Revival Prophecies (7) Honest Voice

An honest prophetic voice would be warning that New Zealand is going into a season of relative darkness (not intense persecution or tribulation) when the resistance to the gospel will be stronger gospel, and hostility to Christian values will intensify. Pastors who speak out on social issues from a Christian perspective could be strongly criticised in an attempt to silence their voice.

An honest prophetic voice would be explaining that the spiritual powers of evil have seized territory throughout the nation and without facing much opposition. They have gained control of places of authority without any resistance.

In the face of this intensifying spiritual struggle, the church is floundering and confused, doing the same old things over and over again, but hoping for better outcomes this time, but knowing that it probably won’t work; knowing that they need more of the Holy Spirit, but unwilling to totally obey his voice.

At the same time, government leaders have been given more power than they have ever had, because they are expected to deliver us from evil and restore our lives to blessing, but they lack the wisdom to do what they promised.

An honest prophetic voice would be warning that the darkness rolling down on the land will be deeper and darker than anyone expect and it will take a long time for the light to penetrate and break it up. They should be warning that the opportunity for a traditional revival has passed and will not come back for some time. The spiritual powers of evil have entrenched their stronghold over the nation and they will not be pushed out easily.

At this time, an honest prophetic voice would be challenging God’s people to stop sitting around and waiting for revival prophecies to be fulfilled and use the time to get prepared so they can stand strong in a season of adversity. It would explain how they can position themselves in a place of strength, so they can share life and hope with those who are lost in the darkness.

Standing alone is the most dangerous place to be during an intense spiritual struggle. A church meeting and sermon once a week will not be sufficient to sustain Christians when they come under pressure. The Covid experience confirms that driving to a large church meeting on a Sunday to listen to teaching by a pastor might be a luxury that is not sustainable. The best possible protection during tough times is to be living close to other followers of Jesus who can provide emotional, spiritual and physical support when it is needed, not when the next meeting is due.

Followers of Jesus who live in close proximity to each other in a neighbourhood can stand together in prayer to establish an evil-spirit-free zone where the Holy Spirit is free to operate. This should not be a place to hide, but a base from which the kingdom of God can be expanded as the gospel is shared with those living around them who see the difference that the presence of the Holy Spirit makes. If these believers heal the sick and cast out demons in the power of the Spirit, the name of Jesus will be lifted up.

As these small kingdom communities grow, God will raise up elders from amongst them with balanced giftings, who will love one another and submit to each other to establish unity in the body. If one is taken out, or falls away, the others will continue to support each to watch over the flock to ensure that everyone is kept safe from evil and growing to maturity.

These kingdom communities will expand further by sending out their best elders as apostles (as others step up into their place) in a team with balanced giftings to establish a new community in another neighbourhood. They will carry on loving and serving each other, while listening and obeying the Holy Spirit, and he will keep doing what Jesus did.

An honest prophetic voice would explain that God’s plans for New Zealand have not changed. He still wants his people to take the good news of his Kingdom into the nation with sign and wonders following. He still wants us to show the world what Jesus meant when he said that his disciples would be known by their love for each other. God still wants New Zealand to be a light to the nations by demonstrating the fullness of his Kingdom by transforming society. He still wants Jesus to be acknowledged as king of New Zealand as the people freely choose to serve him and live together in obedience to his Spirit.

The main change is timing. Because opportunities have been missed, and the spiritual powers of evil are much more deeply entrenched in the authority structures of the nation, the spiritual struggle for the heart of New Zealand will be much tougher, and will take much longer. However, the outcome will be better and stronger, because it will it is established on a stronger foundation by being refined by fire.

For this to happen, God’s people will need strong prophetic guidance about how to deal with the pressure, and how to establish and grow kingdom communities, not vague promises about a coming revival that never comes.

This full series can be read at NZ Revival Prophecies.

Revival Prophecies (6) Real Community

During the 1970s, there was a massive buzz about real community. People were thinking seriously about Jesus new commandment and what it means to “Love one another as Jesus loved us”. They realised that this meant more than a meeting once a week. People were thinking about how the practices described in the first few chapters of Acts could be applied in the modern world.

This interest in developing real communities accompanied a hunger for deeper relationships, as the Holy Spirt inspired people to connect with and support other people. Various strands supported this interest.

• Teaching about body ministry was popular.

• Many Christians read Edith Shaeffer’s book called “L’Abrie”. While the nerds were reading Francis Shaeffer’s books about Truth and Reason, others were inspired by the story of their community in Switzerland.

• Speakers from overseas were sharing at conferences in New Zealand about their experiences in developing intentional communities.

• People were reading books about Christians who had developed a deeper community in their homes. One example was Love is an Open Home by Bill Bair.

• A friend had a vision of four houses close together with Jesus standing above them and shining his light upon them. This type of vision was common.

I am certain that the Holy Spirit was the inspiration for this interest in community.

Quite a few people tried doing something different. Most found it too hard and eventually gave up. Their struggle is not surprising because they were pushing hard against the world and the spirit of the age. The eighties were a very materialistic decade when everybody seemed to be working hard to get ahead.

Unfortunately, there was very little prophetic guidance or encouragement about how the people of the Spirit should live. One reason is that despite Ephesians 4 being studied assiduously during this season, the prophetic ministry was not really nurtured. Churches that were touched by the Holy Spirit continued to be pastor-centric, so it is not surprising that the movement did not get the prophetic guidance it needed.

Inspiration and guidance for the future came mostly from books and visiting international speakers rather than from a home-grown prophetic voice.

When the Charismatic renewal petered out, the prophecies about revival coming soon kept on coming. Looking back, it seems like they had missed a season of opportunity.

Part of the role of a prophet is to interpret the events of history and explain to the people what was happening. However, when the Charismatic Renewal slowly died out, no prophetic voices examined the move to understand what had gone wrong because they still believed revival was coming. No one asked seriously why such a wonderful opportunity had been missed.

I believe that the hunger for a deeper community back then was inspired by the Holy Spirit, but it is gone now. The buzz about community has died. This is a serious obstacle to revival coming at this time.

The next generation is watching The Block and other home renovation programmes on television and thinking about how they can progress up the property ladder. They are not thinking about what community means for those who have chosen to follow Jesus.

There is a lot of noise about the Kingdom of God, but it is mostly ephemeral, and there is no understanding that a kingdom is a social order, comprised of communities.

Revival Prophecies (3) Fifty Years

I have recently been thinking and writing about the numerous prophecies that revival would come to New Zealand. I first started hearing them when I became a Christian during the 1970s. At that time, the nation seemed to be far more open to the gospel than it is now (I will say more about that in a future post). The prophecies about revival have kept on coming since then, despite the situation in New Zealand becoming much more difficult for the advance of the gospel than it was when I first heard them. The difference between that season and now is striking. Winning the nation for the gospel has become much harder over the last fifty years.

• Clergy are now openly mocked on television. If they appear in entertainment shows, they are made to look weak and foolish.

• Most weddings and funerals are now conducted by secular celebrants. Christian content is mostly gone from these ceremonies.

• The news media frequently report on sexual and physical abuse of children and women by church leaders and staff of Chrisitan organisations. Christians see these incidents as having nothing to do with Jesus, but that is not how the people of the world see it. They see Christian organisations condoning abuse. Christian leaders have lost respect, and some of the hostility attaches to Jesus.

• Mainstream media readily publish articles mocking the church.

• The culture has become increasingly secular. Many young people do not even know who Jesus is, and they know nothing about his life and ministry.

• People now get their ideas about life and the world from television and social media. The influence of the church as a thought leader has declined dramatically.

• People are used to listening to snippets on television and social media, so they don’t know how to listen to a sermon unless they are trained by church attendance. This means that preaching has become an ineffective tool for evangelism.

• Many people see church services as strange events that they would be frightened to participate in. They are scared of being embarrassed because they would not know what to do.

• Covid is going to limit the ability of the church to function in the way that it has in the past. It might be a long time before seeker-friendly services are practical.

• Many people see the church as an institution that attempts to control people, not set them free. It is seen as desperately clinging to outdated and repressive values from the past.

• When many people think of the church, they see an organisation that takes money off people who cannot afford it.

• Many people now believe that all religions are valid and people should be free to choose which one they prefer. Some believe that eastern religions are better than Christianity because they are less violent.

• When crises occur, people no longer look to God for deliverance. They look to friends and family, and government-funded social services.

• Pressure from social media makes living a Christian life increasingly difficult.

• The spiritual powers of evil have entrenched their authority in all aspects of the life of the nation.

• There are very few Christians in parliament. A significant number of MPs are really hostile to Christianity, and many hate the church. The church no longer has a serious voice in the political world.

• The current government is passing laws against Hate Speech and Conversion Therapy. The new laws do not define these concepts very clearly, so they have to be interpreted by judges. As social attitudes change, these laws could be used to silence outspoken pastors.

These changes make a revival that will transform the nation much less likely than it was when the prophecies of revival were first shared. So prophesying that revival is just around the corner, when it clearly wasnt when these prophecies were first made, doesn't make sense.

Revival Prophecies (1)

Soon after I became a follower of Jesus nearly forty years ago, I heard Christian leaders declaring that God would send a massive revival to New Zealand. This message of hope has continued to be proclaimed right up to the present day. Visiting speakers who flew into New Zealand would speak of seeing visions of angels, or bright lights, or something similar. They often declared that New Zealand has a special place in God’s eyes and that revival is just around the corner.

I have always believed in these promises, as they made sense in terms of my experience. I had been living as an atheist when God reached out and grabbed me with the gospel and prompted me to chose to follow Jesus. A year later when I was spiritually hungry, the Holy Spirit overwhelmed me and gave me a heavenly language to enlighten my prayer and praise. I have seen people healed and broken lives restored by the power of the Holy Spirit.

I do not consider myself special, so I have always assumed that if God could do these things for me, he could do them for other people just as easily. Consequently, I have always expected that God would visit us soon and bring revival to our nation. I have trusted the promises of revival given by the prophetic people and recommended them to others.

For the last forty years, this has been axiomatic for me. Humans are invigorated by hope, so we naturally cling to promises of hope. The hope of revival inspired much of what I did for God.

No Longer
After forty years, I still trust God as much as ever, but I am no longer convinced that the prophecies of revival will be fulfilled. I see no signs that revival is getting closer; in fact, it seems to be further away than ever (I will explain why in a future post).

Instead of just assuming that revival is coming soon, I am pondering why these promises have not been fulfilled, especially if they reflect the heart of God. I am certain that God is not the problem. I still believe that he is capable of sending revival if he chooses, but it has not come. If he is not the problem, it must be us. I assume that God’s people are the problem, not God.

I have now arrived at the conclusion that most of the promises/prophecies about a move of God were a true reflection of his heart, but he has been unable to achieve his purposes because his church was unwilling to do what needed to be done.

To contain a powerful visitation of the Holy Spirit on their nation, the church would have to make significant changes to the way that it operates. But the church and its leaders have not been willing to make those changes, so the hoped-for move of God has not come.

I see no end to his chokepoint. God knows what needs to be done to bring revival to the nation, but he can’t get his church to do what needs to be done first. I have very little hope that the situation will change soon, so the promised revival is probably further away than ever.

One role of the Old Testament prophets was to explain why promised blessings did not arrive as expected. When things went wrong in Israel, people wanted to know why, and the prophets were expected to provide the answers.

I am not very attentive to prophecies that restate the same promises of revival that have been repeated over and over again for the last fifty years. After all this time waiting, I am looking for prophecies that can explain why they have not been fulfilled.

I believe that repeated prophecies of revival are distracting God's people from hearing what he is really saying to them.

Deferred Hope

I chose to become a follower of Jesus in 1974. Soon afterwards, I began to hear/read prophecies that God was going to send revival to New Zealand. Similar prophecies were common right up to the present day. Many visiting international speakers would say that God is going to do something big in New Zealand. For all of my life as a follower of Jesus, we have had this promise in front of us that revival is coming soon.

Humans need hope, so when we get a message that gives hope, we naturally cling to it. The hope that we have in Jesus gives us purpose for life. A hope that is true, strengthens our faith.

On the other hand, trust in a false hope can sustain us for a time, but because it does not deliver, a false hope eventually leads to disappointment. The well-known proverb says,

Hope deferred makes the heart sick,
but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life (Prov 13:12).

A hope that never comes weakens the faith of those who trust in it. In contrast, a hope that is fulfilled strengthens their lives. A hope of imminent revival has been around for most of my adult life without being fulfilled. I have been wondering about the effect of a hope that is promised continuously throughout a lifetime, but is also constantly deferred. I presume that many Christians would say that it has inspired them to keep going in serving Jesus.

However, there is another side to this issue. The message to the church has been that revival is coming soon. The hope that has been declared is that a visitation of God is near. A hope that better times are coming soon can cause us to put off doing activities that are demanding until our situation improves. We can unconsciously slip into the habit of deferring tough changes that are urgently needed until the time when the visitation of God comes, because they will be easier then.

I cannot help wondering if the prophecies that revival is coming soon prevented Christians from doing some of the things that God was calling them to do, because they assumed that it would be easier to do them when the revival had come.

We can’t know the answer, but what would have happened instead, if we had had prophecies for the past forty years declaring that we are going into a tough season when hostility to the gospel would massively increase, our society would be increasingly secularised and that many of the common activities of the church would cease to be effective. Would some Christians have given up? I doubt it. Maybe it would have inspired those who were serious about the gospel to work harder at sharing it? Maybe it would have inspired those who were interested in becoming a real community to strive harder to love one another as Jesus loved us.

The prophecies that a visitation of God would bring a massive revival very soon were not really totally true. Maybe they lulled the people of God into a false sense of security that everything would be fine, although they were not. We still assume they were good because they were encouraging, even though the expected fulfilment did not come; but maybe they did more harm than good.

In 1974, a prophecy that revival was not coming soon but was a long way off would have been truer than what we got. That might have spurred people on to greater zeal for Jesus than a hope that seems to have been repeatedly deferred. If I had known in the 1980s that the promises of revival would not be fulfilled during the next thirty years, I might have done some things differently.

This is also a challenge to prophetic people making declarations about what God is going to do. Timing is important. If their promises are for a distant future, they should be careful not to give the impression that the fulfilment is close, because they could be creating a hope that will soon be deferred. Repeating the promise again is not the solution to a deferred hope.

The modern church needs a more realistic diagnosis of the current situation. It needs a prophetic voice that will stop talking about what God is going to do soon and focus instead on what God wants his people to do now.

Testing of Time

Jeremiah did not sit down and write the book of Jeremiah. Isaiah did not sit down and write the book of Isaiah. They both gave prophecies at various times during their lives, and they or someone wrote them down. At a later time, they or some of their disciples (Baruch in the case of Jeremiah) compiled them into a book (Jer 1:1-3; 36:1-7,37;51:63; Isaiah 1:1).

In each case, various words would have been assessed for inclusion decades after they had first been spoken to the people. Some would be discarded because they had been fulfilled and were no longer relevant. Others would not make the cut because they no longer seemed relevant to the situation in Israel. I presume that the words included were chosen because they still had a ring of truth (despite not yet being fulfilled) in the situation as it had developed in the nation.

A similar process of testing would be useful today for dealing with the prophecies not yet fulfilled many years after they were spoken/released. Prophets and discerning friends should review their prophecies and decide if they are still correct and relevant for the season as it has developed.

Testing prophecies is not something that should be done once, and then assumed to be settled forever. A word can be tested again if many years have gone by without it being fulfilled to assess if it still seems to be true and relevant.

Time tests prophecies in two ways. Some are confirmed when they are fulfilled. Others continue to be relevant to the situation that has developed in the church or nation (despite not being fulfilled). Others that have not been fulfilled might be exposed as no longer of value if they are not relevant in the new situation that has emerged.

Humility is the key. Letting go of words that fail is not easy, but we need to do it to grow in the prophetic.

If God has warned of troubles through a prophecy, he sometimes changes his mind if the people concerned repent and change their ways. However, he does not change his mind when he has promised to send blessing (unless his people have wandered from the true path).

Political Prophecies

Some of the prophets who were wrong about Donald Trump winning re-election are claiming that they were right before the 2016 election when they announced that Donald Trump would win, as if that cancelled out their recent error. The problem is that those prophesying prior to the 2016 election did not just predict the winner of the election, they each announced several things that Trump would do. When I read their prophecies from that time, they got the winner of the election right, but many of the other predictions that they made have not been fulfilled.

For example, one prophet prophesied that Donald Trump would become a great prayer warrior. There is no evidence that this happened. Another well-known prophet prophesied that God would “use the wealth that God has given him to expose and launch investigations searching for the truth”. Well, the investigations of corruption did not go far, and Trump did not use his money to pay for them. These are just a couple of examples, but there are plenty more for those who look honestly.

The reality is that most of the prophets who prophesied that Trump would win in 2016 were wrong about much of the detail that they associated with their prediction. That should have set off alarm bells for them, and caused them to work out why they got so much wrong before launching into prophecies about the 2020 election.

Like prophesying the sex of an unborn baby, prophesying the outcome of an election with two contenders is not that hard (because there is a 50 percent chance of being right, even if God has not spoken). Even if one is the underdog, tossing a coin would give the correct result every third time, so being right about the winner does not mean much. It could just be a lucky break. A better way to test the accuracy of the Trump prophets is to examine the other events that they prophesied prior to 2016 and check whether they happened. According to this test, most failed to hear from God clearly. That should have been a warning to them, and to the church.

Prophesying Politics

Prophesying that a person or party will win an election is a pointless activity. People will respond in two different ways.

• The supporters of the person or party prophesied about will hear what they want to hear. Prophesying what people want to hear is dangerous. If the prophet thinks that God wants a person or party to win, they would be better to urge people to pray, than to declare a winner.

• The person or party’s opponents will not believe the prophecy until it happens. Even if it does happen, they will assume that the prophet got lucky. They will lose confidence in the role of prophecy.

No one really benefits from such a prophecy, except perhaps the person prophesying. They get an ego boost if they manage to pick the winner, but that might not be good for them either.

Geoff Holsclaw has a good article on this theme called Calling the Election a Fraud Because Your Favorite Prophets Do Is Dangerous.

Election Prophecies

Several big-name prophetic leaders in the United States (they openly call themselves prophets) have prophesied that Donald Trump would easily win the presidential election. Like prophesying the sex of an unborn baby, prophesying the outcome of election is risky (because there is a 50 percent chance of being right, even if God has not spoken). Prophetic people should be careful about both because we can easily be overcome by a desire to help and encourage, but the consequences can be quite serious if we are wrong.

Now that Trump seems to have lost the election, I will be interested to see how these people deal with their mistake. I suspect that they will respond in four different ways.

• Some prophets will stand by their prophecy, but claim that it was not fulfilled because Christians did not pray seriously enough and consequently the spiritual powers of evil were able to obstruct it (this is blaming their listeners). However, there is a big difference between saying we should pray for a person that God wants to win and prophesying that he will win. People who are prophetic should understand the difference. In this case, they did prophesy that Trump would win, so they cannot wiggle out now by saying that there was not enough prayer.

• Some will reinterpret their prophecies and claim that people misunderstood what they were saying. They will claim they were actually giving a much more nuanced message than was thought at the time and that their listeners should have understood this (another form of blame the listener).

• Some will claim that they were not actually prophesying, but were speaking in their role as a social media commentator. They will blame the listeners who misunderstood what they were doing. This is not really an excuse, because prophetic people should state clearly when they are prophesying. Being vague about what they are doing as an escape if their prophecy fails is not an option.

• Some prophets will respond to the failure of their prophecy with real grief, and ask forgiveness of the people who have trusted them (blaming themselves). I am not sure that this will be a common response.

• Some will respond to the failure of their prophecy with a quick confession, saying something like this. Whoops. It is impossible for prophecies to be right one hundred percent of the time. All prophets make mistakes. I made a mistake on this one. Sorry! Let’s move on. This is a way of blaming the Holy Spirit for not speaking clearly.

A trite acknowledgement of a prophetic mistake is not good enough. These prophetic people claimed to speak for God. They declared that they had received a revelation from God about the election. They were wrong about this, so they need to do some real soul searching. They need to discover why they could be so easily misled about something so important, and explain what they will do to resolve the problem and preventing it from happening again.

God does not operate on the principle of “one strike and you are out” so these people are not finished. However, they might need to go through a restoration process for trust to be recovered. Their prophetic failure has done serious harm to the church’s witness to the world, so there needs to be some serious accountability.

The prophetic leaders who were wrong about the presidential election will need to engage in some serious personal examination. There are two big reasons why they may have got their prophecies wrong.

• Some may have opened themselves up to a spirit of deception, which has been able to mislead them (like the court prophets who misled Jehoshaphat and Ahab (1 Kings 22)).

• Some have previously accepted a lie that is commonly believed in their culture and this has opened the way for them to accept another lie without their realising it was a lie.

The second reason will often lead to the first: believing a lie opens people up to deception by a lying spirit.

Both these reasons represent a serious problem that would need to be dealt with before the prophetic person should be trusted again. If prophetic people admit they were wrong in their prophecies about the election, I suspect they will respond in different ways.

• Some will admit that they were caught up in the general euphoria of the election and got carried away by what some pundits were saying. This is not very creditable. People should not be prophesying on the basis of media noise. They should ensure that they have heard from God before they speak, as this is what gives them a voice to the world.

• Some will say that they were just repeating what other prophetic people were saying. This is not very creditable either. The scriptures are clear that prophets need to hear from God. Christians should not be prophesying what they hear other prophetic people are saying, if they have not heard from God.

• A few will admit they were trapped by political biases that they inherited from their family or church, but I double that will be common, although it could be true.

• Very few will admit that they have believed a lie or been deceived by a lying spirit. That is dangerous, because if it has happened once then it can happen again. No real harm has come from their mistake about the Trump presidency (except for creating massive disappointment) but the next time a mistake is made for these reasons, the impact might be far worse. The spiritual powers of evil like to try a tactic out and see if it is successful before trying it again in a different context to do far greater evil. Having people access to people who believe they are prophets, but are vulnerable to believing “lies” or deceiving spirits is a very dangerous situation for a church or a nation.

• Most of the prophetic people who were mistaken about the presidential election will say that are sorry but carry on as if nothing has happened. This would also be dangerous, because what has happened is serious. People have believed a lie and spread another, and some who claim to be able to hear the Holy Spirit have been deceived by a lying spirit without being aware of what has happened (even after they have been proven wrong).

God's Plans

There is a huge difference between what God would like to do, and what God will be able to do.

Many Christian prophets proclaim what is on God’s heart; what he wants to do. But they miss the contingency that goes with it.

God is only able to do what his people will allow him to do. He cannot do most of what he would like to do, because his people will not change enough to make it possible.

So when a prophet declares what God plans to do, we should not just wait for it to happen, and grumble when it does not. We should ask God how we need to change to allow him to do what he wants to do.

Prophesying to Nations (5) People Trusting Politicians

The message to the Christians who trust politicians would be something like this.

You have put your faith in political power
and looked to politicians for solutions
to the problems of the nation
You voted them in
because they promised to make things better,
but you do not realise that political power
empowers the spiritual powers of evil.

Political powers are manipulated by spiritual powers.
Every human government is dominated and controlled
by a government spirit (principality or power)
that exercises control over the nation,
regardless of what government is in power.

A change in government changes nothing,
because the same spiritual powers remain in control.
So it does not matter who you vote for,
because government-spirits cannot be voted out.
They can only be removed by the people of the nation
turning back to God
and forcing them out in the name of Jesus
and the power of the Holy Spirit.

Political power is a trap.
It promises solutions to the problems that people fear,
but it gives evil spiritual powers a home
and allows them to leverage their authority
and increase evil.

Political power is an illusion,
because it is controlled by spiritual powers
who use it to amplify their evil power
and take the nation further away
from peace and blessing.

See Political Power is a False Hope.

Prophesying to Nations (2) After the Gospel

Since the coming of Jesus, the situation is as follows.

Israel mostly rejected the new covenant, so is still under the covenant with Moses. If they fail to keep that covenant, they can expect to experience troubles. Prophets to Israel should be warning about this danger.

The growth of the church changes the situation for the nations of the world. God has promised to bless and protect the people who have chosen to follow Jesus. If there is a large number of people following Jesus in a nation, the blessing of God will flow a long way out to the rest of the nation. The believers will push back against the spiritual powers of evil in prayer. Blessings will flow to those who engage with them in various ways. The poor and infirm will be cared for. The vulnerable will be protected from harm. Those who submit to a Christian employer, share his/her blessings. The wisdom that God gives to his people will be copied by the people of the world. Everyone in the nation benefits when more people choose to follow Jesus.

The real problem occurs in a nation when there is a substantial drop in the number of Christians living within it; everyone suffers. The prayers of the saints will have restrained the spiritual powers of evil. When their number declines, the authority and influence of their prayers will decline too, so the spiritual powers of evil get greater freedom to operate.

People who have lived in a country with many Christians get a false sense of security. They benefit spiritually from the prayers of the saints and the blessings that flow towards them, even if they do not acknowledge Jesus themselves. When the influence of the Holy Spirit in a nation declines, the decline in the state of the nation is not proportional. The amplification of the power and authority of the spiritual powers of evil means that evil gets worse out of proportion to the influence of the gospel in the nation.

This is the situation in New Zealand. The number of Christians and the influence of the Holy Spirit has declined significantly. Here are results from the last population census.

This is a disturbing picture. The Christian influence in New Zealand has declined significantly, but Christians and non-Christians both assume that things can go on mostly as normal. Christians tend to assume that revival is just around the corner. Unbelievers assume the residual blessing from the faithful past will continue, even if they do not acknowledge its source.

The reality is that the influence of the spiritual powers of evil in New Zealand has increased much faster and further than the blue line in the picture would indicate. They are now rampant in our nation. We should expect to see the impact of their greater activity, if there is not an increase in allegiance to Jesus.

The role of a prophet in a secular nation with a declining gospel influence is to warn the nation of the harm that the spiritual powers of evil are planning to do. This is the fourth task in the list in the previous post.

God may sometimes allow Warning Events to wake the people of the nation up. At every stage, the prophets should be warning what the spiritual powers of evil want to do in the nation. The believers will often not have the spiritual authority to prevent it from happening, because unbelievers have given the spiritual powers of evil much greater authority in the nation. I describe this situation in Prophetic Events. If the influence of the gospel declines massively, the control of the spiritual powers of evil will become huge.

If the nation where this is happening is powerful, they might use it to do great evil in the world. When this happens, God might have to bring a Protective Judgment against the nation to restrain it from evil. This is what happened to the Babylonian empire. See Protective Judgments for more on how this works. Warning of the collapse of a powerful empire is role number 4 in the previous post.

The influence of the gospel in the United States is declining so God will need prophets in the United States to undertake this role.

Prophecy and Evil

The spiritual powers of evil are not very creative, so they mostly just repeat what they have done in the past. That is why they are trying to use the Islamic Revival to do what Persia and Babylon did in the past, and Isis to be another Assyria.

Pride and Hubris makes the spiritual powers of evil blind. When they read the prophetic scriptures, they think they describe them winning. When they read the book of Revelation, they think it describes them being victorious, so they are keen to do the things that they read about there.

The powers of evil hope that the events described in the book of Revelation will lead to their success, so they have been trying to get the seven seals started for a long time, but God has been holding them back until the time is right. He has been able to do that because enough people have been praying and calling on him for peace.

So when Jesus opens the first of the seven seals in heaven (Rev 6:1), God removes his restraint, and the powers of evil get straight into it, without God having to do anything. They want to fulfil their warped understanding of God’s plan, so he does not need permission to bring these events to pass.

The same applies with many other prophecies. The powers of evil are looking for new ideas and they think the events described by the prophecy will bring them victory, so they are keen to fulfil them. They usually try to fulfil prophecies too early, so God’s main challenge is to prevent them going to soon. He does this by prompting other groups of spiritual powers to oppose them. The Holy Spirit is skilled at bringing division between them by slipping new ideas into their minds.

Too Many New Seasons

I get frustrated when Christian prophesy that a new season is coming. A season of blessing, a season of miracles, a season of victory, or a season of taking back what was lost. These seasons are often linked with the numbers of days in the Jewish calendar in a way that often seem more like Christian astrology than prophecy.

These messages are confused about God’s character and the way that he operates. They seem to project human fickleness on to God. We change our minds. We forget to do things we intended to do. We don’t get round doing things that we want to do. We put effort into doing that we should have done earlier. God is not fickle. He does not act in arbitrary ways.

A change in season can only occur, if there is a change in the covenant relationship between God and his people, or change in the authority situation between God and the power of evil. The death and resurrection of Jesus was the biggest season change in history, because it destroyed the authority of the powers of evil and dealt with the sin allowing us to receive the fullness of his Spirit.

The last big season change occurred in AD 70 when the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed, bringing the old covenant sacrifices to an end. This opened a season called the Times of the Gentiles, when the Jews people who chose to remain under the old covenant have no spiritual protection, because they has no sacrifice for sin.

The next season change is the fullness of the Jews, when the majority of Jews come to faith in Jesus, bringing great blessing to the world. (These seasons are described in detail in book called Times and Seasons).

In between these big season changes, there is spiritual warfare. What happens on earth depends on the state of the ongoing war. Success or failure depends almost entirely on the church. Changes in the spiritual realms come from binding and releasing on earth, not the other way round (Matt 16:19).

God does not come and go. He does not arbitrarily jump from offering his blessing to withdrawing it. Blessing that were not available last week do not suddenly becomes available this week, because the year has a different number. God is not in a stingy mood one day and in a generous mood the next. He is not miserable last year and happy next year. The angels are not tired one week and strong the next.

God operates consistently according the principles that he has revealed in the scriptures. He has been working on a long-term strategy that began when Adam and Eve sinned. His strategy is consistent with the way he has decided to operate on earth. His way of dealing with the earth does not change.

In any season, they key is alignment with the will of God. If we align with his will, we experience his goodness. His goodness is not just blessings. His goodness might mean blessing with persecutions. If we do not align with God’s will, then things will go badly in every way (although he will work it for our good in the long run).

We do not need prophets giving vague promises about season changes that are disconnected from our circumstances and alignment to God’s will. What we do need is prophetic insights into God will’s in our current situation, so that we can obey his will and receive his blessings. What need less prophecy tell us God is changing, and more telling us how to change so that we can align with his will.

If we understand God's times and seasons. We will not see fickle and arbitary changes in the way that God works on earth.

Harsh Prophecies

Some of the prophets brought a very harsh message in the name of God. He sometimes does not seem to be a God of Grace.

The people of Samaria must bear their guilt,
because they have rebelled against their God.
They will fall by the sword;
their little ones will be dashed to the ground,
their pregnant women ripped open (Hos 13: 16).

This is what the LORD says: I am going to fill with drunkenness all who live in this land, including the kings who sit on David’s throne, the priests, the prophets and all those living in Jerusalem. I will smash them one against the other, parents and children alike, declares the LORD. I will allow no pity or mercy or compassion to keep me from destroying them (Jer 13:13-15).

To understand these words by Hosea and Jeremiah, we must understand blessing and cursing, and spiritual warfare.

Once we understand that struggle between God and the forces of evil for control of the world, it becomes clear that God took a huge risk when he intervened in the world to establish a covenant with the children of Israel. His problem was that he could not create blessing without creating curses. Once he had chosen them and started to bless them, spiritual warfare shifted towards Israel. The spiritual forces of evil that had been wreaking havoc all over the earth did not want blessing to break into their world so they attacked it with a vengeance.

This shift in the spiritual struggle was not a problem while the Israelites were faithful to God. He could deal with anything that the enemy threw at his people. However, when they shut God out by their disobedience, as they inevitably would, they would not just lose their blessing and fall back into normal misery. When they rejected God’s blessing, they were leaving themselves without spiritual protection in a dangerous place. They were exposing themselves to the spiritual forces that had gathered to attack them. This is the curse. God did not have to do anything when the people disobeyed, because the spiritual forces of evil were waiting to choke off the plan of God by destroying his people. This is why the blessings and curses are spelt out so clearly (Deut 28).

The reality of blessings and curses explains why some of the prophets brought a harsh message. God could not create blessing, without allowing a curse to emerge. Blessing cannot exist without curse, because the absence of blessing is a curse. The blessing brings the curse into existence, powerful and waiting to pounce. The outworking of the curse of the law was automatic. The prophets described the evil that became inevitable when the children of Israel disobeyed and shut out God. The forces of evil were ready to go to work and do evil in their midst.

When God had intervened to bless his people, he inevitably gave the powers or evil the right to curse, if his people rejected him. To acknowledge this responsibility, he sometimes spoke as if he was the one who was executing the judgment on Israel, although the judgments were actually being executed by the powers of evil. However, God always take full responsibility for his actions, so he spoke through the prophets as if he was bringing the judgment. Indirectly, this was true.

The spiritual struggle for control of the world is a tough one, as the powers of evil are totally ruthless. Those who choose their side will often get their fingers burnt. The prophets’ message had to be harsh, because harsh stuff would happen when the forces of evil got a free hand to work out their evil plans.

Third Big One?

A warning of a Third Big Earthquake in Christchurch shared by Kathy Robinson (KR), an intercessor living in North Canterbury, is causing a lot of confusion and fear in Christchurch. I take prophecy seriously, so I have prayed about what this means. Here is my take on it.

I believe that KR did hear from God. She was right about a third earthquake, but wrong about the timing and some of the interpretation around her revelation.

We should not forget that Christchurch has already experienced three big earthquakes, in September 2010 (7.2), February 2010 (6.3) and June 2011(6.3) Some of the people in my neighbourhood have had to shovel the silt of liquefaction out of their homes three different times.

The third earthquake in June was the same strength as the one in February, but in some parts of Eastern Christchurch, it did more damage. The June quake left worse devastation in the CBD, as many of the buildings that owners had hoped to repair received further damage meaning they have had to be demolished. Hopes that the cathedral could be repaired were smashed.

I would not classify KR’s revelation as a prophecy. It is more a series of words of knowledge, received in response to questions she asked God. Asking questions of God is a good way to get understanding.

Most Christians would find it hard to know what to do with a revelation like this one, so KR deserves credit for the way she handled it. She gave the word to friends to pray over, before handing it to leaders of the intercession movement to test. The fear arose when other Christians began to hand her word around as if it was a validated prophecy (see Prophets and Prayers).

KRs first word of knowledge was received on 25 Sept 2010, a few weeks after the first earthquake.

One hundred and fifty days!

She seems to have been spot on with this, as it points to the 23 February 2011, the day after the second big quake.

After the February 2011 earthquake, she got a second revelation.

There is more yet to come.

She then asked when, and got one word,

Months

This seems fine to me. After the February earthquake, many Christians felt that it was not all over and that there was another big one to come.

However, being dissatisfied with the level of detail that God has given is risky, because a number of days later, KR sought another word and was given a specific date. This date does not ring true withme. God cannot be inconsistent. He would not give a broad time spread, and then change his mind and give a precise date a few days later. Therefore, I assume that the correct word on timing was that it would happen in a few months.

We should note that other people getting the same date does not prove that a date is from God. The enemy can send the same fiery dart against a number of people (Eph 6:16). The court prophets supporting the King of Israel often had the same word, but they were usually wrong (1 Kings 22:13) (see Dreams of Disaster).

If God said in February that there would be another big earthquake in a few months time, this was a true word, as it was fulfilled when the third big earthquake struck in June 2011.

A few days after getting the date, KR received another revelation,

water and drownings.

This probably came from God, but it has been misinterpreted. Many have interpreted it literally as a tsunami, but this is not right. I believe these words should be interpreted symbolically. Being swamped by water is usually a symbol for being spiritually or emotionally overwhelmed. Drownings can represent the crushing of the human spirit and the choking of hope. Psalm 18:16-17 and Psalm 69:14-15 are examples.

This is what happened after the third earthquake. After the February quake, people got straight out to remove the silt from their backyards. It was hard hot work, but their words were full of hope. “This thing will not beat us. We are resilient people, so we will come through this stronger.” The situation in Eastern Christchurch was totally different after the June quake. People were slow to take on the removal of silt. It seemed like they just did not have the energy to deal with it. They spoke words of despair, not hope. “We have had more than we can take. We cannot cope with any more”. Self-pity emerged quickly, and sometimes turned into complaint.

A thirty something man whom I met on the street looked like someone who would usually be afraid of nothing, but he had big tears in his eyes as he spoke about the uncertainty and fears for his family’s future.

Having seen the effect that the June earthquake had on the people that went through it, I cannot accept some of the scriptures and context that KR put round her words of knowledge. She said,

The impression I received was that the people’s hearts are so hardened that it would become necessary yet again to bring judgment before change would happen.

This assessment sounds like it was made by someone living outside Christchurch. It does not match with what I see here. In the eastern suburbs of Christchurch, where the effects of the earthquake are worst, hearts are not hard. People are worried, frightened, confused, angry, hurt and scared. You can see it on their faces, and when they speak, the stuff in their hearts comes out of their mouths. These are not hard hearts that need to be broken by judgment. They are broken hearts that need to see the love of Jesus and receive the peace of the Holy Spirit (see Hard Hearts).

Concern about prophecies of earthquakes has absorbed a huge amount of spiritual energy. God has things for his people to do in this city. We must be careful that we do not get distracted from his purposes by earthquakes and rumours of earthquakes.

I believe that the revelation received by KR was fulfilled when the third big earthquake struck in June. We will continue to experience aftershocks in Christchurch, but God has not said that we will have another big one. At the end of September, I will be the Eastern Christchurch going about my life as usual. I will try to serve Jesus and walk in the leading of the Spirit. I encourage everyone to follow the leading of the Spirit, not the voice of fear.

Seeing in Part

1 Cor 13:9-12 is often used as an excuse for mediocre prophecy.

For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears…..For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

Paul is explaining our human situation, not providing an excuse for weak prophecy. We see in part, because God does not reveal everything to his people. He only gives each person the small part that he wants them to have.

The common saying that we always see through a “dark glass”. That is not Paul's message. He is actually explaining the difference between our situation now and that in the next life. Because we live in the physical world, we miss most of the important spiritual stuff that is going in. Human minds just cannot comprehend the glory of the new heaven and new earth.

The Lord speaks clearly. He only gives us each person a small part of the big picture, be he gives it to us very clearly. Because, we are human, we may not always receive it as clearly as he has given it, but often if our heart is right, we do. We can often get our small part of his total revelation very clearly.

The prophet’s role is to share their part clearly, not explain to explain all parts dimly. If all the prophets give their part clearly, God’s people will get what we need. If every prophet give the entire picture dimly, we will just get confusion.

First Person Prophecy

A reader asked about giving prophecies in the first person. This happened quite frequently in the Old Testament, so it is still a legitimate way to speak. However, it demands a higher level of certainty. It should only be done, if the prophet is absolutely certain that they are saying the exact words of the Lord. That level of confidence will be relatively rare, so this method of speaking should not be common.

Humility is always better than presumption. If the person prophesying is not totally certain, it is probably better to be humble and speak in the third person.

Speaking in the first person, should never be used as a literary device to make a prophecy sound impressive. This is done far too often. I would not want to be accountable for using God’s name in vain in this way.

We should remember that the authority of a prophecy does not come from the eloquence of the words. Authority comes from the Holy Spirit quickening the word in the heart of the listener or reader. Therefore, it is best to be humble in the way we present our words and let the Holy Spirit lift them up, if the thinks the word is important. He can do that if he chooses.

Wisdom or Word

When I read many of the words on prophetic lists like the Elijah List and Open Heaven, I find it hard to distinguish between human wisdom and true words from God. Many of the words have good applications of the scriptures and others provide good insight into what is happening in the world, but none seem to be very different from what would be heard in many Sunday sermons, if the pastor seeks the Lord about what he should say to his flock. Calling these words prophetic, not only devalues the meaning of the word prophetic, it makes it hard to dig out the genuine word from the Lord.

Most prophetic people have studied the scriptures for most of their lives. They usually have a passion for God’s Kingdom and are keen observers of all that is going on in the world. This puts them in a good place to comment on what is happening in current events or to develop sound applications of the scriptures. Their wisdom is often be really insightful and worth sharing (often more relevant than the editorial writers who dominate the websites of news organisations), but it is not the word of the Lord, so it is misleading to label it prophetic.

A prophet must learn to distinguish between what they receive from the Lord and what comes from their own wisdom. If they are unable to do that, they are on a very slippery slope, which can easily lead to disaster. Prophets should be very clear about the source of their words. If a word comes from the Lord, the prophet can say so. If it a prophetic of their wisdom and experience, they should label it as wisdom. If they are not sure, it is better to be modest than to exalt their wisdom above its place.

When prophets do not distinguish between their human wisdom and a word from the Lord, the word prophetic is depreciated and confusion follows. The true word from the Lord, which his people need to hear, to easily gets lost in the “prophetic slush”.

Spontaneous v Deliberate?

In a post called Patterns in Personal Prophecy, Gene Redlin describes how he hears and delivers personal prophecies. His bullet points are worth digesting. I like his emphasis on achieving precision in hearing and delivering what God is saying. Precision is an important value for prophetic people, because truth is important and there has been too much prophetic mush masquerading as prophetic truth.

Gene contrasts “rapid fire” prophecy with a quiet, more measured, style that he often uses and concludes that one is not better than the other. I find this interesting, because the modern church tends to assume that spontaneous prophecy is more accurate. There is no biblical basis for this view. The Holy Spirit can do both, and he is free to choose how he will operate in any situation. To shake us out of our comfort zones, he will sometimes be spontaneous, when we want to be deliberate, and he will often be more deliberate, when we want to be spontaneous.

The benefit of a spontaneous word is that the Holy Spirit can drop it into our hearts unexpectedly, before our minds get going and before the flesh starts getting in the way. This is fine for beginners, but it not the basis for developing into a prophetic ministry. The person who wants to be used by God in prophecy must learn to quiet their minds and put their flesh to death. They must learn to distinguish between their own thoughts and the voice of the Spirit. This is difficult and takes time, but essential for developing a prophetic gifting. Relying on the Holy Spirit to beat our minds with spontaneous words is not a long-term solution.

The Holy Spirit loves to surprise us, so he will continue to give us words when we are not expecting it, but we must never fall into the trap of thinking that spontaneous words are superior to those that are received in a more deliberate, careful process. Clinging to the spontaneous will keep us locked in immaturity. Those who want to be used in prophecy will need to work hard at learning to shut out their own mind and flesh and deliberately and carefully seek the words of the Lord.

Sometimes precision is worth waiting for. At a meeting I attended recently, it took nearly a whole day for a few prophets to pray for less than twenty people, but the quality of the words was amazing.

Pearls take time to polish:
Mush tends to gush in a flush.