"The Prophet - The Joys & The Pitfalls" | POWER HOUR | Ep.103

[Music] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] good afternoon for our family and massive hugs and big love to you guys who are watching all around the planet on facebook land and youtube land and uh we're just delighted that you're here with us from right across the four corners of the globe to hang out and talk profit the good the bad the ugly the joy the confusing the over dramatic world that is the world of a prophet uh and to uh hopefully stretch you today in thinking about what a prophet is what a prophet should be doing and what is the best uh a profit can be so yes boy it's been a tough few days all right hasn't it i think if anybody is feeling high of energy and well rested well done you uh we celebrate you looking after yourself uh but i do think that we are acknowledging that it's been a day a few days of battle disappointment shock and uh lockdown elections more lockdown brexit negotiations and hallelujah that jesus is the unshakable rock in the midst of all that is swirling to bite us and more than ever we just need each other um more than ever we just need to be nice to each other just for a par r of actual kindness and chewing over some issues together uh without criticism and without battle how about that for an hour that would be lovely wouldn't it so i've got the gorgeousness that is sarah jane with me again sergeant i'm still gutted that i've not been able to get to your house because we're not actually allowed in each other's houses i know it's it's rough i know if your new house is that little corner that you stand in well yes it is getting transformed actually as we speak and i've got my earphones in today because we've got um um the tree men in the garden cutting trees and grinding trees outside the house which is very loud and then we also have a team working in a bathroom because one tiny little leak in a tile has caused rot all through the flooring in the ensuite and it's getting ripped out talk about a little you know a prophetic sign of a little gap let's sing a lot of rot unintentionally and unseen oh my gosh we're right back to the floorboards and the garage roof is off and not the roof the ceiling of the garage is the bottom of the bathroom so literally there's a hole in the floor of the bathroom and i said to alistair last night remember not to go in there in case you fall through to the garage in the night i was paranoid if he called for the loo in the night and forgot oh dear and then and then in the garage floor but yes so we've been uh very noisy today in the house very noisy we actually have a guy out raking the leaves in our front garden i'm just not a gifted gardener i really it just hasn't quite landed on me and i actually was saying to the gardener this morning the garden guy who's come to give us a hand my mother used to say to me i'm sure i've said this before emma when you hit 40 you know you'll just fall in love with gardening it's it's like something happens at the age of 14. and i'm like i'm 45 in a few weeks and i'm like oh lord give me strength to do it you know i have no understanding of anything to do with gardening but anyway sorry you're 45 in a few weeks is it 45 i've missed a couple of years what happened i think because you kept saying i was 50 and then 51 i missed two years of your life what are you doing my life every day for 12 years every day which is a joyous thought isn't it there's barely a day in 12 years you and i have not interacted or talked so i know i know sam how are you you are in a different house for the next few weeks and it looks like if you jumped you would smash your head on the ceiling yes it's a very low ceiling i've moved moved in with some friends and for a while just change the scenery and everything else and i needed to so yes i'm in this kind of converted garage extension type zone that's a studio one of my friends i moved in with the worship leader so the piano and all the worship stuffs over here but it's a low ceiling so i can and if i worship then i touch this need to make purple with that but i am very close to the ceiling and here you're so tall sam you're so tall we could make a song about it oh he's so tall he's so tall what can i say you know the choice of being a prophet i mean ironically when i got called out by a prophet though i grew two and a half inches mm-hmm remember when you were jeremiah i was under six foot i was five foot twelve or so i might have even grown more i was like five foot eleven five foot twelve i was average height and i grew overnight like two and a half and or three inches yeah i have a big memory that do you know i remember calling you as a jeremiah prophet and you were sobbing i think we were all sobbing the glory of god came into the room but can i just say this apart from the moment of your call and your and your growing what is it with men who are obsessed with getting over this six foot threshold of light i get i'm really excited that i'm over it but i don't know why i can't tell you the reason i know that men do like to be sex foot and above like it's it's almost like i have arrived yes you know and so i don't know but i'm six foot one so yeah so you're safe i'm five foot five and a half do you think i've arrived you've definitely arrived no matter what height you are i think you know we're not tall people are we emma even i we're not i'm i'm about five five as well we're about the same in our flat feet but um yeah thomas has that my son who's 19 and and he bemoans the fact that all of his friends are super tall he's got all of his friends are six foot seven and six foot four plus and he's the short one at six foot so he's like i would be tall if i had short friends it's a thing that comes around all the time it must be a menthol a man thing but do you know what else are seeks i'm so used to seeing both of you in heels like i feel like 100 of the time you're both wearing high heels because you both love a good pair of high heels it's when there's prayer and you take the high heels off it's like where's the gun that's not your height because i've only never really seen you guys and your high heels so as soon as you get in the prayer room and they're off oh hello and that's when you feel very tall when i get my socks when i get my shoes off of a socks and stand they just think sam you're so tall today it is winter brand new trainers that are kind of a cross between snow boots and trainers uh sneakers on my feet today new ones uh from an american company sorrel so i've got my my my warm my warm toes ready to go and uh because it's it's absolutely free it's absolutely freezing carbs and snow boots on our feet already anyway okay we are going to jump into talking about profits and i want to set the scene for you and some of the stuff i've actually pulled from the emerging prophets program to give you this fairly high-end kind of instruction some of them that i uh uh some revelation that i share with them because i want you to understand what a profit is okay and um it might interest you to know that there are 85 give or take one or two because it's hard to get it exactly right but 85 named prophets in scripture and actually i think we're quite surprised by that now when i say a bite 85 is because we get isaiah's wife who we don't have the name of but she's called a prophetess isaiah's wife i think the more shocking thing is that 60 of the named prophets are in the old testament but there are 25 named prophets in the new testament and we really don't kind of track with that as being that level of a percentage uh there are uh nine who are called uh female prophets miriam deborah holder isaiah's wife anna and the four daughters of philip those nine definite girl prophets but there are another nine women named who prophesy rachel hannah abigail elizabeth mary the mother of jesus sarah esther and so we have 16 named women who prophesy in scripture that is absolutely remarkable it is not just one or two here is a fair weight of biblical normality that there are women prophets and that there are a load of prophets in the new testament so that is a bit of a yay cheer right here uh i think what is it is important is uh to know is that they are part of the leadership prophets and part of the government of god on planet earth and we must bring a very clear distinction between the gift of prophecy and the office of the prophet and the gift of prophecy anybody can do that i mean that's written about in some detail in corinthians and that is the place where we read all may prophesy so the spiritual gifts that's for you anybody can do that whereas ephesians is clear that only some a fewer number get to be prophets who carry governmental leadership weight i think uh we really need to be very clear on the differences by the gift of prophecy it is mainly interested in personal prophetic ministry the office of the prophet is mainly interested in prophesying to the direction of nations to leaders and corporate words it is very rare that you ever ever see a prophet in scripture bring a personal prophetic word unless it's to somebody in senior leadership so my question is how have we got how we use a profit so badly wrong because we think that the prophet turning up is all about give me my word and my personal uh you know instruction and i need a word yet it is only the gift of prophecy that repetitively gives personal words the office of the prophet is for the direction of nations and leadership issues and i always say how do you annoy a prophet how do you annoy it sounds like it should be a joke how do you profit you know how do you know a prophet you badger them for lots of personal prophetic words it's not their main thrust or role biblically in the body of christ really important to know i'm not sure how we so badly fell off the wagon uh with that thought so they are supposed to be prophets in the new testament foundational with the apostles and with christ jesus that means that a prophet is a little bit like baking bread in the house the foundation or the baking of the bread it it is pungent in the entire atmosphere and so when you have apostolic and profit foundations there is an understanding that everything is guided by the voice of god they are not bolt on optional extras prophets are the foundational stones that infiltrate the entire body of christ to prioritize his voice so that it is not just the prophet who does all the prophesying but the prophet shadows the atmosphere with a high value for revelation okay so the other thing i would say about the prophets there's so much i'm scrolling through notes here is that they are quite strange in scripture and uh hang on while i scroll they speak with intensity because of what they have seen you rarely ever see a prophet in this kind of middle grind they never are in shades of gray they are black or white why because they have beheld the glory of god and they dare not dilute it prophets are those motivated by extreme language ezekiel's eyes wings burning glory crashing noises rushing winds god seated on the throne outside the circle of the earth isaiah the prophet painting the picture of jesus in pain and in a bloodied mess by his stripes we are healed you can almost hear the whip of the lash you know going down on jesus back because of the brilliance of dramatic communication of isaiah you know look at john his face is like the sun in noonday brilliance his voice like many waters you know two edged swords in his mouth now no wonder john falls down dead and of course revelation to the prophet feels like their bones are boiling uh jeremiah says you know like a fire shut up in my bones it's your word and so prophetic people is either all wonderful or it's all awful they are happy in extremes they are happy in drama they feel deeply and they feel strongly they disturb and they agitate and they question a prophet is not in your life to make you feel good a prophet is in your life to nag and rock the boat until you pay attention corporately to aspects of your life that don't reflect god which is why they are often marginalized and killed they are gloriously happy with drama john the baptist eating locusts and dramatic clothing jeremiah hiding his underwear in a rock preaching naked lying on your side cooking your food over human excrement they are the ones who love to verbally process so if you feel uncomfortable with a prophet they are probably doing the right job and if everybody likes a prophet they are probably doing a very bad job ours is not a popularity contest and never has been but ultimately the driving motivation and then i'll hand over to sam and sarah jane the driving motivation is that they are wired for holiness and they are called to maintain faithfulness to god and they motivate you to change to live faithfully in light of who god is now this would be my description they are god's lawyers they advocate and speak on behalf of god now god has created shepherds who advocate and speak on behalf of the people but he has prophets who advocate and speak on his behalf so as a prophet you are less interested by public opinion by what the zeitgeist is the spirit of the age by what the church feels should be happening by the opinions of man and when a prophet stumbles it is usually in that place where they get too influenced by the people because it is the shepherd who is influenced by the people it is the prophet who is only supposed to say what god is saying that's why somebody's saying that's why prophets are terrible evangelists i would agree because they they go sheep oh sheep there are sheep i'm supposed to think about the sheep hang on a minute you know it's rare that you get a shepherd and a prophet anointing in the same person they do exist but it's rare uh they're very very very few of them so because of that they are my lineup on it is the prophets comfort the afflicted and they afflict the comfortable yeah so you know i don't know how much you can actually take of a profit in one sitting i think if i preach to my church every sunday morning as a prophet i'd blow them up you actually need the fivefold round to bite you to balance otherwise it's a constant dramatic uh agitation so that is our job do we always love that call no it's not not it's not an easy call on occasions but there is joy in it so someone said jane what do you want to add to that in terms of what the prophets are the gift of prophecy is a totally totally different conversation it's not even in the same swimming pool it's not that the gift of prophecy is the shallow end and the office of the prophet is the deep end their roles and their responsibility are vastly different in scripture we need to get more biblically literate how is a prophet declared to be a prophet man you need to apply for the emerging prophets training for me to tell you that sam and sarah jane i'll try to answer it today 7 30 what do you want to add so good and you know i've heard you say that so many times but for me as a prophet when you share and you share that description i know that i get excited but the sense of the context of god drops into my life and i know that for many of you watching uh who are called as prophets some of you will be going oh that makes sense oh i understand why i'm a little bit like that i understand why god has given me that temperament that personality type so remember what emma said that there is the gift of prophecy which is completely different and then the office of the prophet and it's different because the office of the prophet the prophet is the gift that is given to the church and given to the nations and you really see that in jeremiah chapter one and that's where you actually see the wording though it's not in our translations what we understand of jeremiah chapter 1 5 is that god says before i formed you in the wood womb i knew you before you were born i set you apart i appointed you as a prophet to nations and that sentence there i appointed you as a prophet to nations and its literal translation means i give you as a gift to the nations i am giving you away as a gift jeremiah to the nations and so god gives prophets as a gift he gives them away to the nations and to the church and the prophet isn't someone who just prophesies and brings the word of the lord the prophet is the prophetic word the prophet loves the prophetic words and so prophets don't just say revelation they live it out and that's why we often use the phrase that the prophet's life is a story of what god is doing in a group of people in a nation in the church because the prophet must first live what he or she says they must first live the revelation that god puts on the inside of them and so that is why it is often a wrestle so you ask the question emma do we often like it i think deep down we love the call but nonetheless it's a daily wrestle because you're always living out a prophetic word and that's why for many prophets the big lesson is learning that what they are going through right now is never just about me myself and i very rarely is it about me myself and i that actually work what often the prophet is going through is a story that god is saying to the nations or to the church or to a body or group of people and that is why therefore it is important and fundamental for prophets to find themselves in a community of belonging where there are those that can help them see that what they're walking through is a prophetic word that god is speaking to the nations and so i think for me personally if i could summate the joy that i have as a prophet and the joy that i have of watching other prophets it would be the honor of the invite from god to participate in his story on the earth and to participate in writing his story on the earth and god calls the prophet into this place where he says here's my story i now need you to bring it into the earth i now need you to speak it out to live it out to deliver it in the earth and that's weighty but the joy of being invited into that particular place i think as as something quite remarkable and an awe-inspiring and brings a lot of reverential fear and trembling with it but nonetheless is a joy as part of the call of being a prophet oh emma you're amazing very good yeah very good and i think what you're saying is there like any of the nine uh spiritual gifts in corinthians where we find the gift of prophecy we switch those on and off we switch on you know am i hearing god am i not i'm not do i have a faith level or go am i praying in tongues am i not am i discerning a spirit am i not we switch those on and off we know we switch spiritual gifts on and off that's quite appropriate or we set one dime and we pick one up depending on what is needed in the moment the office of the prophet because it is a life call doesn't get switched off uh you are always the prophet you wake up as a prophet you live as a prophet you go to bed as a prophet it is a jesus vocational call on your life and who are born that way okay as with any of the fivefold how do we know that because they are chosen by christ and named by christ uh at birth according to scripture whereas the spiritual gifts are given in the receiving of the holy spirit okay so sarge would love a bite and what would you want to add to our descriptions oh i love it i love it it's just good to be reminded of who we are as prophets isn't it i i think i love and i find challenging all at the same time the the the principle and the truth that a prophet's life is saying something about what is god doing on the earth and i love that we get to partner with that and there is great joy in that and there is nothing more uh joyful than knowing and feeling the hand of the lord upon you you remember from scripture where it recalls very commonly through the books of the prophets the la the hand of the lord was upon ezekiel was on jeremiah was on and it describes this weight of the hand of god upon his prophets and you can see that particularly in first kings 18 when the prophet elijah's running faster than ahab that because the hand of the lord is on him and so there's this moving with god there's this deep place of connectivity in the spirit connectivity to the heart of god and for me the greatest joy is when you are experiencing that when you are in the in the middle of that and you would expect that from a seer who loves to feel what god is feeling and and kind of marinate in that i love it but i also find it challenging so there's the joy and the challenge because it's it's so country to natural daily living in the sense of what we know as normal life and it's so intense it's so overwhelming and it's so shaking often that just when we read like daniel you know he had to sit for seven days or lie down for seven days it can be so intense that it doesn't just shake your world it shakes you physically emotionally and spiritually and so for me there's great joy in that but there's also great challenge in that and i think actually emma and sam i've had the most conversations even in the last two weeks about uh with prophets and watchmen about um what's my what's my emotion you know what's my stuff and what's going on with the nation that i need to figure out and quite often it's can be so interwoven that it's quite a challenge to figure it out which is why another thing that we always say be in a company have your company around you so that you can wrestle some of these things out sometimes and sharpen each other and say actually as you're learning as you're emerging to be a prophet what is going on in the nation what is going on in the spirit what is going on with god that i'm feeling that i'm contending with that i'm in prayer for and what is actually mine personally because often prophets can wake up feeling very out of sorts and it's nothing to do with them it's actually what god is doing in the spirit so i find for me it's a bit contradictory actually emma and sam it's a bit because there's a joy in it but there's a challenge in it as well and i think the joy is always when releasing a word you're feeling the hand of god on you you're feeling the strong anointing and the glory of god and there is such a shift in the atmosphere in the spirit and in the natural either over a king's life a leader's life or in a nation and i i you know i i it doesn't it doesn't get old if that's the right phrase that seems to diminish it a lot it's like you know i live for that i live for seeing that i live for feeling that because there are challenges i would say there's probably more challenges than joys if i'm honest and in in the you know it's that sense of wrestling with the word of god and wrestling with some hard words of god that we often are asked to deliver yes and a question from mary louise is it normal to feel completely misunderstood yes i think that's most of a prophet's life and that's not rare that is normal why because the prophet is never the majority opinion yeah why because god's opinion that you advocate for is rarely the majority opinion and if you find yourself speaking a majority opinion you would need to have a good old double check with god because you rarely ever are speaking the majority opinion okay so you do not survive unless you have people rhymed about you there is no ifs or ants or buts about that and it is a lie to believe that prophets in scripture are on their own that is not biblically accurate they think they're on their own but god always kicks it and says uh by the way there's a few others right the corner you know and when you do any basic timeline search and then go and google it you will see that god always has prophets overlap chronologically in the history of scripture there is never just one at any given point in the land even a nation the size of israel which is a very small nation there's always multiple prophets going on now prophecy is 27 of scripture so about a third of how the bible spends its time is in prophecy and i think that is because prophecy sets the horizon line for the future prophecy and prophets set the timings of god they set the seasons of god they set the aim of the horizon line for where you should be directing your life and that's why a third of the biblical text is given to prophets now what you will know there is that they are not always forth telling in fact very rarely are they forth telling and that is a massive wow okay because we think profits should always be telling the future telling the future is something a prophet does sometimes but more than that we are saying whatever god once said at that particular moment we are the voice of god or his lawyer in that situation however he wants that situation directed and so what i would say to you is you need to make sure that surrounding your life you have about a third of it prophetic input prophetic thought processes connecting with prophetic people now if you get over the top and you get out of kind of that biblical percentage you will think that the world lives and dies around a prophet that would be a lie okay so we pivot around scripture and we picked around christ first and foremost but we appreciate that about a third of our lives needs to touch some kind of prophetic revelation otherwise i will be out of time and i will have no where to aim the horizon line for my life will be in the wrong place and i will become risk averse because the prophet gives you the courage to step out because they have seen the way god is going to do something okay so that is really really important now here comes the rub and why did i ask the team to join me in this today because we are dealing with some situations in the wider world where it looks like perhaps and i'm coaching my words carefully that some of the profits fell into some pitfalls and we need to talk to you about that i need to you to understand why you need profits in your life and i need you to also understand that you've got to test us and that the word of god says you've got to test the spirits that operate through the prophets now we honor prophets and we don't touch the lord's anointed but we all have a part to play in testing the spirits of the prophets new testament is really clear on that in other words you have to test the motivation for why a prophet is saying something you've got to weigh it up and the scripture is really clear particularly in the new testament where it is talking about that the prophet only sees in part why does the prophet only see in part because they're a servant of christ it is only christ who is infallible so the prophet sees in part and does their best with the part that they have your job is to test the motivation that is not a wrong thing to do that is a biblically right thing to do test the spirit or the motivation and so i want to talk about how do we um navigate when we are dealing with prophets who look right now like they weren't 100 on their game does that make them false prophets no can we be really clear in a definition of false prophecy false prophets are jezebel false prophets want the complete and utter destruction of the church most of the prophets who stumble are not false prophets they are poor prophets p-o-o per-profits okay on occasions and we need to be able to be those who are pure p-u-r-e i know my accent doesn't help here but we need to be pure prophets who stand in the counsel of god and not poor prophets who stood in the council of men and you have got to be able to discern did that prophet stand in the counsel of god and release purity in their words or did they stand in the counsel of men and release per words okay that is for you to judge that is scripture all right so you don't ever just take the word of the prophet without your biblical responsibility to weigh it my words too sam and sarah jane's words too are you a poor prophet in this moment or are you a pure holy prophet who has heard god undefiled and what i would say is that a prophet is not a promoter a prophet is not a people impressor a prophet is not a slave to a cried a prophet is not the regurgitator of the opinions of men i'm sarah jane let's unpack this this difference between pure purity in prophets and poor prophecy whenever we marry the wrong spirits temporarily and i think that that's such a key uh thing that you've said there that often it is a temporary moment for the prophet of weakness that there was a moment of weakness where they misrepresented a revelation they misrepresented or just did not hear what god was saying and that one moment is a learning moment and there needs to be a men's put to that there needs to be a sense of taking ownership over it but uh in the majority of cases it does not then disqualify that one person from the role of a prophet as long as there's a men's that's put to it and what i would say just on the back of testing when the bible writes about testing prophecy and testing profits he puts god puts the responsibility on the listener to do that and he has given the listener which is all of you who's listening uh to a prophecy any of you who are listening to prophetic words he has put his discerning spirit in you to discern the prophetic words so that you can understand your response to it jeremiah 23 22 i think this is one of the key hinge scriptures for what makes or breaks a prophet and what causes a prophet either to be pure or poor but if they had stood in my council then they would have proclaimed my words to my people and they would have turned from their evil way and from their evil deeds if they had stood in my council then they would have proclaimed my words and let's remember the context here this is set with an escaping passage of scripture where jeremiah is releasing judgment a judgment to god of of god to the prophets and the prophets have been saying you're gonna have peace when god wasn't saying you're gonna have peace and the prophets were saying everything's gonna be okay i'm gonna sort it all out there's gonna be no harm when god wasn't saying that why because the prophets were listening to what the people wanted to hear not what god wanted to say and that is the make or break of a prophet who stands in the counsel of god and god essentially says in the whole chapter of jeremiah 23 you prophesied what the people wanted to hear and not what i wanted to say you prophesied what the people wanted to hear and not what i wanted to say and the prophet must therefore spend more time in the council of the lord than in the council of man and the council of the lord must be the only source of revelation for the prophet not the news not man's opinions not research not facts or statistics the council of the lord the voice of god and when you stand in the council of man and you start to speak the words that man wants to hear your words actually will often bring excitement but they'll never bring real change when you stand in the council of man and not in the council of god your words will probably be really welcomed but will never release real repentance your words will create abundance but they will never release change your words will be heard but they'll never release the fear of the lord and the real key here is if you had stood in my council from that verse meaning god has opened up the opportunity it's the choice that the prophet has to make where the prophet goes do you know what right now i'm shutting out every other voice from the council of man and choosing to hear from the council of god because i think we need a moment of honesty that in our fallen flesh and the weakness of our human flesh it's easy to be overwhelmed by the counsel of man and it's easy for the council of man to have a loud voice in our ears therefore it is imperative that the prophet makes daily consistent choices daily consistent strides away from those voices into the voice of god that is heard when they stand in god's counsel oh you're muted very helpful sam sarah jane yeah um totally agree with all of that you're saying and this sense of the lord right now even this week putting his fear on the prophets and the watchmen releasing a fear of the lord to actually say come on prophets and watchmen turn away from that fear of man turn away from the mixture that has come into the words that come have come out of your mouth have come out of our mouths and ask now for that exposing purging of god to burn our lips again and to burn our hearts again that we would only release the opinion of god and i feel like god has got us on this journey as prophets in the nations where he's taking us with his hands strong upon us into a time where he's saying now today be strange and prophesy be strange and be silent be strange and speak and so that sense of the strangeness of the prophets that we read in scripture coming back to the prophets today where prophets are assigned as much as they release words and so this sense of the the wordless prophet and the word prophet coming together in individuals prophets together that this strangeness is about to hit us in a more increased way as hands come upon us and i felt as if we were praying yesterday and today about this this sense of actually unknowingly many of us as prophets have uh taken the edges off the words that god has put into our mouths that are burnt and been uncomfortable and we felt like well i'll just kind of soften the edge a little bit because it seems really harsh and it doesn't fit with what everybody else is prophesying or we have loud the mirrors if you will of reflection of media we've allowed the reflection of the mirrors of other prophets uh who are either in relationship with us or in relationship with others to affect the word that has come out of our mouths and it was so so much the fear of the lord that just oh god i have not seen this before as i prayed and it was from very much from psalm 36 2 in their own eyes they flattered themselves too much to detect or hate their sin and i was like oh god that really arrested me and i was repenting myself but this sense of actually the lord saying to us as prophets that he is no longer going to allow the prophetic entertainment that has become a pollution in the stream of the prophetic that is no longer going to allow the self-pleasing prophets to have the word of god in their mouth and there was this arresting of god on me as i prayed about it that he's saying to us look prophets you know from where comes your opinion and you know this sense of we have to have the pure opinion of the lord we have to have the marinated word of god through us and in us before we even dare speak and i think we we've inadvertently and in an unknown way we've we've aired into fat food prophecy as prophets in the nations yes i think i think we have sarah jane there's a lot of comments that some of you are having an internal conversation about profits and their fallibility or infallibility let me address that uh scripture only talks about two prophets being a hundred percent accurate one is jesus christ no surprises there the only other prophet and this is remarkable that is spoken of as infallible is samuel and what they say of samuel is not a word fell to the ground remember that in scripture you cannot smile i remember that okay so only samuel and christ are infallible in their revelation and we need to remember that it is only those two now does that mean that the others were off their game and got it wrong on occasions yes it does because scripture is clear to point out only two does that mean anything in scripture is wrong no of course not because what is gathered for our canonical uh collection of old and new testament is the stuff that is infallible completely pure completely accurate but the indication is that the stuff outside of scripture that ezra and isaiah and the others had off days because they were human and because scripture tells us only two were infallible so can you say the most remarkable things on one day that are pure and then have an off day the next day absolutely you can and of course what we then have to understand is how do i as a prophet go from pure to poor and how do i navigate my uh that is the real test of the growth of a maturing profit voice can they weigh and see the difference between purity of god's voice and per stuff when they've stood in their own council may i suggest that is that is why scripture says we see in part you've got to test us okay so if i am angry or if a prophet is angry they're probably not going to be a pure voice if a prophet is really exhausted they're unlikely to be a pure voice if a prophet has a particular button press issue that they know always irritates them and they have a particular agenda about a certain thing or they have a little bit of a soap box and i have loads of soap boxes we all have loads of soap boxes that we realize our little things that we like to have a particularly you know uh robust conversation about may i suggest that actually that we don't prophesy well in all of those things where we are personally in our humanity over the top in our emotional response to it we're just not as pure which is why you know somebody said to me the other day you you're not allowed to prophesy into america because you're not american can i just slap that down actually i don't have an agenda within america so therefore i can lean into a greater sense of purity in the same way that american prophets can often lean into a greater sense of purity when they're talking about brexit and things that matter to my nation that's why we need the international community of prophets okay so good amen okay so here is the biggie here is the biggie and this is my personal you need to test me on this but here's the biggie i would suggest that no profit should ever be a member of a political party because if you are a signed up card carrying member of a political party you have assigned yourself to such a robust opinion on earth it leaves you questionable as to your purity in stewarding the voice of god that would be my personal take on it now do we vote of course we vote you know and do we have vested interests yes we do because we believe some some policies are godly but i actually think we must not come into as prophets i'm not talking about the rest of the body of christ rest of the body of christ i think it's very different okay but i think as prophets as senior prophets we have got to understand what dilutes our purity and sometimes god backs his people and he backs their righteousness and he backs their noble biblical opinions but sometimes god backs what looks like babylon or egypt or nebuchadnezzar or the chaldeans or the assyrians and sometimes god backs what looks ugly and evil to us because he's in a different modus operandi in that season and you need your prophets to not fall into the pitfall of extreme political alliance again i'm not talking about the rest of the body of christ i'm talking about prophets because they have got to be able to stand one step outside of politics to say god what is your medicine in the nation at this point knowing that god changes back and forth between the blessing of you know nations and the judgment and the correction of nations all right so i think for prophets that is a very important standard for me and my expectation is that people are part of the global prophetic alliance who are prophets prophets i'm just really stressing it so you don't misunderstand me that prophets keep themselves one step removed because their voice is to advocate for god not for what feels good to a nation in a moment now my concern in that is that prophets must not marry political spirits all right so that is why you get that is why you get the level of chaos not that anybody is a wrong prophet not that anybody is a false prophet but have we seen perhaps some poor prophecy because of that standard not being kept i think probably we have now time will tell we're not out of the the woods on the american thing and we don't want to bring you know unhelpful comment when america is still mid process okay we're still mid process but what i would um expect to see happen is that we have as profits very public platforms if we don't have public platforms we're no good to anybody because if we if we can't share the word of the lord and it's a secret that doesn't help anybody so because we have trusted public platforms if we air and if we are wrong we must use those profit those public platforms to apologize and repent okay so you can i want you to be able to measure whether a profit is worth following are they humble when they get it wrong whenever they appreciate that processes clearly come to an end and they can see error of course are they one who doesn't mind if you test their words that's a good prophet is a if a prophet says you know this is it this is it this is it you know i would have problems you have to reserve biblical right to test and weigh if they keep promoting themselves more than they introduce god i would have questions about that if you hear them stand on a platform myself included and it's all about personal advantage or self-promotion or product that's problematic because it should be more about god if a prophet distorts the message and they are only comfortable in the goodness of god or they're only comfortable in the judgment of god they will distort the nature of god to you a prophet must be comfortable in the full spectrum of god that he's he's merciful and kind but he's also just and judge so a prophet cannot be lopsided in what they bring if you only hear a prophet talk judgment or you only hear a prophet talk mercy you know that's not biblically literate if a prophet speaks a word and you feel fear or shame or anxiety or emotions that are not godly ben robert trash uh whatever the word is in america been that prophecy if that profit if that that that word for the prophet takes you into non-godly emotions get rid of it conviction and hope i'm looking for hope or conviction that's how i'm measuring prophetic words am i rightly biblically convicted or is it giving me hope if it's giving me anything else i'm chucking it sam said that we're in really really uh deep waters here i mean i think that's so helpful there um about the hope and and conviction you've got to write that down as a question because that is a key question when responding to prophecy we've got to be honest and just say in our humanity we often cannot trust ourselves to prophesy well into areas that we feel very strongly about and i think mature prophets know what their no-go areas are about that they know that there are some areas that at a certain point are no goal for prophesying because they are aware that in their own humanity they could be tempted to prophesy according to their own agenda and you need to be honest with yourself that there are times maybe some of you feel very passionately about politics that you know as much as you pray for politics that are around seasons where there is a lot of political stuttering actually this is not the moment for me to prophesy into politics you might feel passionately about other areas and have a lot of conviction as a prophet you might think right now this is not the time for me to bring a word into those particular areas and that is why profits need community that is why profits need community and profits need accountability and profits need pathways of honest dialogue with other prophets where people can say one prophet to another i think that was your own agenda there and there's not a sense of offense because sometimes we don't even know that we have an agenda only another prophet outside of us can assess that that's going on and when profits are in honest honest community with one another who communicate with those who are even outside their own uh kind of pathways of thought about certain things that is where a sharpness and a roundness comes to the prophet that enables them to prophesy purely sir jane yeah absolutely i think i don't know about you guys if you've ever prophesied and you've thought oh hang on a minute i think that might be a word for me or i think that that might be a personal word i think we have to also watch for that when we're prophesying and god's speaking to us so we have to be to be a pure vessel we have to bother to take the time to hear god for our own selves as prophets what is god saying to us so that we don't bring mixture into the corporate word that is a personal word and this is something as we we train uh prophets and even those in the gift of prophecy uh it's common isn't it it's time and again if you have not heard god for yourself it can come into the word for the other person or for the corporate word that you're releasing as a prophet so these are i'm almost like good principles self checks um that we need to bring and i think the the purity i think we have to be prophets who say to god in ourselves and even to each other i will not speak an opinion in that matter unless it's the opinion of god and i would rather be silent and hold my tongue then say something that is somebody else's opinion or my own opinion in mixture and not the opinion of god because how many times might we have heard somebody prophesy and we've even heard phrases that have come from other prophets that are pure that that are mixture even from other prophets because you want to be a pure vessel you want to be a pure stream and you want to be a pure word then god is going to put pure words in your mouth not another prophet's words in your mouth and so these are kind of like oh check check check as and and i think there is a reset of even prophets that god is saying to us actually listen coming to my counselor sam was teaching so strong i had that word to comment to my counsel so that you can release that pure word i think a a couple of thoughts and then i've kind of got one eye on time but i want to wrap this up so we can kind of change tac tomorrow together but i do think that we see a lot of stale words that we kind of we taste them and they're into our spiritual taste buds they're stale why is that the case because they are echoes of what other prophets have said and not our own revelation from god and i think you need to to to to monitor that if you hear all of the prophets saying the same thing boy that's a massive red flag that's a massive massive red flag because that would suggest to me that there is um an echoing of each other rather than hearing the voice of god uh for yourself okay there are times god does say exactly the same thing to people uh but that i actually think is rare we get different pieces of a jigsaw puzzle as prophets to make the whole all right i think that's really important the other thing is prophecy is nearly a hundred percent of the time conditional uh we gotta underst we gotta understand that in scripture you get promises of god and then you go all the way through the texts and conditions you know uh come to me all who are weary and heavy-laden and i will give you rest that's conditional all right you get rest if you come to god all right so we we read in scripture but i don't think we understand quite here as a promise and here is a condition most prophecy is conditional so if something doesn't happen in your life that was prophesied or doesn't happen in the life of the nation that was prophesied does it me does it mean that the prophet uh got it wrong not always it it often means that the conditions for that word weren't met all right so it's a much more complex business than just hearing the word and going is it right or is it wrong is it stale is it from personal agenda is it pure what are the conditions attached to it okay now let me say this in closing particularly you know with reference to the states because we have to have this conversation because of what's happening over there at the moment would we like godly leadership yes sorry it's my phone would we like godly laws yes would we like our man elected whoever that happens to be for you yes of course we would we would be foolish not to but did we ask god what is the best for the nation or did we assume because god doesn't get things wrong and sometimes the best thing for us is not the thing we think but it's the assyrians and it's the babylonians and it's the egyptians and sometimes it looks like it's the enemy that god says is the best thing for you because it will grow in you something you are lacking and that is really important as prophets that we are so pure we have the ability not to prophesy according to what i want but the ability to prophesy what is god's medicine at any given point tough it's a tough call i think it's a tough call to say that pure be kind to the prophets yes you weigh them yes you test them and test me as well you know and yes you measure them according to biblical standards but pray for them with great fervor because theirs is a tough job to only hear the voice of god and not to be on the bandwagon of uh opinion knowing that if they bring an opinion that you don't like you are likely to stone them would you have believed a prophet if they brought an opinion you didn't like well would you lord have mercy on the prophets and lord have mercy on the church who weigh and test them because without the profits we will all be out of time without the profits we will have no horizon line to aim at without the profits we will lose our risk but god have mercy on us to speak and not be silent even if we get stoned because of it [Music] god bless you and we will see you tomorrow boy we covered grind today and happily tomorrow you're well happily it is your 20th wednesday anniversary tomorrow so you're not winning yes yes sam and i and look are on tomorrow but have a great uh wedding anniversary sj lovely all right because we're missing your faith as you go and do something gloriously romantic yes absolutely reliving our honeymoon days in the center of scotland which will be lovely yes yes brilliant all right see you tomorrow guys bye [Music] you

Channel: Global Prophetic Alliance-Glasgow Prophetic Centre

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Length: 68min 44sec (4124 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 10 2020