The Life of a Prophet

Not only does this lesson apply to the prophet, but I believe it also applies to those in a pastoral or Christian teaching position. I believe it was my teacher Ken Brewer who said something along the lines of, “when everyone agrees with you, you’re in bad territory.” This makes total sense to me. If you are a pastor or a teacher and people never give you any hardships about what you teach, you’re probably teaching a watered down gospel. You might be telling people what they want to hear, rather than what they need to hear.

I feel that that is why so many people try to write real prophets off as false prophets. “Oh no, this person challenged me tonight! My God would never tell me to do something difficult so they must not be a real prophet!” Yet, if we read the Bible we can see that God calls people to do radical things all the time—not just some times.

Listen to the word you’re given.
Test it.
Try to understand it.
Don’t just find it as false because it’s a difficult word.

And if you’re up for the challenge, try to put yourself in the shoes of the prophet/teacher/pastor. I was just reading Ezekiel 2 when I felt the need to post this rather than watch the Simpsons and fall asleep as planned.

We see in Ezekiel 1:3 that Ezekiel was a priest. But it seems that after word of God came to him expressly, he stepped into the shoes of a prophet. His teachings became Spirit-filled and he was given visions of God and heard the word of the Lord. Now Ezekiel was speaking not out of his own mind, but out of the very mind of God.

But speaking out of the very mind of God makes the prophetic/pastoral/teaching role much more intense. It is NOT always an easy role to take on. Ezekiel 2 explains:

Then He said to me, “Son of man, stand on your feet that I may speak with you!”

As He spoke to me the Spirit entered me and set me on my feet; and I heard Him speaking to me.

Then He said to me, “Son of man, I am sending you to the sons of Israel, to a rebellious people who have rebelled against Me; they and their fathers have transgressed against Me to this very day.

“I am sending you to them who are stubborn and obstinate children, and you shall say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord GOD.’

“As for them, whether they listen or not–for they are a rebellious house–they will know that a prophet has been among them.

“And you, son of man, neither fear them nor fear their words, though thistles and thorns are with you and you sit on scorpions; neither fear their words nor be dismayed at their presence, for they are a rebellious house.

“But you shall speak My words to them whether they listen or not, for they are rebellious.

“Now you, son of man, listen to what I am speaking to you; do not be rebellious like that rebellious house. Open your mouth and eat what I am giving you.”

Then I looked, and behold, a hand was extended to me; and lo, a scroll was in it.

When He spread it out before me, it was written on the front and back, and written on it were lamentations, mourning and woe.

(Emphasis added for points below.)

Here’s 2 quick things you can gather about the hardships involved in Ezekiel’s role (and if it is our role as prophets/pastors/teachers to share God’s word, we should find the same burdens).

• We are going to have to talk to people whether they listen or not.
• We may find ourselves afraid of those whom are message is meant to connect with. It can be like sitting on thistles, thorns and scorpions.

There are many other things we can gather from this chapter too, but these were the main two points God put on my heart while reading this.

So many times we rebel against difficult messages.
So many times we preach what people want to hear.

We prefer La-Z-Boys to thistles and thorns
and turtles to scorpions,
despite the fact that Jesus fought thistles and thorns to the point
that they ripped the flesh from His very head.

But the burden of the prophet/pastor/teacher is that they preach God’s word regardless of whether the thorns, thistles and scorpions listen. It is the burden of those in these positions to live in a world of highly-probable rejection.

The Healing Service

CORRECTION TO THIS STORY:
I MYSELF DID NOT HAVE GOLD DUST WHILE OTHERS DID.
READ HERE.

“Jamin, you’ll be with me on team nine,” said an older and quite experienced man. And when I say experienced, what I mean is that he seemed as though he helped out with quite a few healing services.

Yeah, you know. Healing? That thing that Jesus did a ton of, told us to do the same and then for whatever reason we stopped practicing it?

Silly Christians. Healing is for kids!

Or so it would seem at times due to their incredible faith. A man told a story once about a bunch of children praying for healing for a woman who’s heart was not working well. When they removed their hands from her, there were fingerprints of gold dust across the woman’s shirt and her doctor informed her that she now had the heart of a 20-30 year old who was very, very fit.

The faith of a child is what we need have to heal. They don’t worry about it not working, they just do it! And healing is something we are all supposed to practice in our walk with God, not just children.

Perhaps we need to stop teaching children and let them teach us for once, because it is faith like their’s that God can use easily.

Again, healing is something we all need to practice. The youngins and the oldens; the middle-aged and the over-the-hillers.

“We’ll be divided into nine different groups,” the older man continued. “The people will be told to go to a group for healing in which the three people in your group will then pray for them. We’ve assigned one leader to each group so that you can have someone experienced that we trust to help you. You’ll be set up at stations around the gym and my group will wander around, helping out wherever it’s needed.” And then he added, “Ken, if we have any demonic manifestations, we’ll need you to leave your group and we’ll bring them into this workout room here for an exorcism.”

“You always give me the dirty work!” Brewer joked.

My whole life I knew something was missing from church and now I’m standing in this room thinking to myself, “Holy cow, are we actually having a casual conversation about this stuff?”

Going to church and actually experiencing God? When did that become so underground in the faith?

The schedule was explained and the New Zealand priest who was speaking introduced himself.

And he had the sweetest accent ever.
And I had hobbits on my mind all of the sudden.

We prayed some more.
Started the service.
Worshipped with some decently old songs .
Listened to a testimony of a woman who’s hand was healed at one of the previous healing services.
And the priest came up to speak.

And speak he did. He shared many stories about healings he had heard and seen and been apart of. Story after story after story. However, the story that stood out to me the most was about praying for a hankerchief. I can’t quite recall where it was in the Bible, but apparently if Paul couldn’t get out to someone to pray for healing, he simply prayed over a hankerchief for them. And then, when that hankerchief was put on it would heal the intended person. And the priest had had the same thing happen!

Praying over hankerchiefs? What?

Magical.

Oh, and in case exorcism and healing isn’t different enough for you, there were also “Words of Knowledge.” Ever heard of these? These are when someone gets a word from God to share and this dude had a ton. A very, very specific ton of words to share. Basically they were descriptions of people at the service who needed healing and that they should come up if it was them. He had written all of these words of knowledge down before the event. Here’s bits and pieces of some I can remember to give you a few examples:

“There are three people here with problems of getting rid of waste. One of you suffers from constipation. Another one of you has bleeding problems…”

“Someone is here whom the names Bob and [Susan] mean a lot to. I don’t know if they’re friends or relatives…”

“Someone is here with a tattoo on your right leg, I don’t know where, but you also have [insert problem here].”

Okay, I remembered three, but there were a lot more. It actually seemed as though he had gotten enough words to give one to each person who had come for healing! Sadly, there weren’t as many people as we hoped would show up since it was raining pretty hardcore that night.

The people walked up to the priest for prayer and annointing and then would head to a group for further prayer. Unlike many people, the priest pulled a Jesus and kept all of his prayers short. If you ever noticed, Jesus literally commands sickness to go away and he does so very quickly. So the priest followed in his footsteps.

I was quite worried I wouldn’t really get a chance to do anything since I was a part of the wandering group. But God made sure I got a chance! Actually, I believe we prayed for just as many people as everyone else and it was an awesome experience! Myself, the older man, and one of my proffessors, Mojo, began praying for the sick.

A woman with a problem in her ear.
A man who’s friend was in constant pain.
A young man needing healing on his allergies.
A woman needing prayer for her daughter’s cancer as well as for her own.

So many people around us are looking for prayer, and God gave us the Holy Spirit so that He could help in ways like this if we are willing to let Him do so through us. Jesus died to free us, now we must die to ourselves to free Him.

Some of you are reading this right now and are quite skeptical. You’re not alone. I grew up that way. For 18 years or so I was completely in the dark on this stuff, but God placed on my heart a desire to learn it, and so I’m trying to understand. Prophecy, healing, exorcism, the whole deal.

Maybe you’re skeptical yet you do believe this stuff goes on. But perhaps you think it’s not for you, it’s just for those charismatic weirdos and God doesn’t have that kind of stuff in His plan for you.

Yet if you read the Bible you might find that it is the charismatic weirdos that seemed to live God’s plan in full.

If it makes you feel any better, I’m still very new to understanding the spiritual realm. I’ve been studying it, reading about it, listening to messages on it, trying to come to terms with it, but I got a long way to go.

And so I would like to pressure you right now to start trying to develop an understanding. It may be a long journey, but you will want to know this stuff- especially if you’re like many of us who are dying to experience God here on earth but have given up. We’ve been to church our whole lives, but it just seems so stagnant and boring and as if… something’s missing.

Oh, and some of you may just think I’m straight up from satan right now. Just want to let you know that God has a supernatural side to Himself and He’s willing to share it with you. Ask Him to open your mind to it.

No matter what your view is on all of this or what your life story looks like or what church traditions have taught you, I encourage you to read your Bible and keep your eyes peeled for this kind of stuff. You’d be amazed what the normal Christian life is supposed to look like and that it includes this kind of stuff.

Alright, I keep going on so I’ll try to wrap this up:

Our churches have become so bussiness-like and stagnant lately that I really believe it is the gift of the charismatic through which God will revive the church and Christian life through. So from one brother to another from a different mother, I really encoruage you to learn.

1,385 words later, I will now shut up. Feel free to contact me if you want to talk about it. Peace out brusselsprouts!