Prophetic Intent 2023 - Stewarding Prophecy - Clem Ferris

I guess the basic topic of the name of the book called stewarding prophecy.

But it really comes down to, Okay, God has spoken. Now what

right God spoke to me? What do I do? How do I steward

the revelation that God gives me? This could be in your devotions. It

doesn't mean it has to be a public prophecy or a word from somebody else.

It could be. But it's when God speaks to our heart and gives

us instruction and gives us insight. How do we carry it out? What

are some of the principles fulfilling the word of the Lord. So we'll start

in Revelation chapter one, which is a very I mean, the whole Bible

is a prophetic book, right, but we all know the book the Revelation

is, I guess we would say extra prophetic. It is very prophetic.

And here's how John opens up in the prologue Revelation one to three. He

says, blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy.

So John actually calls his writing a prophecy. And blessed are those who hear

and who keep what's written in it. And I want to hone in on

not only blessed are those who hear, but I'm honing in on the word

keep. It's not enough to say, well, it was a great sermon,

Thanks Dave. Hope next week's better. We're not just hearing and hearing

and hearing. There's no famine there. There's lots of hearing going on.

But the hard part is keeping it, keeping what God says to us.

So that's the requirement, and the difficulty is always from the moment God speaks

to us to as we say the amen to there it is did it come

to pass? So what does it mean to keep a word from God?

So the Greek word there is to rattle, and it means it's got different

connotations. It means, first of all, it's a visual action. Is

to watch over something so that it won't be lost or stolen, isn't it?

So if I said, you're Dave, can you just keep my phone

while I'm speaking, I'm going to give Dave my phone. I want him

to keep it. What does that mean? I'm hoping he has an awareness

of where that is all the time. So when the session is over,

I go, Dave, can I have my phone? He goes your phone,

your phone? Did you give me your phone? Yes, I did

I give you my phone? Where is it? I don't know, Julia,

have you? That's always the first thing you always ask your wife.

Keeping watching over something, so guarding something so it won't be lost or stolen.

What does that mean? Your prophetic word could be lost, It could

be stolen. We have an enemy, by the way, he's very active.

He's been around prophecy a long time. He was right there in the

garden when the first prophecy came. He was there. The seat of ob

woman is going to bruise your heads. I don't like this prophecy stuff.

I never get a good word. So it also means to ward off an

enemy. That's another idea behind this word. To retl to ward off enemy.

And thirdly, it also means to bring something to action, so it's

not just do nothing. It's to keep something. Means to bring it to

completion, to fulfill something. So it actually turns into something something like a

command. I want you to do this. So a prophetic word just doesn't

sit idle and do nothing. It's designed for action. God's word was designed

for action. Right when we stand before God, we all want to hear

the great phrase, what well heard, thou good and faithful servant? Right,

Oh, excuse me, well done, thou good and faithful servant.

God's word was designed to be done, not just to be heard. So

this whole idea of warfare, which is this word, describes for us there's

a warfare for the words. How many do we live in our true warfare

is a war of words. We should know that by now. But in

our society there's constantly and if you're on social media, how many know that's

another exciting battleground, isn't it. Never thought you were getting into a battle,

But every word you read, there's a battle somewhere in there. We're

in a war of words, and it's our you know, it's God's word

against everybody else. So often when God speaks, there's an immediate warfare from

you starts with you. That can't be here. I never thought of that,

or I don't see myself like that, And that's the enemy trying to

goad you into unbelief. Faith comes by hearing. So how do you wage

warfare? Well, let me take you to the parable of the sower and

get one principle out of the parable of the Sower Matthew chapter thirteen. It's

a foundation parable. There's eight parables in Matthew thirteen. This is the foundational

parable of the Kingdom of God. Really helps us, he helps understand the

kingdom. And so you know the parable four different conditions of the heart,

four different soils, one seed, different kinds of soil. Right, soil

really matters. Right, you can sow good seed into the wrong kind of

soil and it's not going to come up. So Jesus presents this great parable

of the sower, and the disciples, being good disciples like we all are,

just didn't get it the first time. And so they said, please

explain the parable of the sower. He said, okay, let's start.

Okay, here we go. You can see Jesus. I was like,

okay, here we go again. Let's start from the very again. So

and Jesus says this in Matthew thirteen eighteen. He says, now, when

anyone hears the word of the kingdoms, stopped right there. He's breaking down

the parable of the sower. What's the seed a word? When anyone hears

the word of the Kingdom, it's not a word of man, It's a

word from a king. The word of the kingdom comes out of the kingdom.

It's not a visible kingdom. It's an invisible kingdom. It's where of

the king rules king the domain of the king. When anyone hears a word

coming from another kingdom, here's the next phrase, which is very important and

understands it not, And then you go, that's stop right there, that's

me. You know, God says things. I don't get it. I

don't understand. I'm not a theologian. I've never been to college. I

have good news for you. This whole idea of what he says and understands

it not doesn't have anything to do with your intellect, your how much education

you've had, your cognitive ability, your knowledge of Greek and Hebrew. None

of that has anything to do with this word understand. It's a different Greek

word. The word is soon am i, and it literally means to happen

upon. It's like a convergence where something two things meet together. So if

people are standing on opposite sides of the room and they come across and meet

in the middle and happen upon each other, that would be soon of mine.

They happen upon each other. There's an understanding or two water sources.

Say a river is flowing, another river's flowing, two different water sources,

but they come and they meet and they form a new water source. That

place of convergence would be soon, amie, those two new those two separate

rivers now have a new understanding of each other. We're not one river.

So that whole idea of when anyone hears the word of the kingdom, you

have to allow the word to happen upon you doesn't mean I understand it with

my brain, means I have to receive it in my heart. That's why

the pair of the sore is the sea going into the heart. The condition

of the heart is I'm going to receive what's being said. Do I understand

it? No? But what I'm going to receive it, I'm going to

let happen upon me. Jesus said, when anyone hears the word of the

kingdom but doesn't allow it to happen upon you, then comes the wicked one.

I know, the devil. The devil is very aware of Popec.

Like I said, he's been around a lot of prophecy his whole life.

He knows it's dangerous to his kingdom. It's going to eventually bring it down

completely. He's heard all those prophecies. He heard all the ones about Jesus

and thought he had Jesus done for on the cross and didn't realize he was

actually fulfilling the prophecy. So he's been around prophecy alone. He hates prophecy.

He's going to do all he can to fight it. When anyone hears

the word of the Kingdom and doesn't allow it to happen upon them, then

comes the wicked one. It's like, okay, I'm up. This is

my big chance. And what does he do? It says, Then comes

the wicked one, and he snatches away that which was sown in the heart.

It's the destination of every word is the heart of man, and it

can get sown there. But the devil doesn't want it to stay there and

bring fruit. He wants to steal it if he has the opportunity. If

you don't allow it to happen upon you, it says, then comes the

wicked one, and he will snatch away that which was sown in the heart.

Snatch a way strong strong Greek word there, harpodzo means to seize something

by force in warfare, he'll force his way in. That's why you gotta

it's warfare. That's the that's the that's the hidden part of prophecy. Nobody

likes to talk about. But you know when you you come to a meeting

and there's gonna be prophecy, and the inside your going, I want to

prophecy. You got one hand up, going I want to prophecy. Guess

what your other hand's doing. I'll take some more warfare, please, more

warfare, priests, please. Nobody goes I'm here for the warfare. What

are you here for? I'm just here for prophecy. Guess what both hands

are up. You're gonna get prophecy and you're gonna get warfare. It's a

two for one special. You cannot have one without the other because it will

always be contested by the enemy. Then comes the wicked one. When when

that word comes and you don't let it happen upon you, then comes the

wicked one to snatch away that which is sown in his heart. So we

need to learn how to hold on, not just hold on for dear life

and hope nothing happens. We have to know how to wage warfare with prophecy,

and so Paul taught Timothy how to do that. For Timothy. Chapter

one at the end of this chapter wasn't a chapter in Paul's mind, but

we made it into a chapter. But he then changes his focus in chapter

two on prayer, and he's actually finishing of great Gospel presentation up to this

point, and verse seventeen says to the King of Ages, immortal, invisible,

to the only God, be honored God, great doxology, Amen,

goes, Oh, before I talk about prayer, tim let me just tell

you something about prophecy. So he takes three short verses verse eighteen, nineteen

twenty and gives Timothy some instruction about the prophetic word that he got so that

he can carry on. And he says this charge, I entrust to you,

Timothy and my child, in accordance with the prophecies previously made about you,

that by them you can wage good warfare. So he's reminding Timothy about

the warfare because of his prophecies, but he's teaching him how to wage good

warfare. How many know there's two kinds of warfare. There's good warfare and

bad warfare. Say I like option three, please, what's that? How

about no warfare? Sorry, I'll take no warfare. No you won't.

Then you don't get a prophecy because prophecy comes with warfare. So he's teaching

him. So this is, by the way, all one sentence, verse

eighteen, nineteen twenty. So just take it apart here for a minute.

This charge, I trust you, Timothy, in accordance with the prophecy he's

previously made about you, that by them you can wage good warfare. Comma

holding See how do we hold on to a word? Well, this is

Paul's teaching Timothy holding faith. Don't see didn't say hold on your word.

He didn't say that, He said hold faith, holding faith in a good

conscience. By rejecting this, some have made shipwreck of their faith, among

whom are Hymeneus and Alexander, whom I've handed over to Satan that they may

learn not to blasphemy. It is an amazing little chunk of scripture in between

a great doxology and the Gospel. And then teaching on prayer is kind of

like help us here, Paul, what are you saying about this? How

do we wage good warfare? So let's take it apart for a minute.

Paul starts out using a very strong military word. So we're talking about warfare.

Paul's using military language. He says, this charge, I'm intrusting to

you. So the word charge is paragaleon and the Greek, and it really

means a command given by a superior ranking officer to an inferior ranking officer in

the military. Anybody serving in the military in here, and they know somebody

that's served in the military. When he never raise your hand in church,

the rest of your faith people online, I want my online people to read

your head. Yeah, this whole idea of a superior ranking officer giving a

command, I didn't serve in the natural military. I've been in the Army

of the Lord a long time. But the way I understand it is,

when a superior ranking officer gives a command to an inferior ranking officer, what

are your options, Simon, what would you think? We got two Simons?

What I got first and second? Simon, first and second? Peter,

Yes, yes, sir, right, that's pretty much it from what

I understand the natural military works. Now I've got good news. I've been

in the Army of the Lord. We have options, religious options. They

sound so good and religious. So then we get a command. Certainly.

The first thing is I'm going to pray about it. I'll let you I've

got to pray about that. I'm really sure I can go witness to somebody

why I can pray about it? Or this is a really good one too.

You know, I just don't bear witness to that command. I'm not

how I have nobody's no officers in here. But if you were to ask

a soldier, how does that work? With your commander? If he tells

you something you just don't bear witness, what do you do? Just pounder

your chest like Christians do. Don't have a witness, sir. You don't

have a witness about cleaning the lutree this afternoon, hike, or I'll just

I'll go to the bunk house and pray about it. And if I'm the

lad, then I'll come back and fulfill the command. Right are you with

me? How many? Okay? So? How many any parents in the

room? Okay? Anybody knows some parents? How many? Still have to

raise your hand? Church, get espressed? So parenting, Sun, what

I'd like you to clean your room this afternoon before I get home from work.

You need to clean your room? Yes, dad? Okay? Thank

you, Thanks for the command. Dad comes home from work. Did you

clean your room? You know, Dad, After you left, I started

praying about that, and I was I was just led to go outside and

enjoy the fresh air at the beach with my friends, right or you know,

Dad, I wanted to clean my room, and I will clean my

room. But you know, I just didn't have a witness that today would

be the best day. I think next week would be better. Dad.

And you got to understand my heart. Dad, it wasn't in my heart

to clean my room. So we all laugh. But that's how we treat

God. I see your commands, God, Soul, this command, this

military command, I'm entrusting to you. So now it's a sacred entrustment.

And knows Paul's references. He says, according to the prophecy, is Paul

saying, not because I'm an apostle. I'm not pulling rank on you.

I'm going all the way to the top according to the prophecy made about you,

that which is a purpose clause in the Greek. Here's the purpose not

to make your life miserable. Is so what you can have good warfare?

Because he says, Tim, you're gonna have warfare. You're gonna pastor these

Ephesians and there are a bunch of intellects and stiff neck people, and signment

you're gonna have warfare. That by them what the prophecies? You can wage

good warfare. This word wage interesting verb, and now waging is a verb,

and then the noun warfare come from the same root word in the Greek

strataia, and it means It literally means to serve in a military campaign,

to contend. I love this, to contend with carnal inclinations. How many

know that describes our warfare. We're always contending with our carnal inclinations. Or

as Paul describes it in Galatians, the flesh opposes the spirit, and the

spirit opposes the flesh. These he says, these two are in opposition one

to another. That's that's the real warfare. It's in here, it's not

out there. It's not him, it's not her, it's me. It's

my carnal inclinations contending with the things of the spirit. And so it also

means to put a plan in place to invade. See, if you're thinking

military, Paul is thinking military. So to wage warfare is to put a

plan into place to invade some territory. That's what an army does. We're

going to invade Putin has a plan to invade Ukraine, right or whatever.

So there's a plan. The enemy has a plan to invade your space.

Guess what. God has a plan to push back the kingdom of darkness.

And so this warfare is real warfare, and it's how we execute the word

of the Lord. So by them you can wage good warfare. Also interesting,

the word strataia is where we get the English word strategy. And the

good news is in every prophetic word that God speaks to you, there's a

hidden strategy for victory. There's a strategy that God wants to reveal to you.

That's why you have to meditate on your prophecy. Where he said in

First Timothy chapter four, this isn't in my notes, but I'll just give

it to you. He says that we're to verse fourteen, four fourteen.

Don't neglect the gift that you have, which was given by prophecy when the

Council of Elders laid their hands on you. Verse fifteen. Practice these things.

Devote yourself to them, so that all may see your progress. So

what's Paul further instructing Timothy about that? He says, you take that word,

and your strategy is in that word. And how do you extract the

strategy of God? You meditate on it. That's why I said, take

that word, don't neglect it. But he said, meditate on that word.

Now we've lost the fine art of meditation. I think we want quick

reels. Now we want short, quick, quick, quick, fast,

give me information fast. Thou shalt meditate. God said to Joshua, this

word of the Lord will not depart party mouth. You shall meditate day and

night. Sheep eat. Strangely, sheep's stomachs have four compartments. So when

sheep eat the first round, they break it down, ruminate, and it

goes into the first stomach, and guess what, They bring it back up

again in round two, and they chew it some more and the sticks come

out in the little grain, and and then they take it down to the

next stomach, and that ruminates some more, and then it comes back up.

And this is the process of meditation. And the whole time they're extracting

the nutrients, getting rid of the bad stuff and extracting all the nutrients out

of that whatever they're eating. And so that's what we really have to do.

There's there's nutrients in a word from God. There's nutrients in the word

of God. We have to meditate like she, we have to ruminate.

So as he said, I want you to devote yourself to them, I

think the Greek says it much better. He says, actually see yourself in

its nicol. So if you get a prophetic word where God gives you something

about the future, and your immediate response says, well, I don't see

myself doing that, well no, because it's futuristic and you haven't done it

yet. But that's why God's kind of giving you, you know, featured

featured events coming right this is this is what's going to come in your life.

And you go, want, I'm not doing that right now. It

goes precisely, So see yourself doing it to where if God says, you

know, make props saying you know, I see you, I see you

going to a foreign field and reaching people, going down a missions trip.

You I don't even have a passport, Well get a passport, you know,

I mean step one, get a passport, Step two, check with

the pay are we going on any missions trips. Can I sign up for

missions? Maybe there's a group going. You got to begin to see yourself

in it. Taking I say it this way, anybody ever, like a

school play or any drama or anything. You just say, we're not we

refuse to raise our hand, clem anymore. So stop tricking us. We're

not. We're not just gonna We're just not gonna raise our hand. Okay.

So, if you're to play, they hand out your script, right

your part. Here's your part. You're mister so and so. Okay,

I've never been mister so and so. Yeah, but read your lines and

begin to what see yourself as mister so and so, see yourself in it.

That's what he's saying. Practice these things, devote yourself to them.

See yourself into what that you're profiting into. The King James says, And

here's progress will be seen by everybody. Pro Cope is the Greek word.

Your profiting will be seen by all. Pro Cope means to advance through obstacles.

See so, there's warfare, there's obstacles in fulfilling a word from God.

But when you advance through the obstacle, guess what other people are watching.

That's why we give prophecy in public, That's why we do it in

a church. That's why community is the context for every prophetic word. Why

it's not just about you, It's about how other people are affected by your

fulfilling a prophecy. So when our sister goes to Uganda and we see the

fruit of a prophetic word, comes back and says, guess what happened in

Uganda? What this? And they prophesied this and then this happened, We

go ooh, her profiting. We all get to take part of That makes

sense. So here's some things that we remember about the prophetic. The prophetic

always involves a process. It's not about just getting a word. It's not

just information transfer from God to you. Every time you receive a prophetic word,

you enter a brand new process of development with God in essence. You

say, why is their prophecy? What is the purpose of prophecy? Very

simple? To make you more christ Like. It's to make you more like

Jesus ultimately, because you enter a process of development, and as you fulfill

that prophetic word, you're going to become more christ Like because you're going to

have to get rid of some things that aren't you and pick us some things

that come from Him. So no process, no arrival. In other words,

you can't say thank you for that prophetic word. I've just got it

written out. It's going in my Bible and it will sit there until it's

done and God send me a text. I'm busy when that word is fulfilled,

just past your date. Let me know when my prophecy is fulfilled with

you, I'm busy. No, you enter a process. If you don't

engage in the process, you'll never arrive at the death nation God has for

you. Secondly, it is not just the delivery of that singular word.

It's not just the word the Lord coming through one of you to somebody else

or a prophet whatever. It's actually something that you engage in by then going

back to God. We call it. I call it the journey of inquiry.

It starts fresh dialogue with God. It's not one way communication. A

prophetic word comes. You ought to have questions. In fact, if you

don't, I would then that wasn't even so much a prophecy, just kind

of like a hip at a boy. You're doing great, It's like,

okay, thanks, I needed I needed a little encouragement. It might be

an encouraging word, but if there's something that God wants to change in you

and doing you, you have to go back to God and get the details.

It's like I said, you could You could say God, I want

more details, and he goes, well, then come find out right,

come on, it's almost like God, I wanted more. God, you

can get more. Come spend time with me. It's God's invitation to spend

time with him. God can be very cryptic sometimes, you know the You

know when Jesus was teaching on a prayer and he said, when you pray,

go into your closet and close the door. And the God who is

in secret. Kryptos is the Greek word. It's where we get the word

cryptic. God's very cryptic. He speaks in codes. Sometimes, you know,

you have to go and decipher God, what did you really mean by

that? God will show you things, but he wants you to come into

his cryptic place and engage with him. So a prophetic word requires you to

go back to the God that gave it. Take the person out, take

me out, dave out wherever, get rid of that. That's just a

delivery boy. He delivered the bread. But you've got to go to the

baker say how did you make this? And you go back to God.

Why? Because God wants to build his relationship with you. See. The

danger is to hear a word from God and then try to fulfill it in

your own strength. I guarantee that's a disaster waiting to happen. God will.

God will make sure you can't fulfill it on your own strength. You're

going to say, God, I need you. How am I going to

do this without you? He goes, That's what I'm looking for. And

so what begins is future insight, which we all want, and the Holy

Spirit was given to us to show us things to come. That's why we

do love prophecy, and we're privileged. We're the only humans on the planet

that can actually say I know the future. That'll be a good conversation starter.

I want to go wins to one of your friends. But how are

you doing good? You know I've been hearing some things about the future.

What tell me what news? Speed A you're watching? What app How do

I download that? I got a great download for you. What begins is

insight in the future has to at some point eventualized into some kind of action.

Remember the word the Lord was designed for action. In the Old Testament,

there's a word the bar in the Hebrew used over five thousand times,

translated this way, the word of the Lord, the word of the Lord.

Now that word dabar means that which pushes from behind. So the idea

when God speaks there's a there's a divine push for action. It can't just

sit there inside of you. It's meant to be done, not just to

be heard. So what kind of actions? Well, God begins to change

some thinking strategies once you get rid of some stuff. I said that journey

of inquiry just it should be questioned after question, Well God, what do

I do? What should I stop doing? What do I need to pick

up? What do I need to let go of? Who do I need

to talk to? I say, what authenticates a word from God? Is

you ought to have a lot of questions. If you have questions, you

heard from God. So what happens then is we we end up in battles.

We end up in the warfare. Let me just describe a few what

I call battlefields of the prophetic, which we all have. These are the

battles that the enemy tries to engage you in to do what snatch away that

which was sown in your heart. The enemy is a thief. Did you

know that Jesus describes the enemy as a thief. He wants to steal your

word, he wants to take it away. How does he do it with

his words? He will counter the very thing that God said? Did he

not do that in the garden? Very sure thing did God really say?

Did God really say, don't eat of that fruit? So he'll always come

and bring a lie encounter. And so that idea of snatching here, by

the way, his I would say, brazen, prideful audacity to think he

can snatch a word was not even his idea. Where do you think he

got the idea from God? Because God told us Christians. Jesus told Christians,

just as he warned the disciples. If you hear the word of the

Kingdom and don't understand the enemy, he's going to come and snatch away.

He's going to do what I just told you to do. Two chapters earlier,

Matthew eleven, verse twelve, he said, the Kingdom of Heaven suffers

violence. You know this verse, and the violent ones take it by force.

Same Greek word harpazzo. We're the violent ones. We're supposed to be

violently aggressively advancing the Kingdom of God. How with words. See, it's

always a war of words. It's our preaching of the gospel, it's making

a disciple, it's confession. All these words is how we advance the kingdom.

And so the devil here is hmm. The Kingdom of heaven suffers violence.

Woo against who kingdom of darkness and the violent ones. That's not the

devil in his cohorts, that's us. We take it by force, we

seize it in more fair and the double goes, humph. I guess I'm

gonna counter that. I'm gonna seize their words by force, because if they

go, they get out there confessing and preaching and and believing I'm done.

So he says, I'm gonna you get a prophecy? You got you don't

believe that good. He takes us onto these battlefields, and the first one

is going to be the battlefield of delay, where it's like pastor, what

spend three weeks since that prophecy, nothing's happened. Can I get another one?

I was online and I had whatever. Yeah, the battlefield of delay.

We all go through delays because God's time is not our time. And

so you think of, you know, someone like Abraham. There's so many

examples in the Bible. But good to Abraham got a great prophecy. You're

gonna have a child. It's your old age, and you're gonna be even

older when you actually have it. I mean twenty five years still didn't have

that. You know, that's a battlefield. What was God trying to do

though he was forging faith? And who was to be the father of our

faith? See, every day of delay is not denial. It's a day

of preparation because I was preparing you for something and you say, God,

I'm gonna so trust you. I have to believe in you. Quick story.

We my wife and I got baptized in Holy Spirit almost forty one years

ago, nineteen eighty two, and we got one of our first prophetic words

within within a year from doctor Bill Hammon, who's still alive. He's in

his eighties. He's kind of like one of the fathers of the prophetic movement.

And one of the things he said, so, I mean like one

or two years in the Lord, he says, I see God opening up

a big beautiful home and it's for my glory, and you're gonna, you're

gonna, you're gonna want people in your house and all this stuff. We're

like, yeah, we're newly Wesbarn living. I mean, I quit my

job, was in the hotel business, got baptism in the Holy Spirit,

then quit my job and went to work at this church for a eighty five

percent pay cut. When you I mean, it's an offer I couldn't refuse.

And so we had nowhere to live. We lived in the basement of

one of the elders of the church till we could scrape up enough money to

rent a little one bedroom flat. So it was exciting days. And then

we get this prophecy God's going to open up a big, beautiful home.

We're like, yes, and we're in the Word of Faith movement back then,

so it's like any day now, any day now, mansion, mansion

of this guy. Well, let me fast forward. Fourteen years later,

we bought our first home. Fourteen years. What's interesting is every time we

moved, and we moved a lot because we were always renting and we were

always moving. Every time we moved, we paid a little more rent.

It's like God said you cannot. He didn't say it that way, but

the basis like you need to pay more rent, you need to go for

something a little bit bigger. It was maybe like maybe one hundred pounds or

hundred dollars more than we were paying, which was a stretch. But every

time we moved, it's like God stretched our faith and we had to believe

God. And long story short, fourteen years later we foundly we were able

to buy our first home. And why because God stretched our faith For fourteen

years we didn't have we didn't have enough faiths to get the home that God

propsied about. And we just didn't fold our arms and say, well,

God, Africa Dabor, we need to give us this big house with no

mortgage. Oh we had a mortgage and everything, you know. But God

was preparing us as stretching us. So battlefield of delay second is a battlefield

of what I call no recognition. What does that mean? I said,

Lord says there's leadership in you. You're going to be leading, and you

got a call to leadership in the house of God, and God's preparing you.

You know a great story about leader, right, and then you walk

out of the meeting that night, and everybody but you hear my word leader,

hear me hear my prophecy about leader. I told you, yeah,

this is always a matter of time. But ha. Yeah. So you

come back the next week and you walk in and they can you Greek people

at the door? Ah, you hear my prophecy Sunday. I'm a leader,

not a door, not a greeter, a leader. When do I

start leading? What do you want to lead? Could you just you know,

oh, by the way, somebody just spilled the milk, and can

you go mop that up in the kit Leader? The prophecy said, leader,

not cleaner. Leader. Oh yeah right, So yeah, thanks for

reminding me. Next Tuesday, we're starting our leadership training on Tuesday nights at

seven. So it's it's eight weeks, like you to be there. What

night Tuesday? Tuesday, it's my bowling night. Can't make it. Sorry,

Just just I'll just lead. I'll just just tell me what to lead.

I'm want to lead something. Do you have to lead the meeting?

You want to preach? It's like no, no, okay, forget it,

forget this church. I'm going to the other church. I'm gonna bring

my prophecy I'm gonna show it to the passing. See, I got this

prophecy, and they don't. They don't recognize my leadership at all. Done

there, So I'm supposed to be a leader. So I'm here to lead,

and the devil goes good and diddy diddy biddy, they're supposed to lead

at that church because they got no recognition. I stole the word from them.

You say, how the devil works, it's never going to happen.

They'll never recognize you. And here's the other one, the battlefield of true

misunderstanding, where I didn't understand and therefore I'm not going to seek God.

I'm going to seek everybody else in their opinion, and I'll take a poll.

What do you think that meant? What do you think it mean?

What did you think? And we pulled the audience like job he pulled his

friends. What do you think? Why do you think I'm going through this?

Why am I going through this? Wollw because you did this and we

asked everybody but God what he meant? You do? You should counsel with

your spiritual oversight, your pastor's thing. But sometimes we get stuck on the

battlefield of misunderstanding. And so there can be too many voices. You can

ask too many people, so you spiritually discern what God's saying. Isaiah fifty

five is instructive for us from Isaiah verses eight on through ten and eleven,

where he said, first of all, my thoughts aren't your thoughts. It's

pretty clear. My ways aren't your ways. As high as the heavens are

above the earth, so are my thoughts from yours. So you have to

start there. First of all, when God talks, they're not my thoughts.

It's not gonna sink with your thoughts. Immediately prophecies to help change you

to think like God thinks. That's why when you sometimes you get a preparty

word to go that makes no sense, and God goes, good, got

a good start going here makes no sense. Good, We're in a good

starting place. Then you go back to God and say, God, what

did you mean by that? High's the heavens are above the earth, so

are my thoughts and your thoughts. So you have to allow that thought.

Then. Isn't great how God uses a simple weather analogy, as the rain

and the snow come down from heaven. They come from another source, but

their job is the same. To water that which is sown in the earth.

So shall my word be that comes out of my mouth. Here's the

best part. It will not return empty. It will not go back.

There's no reverse year in a prophecy. Aren't you glad God never takes me

because oh I'm sorry, I messed up. I'll to get back. No,

he says it's going to stay until you engage with it. Do you

believe there's a lot of prophecies floating around in the earth and nobody's really engaged

actively with those prophecies. They'll hang in suspension, sometimes for hundreds of years.

I think about the prophecies about the Messiah hung in suspension until in the

fullness of time God sent his son. So we have to engage otherwise there

will be this battle of misunderstanding, and then the devil will try to snatch

away that word and say, yeah, that wasn't for you anyway, Oh

it wasn't. No, that was for your wife. Oh good, I

don't want to have to read my Bible as much as her anyway. Okay,

so you know we have all these misunderstanding. Two more and then we'll

take a lunch break. There's the battlefield of doubt, which is very close

to the battlefield of delay. That will always they always kind of work together.

If the devil can get you on the battlefield of delay, his ultimate

goal is to get you in the take you all the way into the battlefield

of doubt, and the words will come that will never happen, that wasn't

for you. And you start hearing all those words. The writer of Hebrews

said in Chapter four, verse two, he says, the word preached,

which is not prophesytas, but it's the idea of the word delivered to the

children of Israel, did not profit them. Why they didn't mix faith with

it. That's where you have to mix faith. That's the antidote to doe.

It's faith. Believe I don't believe that, Well, you're never going

to see that happen. Then you know you have to mix faith with it.

That's why I said. Your heart is the chamber of your faith,

and your mouth is the organ of your faith. And you put those two

together, you have a divine transaction between heaven and earth. Something happens is

how you get born again boom. Spiritual transaction when you mix the faith in

your heart and it comes out of your mouth, something happens, as we

call a confession. Jesus is the high priest of what our confession. Homo

logion is the Greek word. It means to say the same thing. In

other words, say the same thing God says about you. You're a child

of God, You're beloved, You're more than a conqueror. Ah, you're

in that name and claim it grew up? Aren't you just that? No,

that's what God says about you. You better say what God says about

you, because otherwise, who are you gonna agree with? Right? The

devil says, no, I want you to agree with me. You're an

idiot, You're stupid, You'll never amount to much, and you're never gonna

be able to you know, and those I don't know about you, Those

things come into my head. I was I was walking down to my office

when my offices in my basement of my house, and I just done something

really stupid. I admit it. I was shocked. I'm walking down the

stairs and inside I didn't even say it out loud. Inside I went,

you're such an idiot. I just said that, and man, the Holy

Spirit arrested me so quickly. I was so clear. I knew it was

only spirit because I'm thinking, I'm still thinking I'm an idiot and agreeing with

myself that I'm an idiot. And I heard this, I don't say that

about you, just like that. Bickwick came right away. I don't say

that about you, and it wasn't mean. It was not It was just

kind of like, I don't say that about you, and I knew that

wasn't mean. I knew that was the Holy Spirit going, I don't call

you an idiot. I went, oh, it just it was one of

those revelation moments. We have to agree with what God says about you.

I'm a child of God, I'm the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.

And these things are important in the battlefield of doubt because the enemy will try

to get you out of faith. And then finally we have the battlefield of

what we call the prophetic crisis. This is interesting, but buckle up.

We're almost done, and we'll give you some pizza and it'll make you feel

better. A prophet crisis. Now, the word crisis comes from the root

word actually comes from the word a decision point. It's where you have to

make it you're forced to make a decision right, which ultimately probably means you're

forced to change, which we don't like, but you're forced to because of

God's prophetic intention. So what happens is we go into this testing time.

The crisis comes through a test, and again, if God designs a test

for you, you can't pray it away. You can't say, God,

I'm going to skip the test this week, I'm going to skip it.

Is that, okay? Can I do a makeup test when I'm ninety?

So a couple of ideas Psalm eighteen thirty and Propers five or Proverbs thirty verse

five kind of say the same thing about the word of godness. As for

God's word, it is pure, or it's actually in the Hebrew it's more

of a verb, it's a pure fire. And the picture of that would

be out of an old smelting furnace that they would stoke up to very high

temperatures, and then they would take raw ore from the ground and throw it

in the smelting furnace, and then it would break down and bubble up and

get very hot, and then all the impurities would come up to the surface,

and then they would scrape off the impurities and they'd be left with pure

or whatever that was gold copper. And it says God's word is a pure

fire. What does that mean? When God's word goes in you, God

goes good? The word went in them. Okay, turn up the heat,

turn the heat up, angels, Oh what happens? Well, suddenly

this bubbling stuff happens. Things start changing in you, and impurities start coming

to the surface that you didn't even think we're in there. It's like,

I haven't cost in twenty years whatever, something bad. That attitude comes out.

You thought I've got control in that area. And then the heat comes

on the pressure. The testing the furnace was God's drilling down into something in

you that's gonna He wants to extract out of your life to what make you

more christ like. He knows what's in there. So those words come in

and you go through a crisis, crisis of faith, a financial crisis that

helps crisis, some kind of crisis. There's a turning point that causes impure

thoughts, impure thinking, wrong theology about God, wrong theology about you.

Something God wants to undo. Bring that impurity up and scrape it away so

there's more pure Jesus in you than contaminated Jesus. Right. It talks about

Jude right. It says, we wear the garment is spotted by the flesh,

and we all have impurities. So God takes us into these testing times

like Joseph. The Great Commentary on the life of Joseph in Psalms, the

Psalmist said this in Psalm one hundred and five, verse nineteen. It says,

asked for God word it tested him. It says his neck was put

in iron. Neck is actually me feesh, it's actually the word for soul.

When Joseph went through his testings. You know, he's falsely accused,

he's thrown into prison, and yeah, and the natural maybe he was put

into iron, but actually it was his soul was put into iron. He

was under limitation, and it says and he remained there, and the word

of the Lord tested him. Joseph went through a purifying and the testing for

what his promotion. You know the story of Joseph. But it shows how

God will take us through these things to purify us. And so I'm going

to give you a good, a good scripture to finish with. First Peter,

chapter five and verse ten it's one of my favorites. I love this

the way that and Peter guess what how many and Peter went through some testing.

He went through some serious testing. He went through some failure. Peter

had a great prophecy, right or Peter upon this rock, I'll bill about

church. Peter had some great prophetic words, but he also had some challenges.

Right, he denied Christ and all that. So Peter understood testing.

He actually called it that the trial, that the trying of your faith produces

something good. Peter realized that, so he closes his first epistle five verse

ten. I watched the words. There's really good, he says. And

after you've suffered a while in that comforty, what does that mean? You

will suffer? So after you've suffered The keyword there is after, after you've

suffered a while. Tell me the Kingdom of God was built on suffering.

We can't pray it away. Jesus tried to pray it away. If anybody's

going to get his prayers answers, it's got to be Jesus. Right.

At some point, you have to have that moment of consecration like he did.

Nevertheless, not my will here will be done. So after you've suffered

a while patho. That means to experience a sensation or impression. That's usually

there's some kind of pain involved. It could be mental pain, physical pain.

It's a severe human experience. That's what suffering is. After you've suffered,

let's go back to verse nine. Sorry, well let's go back to

verse eight. Well, let's go back to verse six. Well, okay,

verse five. God opposes the problem, gives grace to the humble.

We all know that one. So humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of

God, so that at the proper time he may exalt you. That's Joseph's

life, right, casting all your anxieties out on him. Now, notice

Peter's using words that he personally experienced anxiety. Why because he cares for you.

Be sober minded, Be watchful your adversary, the devil, that's the

one, the thief that goes to steal. He prowls around like a roaring

line, seeking someone to devour. Resist him. Firm in your faith knowing.

The word knowing is actually a pight word in the Greek is idoll and

it really means to actually to see or perceive with faith. It's the one

seeing word in the Greek that's tied to faith, knowing or seeing that the

same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And

after you've suffered a little while, here we go the God of all grace.

Just soak that phrase in. He's always there. He never leaves you,

even in your suffering moment. He is the God of all grace,

all grace Peter Back in chapter four, he said, in verse ten,

as each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good

stewards of God's varied grace. God's varied grace. The King James use the

word manifold, not just for mechanics. It's manifold grace. You know what

that means, multi colored, multifaceted grace. God has a multicolored, multifaceted

grace to match every one of your trials. James said, what count it

all joy? James Chapter one, When you fall into all kinds of trials,

that's the same Greek word multicolored trials. Trials come in all colors,

don't they all shapes and sizes. We all have different trials. Guess what.

God has a matching grace for whatever trial. He's the God of all

grace. So if you're having a blue Monday, Simon, God's got blue

grace for your blue Monday. Right, no matter what color trial you're going

through. God, he's the God of all grace. So Peter knew that.

He says, so after you suffered a while, the God of all

grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, and don't

ever forget that. That's why I said, we have to think differently as

we walk around planet Earth. We're called to an eternal glory. Watch now,

will him strong language to show this is what God's grace will do for

you. After you've suffered, well, he will forwards, will finish these

forwards. He will restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. It's

all about you. It's really all about you. Whatever suffering God design,

whatever piet crisis you come into, it's still about you. What being restored.

That's the same word for equip. You know, a trial and earthly

suffering is part of the equipping of the saints. It's the same Greek word

cat artismus that we use in Ephesians for it to equip the saints. It

will restore it will confirm, staridzo. Great word means turn resolutely in a

certain direction. A trial and a suffering, the grace of God will help

turn you in a direction that God wants you to go in. That's why

it's called a crisis. Is called a turning point because God says, I

want you to go another direction, and you're not listening. It's not working.

So we're going to arrange some circumstance is to get you to go in

a certain direction. Restore, confirm, strengthen, strengthen in spiritual knowledge and

powers. Where that word really means doesn't mean just go work out of the

gym every week. There's a spiritual strength in that word. And then it

will establish. I love that means to build foundation, to lay a strong

basis underneath you. It just continues to put a strong foundation underneath you.

All these trials and tests through a prophetic word will restore, confirm, strengthen,

and establish you. Make you solid as a rock to Him be dominion

forever and ever. Amen. You feel strengthened just by that exhortation alone,

that little doxology that Peter gives. And Peter had been through it, he'd

been through it and he became a foundation stone in the early Church. So

thank God for Peter, aren't you? Glad for Peter? Makes me feel

very human when I read about Peter's So let's pray. Father, we thank

you for your word. We thank you. You've called us to be prophetic

people, to hear from God and do what he says. That's the hard

part, we know, God. But that's where the trials come in.

That's where the change comes. That's where transformation takes place. And we need

it, Father, we need it. That's why we're still on planet Earth.

There's still another level of transformation. Christ's likeness. Do you want to

build into us before we all hit eternity? Which we will, And we're

grateful for that that you are the God of all glory. You are the

God that has called us to eternal glory in Christ Jesus. And oh,

that's got to make everybody happy just to know that that's what we're called to.

So we give you all the glory, we give you all the praise.

We thank you for the food they were about to partake. Thank you

for the rich fellowship we'll get to have around tables and dialogue and Christ's likeness

we just thank you. And for those I just feel maybe I'm catching a

draft of what the Holy Spirit was whispering today. It kind of jumped off

the page when I was reading about this exhortation. Here Lord, if anybody

has anxiety, even right now, it says, we're to cast all of

our anxiety on him because he cares for you. If you have anxiety,

just lift it to Jesus right now. Cast him. It means acbollo means

to take it and throw it. Throw your anxiety, marror him. Not

oh, I think is the Greek word there, and it means to have

a distracting care. If you're distracted right now by something that's distracting you,

cast it on Jesus is cast it on it right now. Might be a

child, might be a family situation. Whatever it is, he cares for

you. He cares for you. We've got to say the same thing the

Bible says, Jesus does care. Don't let the devil in, don't let

him lie, don't let him say, well, you know what, you're

insignificant. He doesn't care for you. No, that's not what the Word

of God says. He cares for us, and we receive the loving care

of our Father, our great Shepherd. Right now I speak peace and rest

over this, this whole day, in Jesus' name. Amen, Amen,

Amen, God bless you