Hi all! In light of the recent hurricane, I’d like to rehash some things that have come up the last few weeks. It may help to just talk about it all again. There are many voices out there. When you boil them all down, there are only three – God, self and satan. But there are a multitude of angels and demons. The Bible says the heavens declare the glory of God. Prophetic people think that’s an ongoing thing, that there are countless voices declaring what God is doing and giving Him glory. A somewhat eerie reminder for us all is that satan is the prince of the power of air. It’s possible to hear what is referred to as second heaven revelation, a domain in which satan (aka prince of power of the air) and his minions speak and have authority. What does that mean for us? You test the spirits (1st John 4:1) whenever you think God is revealing something to you. But there’s more to it than that. Even if God is telling you something, do you move out in faith on it?
There’s not a step-by-step list of what to do when God speaks. You learn as you go. When it comes to prophecy, people wrongly assume that God is just going to show up and give a word for word prophecy and tell you to deliver it just as He spoke it. That’s wrong. Oh, there’s plenty of examples of that happening in the Old Testament. But that is not how it always works. Furthermore, there'd be no faith in that. You'd be sure it was God and wouldn't need faith. You have to see the big picture before you teach anything from the Bible. There’s more to prophesying than getting a word for word prophecy. The prophets sometimes got a prophecy from a vision. There are plenty of examples of that. Isaiah 2:1, Micah 1:1, Hab 2:2, 1st Chron 17:15 all contain evidence of some kind of visual playing a part in the prophecy. Meaning – something had to be interpreted.
If you’ve been following along the last few weeks, this will feel like review. I’ll try to include some new material so bear with me. A few weeks ago, the Lord spoke to me and said, “Showcase prophecy.” He still hasn’t said anything else about that. To the best of my knowledge I’m moving out in faith on those words by sending out these weekly emails on prophecy and the gifts. God does that often with me. He gives me 1-3 words and doesn’t say anything else. I pray about it. I look at the words. I consider a biblical view of those words. I look at them from another angle. Flip it over and look some more. Process it according to what He’s shown me before, what I know to be true, even comparing it to the backdrop of my own life, just looking for clues. The only thing that showcase prophecy goes with is this blog and my third book, which is already all about prophecy. I’ve interpreted the words, “Showcase prophecy,” even though it did not come from a dream or vision (See the word riddle in Numb 12:6-8, especially verse 8).
Then the Lord spoke one day and said, “Overachiever.” There was nowhere to go with that word at that moment. Sometimes you just write it down, put it on a shelf and come back to it later. Later in the day, I saw a social media post with a weather forecaster that mentioned a storm in the gulf headed to Texas. It said the storm probably wouldn’t do much damage but sometimes they can be overachievers. I caught it. Most people wouldn’t connect the word overachiever to that and those that did might brush it off as a coincidence. I’ve gotten to a place where I consider just about everything. Not everything means something. There are coincidences. There are a multitude of voices that would like to lead you astray or at least lead you down a rabbit trail to distract you from whatever you need to be doing. However, sometimes these things are more than coincidences.
I mentioned all this to you in a previous email. As you know, the Texas storm wasn’t significant. The next storm was. As you probably know, hurricane Idalia hit Florida as a deadly category three hurricane. It became a category four at one point before weakening slightly prior to impact with Florida. According to Wikipedia, the rapid intensification that Idalia went through was some of the fastest ever witnessed. I couldn’t find another source, but remember seeing an article that quoted someone in the hurricane center saying, “No one has seen anything like this.” No doubt, this storm was an overachiever.
To be clear, I never prophesied anything. I speculated a little about a possible storm. Let’s be real. It’s September 2. We’re in peak hurricane season. Anybody could predict a hurricane in August or September. They’d have a good chance of being correct if they did. Let’s be real. It’s been 100 degrees everyday for awhile now, here in Texas. The water in the gulf is hot. All of the ingredients are there for a remarkably powerful storm. An overachieving hurricane. So why not prophesy something like that?
I thought about it. God didn’t give me any more details. Granted, I didn’t spend much time asking Him about it. I’ve prophesied stuff like this before. In the back of my mind, knowing He spoke, “Showcase prophecy,” I assumed there would be something significant. He never gave me any more details. Again, it crossed my mind. I never felt comfortable with it. The Bible says we prophesy according to our faith (Romans 12:6). This may not make sense. I had the faith for it, but didn’t have the faith for it. Knowing God well enough to know that He was signaling a storm was not enough to step out and prophesy on. Instead, I prayed against it. And you know what? Even if I had prophesied a hurricane, I would have prayed against it. That’s what you do. There are ethics that come into play with this sort of thing. I know people that would insist that you should be like Elijah and withhold the rain in prayer. Bringing that application into prophesying a hurricane, there are people that would say you prophesy the hurricane and then pray for a hurricane. NO! You always act like Abraham did and argue with God, just as Abraham did with Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 18). Why am I going here?
The gift of prophecy is somewhat complicated. You look at the Old Testament prophets and see everything they did and sometimes assume that’s how it should work in the New Testament. According to Paul, prophecy is meant to edify, exhort and comfort (1st Corinthians 14:1-3). A hurricane is not edifying or encouraging. A hurricane is not comforting. Prophesying a hurricane doesn’t fit Paul’s description in Corinthians. It can still be done and I’ll explain more about that next week. For now, just remember that Holy Spirit can still show you things to come (John 16:13). You don’t always prophesy everything you think God is showing you. But you have to know that He will show you things. Often it’s a prayer assignment. And it’s a pattern. If you’re interested in that pattern, here’s some homework: Genesis 18:17, Psalms 25:14, Prov 25:2, Amos 3:7, John 15:15, Rev 1:1, Rev 4:1.
I hope this blesses you! Pray into the aftermath of Hurricane Idalia! Those people need help!