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Now about the gifts of the Spirit, brothers and sisters, I do not want
you to be uninformed. – 1 Corinthians
12:1 NIV
Notice, they
are called the gifts OF the Spirit,
they belong to the Spirit, not to individuals and it is the Spirit who uses
anyone He desires in any of these gifts. Now let me hasten to add that, the
Holy Spirit is not a bully, so He won’t force anyone into doing anything, He
will gently let you know of His desire to use you in a particular gift. It
could be by way of a spontaneous thought that alights on your mind or by an
impression, by a vision, a tugging at your heart or through His still small
voice in your spirit…the point is He knows how to get your attention and how to
communicate with you, there is no formula, it’s a relational thing…another good
reason why you should make communicating with the Lord who is always present
with you round the clock, a habit. The importance of spending time in the Word
cannot be overemphasized That’s one sure way of getting to know His voice
intimately and prophecy will always be in line with the Word of God, never in
contradiction to it.
Our walk with
the Lord is one of faith, once we hear His voice, let us be bold enough to step
out in faith and do what He tells us to do. Should we draw back out of fear, we
might not only deny others of what God has for them, but we also won’t experience
the joy of being a vessel that the Lord uses to touch and bless others in the
body of Christ. Let us be reminded of this one thing, it is never about us, it
is always about Him. His gifts are for building up His people not our egos, so
there…the flesh has no place…
Today, I’d like to zero in on the gift of prophecy, for the Word tells
us to ESPECIALLY DESIRE this gift.
Follow the way of love and eagerly desire gifts
of the Spirit, especially prophecy - 1
Corinthians 14: 1 NIV
Here we see the fruit of the Spirit (which is encapsulated by the phrase
“the way of love”) and the gifts of the Spirit with emphasis on prophecy going
together, hand in hand as it were. The simple reason for this is the truth that
everything in the Kingdom operates by love. Whatever we do should be out of God’s
love that has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit (Romans 5:5). His love should be the
motivating factor behind our desires for His gifts to operate in and through
us. Let us not forget that God is Love. His very essence is Love. Anything done
without love doesn’t amount to much, 1
Corinthians 13, the popular love chapter in the Bible, makes that abundantly clear.
As we yield to the love of God that’s poured out in our hearts, we won’t
have any other agenda, our desire will be to see others saved, healed,
delivered, blessed, lifted up, restored and fulfilling their God ordained
destinies. The gift of prophesy that flows out of love is never condemning,
neither does it seek to bring fear, control or manipulation; the gift of prophecy
will always edify, exhort and comfort others.
The gift of prophesy is for building people
up, for comforting them and for encouraging or exhorting them. It is never for tearing
people down. The ministry of the Prophet goes beyond edification, exhortation
and comfort but that is beyond the scope of this post, suffice it to say the
ministry or office of the Prophet in the New Testament is a foundational ministry
in the Church together with the Apostolic ministry.
Every believer can and should operate in
the gift of prophesy, the Lord urges us to desire it earnestly, He calls on us
to desire it above all the other gifts because He knows we – His body – need it very
much and for that reason He desires to use you to prophesy, to speak what He
reveals to you to others. In His wisdom, God has made a way for us to learn how
to operate in this gift, and as we learn we become bolder and more fluent in
flowing with the Spirit. Let me quickly state this fact: we cannot improve on the gifts of the Spirit; they are already
perfect gifts from the Perfect One. What we can and are ENCOURAGED to do is to LEARN
HOW TO BETTER FLOW or OPERATE in the Gift of Prophecy
31 For you can all
prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be encouraged. – 1 Corinthians 14:31 NKJV
Start where you are, if God reveals
something to you for someone else and impresses upon you to share it with them,
the in love, step out by faith and share it, even if it is a one liner such as “rest
in the Lord” or “I love you” or “I’m with you”, that might be exactly what the other
person needs to hear at that time. Don’t hold back and wait until you can
prophesy paragraphs and chapters; faithfully start with what He reveals to you.
Do not let fear hold you back, the Lord desires to bless others through you.
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It is the enemy who doesn’t want them to
be blessed and certainly doesn’t want you to step out in faith and obedience to
God, he will attempt to immobilize you with fear, but as the Word says, we are
not ignorant of his devices…so now that you know this, bask in the love of God
for you and His people and all that fear will be cast out as you respond to His
love by stepping out in faith, you see, whenever you obey God, you offend the
devil, so why not make it a habit to obey God every step of the way!
Desire the gift of prophecy today and as you do, delight yourself in the
Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart - the gift of prophecy
being one of those desires! And
as opportunities for encouraging, exhorting or comforting others open up before
you, may the love of God in you cause you to step out in faith and share what
the Lord reveals to you. Become a blessing to someone today, prophesy!
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