Have you ever wondered where today’s flurry of prophecies is coming from?
Do you know which ones are authentic and which ones are not?
I believe in prophecy, but only if it is a genuine, Bible-supported one; not the kind we hear of everywhere today, whose source is in serious doubt because it neither bears the signature of God’s Word nor a semblance of His Divine attributes.
By that statement I mean to say that when a prophecy crosses the boundary of what is acceptable to God and plunges into the filth and mire of carnal, worldly pursuits and unmoderated reasoning, then anyone who is acquainted with God’s word must question if God has given that prophecy at all. It is the same thing as rightly questioning the qualification of a doctor who fills the ears of a terminally ill patient with tales of the good life they can have if only they can walk off the hospital bed and groove in any of the many recreational parks and clubs in town, albeit that doctor has not done anything to help them get better: this is the same as what so many preachers/prophets are doing to their congregations today.
The book of Lamentations 2:14 beautifully captured this essence as follows:
“Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for thee: and they have not discovered thine iniquity, to turn away thy captivity; but have seen for thee false burdens and causes of banishment. “
God’s word teaches that He does not esteem the pursuit of temporal worldly pleasure, in those who serve Him, above the soul’s eternal spiritual well-being, so any prophecy that seems to suggest that He does is, most likely, a false prophecy given by a false prophet.
Who, though, is a false Prophet and what’s a false prophecy? Again, a scriptural view will be more satisfying than a personal view: see Jeremiah 23:21 :
” I have not sent these prophets, yet they ran: I have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied. “
A prophet who runs an errand that is not of God and delivers a message that He has not given to them is a false Prophet with a false prophecy. We have a lot of them today and we know them by the kind of prophecies they give to the people who throng their programs.
This is what God’s word says about them in Jeremiah 23:32 :
” Behold, I am against them that prophesy false dreams, saith the LORD, and do tell them, and cause my people to err by their lies, and by their lightness; yet I sent them not, nor commanded them: therefore they shall not profit this person at all, saith the LORD. “
At a time when God is seriously concerned about the spiritual welfare of His people, we should be wary of any person whose so-called prophetic ministry is dedicated to declaring any other thing else: God is patient enough to have you in heaven first before He could lavish the riches, splendor and wealth of His kingdom on you without sparing any expense because it has been fully paid for when Jesus Christ died for your sins and rose again to prepare a place for you in heaven.
See John 14:1-3:
“Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.
In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. “
A false prophet would want you to believe that God is more interested in giving you the world than He is in giving you the kingdom of heaven: of course, they never say that word for word but, nevertheless, their actions and the fruit of their prophecies screams it to the highest heaven.
When a Prophet is always praying for you to get a visa to travel abroad to seek greener pastures or to win that lucrative contract, but would hardly engage you about your spiritual welfare and the progress of your walk with God, then you should naturally doubt his mandate as a true servant of God.
The mandate of Jesus Christ to His followers is simple:
” Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:
Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.”
Matthew 28:19-20.
Of the many things which He commanded His disciples to teach the nations of the world to observe are these golden verses of the Holy Bible:
” Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? Or, What shall we drink? Or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?
(For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.
But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. “
Matthew 6:31-33 .
Any prophet whose prophecy subverts this rule is evidently a false prophet who does not speak by the Spirit of God but by a deceiving spirit pretending to be from God.
1 Timothy 4:1-2 exposes them for whoever cares to take note of them and escape for their lives. It says:
“Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times, some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils;
Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;”
Now you could never know the spirit behind any prophecy unless you use the Holy Bible as the yardstick for measuring their authenticity. In 1 John 4:1, God’s Word admonishes us to “”…believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.”
The fact that any person seems to be giving accurate predictions or story-telling future events with precision doesn’t make them prophets of God because Satan and his kingdom have such skills too: they have data about most humans dating back to millennia of years, and they can also organize events ahead of time to make it seem as if their own anointed prophets have seen both into people’s past, present and future life.
Let me give a personal testimony which speaks to this truth:
As a young, innocent boy of around ten years old, at Enugu in eastern Nigeria, a Yoruba fetish priest, who was my neighbour at that time, had asked me to help interpret the proceedings of his oracle to a Hausa-speaking woman who didn’t understand English. From what I gathered during the interactions that ensued, she had asked for help for her toddler, who was of age but could not walk. He gave her some substances to rub on his knees and assured her he’d walk in no time at all. Then, before leaving, the woman asked him to tell her what would happen to her in the near future, to which the fetish priest plainly told her that she’d have a visitor in the days ahead and would be worried about how to entertain them, but suddenly help would come her way and she’d have what to entertain her visitor with.
Some days later the woman returned and he called me, once again, to help with the interpretation: sure enough, her boy had started walking, and that august visitor had also come, but she “miraculously” got what she needed to entertain them.
Was I surprised then? Yes of course!
Am I now anymore? Of course not!!
What makes the difference between then and now? The knowledge of God’s Word of course!!!
In those days the witch doctors were proud of their profession and clearly marked their shrines as a place for people to consult spirits for solutions to their problems. However, today, they are not so proud to be called those names any more because the spread of the gospel of Jesus Christ has made that tradition and practice unpopular, so they, too, have learned to flow along with the popular Christian practises by transforming themselves, as God word puts it, “into angels of light.”
Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour had plainly told His followers in Matthew 7:15-17 to “Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves .
Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles, ?
Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.”
Any person who is possessed with demons, or anyone who works with familiar spirits, may stop you in the way or mark you out in a multitude and begin to tell you of things that only you are privy to: but do not begin to jubilate and begin to say, ” man of God it is true! it is true!! “, because accurate predictions do not make anyone a prophet: only God can ordain anyone to be His prophet through the operation of the Holy Spirit. See Jeremiah 1:4-5:
” Then the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.”
God’s ordained prophets speak by His Holy Spirit and their works do not run contrary to the Word of God in the Holy Bible.
On the other hand false prophets show by their own works that they are not ordained by God because their prophecies do not reflect the mind of God, just as Micah 2:11 captures this essence when it says, “If a man walking in the spirit and falsehood do lie, saying, I will prophesy unto thee of wine and of strong drink; he shall even be the prophet of this people.”
Simply put, the scripture above is saying that a false Prophet will most likely prophecy to a person what they are actually willing or yearning to hear: he doesn’t really care if what he’s preaching is scripturally correct as long as the people under his influence like it.
The urgent call today is for extreme caution among God’s people: we must treat prophecy with the same delicate attention we employ when eating a bony fish so we do not get a bone stuck in our throat.
MAY WE NOT FALL PREY TO DEMONIC PROPHETS AND THEIR PROPHECIES IN JESUS’ NAME!!!
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