Have you prayed and prayed for something, but nothing seems to happen? Perhaps you need to do what God does and rely on prophesy. Prophecy is God’s way of getting things done. Until there is prophecy, nothing can be accomplished in God’s kingdom. “Surely the Lord God does nothing unless he reveals his secret counsel to his servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7). He reveals his secrets to his friends who will prophesy them into existence. Be an imitator of God (Ephesians 5:1).
The Spirit is God’s power and his words are from God and full of energy and power (Acts 1:8; Hebrews 4:12). When believers hear the Spirit and believe what he says, they can release the Spirit’s power through prophecy. Prophecy is one of the most powerful forces available to believers. In this study, you will discover how to unleash the mighty power of prophecy in your life.
Introducing the Spirit’s Voice
The Spirit wants to speak to you. He speaks what he hears from the Father (John 16:13). His message is about Jesus and leads believers into all the truth. Hearing the voice of the Spirit takes the mystery out of knowing God’s will. By the Spirit, God reveals his “wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden” (1 Corinthians 2:7-10).
The Spirit’s words are like the gentle whisper through which God spoke to Elijah. After a wind, earthquake, and fire there was the sound of a breeze, “and through this breeze, a gentle, quiet voice entered into Elijah’s ears” (1 Kings 19:11-12 VOICE). The Spirit speaks words like a gentle blowing. His words come like thoughts into a person. They are often fleeting thoughts that have to be grasped quickly before they leave a person’s thinking. The person will know the Spirit’s words are not his/her own thoughts.
The Spirit gives people direct access to God’s presence, guidance and wisdom. He is watching, listening and speaking to people. They are often unprepared and too busy to listen to what the Spirit is speaking. You can prepare yourself to hear the Spirit by developing a relationship with him, becoming sensitive to his voice and following his guidance. While the Spirit can speak to babes in Christ, his voice is heard best by trained spiritual ears and understood best by renewed minds. Spiritual ears and a renewed mind are products of spiritual growth.
Renew Your Mind to Spiritual Things
Believers can know God, his will, and his ways when they receive his revealed word. Then their minds become open to spiritual things. Study God’s word about the things of the Spirit. Renew your mind to the word of God (Ephesians 4:23). Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus (Philippians 2:5). Find out how the Spirit reveals the truth and imparts his power to believers.
Train Your Spiritual Ears
Train your spiritual ears to hear the Spirit’s voice. Take time for sharing and intimate fellowship with the Spirit. “The fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (2 Corinthians 13:14). Be attentive to the guidance of the Spirit and quick to respond to his leading. Let the Spirit be part of everything in your life. His guidance will show you God’s will and his way.
Understanding Prophecy
Prophecy does not come from human initiative, but it is inspired by the Holy Spirit. It is the expression of divinely inspired thoughts and words. Prophecy is proclaimed when people are led by the Spirit to speak words which come from God (2 Peter 1:21). Prophecy can strengthen, encourage and comfort (1 Corinthians 14:3).
Everyone can prophesy by hearing the Spirit’s voice and by faith declaring God’s will on the earth. Prophesy what the Spirit speaks to you. The children and the servants of God are prophesying wherever the Holy Spirit is freely moving (Acts 2:17-18). God wants everyone to prophesy (1 Corinthians 14:5). Prophecy is an expression of faith, not man’s knowledge.
Everything God does is based on prophecy. There are hundreds of prophecies about Jesus in God’s word. These prophecies relate to his birth, ministry, death and resurrection, and second coming. For example, some of the prophecies about his birth foretold that he would be born of a virgin from the tribe of Judah in the city of Bethlehem (Genesis 49:10; Isaiah 7:14; Micah 5:2). Many prophecies were needed to develop the various facets of his life. Each inspired prophecy gave additional facets to his life.
Prophecy is full of the Spirit’s power because it comes from the heart of God. The Spirit pours out his power into a willing vessel to speak God’s words and bring forth his will. When prophecy is given, movement begins in the supernatural realm. This supernatural movement continues as long as the people receive and act on the prophecy. If the prophecy is not acted upon, then movement is halted.
This supernatural movement of the Spirit is illustrated by Elisha’s prophecy to a widow. Elisha told the widow to borrow many empty pots from her neighbors and then fill them from her one small pot of oil (2 Kings 4:1-7). The many pots gathered by her sons were miraculously filled with the oil from one small pot, because the Spirit multiplied the oil. The oil continued to flow as long as there were empty vessels to hold the oil, but it stopped flowing when there were no more empty vessels. The widow and her sons limited the flow of the Spirit by not gathering more empty vessels.
It takes faith to prophesy. By stepping out in faith, believers can prophesy by speaking the message which they are hearing from the Spirit. They may begin to prophesy without knowing the full message, trusting to hear from God. Believers prophesy according to the amount of faith they have (Romans 12:6). As a believer’s faith increases, he/she would be expected to prophesy more often and in more depth.
Applying Prophecy in Your Life
Your enemies want you to keep your mouth shut, but God wants you to prophesy. When you encounter a problem, do you ask God to fix it or do you prophesy to it? How much do you prophesy?
A great example of prophesying by the spirit is found in Ezekiel 37 where Ezekiel prophesied to the dry bones in the valley. The Spirit carried Ezekiel into a valley where he saw dry bones. The Lord asked him if these bones could live. Ezekiel’s answer showed that he did not know whether the bones could live. We need to have a similar attitude that we do not know what to prophesy. The natural man does not know what to prophesy. We are dependent upon the Spirit to show us what to prophesy.
Believers can build an extraordinary future on God’s promises with prophecies inspired by the Holy Spirit. Spend time with the Holy Spirit and let him search the depths of God’s promises to appropriate them through prophecies. Each prophecy adds an additional facet to your life or situation. Do not utter just one prophecy over and over again. Instead, use various prophecies to express different aspects of God’s promises to you. If you are prophesying about your career, for example, it cannot be fully explained in one prophecy. Instead use multiple prophecies to describe the many facets of the career.
Prophesy God’s life over you, your family, your finances, your community, and the body of Christ. See the invisible and call those things that be not as though they were. Bring those things into this time dimension. Prophesy life wherever you go, and light will shine in the darkness. Speak life to the dead situations in your life. The Lord will bring things together and breathe life into them. They will arise and produce fruit in God’s kingdom. Every situation that has been unfruitful will begin to bloom.
Personal Story on Prophecy
Sherry had some health issues 25 years ago. She went to doctors for medical tests. One day when I was praying for her, the Holy Spirit said, “We have the victory over this”. He used the word we rather than you, which meant I was not standing alone. The word we indicated the Father, the Son, the Spirit, Sherry and I together have the victory. This statement became my inspiration to prophesy healing over Sherry’s situation. I began to prophesy, “We have the victory over this” even before I knew what this was. A month later, Sherry met me when I was returning from praying in the woods. She said three doctors have agreed that she had terminal cancer and gave her no more than six months to live. My response was, “We have the victory over this”.
Her inspiration from the Holy Spirit was, “I shall live and not die but declare the works of the Lord”. She prophesied what the Spirit showed her, and I prophesied what the Spirit showed me. Soon, I began to teach a six-week series on healing in the congregation we were attending. During the first session, I prophesied that Sherry would be healed during that six-week period and that she would stand and proclaim her healing to the group, because that was what the Spirit told me. During the second session of the class, she was able to stand and proclaim that the Lord healed her from cancer. She continues to live a long and healthy life. It took multiple prophecies to manifest her full healing. Thanks be to the Lord who always gives us the victory!
Conclusions
Knowing how to hear the Spirit’s voice is important in order to follow him. He does not speak like a man. His words are supernatural and contain boundless energy. His words are heard by the spirit man, not the natural man. Training spiritual ears to hear the Spirit requires spiritual growth. Staying attentive to the Spirit involves a lifestyle committed to the Lord.
Prophecy is a supernatural force that builds God’s way. Be an imitator of God and build your life on prophecy. The Holy Spirit shows believers things to come so they can prophesy them into existence.
Study Questions
#1. What are the greatest hindrances to hearing the Spirit’s voice?
#2. What could you do to hear the Spirit’s voice more clearly?
#3. How does prophesying what you hear from the Spirit differ from the way you pray?
#4. Which area(s) of your life could you change by prophesying what you hear from the Spirit
#5. What do you plan to do to improve your future?