End Times Prophetic, Prophecy, Visions, Dreams, Revelation, Christian Blog

Shepherd of my soul,
I give You full control
Wherever You may lead
I will follow..
I have made the choice,
to listen to Your voice….(Lyrics by Martin Nystom)

Listening to God is an active choice. Not just in terms of making time to sit in God’s counsel, but first and fundamentally to put oneself in a (continual) act of self sacrifice at the Master’s feet and be prepared not just to hear the words for the sake of getting one’s ears tickled, but to actively listen so that appropiate actions may follow - whatever they may be. Therefore making a commitment to be a disciple rather than just a follower of Jesus usually comes before the place of real revelation, before God shares himself with a man heart to heart.

Hearing the words is not usually the hard part. Listening to them and being obedient to them is. We all know listening to someone is totally differant to hearing someone. The Hebrew words for ‘hear’ tells us not just to ‘hear’ but also to hearken, listen, understand, agree, obey and yield to the words heard: or to give ear and pay attention ready to act in response to them. God wants yielded instruments to carry his message. He waits for his instruments to become yielded before allowing these men and women into his full counsel.

The Sovereign Lord has given me an instructed tongue,
to know the word that sustains the weary.
He wakens me morning by morning,
wakens my ear to listen like one being taught.
The Sovereign Lord has opened my ears,
and I have not been rebellious;
I have not drawn back. (Isaiah 50:4)

A true prophet will have had his or her spiritual ears pierced or ‘opened up’ (see my post on bond servants entitled ‘whose servant are you?’), their whole life laid upon the altar - and this will be tested - before their ministry opens up properly as such are God’s ways with his prophets. When the prophet’s willingness to let go of self and obey whatever the cost has been demonstrated, God then accepts the humble sacrifice and then lets these men and women into his counsel in the trust that His words will be faithfully passed on and acted upon whatever the price.

My anointing and empowerment for the prophetic ministry came not as a result of me seeking it or even wanting it: it came a few years after my conversion when I truly gave my life to God and offered to serve him full time for the rest of my life. My life on the line, God accepted it, or rather I should say I accepted God’s calling which was upon my life many years before I was even born. Although nobody was around or laying hands on me, and I was not not expecting it or seeking it, and I was not at a pentecostal meeting (if anything it was the opposite being conservative evangelical) I started trembling all over under the power of the Holy Spirit and over the subsequent weeks and months more and more visions and words came to me, and my evangelism became far more effective. (Note that I had had dreams and visions before this time, its just after this encounter they increased one hundredfold and became a way of life rather than once in a blue moon and there was a real power and boldness on my tongue which I had never heard of before but I now understand was the anointing and empowerment of God. I really understand now what ‘flames of fire’ means.). My voice became stronger and bolder when out on the street witnessing for Christ. For many years - even though I prophesised and kept on prophesying I understood my calling and anointing to be for evangelism and missions - the prophetic was just a sideline if you like: I had never heard of a modern day calling to be a prophet - and my church of that time only taught the three fold ministry (pastoral, teaching and evangelism) and only barely tolerated some of the gifts of the spirit. As I was a woman, I guessed the pastoral was out, therefore it must be evangelism/missions I figured which was also what I was ‘gifted’ at and what I was passionate about anyway.) However God’s ways are not man’s ways, and years later I finally understood what my real full-time calling was. However, the empowerment for this ministry had come at the altar.

The other night God revealed through me some very specific and detailed things that only he could have know about an individual. This led to a great deal of relief as the the person no longer had to hide or pretend - it was all in the open - and it led to healing, and God’s supernatural peace and joy coming to rest in the lady’s life - Praise God! One of my dear Christian friends said to me afterwards, ‘You know…..a lot of people in the church are very jealous of your gift.’ (Others prophesy in the church but not in this detail or to this extent or with this accuracy.) Those who were jealous of my gift/ministry perhaps did not understand what I have been through to be where I am at today. The years of hardship, the wilderness experience, the testing and trying, the disciplining, the amount of rocks I have had thrown at me, the amount of churches I have been hounded out of, the number of friends I have lost. They have not seen the tears behind the power. More than that they did not see the place of yielding all those years ago when I offered my life up in service and it was accepted.

Apart from pointing out that God calls whom he wants into ministry, it is by divine calling and divine calling alone I am what I am, and can do what I can do, then if people want to ask ‘why can’t I prophecy like this?’ the answer may simply be ‘have you laid your whole life on the line for God to use?’ Have you made that choice to listen and obey?