What is a Prophetic Person and What is a Prophet

There’s a difference between a prophetic person and a prophet. A prophetic person as we discussed is someone who can flow in the gift of prophecy and move in the gift of prophecy. There are many Christians who have the ability to prophesy. It doesn’t necessarily make them a prophet. I did read in a book that was written by an Indian apostle on the gifts of the spirit and the offices of the five-fold ministry. He said in that book, I’m pretty sure he said everyone who prophesies one day will become a prophet. There would be a lot of people that would disagree with that statement though.

I’m pretty sure that’s what he said. It’s coming after twenty years of prophesying myself – I seem to find that it’s an easy thing to do to prophesy and for that reason I encourage everyone I meet to get the gift of prophecy and start to move in the gift of prophecy. Prophecy is such a wonderful gift and it’s such a encouraging thing to do to speak life over people, to call the gold out in people, to recognize the beautiful things in a person and call them out and let a person know what God specifically thinks of them and reasons why God admires them.

I find many of my prophecies that I do have the different characteristics of a person in them and what God admires about those different characteristics. My prophecies can be very encouraging. Sometimes my prophecies lack in direction, in giving people direction, that’s something I’m working on but I do pass on everything that I feel the Lord gives to pass on to people. Part of my prophetic gifting is growing so in saying that I find it easy to prophesy, I still am growing in the prophetic gift and I don’t think anyone even if they’ve been prophesying for forty years would say that they’re not growing in their gift all the time so to be a prophetic person is essentially moving in the prophetic gifts and a prophetic person is a wonderful person to have in your church.

I feel that many people in churches should be prophetic and it’s my aim one day to go from church to church and do seminars and teach everyone in the church to move prophetically. I know that would be very encouraging for the flock and very encouraging for every individual that visits the church to have people in the church that can tell them things about their life and about what God feels about them and about their future. A prophet is called from his birth, he may not know at birth, it may take many years before he realises there’s a call on his life.

In my life for instance, I didn’t know I was called to be a prophet until I heard someone preach on the five-fold ministry. He went through each of the five-fold ministry apostle, prophet, evangelists, pastors and teachers and went through each of them and described what each of them does. At the end of that teaching I realised that I was called to more than a stranger and called to more than non-Christians but I was essentially called to people in the church also and so I decided I must be a prophet and I must have been called to be a prophet.

I was deciding to start to  learn what a prophet is and  what is required in the office of prophet and start to move towards working towards what I’m meant to do as a prophet and I was a chat site. I was on a forum on the computer when they used to have forums and you could go in and chat to people, it was a Christian chat site, and I called myself prophetic. I had this girl who came online and asked for a prophecy off me and I gave her a prophecy and she said this is really amazing and I said what? She said, “I was just upstairs with my sick mother in hospital and I said to myself that I really to need to speak to a prophet.” Lord, she prayed to the Lord and asked the Lord could she speak to a prophet and she said, “ I came online and you’re online. Are you a prophet?” And it was at that time that I typed back, “Yes I believe that am called to be one.

Now, many people feel that when they’ve got the gift of prophecy and they’re called to be a prophet, many people mistakenly assume that they’re already a prophet. That’s like someone in the first class of medical school or in the first month of six years study, that’s like someone in the first month of medical school calling themselves a doctor. You know, when you get the gift of prophecy, it takes many years, sometimes ten to twenty-five years to develop in character and to develop in skill and abilities to become a prophet in their office. So one of the mistakes of the Kingdom and one of the big mistakes that young prophets make is going around telling everybody that they are a prophet. It may have been prophesied over them by a prophet that they’re called to be a prophet and God’s calling on their life and they’re a prophet but it doesn’t seem to be much sound teaching around that says to these people that it’s going to take ten to twenty-five years for you to develop into the office of prophet.  They go around and can do a lot of damage in their pride telling people that they’re a prophet and people assuming that they’ve got the experience of a prophet and finding that they come well short of having the experience and the character of a prophet.

In his book The Seer James Goll mentions that there is up to twelve types of prophets. The last three he mentioned covered me. They were prophetic, writers, prophetic equippers, and prophetic evangelists.

I’ve written 7 books and I am pretty gifted in teaching people things and this will be the focus of another book. This will turn into a book, these videos; will be part of a short book on the prophetic. So I’m a prophetic teacher and equipper but prophets can be very emotional about issues. They want to come into a situation and preach on an issue that’s wrong. A prophet will see what’s wrong in a congregation or what’s wrong in a city or what’s wrong in a country, and will preach the truth according to that era. A prophet most of the time, very emotional, prophets can be very lonely, they have an intimate friendship with the Lord and they can be very intense people.

And so for that reason because they’re so passionate for Jesus and very intense, this can stop them from having many friends. It’s not as though they don’t desire friends. It’s just that they don’t want anything to do with the world and lust of the flesh and they live a life that separate world and the fact of the matter is many Christians love to live with one foot in the world and one foot in God’s Kingdom and a prophet just can’t stand that. And so he won’t lower himself or herself to that standard to talk all day about the football or talk all day about a current TV show on TV. A prophet in many instances can’t relate to people who are in the world and are living a really fleshy lifestyle.

So prophets have a mandate from God that some prophet’s are called to the nation to prophesy over the nation and have an impact on the nation; some other prophets are called just to be a prophet in their church and be available for people in the church. Some prophets are called to an itinerate ministry where they travel from church to church and place to place and nation to nation.

There’s many different flavours of a prophet but a prophet speaks on behalf of God and not only speaks when he’s saying prophetic words but often when a prophet is preaching, there’s a prophetic edge to what he’s teaching. On many occasions it’s not a prepared message but the Holy Spirit speaks through a prophet and the prophet delivers a now-word for the congregation that he’s in, a word that’s applicable right now the people. It’s not a message that’s two-thousand years old. It’s not a message that’s five years old. A prophet will deliver a message that is due to be delivered that day.   Even the sermon in that church the week before, was preparation for everything that the prophet has to say. All that has happened in the week before and the weeks and months before the prophet appears in that church was preparing the church for the prophets message.. So, a prophet would do well to listen to God and deliver only what God wants said. Many prophets may have an agenda.

Many prophets may have a pet peeve or a pet interest that they want to get out there. One of my things that I’m very passionate about is the sheep and the goat’s parable; that I was hungry, I was thirsty, I was naked, a stranger, I was in prison, and you didn’t help me. That’s a very message that’s very dear to my heart and one that I would share often but I’ve got to be careful as I start to preach in churches that I don’t preach on that one all the time but I allow the spirit of God to be open with me and direct me to preach exactly what the Spirit of God wants so a prophet out of everyone should be directed by God and led by God to say what they say in every situation.

Many prophets are called on for personal prophecy and they’re accurate in personal prophecy. Accuracy is something that grows like, it’s just like someone learning a game of tennis. They can start a game of tennis as a young child and know the fundamentals of tennis, know how to serve and how to return a ball and how to do a slice and how to do a drop shot and they can know the fundamentals of tennis but a young child who’s ten years of age doesn’t play at Wimbledon. You can watch a young child play tennis and know that they can play tennis but the child isn’t invited out to play at Wimbledon. Well, that’s like someone starting with the gift of prophecy. They’ve got the fundamentals right but can’t be compared to a prophet who’s at Wimbledon, who’s on the world stage and is highly competitive and highly accurate and very good at his craft which is giving personal prophecy.

So accuracy is something that grows in a person. If you’re new to the prophetic, don’t be too concerned that you may miss and hear things that turn out to be wrong. I still hear things that are missed from time to time and even with a high level of accuracy I can be wrong and that just keeps your humble. That lets you know that you’re dependant on the Holy Spirit and it’s not just your own ego and your own personal strength that allows you to prophesy but you’re always dependant on the Holy Spirit to give you the words to fill your mouth.  It’s very interesting that someone with twenty years of experience prophesying can still get things wrong but I thoroughly admit to you that from time to time I say a word of knowledge that isn’t correct and I’m told that that wasn’t correct and that’s just something that keeps you humble. I’m not endorsing people getting things wrong but in a prophetic game, in a ministry of the prophetic, people have to have the assurance that getting something wrong isn’t the end of the ministry.

Many people quit the prophetic pursuit and quit prophesying because they get a couple of prophecies wrong and the only one that wins in that scenario is Satan. Satan shuts down really good people, people that are going to be used to give thousands of prophecies in the future, he shuts them down by them getting a string of wrongs prophecies and they totally give up on prophesying. Satan is very happy with that. The Kingdom of God, God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are saddened by that and sometimes they can resurrect that person and encourage that person to start again. Sometimes they can’t and that’s a shame and Satan is really against the prophetic. He hates it with a vengeance and he’ll use a person’s lack of feedback to really harass you and harass your mind. You may prophesy over someone and they don’t give you feedback and suddenly your mind is thinking you’ve got it wrong, they’re not replying, they’re not responding because you got it so wrong and how could you do that?

Your mind runs off with all these sorts that Satan places in it and gets into worry. So it takes an amazing strength to pursue and to continue to pursue the Lord and prophesy. It takes amazing courage to prophesy over a nation or prophesy over a church. Some churches in their worship time allow a prophetic person to get up and prophesy over the church and that takes courage to that. It certainly is a privilege that the Lord affords certain prophets and prophetic people to do.

Some people move in the flesh. Some people get up at church and feel that God wants to say something but it’s actually them and their own agenda that want to say something and those people get up and put words in God’s mouth and do prophecies that aren’t necessarily from God. And this is why in scripture it says that prophets are subject to the prophets and in those circumstances, if you had a properly healthy church, the pastor and one of the prophets in the church might take that person aside and say that that prophecy wasn’t from God. “You made that up and that came from your flesh. In future, you come and speak to me before you deliver a prophecy and I’ll tell you whether you can deliver it or not.”

Sometimes a prophetic person or a prophet or the pastor of the church and step in after the prophecy and tell the church that that wasn’t a word from the Lord but that would be highly embarrassing for the person.

You can learn a lot from a prophet. They say that a prophet will often live out his message and will have lived out his message before he brings the message to a people. So he doesn’t preach out of other people’s books. He doesn’t look at other people’s books and other people’s revelation and then write a book about the same subject himself. He actually lives out what he’s going to preach. His preaching is most times from experience. I found in the seven books I’ve written, I’ve done no research for the books. I didn’t spend time reading other people’s books to do research.

I just sat down and made videos about the different subjects and different chapter headings that I made out to be part of the book. So I didn’t research other books. I didn’t go to other places to research my books. I just simply spoke my books or wrote my books according to the knowledge that I possessed and a prophet should be able to speak from the things that he knows so he shouldn’t be presumptuous, he shouldn’t be speaking things that God hasn’t placed on his heart. He shouldn’t be speaking his opinions. He should be speaking on behalf of God. Of course you’re allowed as anyone in the body of Christ, you’re allowed to speak you opinions. You can have opinions.

 

That’s what life is all about. But when it comes to other people, you should be speaking your convictions and the things that God has laid on your heart. Are all prophets right? No, not all prophets are right. Prophets are always on a journey of discovery of Biblical truths and theologies. Some prophets have wrong theology. Some prophets, for instance, believe in a judgemental God and an angry God and believe in the God of the Old Testament and don’t factor in the fact that we’re in a New Covenant and God is best represented through Jesus Christ and the love of Jesus. Some prophets are stuck in that Old Covenant doctrine and that Old Covenant relationship with God and these prophets are more angry individuals and speak of judgement and doom and all sorts of things.

These prophets are very big on preaching holiness and yet their own attitude sometimes can be unholy. And then there’s prophets that know the grace message and have got a proper understanding of grace and they come across a whole lot differently. There’s two ways you can share un-holiness. You can be a person who preaches gloom and doom and fear and the fact that if you’re not holy you’re not going to see God like it says in Hebrews. You can preach this scary message or you can preach a message of grace to say that God loves you and he wants everyone to go to Heaven that’s saved and his blood covers a multitude of sins and encourage people to live a holy life, to live a life separated to God. There’s two ways you can do everything. You can threaten people or you can encourage people. And that would be the difference between the two prophets that are out there in the world.

There are many prophets out there in the world speaking of judgement and End Times and holiness that God is an angry god. He’s angry with abortions. He’s angry with this. He’s angry with marriage equality and America. He’s angry with this. He’s angry, angry, angry, and it just seems that those prophets themselves are angry and don’t seem to have a lot of peace. I understand these prophets that are angry and preach judgement and the woes of God; simply because I was one of them in years’ past before I came into the understanding of the message of grace.

It says in scripture in the book of Revelation that a great Angel will go and preach the everlasting Gospel to the whole world. And I believe that everlasting Gospel that the angel preaches is the Gospel of grace, the same Gospel of grace that Paul taught and I believe that it’s not until the Gospel of grace has been shown and delivered to the whole world that Jesus will come back. So I hope I’ve given you some insights. There are many characteristics of a prophet. But a prophet will find it very hard not to be intense. I can be down to earth and talk to people about their TV shows and talk to people about their sport, but it’s just like talking about the weather to me.  It’s like a real, low surface sort of conversation. It just seems to be able to have good friends these days. as a prophet you’ve got to lower your standards and lower what you’re talking about. The majority of Christians can’t endure talking about Christian things for more than half an hour at a time and that’s just the way I find people. I’m a very close to Jesus, a prophet will be a friend of God and literally be a friend of God and God will speak to the prophet and look after the prophet and be the prophet’s friend.

I heard one teacher; I think it was Thomas Kempis from the Catholic tradition. I think he said that if God really loves you, you won’t have any friends and only God will be your friend. And I feel that that is how it is for me. I’ve got a couple of friends but that’s pretty true for my life.  I have Jesus as a friend and saints from Heaven as my friends and angels as my friends. It is an enjoyable but lonely life. Prophets are rejected by many people. It’s easy for a person who disagrees with you to call you a false prophet because you claim to be a prophet. It’s easy to be rejected when you’re talking about issues like feeding the hungry and feeding the homeless and giving justice to people who are lacking in justice. It is easy to be rejected when you’re talking about righteousness and Kingdom principles to people who are lukewarm and people who are just treat their faith with God as an accessory like a handbag that it’s just one of the things in their life. When you’re talking about righteousness and a Kingdom principles and justice to people who don’t want to know about that, you can be easily rejected. Prophets can be perceived as weird but the church vitally needs prophets. A prophet in the Old Testament time used to turn a whole nation toward God when they were sinning and far from God.

Prophets today can come into a church and speak at a church at a week and totally address every problem that’s affecting that church and they can speak with authority which will have an impact on the church. This will greatly please the pastor because the pastor can continue to be the loving pastor to the church and he can use a prophet to come in and speak the hard words that the church needs to hear. So, that’s one characteristic of a prophet that they speak the Word of God. They answer problems. They give direction. They give vision to a church. They refresh pastors. They co-labour with pastors.

Any prophet that comes into a church and embarrasses a pastor and abuses his authority is a prophet abuses his authority is a prophet that won’t be invited back to that church but he’s actually walked out of alignment with God. That a prophet should be respectful to any pastor whose church he’s invited to. Sometimes God may call the prophet to speak to the church in a way that will have him not invited back but a prophet has got to be very sure that God saying that and got to be very sure his message will affect enough people to warrant the fact that he might not be invited by the pastor again.

I enjoy my life as a prophet. I am someone who dearly loves the Lord and I’m still finding my feet in the prophetic office. I am in the office now but I’m still finding my feet. I think everyone in the Christian life is always going to be learning more about God and more about their purpose every day they live. I’m growing into my purpose but a prophet is a full on calling and one that can be a lot grief in a prophet’s life, a lot of rejection, misunderstanding, and suffering. There can be many years where a prophet is in a refiner’s fire and getting refined and persecuted by people but also going through personal traumas and sufferings and it’s only on the other end of all that refining that you can be used faithfully as a prophet. God knows what He’s doing and if you’re suffering, you’re rejected, you’re misunderstood, you’re lonely, you’re sad, and God is your only source, there’s a good chance that you’re being called to be a prophet and prepared for that.