“But you may wonder, ‘How will we know whether or not a prophecy is from the Lord?’ If the prophet speaks in the Lord’s name but his prediction does not happen or come true, you will know that the Lord did not give that message. That prophet has spoken without my authority and need not be feared. (Deuteronomy 18:21-22)One of the problems with Pentecostalism is people who are convinced that they have a word from God when they do not.
The person will come up to you and say something on the order of, “I have a word from God for you.” Your response, then, is to stop and quietly and humbly accept the person’s comment. You are to be grateful and immediately acquiesce to their “word.”
The problem is that many times it is not a word from God, it is a figment of their own imagination.
I believe that God speaks through us today. I believe that he brings his will through the agency of others to help us deal with things in our lives.
But how do you know if it a word from God or just something somebody wants and pretends it is from God?
One way is if it matches with the written word of God. Whatever word we may get from him has to match with what he has already said. If it doesn’t, it is not true automatically.
It is also apparent when the person giving the word expects automatic obeisance. Someone will come to the pastor and demand that they receive the word that God has allegedly given them and before they give it, the pastor is to kneel so the person giving the word can put his or her hands on their head.
When this is done, it is an automatic indicator of pride and greed for position. Nowhere in the Bible did anyone ever do this by decree. If they did, it was because they recognized the one giving the word. Anyone who demands you kneel before them is looking for position, not giving genuine words from God.
Another thing is that God will send no prophecy or word that will cause division in his church, or cause wrong things to happen. Now sometimes bad things will happen and the Old Testament prophets foretold that.
But someone who says blithely, “The Lord has told me to - -” and the thing they say the Lord has told them is something that will harm his church, or smacks of revenge, you know it is not true. God does not tell people to leave their congregations or to take others away. He never tells them to cause divisions in his body. That is not a word from God, it is a wish the person has that he articulates and pretends it is from God.
The problem is, when they say it is from God, it blames God for all the things that will happen. “Well, if God didn’t want that, then he wouldn’t have told me - -.” The people who give the words get their way and God gets the blame.
If the word is couched as a prophecy, then you know it is true if it comes true. Until it does, it is just somebody talking. When it does, it is real.
“Words from God” are many times people trying to coerce the church into doing something they want, or trying to get leaders in the church to do what they want. They figure if they couch it as a word from God, then the person is stuck and has to do it. After all, who can argue with God?
I love a genuine word or prophecy from God and pray for more. But I despise fake ones. They do nothing more than hurt and tear and the ones who give them want nothing more than position and power.
I listen, I weigh myself what they have to say and then I decide whether or not to receive it. If it is true, I will know. If not, I will know too.
No comments:
Post a Comment
To comment, post your comment and click the anonymous button. It would be nice if you signed it so I could know who you are.
You are welcome to say anything you want as long as it is nice. If I don't like it, or it is ugly, I will take it off, place it into the garbage disposal, grind it up, and allow it to be flushed into the Gulf of Mexico where it will be eaten by a fish and then excreted where it will lie on the bottom of the ocean until it is covered up by other comments.