Dorothy Mae
Member
There is a lot of emphasis on being a prophet or getting “words from the Lord” or "prophesy" for people these days. And it seems to me that NO ONE is teaching believes how to discern the difference between the true and the false. So let’s talk about this a bit.
From the Old Testament we have the following verses: Deut 13:1-
If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, 2And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; 3Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams:
So what do we see here? We see that false prophets can actually be accurate in what they say. So is the test of a prophet that the word comes true? No, the test is if what is said matches what is the known word of God. That is the test. In this scripture what the prophet said did not match what was known. We are NOT to go by past records or the authority of the person speaking. Just because so and so said it, does not mean it came from God.
What this also means is that given a so called or real Word of the Lord, one ought to THINK about what is said and do as the Bereans did and carefully study the Bible to see if those things be true, that is, match the Word of God we know IS the Word of the Lord.
Now I am not speaking of those who will tell you with great confidence what the 7 trumpets are or the bowls of wrath or Magog or anything in Revelation. But let me ask you, does it really impact your life who the “Beast” is supposed to be? Does it really matter what eschatology one has in terms of what metaphor means what? Does it affect your choices today? I doubt it does.
So I am talking about those who would tell you something that DOES impact your life and you are wondering if you are rejecting the Word of the Lord to you or are you believing a lie being told to you and how you can tell.
One of the big tests is ask yourself what the speaker gets out of you believing their claim? There are not a few of these so-called prophets who want to sell their books or get you to watch their YouTube clips (from which they also get money) and so this is the first red flag. Do they gain materially from you believing them? If so, they are usually not a prophet of God speaking his word. “Freely you have received, freely give” is the motto of the Kingdom of God. The men of God I know who really do hear from God offer what they learned from him freely.
Second, is the word to you attempting to control you? When I was a teenage there was a particular local Bible study by a Bud and Julie who started telling the young people who they should marry. They did and you can imagine the mess. What did they gain? Power and a lot of power. It is a heady experience to exercise power over people and using “thus says the Lord and you don’t question it” is one way to enjoy that heady feeling. So if someone it trying to tell you what to do, be careful. They rarely live with the consequences and it feels really good to the ego to tell Mary to do XYZ and Mary obeys you.
Third, does the “Word” flatter your pride? I observed a so-called prophet straight from Bethel school of learning how to do this tell a man in a small group that he was like John the Baptist. The man was extremely flattered and the group impressed with this young person. I saw only flattery and a lie from her desire to be admired and control who did what. Oddly enough, the leader did not detect this and promoted this man. I left the group but was not impressed with the lack of discernment. The International House of Prayer was started by a man who claimed to get a Word of the Lord in Egypt (not exactly well thought of in Bible literature) that told him that many tried and failed but he would succeed. Flattery pure. What did he do? He started his group by stealing the name IHoP and was sued, rightly so. That was his first step, stealing someone else’s name. So who was being the flattery that moved him to steal as an initial step? Beware of flattery.
Now let’s look at what God says when he compliments a man. What did God say about Jesus? Did he say he was the greatest even though he was? No. Did he say he would accomplish what no one else would even though He did? No. What did He say? He said, “…my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” That is it. God was pleased with Jesus, well pleased. Daniel was also told a compliment, that he was a man “highly favoured.” He said, "Daniel, you who are highly esteemed, Dan 10:11. Mary was also complimented and told that she was highly esteemed. That seems to be the kind of compliments God gives. Notice that NONE of them include a comparison to other people. So if you get a "word" that tells you that you are better than others, beware. The Enemy flatters. God does not.
So those are three things to be aware of. The New Testament also has the same teaching on responding to those who claim to have or give a Word of the Lord or prophesy. “Let the prophets speak two or three, and let the others judge.” 1 Cor 14:29. Today if one even thinks about judging a prophet, you are “resisting God” and they might even tell you that if you do not listen to them, you do not have the Holy Spirit. That is a kind of blackmail threat. Reminds me of the Emperors New Clothes. Anyone who does not see the prophesy as from God is not spiritual so you’d better be awed or else! These threats never come from a man of God.
This is another test of a true Man or woman of God who hears the Voice of the Lord. A false prophet is puffed up with pride at their own spiritual prowess and is deeply offended if you do not accept their “word” and so uses scripture to say you are “not spiritual” or deficient if you dare to judge their words. 2 Chron 18:23 Then Zedekiah son of Kenaanah went up and slapped Micaiah in the face. “Which way did the spirit from the LORD go when he went from me to speak to you?” he asked. This is what false prohets do when challenged. They slap verbally anyone who dares to judge their utterances. What did Jesus do when his true was rejected? What did Jeremiah do when his teachings were rejected?
Matt 23:37Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks…. A true prophet of God, one who actually hears from the living God weeps as Jesus did, as Jeremiah did. You can hear the sorrow, not anger in the writings of the prophets who saw Israel reject the true Word of the Lord. They mourned and were not angry in pride that their teachings were rejected. This is a very good way to tell a false prophet from a true. A man who has the heart of God and so the Words of God weeps when those words are rejected as they care MORE ABOUT THE RECEPIENT, than their own reputation or honor among men. A false prophet wants praise and to be honored and called “a true man of God” before men. A false prophets wants you to buy their books and brags about writing books. A true prophet does not care if you know that they wrote books or if they did YouTube presentations and how many of each.
Surely the above makes sense, doesn’t it? A true man or woman of God cares more about the other than about themselves. A false claim of hearing from God wants you to be impressed with them, not that you are blessed. Humility is the mark of a true prophet. Pride is a mark of the false. One wants to give to you. The other wants something out of you, praise if nothing else. The difference is pretty easy to spot with some practice.
From the Old Testament we have the following verses: Deut 13:1-
If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, 2And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; 3Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams:
So what do we see here? We see that false prophets can actually be accurate in what they say. So is the test of a prophet that the word comes true? No, the test is if what is said matches what is the known word of God. That is the test. In this scripture what the prophet said did not match what was known. We are NOT to go by past records or the authority of the person speaking. Just because so and so said it, does not mean it came from God.
What this also means is that given a so called or real Word of the Lord, one ought to THINK about what is said and do as the Bereans did and carefully study the Bible to see if those things be true, that is, match the Word of God we know IS the Word of the Lord.
Now I am not speaking of those who will tell you with great confidence what the 7 trumpets are or the bowls of wrath or Magog or anything in Revelation. But let me ask you, does it really impact your life who the “Beast” is supposed to be? Does it really matter what eschatology one has in terms of what metaphor means what? Does it affect your choices today? I doubt it does.
So I am talking about those who would tell you something that DOES impact your life and you are wondering if you are rejecting the Word of the Lord to you or are you believing a lie being told to you and how you can tell.
One of the big tests is ask yourself what the speaker gets out of you believing their claim? There are not a few of these so-called prophets who want to sell their books or get you to watch their YouTube clips (from which they also get money) and so this is the first red flag. Do they gain materially from you believing them? If so, they are usually not a prophet of God speaking his word. “Freely you have received, freely give” is the motto of the Kingdom of God. The men of God I know who really do hear from God offer what they learned from him freely.
Second, is the word to you attempting to control you? When I was a teenage there was a particular local Bible study by a Bud and Julie who started telling the young people who they should marry. They did and you can imagine the mess. What did they gain? Power and a lot of power. It is a heady experience to exercise power over people and using “thus says the Lord and you don’t question it” is one way to enjoy that heady feeling. So if someone it trying to tell you what to do, be careful. They rarely live with the consequences and it feels really good to the ego to tell Mary to do XYZ and Mary obeys you.
Third, does the “Word” flatter your pride? I observed a so-called prophet straight from Bethel school of learning how to do this tell a man in a small group that he was like John the Baptist. The man was extremely flattered and the group impressed with this young person. I saw only flattery and a lie from her desire to be admired and control who did what. Oddly enough, the leader did not detect this and promoted this man. I left the group but was not impressed with the lack of discernment. The International House of Prayer was started by a man who claimed to get a Word of the Lord in Egypt (not exactly well thought of in Bible literature) that told him that many tried and failed but he would succeed. Flattery pure. What did he do? He started his group by stealing the name IHoP and was sued, rightly so. That was his first step, stealing someone else’s name. So who was being the flattery that moved him to steal as an initial step? Beware of flattery.
Now let’s look at what God says when he compliments a man. What did God say about Jesus? Did he say he was the greatest even though he was? No. Did he say he would accomplish what no one else would even though He did? No. What did He say? He said, “…my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” That is it. God was pleased with Jesus, well pleased. Daniel was also told a compliment, that he was a man “highly favoured.” He said, "Daniel, you who are highly esteemed, Dan 10:11. Mary was also complimented and told that she was highly esteemed. That seems to be the kind of compliments God gives. Notice that NONE of them include a comparison to other people. So if you get a "word" that tells you that you are better than others, beware. The Enemy flatters. God does not.
So those are three things to be aware of. The New Testament also has the same teaching on responding to those who claim to have or give a Word of the Lord or prophesy. “Let the prophets speak two or three, and let the others judge.” 1 Cor 14:29. Today if one even thinks about judging a prophet, you are “resisting God” and they might even tell you that if you do not listen to them, you do not have the Holy Spirit. That is a kind of blackmail threat. Reminds me of the Emperors New Clothes. Anyone who does not see the prophesy as from God is not spiritual so you’d better be awed or else! These threats never come from a man of God.
This is another test of a true Man or woman of God who hears the Voice of the Lord. A false prophet is puffed up with pride at their own spiritual prowess and is deeply offended if you do not accept their “word” and so uses scripture to say you are “not spiritual” or deficient if you dare to judge their words. 2 Chron 18:23 Then Zedekiah son of Kenaanah went up and slapped Micaiah in the face. “Which way did the spirit from the LORD go when he went from me to speak to you?” he asked. This is what false prohets do when challenged. They slap verbally anyone who dares to judge their utterances. What did Jesus do when his true was rejected? What did Jeremiah do when his teachings were rejected?
Matt 23:37Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks…. A true prophet of God, one who actually hears from the living God weeps as Jesus did, as Jeremiah did. You can hear the sorrow, not anger in the writings of the prophets who saw Israel reject the true Word of the Lord. They mourned and were not angry in pride that their teachings were rejected. This is a very good way to tell a false prophet from a true. A man who has the heart of God and so the Words of God weeps when those words are rejected as they care MORE ABOUT THE RECEPIENT, than their own reputation or honor among men. A false prophet wants praise and to be honored and called “a true man of God” before men. A false prophets wants you to buy their books and brags about writing books. A true prophet does not care if you know that they wrote books or if they did YouTube presentations and how many of each.
Surely the above makes sense, doesn’t it? A true man or woman of God cares more about the other than about themselves. A false claim of hearing from God wants you to be impressed with them, not that you are blessed. Humility is the mark of a true prophet. Pride is a mark of the false. One wants to give to you. The other wants something out of you, praise if nothing else. The difference is pretty easy to spot with some practice.
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