Prophesy: Declaration
Once I had a conversation with a pastor who told me that practicing prophecy as a church activity was not biblical. He based his claim on the fact that although there were schools of prophets in Old Testament times, the Bible does not record any information about these practices.
As much as I respected the pastor, I couldn’t share same opinion. Our conversation revealed to me that his view was based on the common belief that it’s forbidden for us to pursue prophecy on our own. According to this view, prophecy would just suddenly happen in some occasions when God would want so. In my opinion, the idea has been formed by observing events from the sidelines and drawing conclusions from them, rather than by a deep dive into the Bible and confirming them by personal experiences.
Even though I didn't have a direct biblical answer at the time, I still knew that practicing prophecy was possible and also more experienced prophetic people are able to pass it on to others. It is true that the Old Testament does not record the contents of those prophetic schools, but that didn’t stop Paul from encouraging churches to pursue prophecy and even give instructions for the prophetic order.
The pastor's comment motivated me to look for clear "How to Do" instructions from the Bible. Today I can give passages of God's instructions on the principles of prophecy and declarions, and also show how they were part of Jesus' earthly ministry to which he commanded us to also discipleship others:
“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”
Matt. 28:19-20 (NIV)
Let’s begin!
In a well-known biblical passage, Jesus said He would give us believers an authority and responsibility - for there is no authority without responsibility - in order to maintain things on earth either by denying or allowing them:
"I will give you the keys (authority) of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind [forbid, declare to be improper and unlawful] on earth will have [already] been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose [permit, declare lawful] on earth will have [already] been loosed in heaven.”
Matt. 16:19 (AMP)
Well, if we really had such power, wouldn't we have already used it to shape the world into a better place? In fact, we have already done so, because many of the world's good achievements can be attributed to Christianity. The laws of many functioning societies are built on Christian values. In addition, throughout history, Christianity has inspired and also made room for a number of artistic and scientific achievements. Modern therapy that really helps people has also adopted much of the Christian view of how a person’s mind and heart work . Even in the business world, many companies have started to practice servant leadership modeled by Jesus and found them to be the most effective.
Where the world doesn’t seem like paradise, let us remember we have other factors here as well than just us believers, but when it comes to our duty of following God's call, we as a church have not yet grown into the full responsibility that concerns our calling.
Sometimes we don't think about small detail that leaving things as they are is also one form of allowing them. For example, some Christians and entire denominations have adopted this attitude how we’re here just waiting for Jesus to return, during which time we should avoid any involvement in the affairs of the world. This view has led people to such behavior that they don’t educate themselves with what is happening in their own town or country and also that they don’t want to vote. These are just one examples, but the bottom line is that when we choose not to make a difference, there is someone else in this world who gladly fills the voids we leave unfilled: the enemy of our souls.
Matthew 16:19 raises another question. Can we define reality by our proclamation to whatever we want it to be? If that were the case, why haven’t we already declared ourselves masters of the world to live an ideal life that serves us? Unfortunately, there are Christians and entire movements that have this kind of belief.
However, the bible passage also reveals that our declorations should be in line with what is already forbidden or permitted in Heaven. Jesus gave an example in which He modeled this:
“This, then, is how you should pray: ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
Matt. 6:9-10 (NIV)
What comes to the claim that Bible doesn’t provide a model for practicing prophecy, I can't think of a better coach than God Himself, who taught a prophet by hand to prophesy and declare:
“The hand of the Lord was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry… …Then he said to me,
“Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! This is what the Sovereign Lord says to these bones: I will make breath[a] enter you, and you will come to life. I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord.’”
So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came together, bone to bone. I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, but there was no breath in them.”
Ezekiel. 37:1-2, 4-8 (NIV)
The pattern given by the Father followed the same principle Jesus gave the disciples:
God said what to prophesy = The Word was released (legalized) in Heaven.
Man began to speak (i.e. declare) to circumstances the words given by God = The Word was released (legalized) on earth.
Things happened.
Of all the disciples, at least Peter had understood this, applying it in the midst of the storm in which Jesus walked to them on the water:
"‘Lord, if it’s you,’ Peter replied, ‘tell me to come to you on the water.’
‘Come,’ he said.
Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus."
Matt. 14:28-29 (NIV)
In other words, even though the idea of walking on water with Jesus was originally Peter's, he still sought a word from Jesus as God with whom he could cooperate.
Let’s act!
Now that we know the general principle of prophecy, all we need now are words spoken to us by God to prophesy/declare. We find these in two sources:
First: The surest way is the words of the Bible.
God's written word is filled with Father's previously released words in the form of His promises. They are just waiting for us to receive them by praying and prophesying them out:
"For no matter how many promises God has made, they are ‘Yes’ in Christ. And so through him the ‘Amen’ is spoken by us to the glory of God."
2 Cor. 1:20 (NIV)
Second: God's words and promises that God tells us either directly when we pray, or receive them as prophecies from a fellow believer or from a Prophet.
Bible gives us God's general revelation, but prophecies through words of knowledge are the source from which we receive the Father's personal words and promises concerning an individual person or situation.
However, since we are all in the same process of learning God's voice, it is of course always up to each of us to weigh all words whether they really came from Father or not:
"Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God,"
1.John 4:1 (NIV)“…but test them all; hold on to what is good,"
1.Thess. 5:21 (NIV)
Tho, doubting every word you ever hear is not same as testing them. It's just as unwise as believing everything.
At least for myself, I have set six conditions for weighing prophetic words and I also prefer this order:
They must be in line with God's general revelation, that is the Bible.
They must be in line with will of God, which is also revealed in the Bible.
They must be in line with New Covenant’s reality.
They must be in line with God's character, who He really is as a person.
They should also be in line with what speaks to us personally, but only after the previous conditions have been met. However, it is good to remember that we don’t necessarily understand certain prophecies the moment we hear them, therefore we should always go to God with them in our personal relationship with Him and discuss them with Him.
They should not contradict what God may have told us before. Also important to remember that some prophecies doesn’t necessarily contradict each other, but the Father can share with us a variety of themes and situations that take place in different time or life situations.
For me, at least, this is really inspiring!
While some of God's promises are waiting for their time to come, for many, God is just waiting for our cooperation. As I shared in "Permission for Revival has already been given," we have already been given permission to pursue all of God's promises! They are part of our heritage as children of God.
We don’t always have to wait for some time in the distant future, because we are already united with Jesus, and according to Second Corinthians 1:20, all of God's promises are in Jesus Christ.
So I strongly encourage each of us to begin by reading the Bible for looking Father’s promises that speak to us individually. One way of God showing us the green light to fulfill a particular promise is when as reading the Bible some particular promise pops up in a special way to us.
Having found the best promises, let us start declaring them in prayer into our lives and circumstances. Let us put on an attitude of gratitude in which we own these promises to ourselves as children of God!
Wooohoooooh!!
Follow the freedom!!