How to unlock the prophetic gifting when everyone else seems to be asleep

When I am talking about sleep here, I am not talking about physical sleep, I am talking about spiritual sleep.  One of the things that I’ve learned when focusing on theological aspects, and even on the Love of Christ sometimes, is that we lose sight of the fact to keep an eye out for the seasons we are in.  Some people say that the prophetic Scriptures were for when Jesus was here, but there is a Truth that He is coming back, and like I read in someone else’s commentary, which applies to us today as Christians, we have been part of the “End Times Ostrich Syndrome”.

God reminded me of this, that we all have the Holy Spirit, and have been gifted with the gift of prophecy.  The problem with being a prophet is that sometimes you have to say things that are hard, and pack a punch, but if you are obedient to the Lord, you will do  it.

God speaks through metaphors, and not just the Bible alone, but you have to be well versed in the Bible to be able to grow because it is the Word of God and herein lies the seed and the Truth to what God has set you do for His kingdom.  The  The more you become spiritually and sensitive to the Holy Spirit He will start to begin to reveal and show you things that are deeper than just the surface.  He can show you types and shadows of things in the spiritual.  The most important thing is to pursue a relationship with the Lord, and the goal is to listen to the Lord speak to you about everything so that it is a conversation about everything.  Some people have been gifted with the Word of Knowledge and the Word of Wisdom, but mostly we want to get to that point where we are so intimate with the Lord He talks to us all the time.  That takes some time spending in His Presence.  For that to be right in most cases you have to have your conscience clear from any guilt and there are a number of ways you can do that, but I’m not going to do that.

There’s no formula to how God speaks to you, but we have to be alert and we are watchmen so we have to keep an eye on the Big picture, that Jesus is coming back again…we don’t want to debate about when.

Here’s just one example, and I’m not saying that this will work for you, because God speaks to everyone in His own special way:  So I made something today, which did not turn out pretty good, and it was all burnt and the texture just wasn’t right.  I was reminded of two Scripture interpretations, Revelation 3, and the Laodician Church –

The Lukewarm Church

¹⁴ “And to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans^[f] write,

‘These things says the Amen, the Faithful and True Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God:¹⁵ “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. ¹⁶ So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot,^[g] I will vomit you out of My mouth. ¹⁷ Because you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’—and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked— ¹⁸ I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see. ¹⁹ As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent. ²⁰ Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. ²¹ To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.

²² “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”’”

and I was also reminded of Ezekiel in Chapter 4

⁹ “Also take for yourself wheat, barley, beans, lentils, millet, and spelt; put them into one vessel, and make bread of them for yourself. During the number of days that you lie on your side, three hundred and ninety days, you shall eat it. ¹⁰ And your food which you eat shall be by weight, twenty shekels a day; from time to time you shall eat it. ¹¹ You shall also drink water by measure, one-sixth of a hin; from time to time you shall drink. ¹² And you shall eat it as barley cakes; and bake it using fuel of human waste in their sight.”

¹³ Then the Lord said, “So shall the children of Israel eat their defiled bread among the Gentiles, where I will drive them.”

¹⁴ So I said, “Ah, Lord God! Indeed I have never defiled myself from my youth till now; I have never eaten what died of itself or was torn by beasts, nor has abominable flesh ever come into my mouth.”

¹⁵ Then He said to me, “See, I am giving you cow dung instead of human waste, and you shall prepare your bread over it.”

¹⁶ Moreover He said to me, “Son of man, surely I will cut off the supply of bread in Jerusalem; they shall eat bread by weight and with anxiety, and shall drink water by measure and with dread, ¹⁷ that they may lack bread and water, and be dismayed with one another, and waste away because of their iniquity.

To see where God was going with this I decided to go to read the next few chapters.  I was reminded again that God is outside of time, and when He was He was giving this prophecy to the nation of Israel, He was remember Jesus who was crucified because of the Jews unbelief, and also because of the idolatry of the nation of Israel.  Right now in Israel, we see that it has actually turned away from Jesus except for the few Messianic Jews living there, but the book of Ezekiel gives a warning and Jesus gives a warning in Revelation.  God hates and despises idolatry, and we cannot say that it is ok to keep having idols because of Grace.  A common example of Christian Idolatry is the celebration of Easter.  It was originally Passover, and because of the pagan goddess of where the name comes from and modern day Christians don’t know any better they say “Happy Easter”, knowing that this kind of thing is a blasphemy to God…because He says in Ezekiel – “Then those of you who escape will remember Me among the nations where they are carried captive, because I was crushed by their adulterous heart which has departed from Me, and by their eyes which play the harlot after their idols; they will loathe themselves for the evils which they committed in all their abominations.”

That’s not a pretty picture.  One thing though is we can get carried away with prophecy to the point where can actually be harming ourselves, if we think we’re hearing from the Lord.  It all has be done with wisdom.  For example, I don’t think God would ask anyone to eat bread baked on cow dung, or to walk around naked like Isaiah did.  You have to be sure you’re hearing from God, and it has to be done with a purpose on spreading some kind of message.  It is some kind of message that God wants you to send, and in that you must choose to be obedient to God.

Reading books like Revelation and Ezekiel, which are full of metaphors, are a great way to get insight into the supernatural.  For more information on things like this I would recommend John Paul Jackson’s Understanding Dreams and Visions.  Study the most you can about prophecy, but also examine your heart and ask God to remove anything from your heart that is not pleasing to Him, so you can be satisfying to His mouth, and a joy to His taste.  He really does love you, and He does care for His bride, but at the same time we cannot be blind to what’s going on around us and what the Scripture says about His coming back.  There’s so much more that God wants to share, but He’s looking for hearts that are hungry to serve Him, and be obedient to Him.  Before you can get to obedience, and this is not a works-mentality thing, you must pursue intimacy and be delighted to be in His presence, and not to a place where you are hiding from Him.  It takes time.  Be patient with God.  Listen eagerly and He will teach you through His Holy Spirit which abides in you.

Heavenly Father,

I did not intent to pervert or twist the Scripture in anyway, so I am asking You to apply the Blood of Jesus on this post and let what needs to be seen be seen, and hide what needs to be hidden.  I ask You to impart prophetic gifting to the Church, the Bride in these times, because your Word says, In the last days, young men will see visions, and old men will dream dreams.  Pour out the spiritual giftings among Your people so that they may know You more and more intimately.  Answer prayers, and put a hunger to pray in the Spirit among the people.  Help us to pray Your will and to seek Your face daily and to grow in the light of Your Word and to increase in wisdom, and strength, and power and might, so we can be the true worshippers who worship in Spirit and Truth.  Help us not to be complacent in our pursuit of You, but to pursue You with our whole heart.  We thank You for Your Mighty Presence moving in these last days.  May Your Spirit be poured out even more and more.

In JESUS Mighty Name I pray,

Amen.

 

 

He gave gifts unto men

 

This was another awesome sermon – you may have to adjust the volume a little bit low so you’ll have to crank up the volume.  It goes with the theme God made you unique.  May the Holy Spirit bless you and touch you as you listen to this message.

The unprepared attack

Sometimes your day is going well.  In fact it starts off ok.  You might go to church.  You might sing along with praise.  You might listen to the sermon, but deep down inside you know something is wrong, but you can’t put your finger on it.  You can sense that something is going to happen, but you don’t know what or when or if it will even happen that day.  In my last post I said that God is very smart.  The devil is pretty smart too because He knows when to attack you at your weakest.  When people around you who you have the most impact on are going to look at you and think, “That is not someone who loves Christ and lives by Christ’s principles.”  It is going to be one of those tests, and it all depends on how you react.  Now a mature Christian will have enough character in that type of situation to recognize it before it happens, but when you are still in quite the “adolescent” stage of your spiritual walk and still have a lot of growing to do, you won’t be able to recognize it.  I think two of the most things that help in spiritual warfare, are wisdom, and agape (love).  It takes wisdom on how to deal with Satan and how to deal with others.  It takes agape to walk in your relationship with God, to learn how to love God fully, and to love others fully, and to love yourself fully.  When you are not developed with a proper conscience loving yourself might be hard.  If you have a root of bitterness then loving others might be hard.  And this is an important warning, if you are feeling dead and dry, it is not always good to pray for God to soften your heart because He might do it with a “meat tenderizer” like Joyce Meyer says.  God might try to hammer your dry, hard, steel heart, into something soft and malleable.  So when you see that happen, take some time out for yourself and go to a place where you don’t have any responsibilities to people or things to do, and just sit and worship.  Put some soaking music on and bathe in His Presence, and most importantly wait because He will show up.  It is this daily part of waiting and marinating in His Presence that equips you when these type of attacks come.

Satan likes to make you feel like a victim, and there are days, believe me, there are days, and he has tried everything, I mean everything to get you down and make you blaspheme God, but then the devil might use your own very lips to get you into trouble and get you into victim mode.  It may be with your spouse, or your children, or your parents, or even your friends.  The first initial reaction is usually not the best.  Do NOT let the devil get the best of you on a bad day.  People don’t know when someone is having a bad day.  You can’t tell by the way they look.  Some people seem like they are having a bad day.  Or maybe it is because every time they try to tell you something you end up fighting.  It may be part yours or part theirs, and the problem is communication, and priorities.  For someone a priority may not be as important as you think it is, and for you a priority might not be something that they think it is.  He wants nothing more than for you to be a victim and make you doubt who God is.  Once you know you are in Christ, and have the confidence assured in that faith, and are grounded in love – then nothing by means will harm you.  You can go quoting scripture all day long, but unless you are grounded in love then it is not going to get you anywhere.

When you are weak, be prepared, because even though God is your strength when you are weak, sometimes He lets you go through experiences to make you draw nearer to Him and sometimes, satan takes advantage of the time that you are weak to “make a spectacle” out of you, because he hates the fact that “he has been made spectacle of”.  The best way to fight satan, is not to fight him with your mouth, but to fight him, with your attitude.  He doesn’t like when your attitude in all circumstances, is developed in the fruits of the Spirit, – be that love,joy,patience,peace,kindness,gentleness,faithfulness,goodness and self-control.

God has strange ways of working.  One of His main ways of working is through pain.  He doesn’t like to use pain, but when people hurt, especially people of God hurt, they are more tuned to turn to Him, in their time of need.  Also this is part of the test and trial process.  We all learn through life experiences, which is more knowledge than we can ever get in a book (except the Bible because it is the WORD of God and the main teacher on how to react on these things).  Once we have actually been through something, we know that we have what it takes to get through that situation and come out on top.  In Hannah Hurnard’s book, Hind’s feet in High Places, the main character, goes through trials and tests, and every time she gets through a difficult patch, she create an altar to the LORD, who in this case is identified as the Shepherd.  Even in the Old Testament, the LORD asked people to commemorate altars to signify a victory and God often takes your mess and turns it into Message – [FYI:  In the Message Bible – Message stands for Gospel or Good News].  It’s ok if no one can see your altars or if they are shared on a blog per say, but He always takes the pain that you feel, and the emotions, situations, and circumstances, and turns them around for good.

Sometimes after the trial or test, and you failed miserably, and you grieved the Holy Spirit, God will find a way to let you “escape” and not to bear more than what is necessary.  This is because He loves you.  Come on, He knew you were going to do it to begin with.  Sometimes we are not even aware of the test or trial and how it is happening, so during the trial we may not have the right kind of attitude, but if we learn from that trial the right kind of attitude that we are supposed to have the next time that we go through it then we will at least be a little bit better prepared.  Don’t be surprised if you hear a sermon or preach a sermon, and the very next thing you are tested in that very area in, which you were engaging yourself in.

So if you have been attacked and you don’t know what to do, and you have a battle scar and you want to know how to heal then understand this:  It takes time to heal.  Everyone heals in different ways.  Everyone has different ways to respond to situations.  Even you have different ways you respond to different situations but it will go away.  God will allow you to heal.  The best way to heal – I don’t know if I’ve said it before – is to do something for someone else.  Find someone more weaker than you are and try to build them up through the pain that you went through.  When you feel like there is no hope for you, go to a place where there is no hope for someone else, and let them see the little hope that you do have, that despite what you are going through, you can still be an example of light of Christ.  It may not be to the person or in the same situation you faced the circumstances with, but reach out to someone else.  It is the best way and it is one way to love your neighbor.  So if you fail in one area you are not a total failure if you can use the situation to change someone else’s life, or even if you learn from it.

Oh, by the way, I forgot to mention that some days be may be more spiritually prone to attacks than others because of their spiritual significance.  You can usually tell when those are by doing a little research and keeping your eyes open.  On those days in particular keep your guard up and be particularly nice to everyone because on those days because what you say and do could make a lot of impact.