a mexican restaurant and i walk in and there's a pastor there meeting with some of his leaders and i didn't know this man i'd never met him and i'm out of state i'm in florida and uh he said oh pastor mark come visit with us so i said on wisdom super nice guy and he said do you mind if i pray for you i was like i'm always up for that so he prayed for me and then he opened his eyes after he closed his prayer and he said master marcus i was praying for you i felt like god gave me a vision that i'm supposed to share with you now what he didn't say is thus saith the lord what he said is i feel like god has something for me to share with you and i'm going to tell you and you can decide whether it's from the lord that's a lot better than thus saith the lord it's like i could be hearing wrong or i could be speaking wrong but i'm going to tell you what i think i'm hearing and what i'm supposed to be speaking he said i had a vision that you and your family were packing up moving to the desert a hot dry arid climate that god was going to give you a fresh new season of ministry in a brand new church and god was going to pour out his blessings on you in a brand new place and you were going to live in the sunshine and you were going to be healthy and you're going to do ministry together as a family and he laid all this out total stranger in a mexican restaurant that i happened to walk into he looked at me he's like does this make sense i was like incredible because i've got to go catch a flight from florida to arizona my family is flying in we're going to meet in arizona we're scouting it out we're meeting with the leaders in the city and we're asking the lord if this is where he would have us to move as a family and he's like i had no idea i was like i know but the lord did and i believe the lord just confirmed through you what he is doing in our life when it came time to start this church i met with pastor jimmy evans one of our apostolic overseers and he said mark god's going to give you a building it's going to be off the 101. it's going to seat 800. it'll be a historical church you'll be able to buy it he laid out all of these details i was like how do you know that he's like i don't know i just feel like that's what i'm supposed to tell you this building wasn't even on the market it came available we bought it it's historically designated we could seat 800. everything that he said came true specifically and some of you have heard the story but we had an easter service where we set up every chair and i was like okay how many chairs is it 793 i was like close and then look in the sound booth i kid you not some of you know the story there were seven seats in the sound booth god promised us a building off the 101 historically designated that we could buy that would seat exactly 800 and everything that was said came to pass the point is sometimes god just tells you stuff that you need to know and praise be to god for that you

Channel: Real Faith by Mark Driscoll

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Keywords: mark driscoll, driscoll, christian sermon, bible study, theology, bible, christian, pastor, christian pastor, mars hill, jesus, real faith, how to study the bible, what is gods will, christianity, pray, bible verse, faith, gospel, christ, god, church, online church

Id: 1xD1Q_AGbJ4

Length: 19min 0sec (1140 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 28 2021