The Spirit of Prophecy and Its Role in the Church Part 1
How can we ensure the prophetic movement in the church remains a force for good – a beacon of unity and hope? Join us on a fascinating journey as we uncover the answers. Hear me, Amanda Hill, Ned Maraman, Francisco Vega, Wayland Henderson, and Elizabeth Tiam-Fook talk about the purpose and future of the prophetic movement. We embark on a deep exploration of the prophetic movement – we question its roots, reason, and future trajectory.
Simultaneously, we bravely face the errors that we must right, and the elements we must protect and cherish. The spirit of community is the lifeblood of the prophetic movement. Our conversation underscores the importance of unity and the necessity of diverse gifts among prophetic leaders.
We lay bare the critical importance of prophetic purity and the non-negotiable need for accuracy and integrity in the prophetic voice. Taking a detour into the realm of leadership, we emphasize the need for leaders to be firmly rooted in a New Testament, ancient Christian environment.
We warn against the disruptive spirit of Leviathan that can sow seeds of division and accusation in the community. We engage in a spirited debate on the role of prophets in contemporary times. How can they effectively foster unity and continuity?
We also warn against the traps of popularity and the need to balance prophetic power with practicality. We shine a light on the dark corners of spiritual abuse by leaders, and the urgent need for fruit to match the gift. Prepare to be enlightened about the prophetic movement in the church, the challenges it faces, and the solutions we propose.
Where to dive in:
(0:00:09) – Prophetic Movement
We discuss the prophetic movement, its purpose, and its future, with a panel of guests from diverse backgrounds.
(0:03:36) – Building Family in the Prophetic
We discuss division, accusation, family, strength, and Tammy’s story of suffering.
(0:19:11) – Prophetic Purity and Leadership Mishandling
Pursuing prophetic purity, holiness, accuracy, integrity, and practicality in the prophetic movement.
(0:28:58) – Maintaining Community Amidst Differences
Fostering unity in the prophetic movement, celebrating roles, assignments and gifts, breaking down schisms, stewarding and training God’s people, and loving one another.
(0:34:35) – Leadership, Prophets, and Shepherd Hearts
Leadership, identity in Christ, acceleration, spiritual abuse, fruit, trust, and wrong narrative discussed in prophetic movement.
(0:46:35) – Discovery and Integrity of Prophetic Gifts
We examine qualifications, integrity, holiness, Leviathan, and the fear of the Lord.
(0:50:38) – Role of Prophets in Modern Times
We discuss God’s protection, unity, continuity, qualifications, and protection from Leviathan.
About the host:
Tammie Southerland is the host of Burning Messengers and the author of Permission To Bur: Breaking the Chains of Compromise from a Holy Generation. She is also a speaker and prophetic minister. She releases the sound authentic of revival and messages from heaven as she travels. Her lifestyle is one of prayer and digging deep into the Word of God, her desire is to releasing the Heart of The Father in these last days. She moves in power ministry and is known for releasing the Matthew 3:11 “baptism of Holy Fire” as she goes. Buy
Tammie’s Book “Permission to Burn: Breaking the Chains of Compromise from a Holy Generation” here: https://a.co/d/cznvVYK
Transcript
0:00:09 – Speaker 2
God is doing so much. We’ve entered in this new season and I these are some of the most amazing voices are on the forefront of what God’s doing, and so what we want to do is we want to talk tonight. First, you know, why did God create the prophetic movement, what’s the purpose in the church? But also we want to talk about the future of the prophetic movement. What are some maybe errors that we need to come in as mothers and fathers for the next generation and kind of come around and say, hey, this can be corrected and or like, what do we carry on? What do we correct? So we’re going to talk about some deep things, we’re going to talk about relational things tonight, and so let’s start with Amanda Hill. Let’s introduce everyone, everyone introduce yourself, tell where, where you’re from and what you do.
0:00:53 – Speaker 3
I’m Amanda Hill. I live outside Chawston, south Carolina. Everybody want to make fun because I said Chawston instead of Charleston. I travel itinerantly. Amanda Hill dot org. I have two amazing children. We live on a hundred acre family farm and it’s not as glorious and glamorous as it seems. It’s a lot of hard work but we are grateful for the blessing of a farm during the season and I’m happy to be here. Thanks, elizabeth.
0:01:25 – Speaker 4
I’m Ned Merriman. I pastor locally here at Vision Church, fort Walton Beach. I also travel and minister mostly on the prophetic. I have a new book on evangelism coming out here very soon. I have six kids. I have six kids, waylon, I’m tired. I’ve been tired for a long time. I have six amazing kids, a wonderful wife, lacey Merriman. So just happy to be a part of this panel.
0:01:48 – Speaker 5
That’s a hoop squad with a six man in the week. Thanks for being here, elizabeth and everybody. My name is Waylon Henderson. I am a pastor and apostolic leader at the Gathering Kingdom Center in Arlington, texas. We travel nationally, internationally, with crusades, discipling pastors to begin to step into what team ministry looks like, and one of our most things we do is drive the concept and understanding and importance of intercession in the body.
0:02:17 – Speaker 1
Yeah, so I’m Tammy Sutherland. I am in love with Jesus. I have three beautiful girls and I’ve been married for 20 years, my husband Damon. We live in the Atlanta Georgia area. I travel it tenorately. I love to hear what the Lord is saying and speak what he’s saying in the hour that he’s speaking it and really for me that message always goes boils back down to his return and intercession. It’s one of my passions is really teaching people how to hear from him and to really fall in love with who he is and fall in love with this word. So really appreciate being here and, yeah, that’s it.
0:02:59 – Speaker 6
Hey, my name is Frankie Vega. I actually pastor the Ark, which is the Awakening of Reformation Center in Atlanta, Georgia, and we also have an itinerant ministry, Spirit and Truth Ministries International. Been married for 12 years, three beautiful kids my beautiful wife Oshia should be watching Lovey Baby and our heart is really just releasing agents of awakening and releasing a new roar of Reformation and rebuilding the old waste places according to Isaiah 58 and 12. And we’re so honored to be here with you, Elizabeth.
0:03:31 – Speaker 2
Yeah, so I want to. I want to open up. We are going to get deep, but let’s get ankle deep first. Okay, so I had this vision at the beginning of September and in the vision the Lord showed me like this iceberg and I in the iceberg, I saw, like people that I knew, people I didn’t know on this iceberg, and the Lord was giving them a decision to make whether they wanted to move with the new, what he was going to do or stay with old mindsets and stay with what they thought was the new. And all of a sudden I saw the Lord’s hand go in and he split, which I thought was one iceberg is two. And so I saw I actually saw people I knew go on the old because they thought we’ve always done it this way, so this is the way we’ll always do it. But then I saw God going with the people that wanted to move with him and it really concerned me. It actually made my heart sad because I knew some of the people that wanted to stay with old mindsets and I think the church has stepped in such a new place. I feel like I feel like they’re young leaders maybe younger leaders I should say that God has put on the forefront and he’s mantled them to help lead the church right now.
And so, with the in the middle of this, I’m watching divine order that God’s doing, but at the same time I’m seeing this covenant breaking spirit come in and trying to break so many relationships in the church between generations, and I’m like there’s this war on and there’s this intercession that’s happening in the body.
And you know, it’s one thing if God’s sword comes to the to move people to different places. It’s a different thing when a covenant breaking spirit comes into play and the wickedness that goes with a covenant breaking spirit. So, tammy, why don’t I start with you in this? You, you have the mic there and why don’t we start with you? Let’s talk about, like, some of the things maybe you’re seeing, and how can we intercession wise, fight for the relationships, because we are a family in the body, right Moving forward. If we don’t understand the family thing, the enemy is going to keep overcoming us. We’re not going to have the strength of unity. So let’s talk about you know, I know you’re writing a book that’s about to come out on the ground what let’s talk about intercession, relationships and kind of like where you see God’s doing in the body.
0:05:51 – Speaker 1
Absolutely so. One of the things that we’ve been talking about recently is is the table. So, you know, there’s this intersection between the tabernacle and the tables. The tabernacle would be your tabernacle. In with the Lord, you’re sitting with him, you’re in intercession with him, and this covenant breaking spirit that you’re talking about is actually, you know, if you look at the scriptures, it’s the spirit of Leviathan. It’s what it is a spirit of accusation, is a spirit of division, and it’s actually ripping apart the body of Christ from the inside out, because it uses lies and intimidation in order to bring division right and so that the reality that we are in a body in intercession right, we’re called to sit with him in heavenly realms. We’re called to hear what he’s saying and what he’s doing, getting divine strategy from heaven.
Intercession is important, not because we have a gift of intercession, but we’re called to be intercessors who were seated with Christ in heavenly places, getting divine intelligence, and so if we can’t hear what he’s saying, then we can’t do what he’s doing, and so so we’re tabernacling with him, right, we’re invited into that place, and then the secondary place is that place of the table, and so you’re seated with him and we’re seated together and one of the parts of this Reformation is that God’s shifting us from doing platform ministry, where it’s about building a organization, back to the place of family, where it’s building an organism. And so if we’re not living in the place of intercession, we’re not living in the place of hearing what he’s saying, doing what he’s doing and meeting with one another around the table, then obviously the enemy has a has leeway to get in and bring accusation and vision.
0:07:39 – Speaker 2
Yeah, let’s, let’s say this really quick, so it’s really important. I know it’s kind of like I talk about this a lot about the company of profits. God made profit so special and we need each other. And I know, I know there was like some things that got in the body and the generation above us like who has the better word. You know, these things have really caused a spirited division to be attached to it and so you don’t, you don’t want to sit around being accountable to each other. You don’t want to sit around because you feel like there’s competitive spirit between us.
But if we’re really going to do this as profits, let’s pull out into the profits. I know that’s a niche towards the body, but with within the prophetic movement, profits are so special. We actually really need each other and so let’s talk about that. And then maybe I think Amanda would be really good on this Sorry, guys, I’m kind of skipping over to the she’ll be a really good one on answering that. So how important it is for profits to really understand how we need each other this season.
0:08:38 – Speaker 3
I can speak from this very personally. June 18 of this year, which was Father’s Day, my husband of 25 years went home to be with the Lord and it has been one of the most difficult seasons of suffering that I’ve ever endured in my life. I’ve buried a child, and so this is, it’s grueling right, and having a company I want to say I don’t want to say company, I want to say family. Having a family that will actually weep when you weep and Sit with you when you want to sit and talk, when you want to talk or laugh when you want to laugh it.
There’s been a very big line of demarcation in my own life regarding boundaries of those who have invested themselves in within my groaning, my grieving, my morning experience and in the prophetic streams and the prophetic friends that I have. The Lord has been. He’s been Helping me understand who’s my seven. When I say that, I mean like who’s gonna sit with me, who’s gonna be with me? And like Jesus, he had Mary, he had Martha, he had Lazarus, he considered them friends, he had his mother and then he had the three disciples, and so I think for me, the family and the prophetic family that’s gathered around me In this moment of suffering.
It’s deepened our relationship and you know there’s been some that I haven’t heard from, and that’s okay, right, but the family that has been birthed through this time of mourning of mine, it has really deepened the relationship. And so you know Tammy had a situation with her daughter and and we had a group page of some of the prophetic voices and we were contending with her and contending for her. And when you have that family, that that when you go through hard times, it builds trust, it builds relationship, it builds perseverance, it builds a grit inside of you. That I, when, when my husband got the diagnosis, a friend of mine, she texts me and she said your battle is my battle and We’ve not done that very well in the prophetic and I feel like that, our generation, we are getting back to the place where kingdom really is family.
0:11:17 – Speaker 2
So good, yeah, ned, you know how. How would you speak to someone that is maybe say they’re 20 years old in the prophetic and they’re starting Not to put platform before building the family within the prophetic?
0:11:34 – Speaker 4
Yeah, I would say To be humble and Recognize that, especially that that age, you’re going through such rapid change that the issue is not so much can I receive revelation? In reality, I think we’ve been around this enough to know that it’s. It’s really Not unusual for a below, for a spirit-filled believer to receive revelation. It’s how do I steward that, how do I interpret that and how do I release it? And Are there any relational guards on those processes? In my life I find when a lot of. Let me how?
I say this we have a very hyper sovereign View that’s subconscious, of prophetic revelation. We don’t understand how much synergy there is between I, the person God created in his image and likeness, and what the spirit is releasing, and 50 in the especially early and younger. We’re so excited that we receive the revelation. We cannot possibly imagine our interpretation being any less accurate than the revelation we received, and Realizing this will me. Let me say this we are, we live in a hyper individualistic culture which is really in a. It’s a it’s. It’s a bubble that was formed post Reformation, coming into the enlightenment and what we see as them as, as Liberalism shaped in the 18th century, and now that actually pervades all of culture, and so we actually do not understand how to interact as a community or family because we’re so focused on the individual.
Most people, when they receive revelation, the first thing I think is God is elevating me.
Not that God wants to serve a people, and this is a means by which he’s graced me to serve a body so that the whole Grows together in love and grows into the, the, the fullness in the stature of Christ Jesus, according to Ephesians 4, so that, especially in the modern West, the need for discipleship and the need to understand that we as a body whether you take the label of prophet, the title of prophet or not we are a people of revelation and so when we under let me say this I don’t want to diminish Revelation as special, but I do want to introduce humility that says that Just because I’m receiving you, although I esteem that revelation, let’s understand that I’m stewarding it and I don’t necessarily rise with that word, but I it’s, it’s brought together to to serve a company, to serve a body.
So in reality, I’d say this is Get discipled, be a part of a body that believes in accountability and takes growing in the word of God Seriously and understanding the history that the word emerges from and the people that the word emerges from. Because where we have issued today and I’ll kind of wrap up with this is we actually don’t have a vision for continuity. Going back to the Exodus, we see breaks where God sees continuity and we need to reclaim our history.
0:15:20 – Speaker 2
So good, well, wayland, let me ask you this. There too, there are two things we want to kind of play up. That is two questions I have for you because you’re really smart. So so one of them is I someone told me this let’s I mean none of us are afraid to talk about the elections. I know it’s kind of the elephant in a room certain places. I don’t mind talking about it, because how do we fix things unless we talk about it, right? So Someone told me, a prophet told me that only prophets number one question for you only prophets should correct prophets, or let’s allow it you to worse correct, but Maybe that’s the right word, but you, you can take it from there on that one.
The second question is how important is it for the in this season for apostles and prophets to run together? Because I had, I had a prophet Well, there are a few that I’m actually having a apostle and prophets meeting in Dallas this year and usually just do prophets, but we are adding like full apostles to come to it and I’ve had more pushback from the prophets and I have the apostles about coming. The apostles are, yeah, we need to gather with the prophets and the prophets are like hey, some, not all, are saying hey, why, why do you need to invite the apostles to come? So like are those two really good questions for you?
0:16:35 – Speaker 5
Yes, those are really good ones, I’d say for one, the beauty of team ministry that should be demonstrated by apostles and prophets actually lays a plumb line of accountability. And a lot of times, if you’re not willing to allow the word that you receive to be tested because we are human and that word first has to be taken and processed through the humanness of who we are in order for us to be a witness of that, and you have to allow that word to be judged. And when you have apostles and prophets coming together, even every apostle and prophet doesn’t have the same type of personality, because we’re all called to something different. And if our goal is for Christ to be glorified and for the beauty of the witness of the cross of Christ to be seen, then there has to be a level of humility and submission, because it’s not about me being right, it’s about the nature of Christ being represented accurately. And when we have a prophetic person who was willing to do that, it doesn’t matter who brings judgment, because you are willing to allow that word to be judged, because it’s not about whether I’m off. If you’re really prophetic, you don’t care about being off, you care about the Lord being seen rightly. And when you start seeing apostles and prophets come together. That is the foundation of community.
Because if you look at Paul, paul says that the foundation of the church is the apostles and prophets, jesus Christ, being achieved cornerstone.
So if that analogy of a cornerstone is a building that begins to be set at this foundation, so when shaking comes it will not be removed. So apostles and prophets are similar in one thing that they both give witness to Jesus. And I believe it’s connected from the prophets of the Old Testament, the apostles of the Lamb, that the post ascension or ascension gifts of the apostle and the prophet begin to speak from the same foundation. And the same foundation includes that there was team ministry and unity together. So when you get those two gifts that come together, it actually begins to set the stage for what Ephesians 4 is talking about is that we all grow up into the headship of the sun. So humility, I would say, is the first thing, and having a cross shaped perspective where you desire to be self emptying, self giving and self pouring out. Because if you’re going to be a leader, whether it’s a possible prophet, but essentially if you are apostolic and prophetic, you have to embody the message that you receive. So it’s not what you say, it’s where you say it from.
0:19:42 – Speaker 2
So wow, I told you guys he was smart.
Okay so so let’s go to Frankie here. So, frankie, you know you live in the atl right and so I remember we came to do we prophesy there and I remember the Lord started to speak to me when I was coming to Atlanta and it kind of scared me the word, but he started to speak to me about Eli. Okay, let’s talk about purity in the prophetic and like and like how that impacts the body, how it impacts the prophetic movement. When you have too much is the word unholiness, or when we we’re not putting holiness unto the Lord or the fear of the Lord in our lives as the forefront of that, we’re letting our gift. Is that a good question for you? You go where I’m going? Okay, all right, we’ll let you answer that.
0:20:38 – Speaker 6
No, so it’s very. It’s a great passion of mine prophetic purity, because I think people have become office obsessed so much that they’re losing the purity of the function and how prophet is more nature driven than it is just gift driven. So there’s got to be a function in that and I feel like when you see things like Haphneus and Phineas offering strange fire, you see things like like the sons of Eli and you see the stiff neckness of an Eli, you see an entire prophetic paradigm of God saying I need purity within a prophetic movement and a voice so that that can be spiritually a succession that goes down generation, generation. I feel like the Lord is purifying the prophetic when it comes to things like accuracy, when it comes to things like integrity, when it comes to things like an accuracy involves biblical exposition, not just supernatural encounters and experiences. It has to be that we’re never going to prophesy out of a polluted well or polluted paradigm that we’re never going to manufacture manifestation is going to be something genuinely that comes from a place of intimacy and saying from a pure heart, because I think too many times a generation we’re in that sight and sound generation in this IG generation of just cultivating likes and followership versus following Jesus. And there’s a lot of gimmicks.
Personally, presently, in many of, at least I’ll say, some of the younger generation that’s coming up, we have to be careful with gimmicks. We have to be careful with just trying to pose as powerful but losing the purity of that office and I think the problem with that becomes that we can fall into it. Jesus talks about Mark chapter and the lust of other things and when you look in the scriptures it’s the the lust of other things. On the four types of ground can the enemy can come and destroy and take that word away. I think one of those lusts that we have to be careful with is prophetic power at times, because the nature of our character fuels the charismatic, fuels, our ability to move into gifts or to project a sense of powerfulness. But that’s something that I’ve been kind of teaching in our local church a little bit, because I’m a pastoral prophet, I’m having to function in both worlds. But it’s help temper my prophetic with practicality, like how can we love the prophetic but present in a way that builds a local church where we’re not just blessing prophets, like prophet Kevin has poured that into me. Prophet Kevin Leo is one of my mentors. He said, frankie, don’t be a blessing prophet, be a building prophet. How do you have your tethering, your gifts to the governmental great? A governmental grace is to establish foundations. The greatest foundation is the local church, local churches, local churches. That has to be so.
There’s almost like this way of the prophet in mind said that you see Jude prophesies about, they’ve gone by the way of Balaam and then by the way of cane, and can’s issue was that he didn’t. He didn’t in and he didn’t embrace accountability as part of being essential. God obviously communicated a purity and the sacrifice of in a presentation and he intentionally went around that. And then you see, the Holy Spirit prophesied through Jude that in the last days many will go by the way of Cain and really the biggest issue that that comes into when we’re not wanting to operate from a prophetic place of purity, is that we can become self-induced orphans. So now it’s no longer a wandering from a place of well, my anointing is so misunderstood and cannot be embraced and there’s no expansion for me in the local church. I think some of that masks itself from a place of rebellion and an inability to be planted and say all my grace, gifts and everything that I have is to not even just build up myself as a prophet or just other prophets and apostles, but to help build a governmental grace for sound and solid pastoring, sound and solid teaching. And that means I embrace accuracy, a heart for the loss and going out and having communal ministry.
That’s why Matthew 7,7, the Lord said that many will say in the last days we didn’t with you. All these great works, you know, we prophesied in your name, prophets prophesied. So that could be an innuendo toward we were prophets and we were accurate. And then he said we did many wonderful works. And the Bible says Jesus said and now professing to them be gone. For me I didn’t have, yadda, I didn’t have intimacy with you. So the key is with prophetic purity. Is our unction coming from a place of intimacy or is it coming from a place of just industry? We’re just moving by For follow ships and book sales and and platforms and multi-level market ministry mindsets. We’re not prophesying and loving the local church from a place of purity and intimacy. It’s just manufacturing things and I think that’s huge.
I want our generation, who generally have prophetic graces, to say hey, my gift grace, I don’t want to be a Matthew 7 7 prophet where the Lord says you did a lot of wonderful works but you were lawless. You practice anemia, you didn’t have any, you didn’t tether government, that governmental grace, you were not accountable, you were not integrity, you didn’t press. And also into accuracy, not just into unction, and I feel like that’s a major deal here and I hear that often when I go around and the Lord started telling me, said son, a lot of younger prophets need that fathering, they need the apostles, they also need pastors, teachers, they need, they need a convergence of the full, of the, of the true, faithful ministry. So it tempers and balances us, because many of us are claiming that we’re being rejected or being mishandled but we refuse to honor other grace gifts and we have an orphan spirit and that needs to be healed and delivered. I think in the, in the Rising of the younger prophetic movement today.
0:26:16 – Speaker 2
Yeah, so we’ll kind of pass this on or maybe you guys can answer whoever fails to answer that. But all on talking, talking about this. But you know there’s a difference between what there’s lines of honor, like. We all believe in honor, everybody here believes in honor and we all honor the gifts and people around us. But we’re watching some well, you brought it up mishandling and and leadership.
One of the things I realized when I came into the prophetic movement is I was like you know, some of these prophets are some of the best prophets in the planet. Like my gosh, I’m not even one percent. You know like there’s some of the most amazing, but I realized some of them don’t have leadership gifts and what you do is you, when you can stand up and prophesy to a hundred people, but you come down a mistreat your staff, like there’s some things that really go off as alarms inside of me and I just I’m wondering with the if God is asking us to help keep building what he’s building in the kingdom. One of his things is he’s always says oh, these are my kids, don’t touch them, okay, so, so he’s always protective over the body. So what are some things? Maybe I can Start with you, frankie, and then just kind of pass it down, because this is a heavy topic right now, going on with the Mishandling of people under our care, and we just can’t throw it off with authoritarian type leadership, which is not kingdom leadership at all, where we just say you just do what I tell you do, or I’m gonna call you rebellious, you know? Or say what I say. There should be a giving and taking of a Relation, but I do understand honor on both sides need to be happening, because true covenant, true relationship, is two-sided right.
So I have been seen some mishandling of people where it’s not just a bad day but it’s bad leadership and so. So how do we move forward? Because there’s I’m not thinking of anyone in particular, I’m just talking about this is like something where the prophetic movement is going so fast. We’re building, everything’s being built and we have amazing people that pioneered and built it. But there’s some things that I’m watching come in About leadership that I think like if we’re gonna build the prophetic movement, one of the things that we’re doing it’s not just building profits but we’re actually adding in leadership into it. How do you? How do you do that? Because I don’t think in people’s heart. They on purpose maybe some to hurt people, but when you have bad leadership skills you end up hurting people. So let’s start with you, Frankie, and just kind of let’s do two minutes each and just go down and talk about you know, how do we, how do we fix some of this stuff going on with the mishandling of people?
0:28:58 – Speaker 6
One thing, I kind of scripture came to mind, and I believe this is the text of Romans, chapter 2 Is that, therefore, we have no excuse or defense or justification. Oh man, whoever you are, who judges and condemns another for imposing his judge and passing sentence on another, you condemn yourself because you, who judge, are habitually practicing the very same things that you censure and you denounce. And so it goes on even to say who are we to judge another man’s household servant? And so it literally says I believe that’s in Romans, and correct me guys, give me that text if you but he says it is before his Lord that he stands. So we have a communal mindset and I think some of that, we, we, there’s a little bit of a posturing at times and I feel like Because of that, it could, maybe it could come from a place of conceit or arrogance, with one, a acknowledgement of our giftings and our graces. But there’s there’s a community mindset that comes together. But there’s also this other side that says people have individual lanes of their calling and emphasis and it’s almost like because of that, sometimes people we want to censure and say well, that’s not the kind of prophet you need to be or the apostle you need to be. And then you, you kind of see a convergence.
When you look at this New Testament opening in the Gospels with John and Jesus, they seem like you’re contrasting and you even see the Seemed like you’re contrasting and you even had individuals trying to pit them against each other. You know, john did this and John did that. And then Jesus, instead of saying, of condemning John, he said what did you go to see? You know, just somebody in a beautiful palace and smooth. He said that’s for princess. He said you’re looking at a man who was a prophet, more than a prophet. So you, you got to have these contemporary mindset where John understood his role is to make the crooked straight and level out the prideful mountains and Jesus was there to receive people with open arms For salvation.
And I feel like there’s John and Jesus style ministries in the apostolic and prophetic community when we’re not supposed to be trying to censure and which actually creates this Schism in our ability to fellowship and community. But we need to say you’re different, god is having you speak something different, but you’re part of our community and we’re together and we’re one and I love that. You never see John condemning Jesus’s ministry, as different as they were in Jesus. Of course he’s God in human form, but he’s our example, not our exception. We don’t see him condemning John. He actually is publicly appraising and affirming John, though he’s different in his assignment, and I think some of that causes, uh, some schism in our inability to really maintain that community where we don’t celebrate the difference, we see differences, dysfunction and that creates a separation and a constant pushing away.
0:31:34 – Speaker 2
So how would you say that? I know we have to pass on the the, but, like, how would you say that, though, in a leadership point of view, with people, they’re stewarding under them? Because I think, like a parent, a parent Handles every child differently and stewards the call of God on their life. So, where a prophet may be, where I could be more of a John the Baptist, I, you have to steward me, different than someone that’s called to be, maybe, a governmental prophet. You know, like we’re gonna have different. How I’m built is different, how I, how I process is different, and so how do we make sure that, at the end of the day, love is our highest aim? Okay, at the end of the day. So why is there a mishandling of things? Um, I don’t know if you can say that in one minute or you need to pass, okay, all right.
0:32:25 – Speaker 6
I feel like there’s a difference between creating a clone and creating a disciple. So sometimes I feel like, because I have three kids and it’s very tempting to say, hey, I don’t want you to have any of my weaknesses, I want you to have all my strengths. But then sometimes we also Bicariously try to live through our kids. And if we didn’t go to the league, we want our kids Be a doctor and lawyer and I feel it. Part of that is our ability to Really Proverbs 22. It prophetically in verse 6 train up a child in the way that should go and win their old and want to part. And it literally means to To understand how God is molding. And I think that happens with prophets and ministry and itinerant gifts. They may not preach like you and prophesiality as long as they have the foundation of integrity and honor and they’re not breaking that pattern Biblically. We have to learn how to celebrate the difference of that.
0:33:14 – Speaker 7
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0:34:35 – Speaker 1
I want to jump into your point of being a prophet or apostle and a leader. And how do we steward the hearts of people well, if I’m understanding the question right, when it may not necessarily be our natural gift, bend In that. What I’m thinking is that even it goes back to the community side of things and the team ministry, team leadership. But as one that I’m probably more of a John the Baptist type, that’s probably more of my bend, that doesn’t give me an excuse to not seek after a pastorial shepherding heart.
I think in some of what we have seen an issue with with fivefold ministry, if we found more identity and title and desire to honor for title, then we have found identity in Christ.
And so I think part of the reason we’ve mishandled or not I say that in general some have mishandled those who have been under them or not been good leaders, is because in Wayland’s words, we’ve not found ourselves in a cross shaped life, we’ve not crucified the flesh, we’ve actually catered to it.
And I could keep going like we could go into the orphan spirit and how we have perpetuated that orphan heart in the next generation because we’ve not found ourselves healed. And even in the fivefold understanding, jesus is the representation of the all five. He’s the fullness of the fivefold, and so if I’m going to identify myself with Christ, then I’m going to need to understand that my weakness, where I’m weak, he’s made strong, and so that means that I may have to care for someone who I have nothing in common with with tenderness, and so I think that’s just it’s important when we talk about being a fivefold leader, but also being a leader as we continue to draw on Christ, yeah, and we’re really under shepherds right, and so we’re actually supposed to reflect what God has taught us, the type of leadership he has, and we do that into the people below us.
0:36:47 – Speaker 2
Anything outside of that is not kingdom, right. So the mishandling or the abuse, well, let’s say that you know, we were talking today at lunch and we said, you know, sometimes when we, when we talk to the next generation above us or we talk to them about things being mishandled, it’s okay like there’s a line in the sand if we talk about sexual sin or sexual abuse, but when we start talking about verbal abuse or spiritual abuse, somehow they don’t have a, they don’t have any, they don’t know, even know you watch them, start to like get, you know, shaky in the chair because it’s okay to talk about sexual abuse, but it’s not talk about when a leader verbally abuses your. You have spiritual abuse. These are some things that we have to kind of clean up, guys, and so why do we wait? Why do you get talk into that? Maybe some of that you guys can answer it, however you’d like.
0:37:38 – Speaker 5
Sure, that’s a power packed question here, but I would say for one, the challenge we have is the good thing, there’s an acceleration of what God’s doing in profits. But the challenge is that acceleration can be devoid of leadership around them. That shows not just your gift or your ability to prophesy but also what it’s like to lead. And when you are only around profits and not shepherded by pastors, then you don’t understand what it means to have a heart for people. And your fruit has to speak just as much as your gift. And I’ve seen a lot of profits that are wounded and healed and try to mask it with their gift because of spiritual abuse that they perpetuate through those they lead. So there has to be a safe place where you can begin to bear your wounds, so your wounds can be healed by the wounds of Christ, so that those wounds become wounds to begin to birth greater things. And there has to be that unity of all five-fold functions. And I think a challenge for many prophets, at least in my experience, is because we’ve moved in such a restoration of the apostle and their prophet that we’ve kind of kicked the pastors to the side. And because we’ve kicked the pastors to the side we lose that heart posture for the sheep.
And one of my mentors, lynne Sweet, would always, you know, were none of us our leaders. And he’s like what do you mean? None of us are leaders, we’re all followers, which means you lead, how you follow, and if you bear the image of Christ laying down your life so that life can move in others I mean Paul says it really the, the, the apostolic function that should move in all of us is death works in us, so life can work in you. And one of the challenges out and with this is if we kind of use this cop out that says I know you by the spirit, right, right, right, right, you feel me, you feel, instead of actually sitting down with somebody and getting to know them.
So if I hear somebody that’s full of fire and prophetic gifting, but I know there’s wounds in them, but I’m not willing to sit at the table and hear them and begin to celebrate the gift that they are and give them space to be transparent, then they’ll always be a leader that will perpetuate. This is what leading looks like, and if you don’t begin to embody what another way is, a more excellent way, through love, then how will they ever know any different. So I think it’s you know. With those leaders that begin to move like that, I think there’s more to their story than we know. But if you’re not willing to sit down and give them space or give them a year, sometimes I found that that’s why they are the way they are, because no one ever gave them a space to sit at the table and get to know them.
0:41:10 – Speaker 4
Well, no, I have things to say, I just these are my views. I think, in large part, most of the prophetic movement has the entire narrative wrong. I think most people let me say this subconsciously in an action maybe you wouldn’t say this publicly, but functionally they view prophetic ministry as manifestational, not incarnational.
0:41:37 – Speaker 2
All right, Can you, can you share a little?
0:41:40 – Speaker 4
bit about that.
0:41:41 – Speaker 2
Come on.
0:41:43 – Speaker 4
They view it as manifestational, not incarnational. So therefore, most people are elevated not based on their Christ likeness, which requires relationship, but on the level to which they manifest a spiritual gift. Therefore, you do have some who manifest at a high level, but Christ is not yet formed in them. And the problem is is that most of modern day prophetic ministry in the West is based on entertainment, not edification of a body, because we are a decadent society and therefore a lot of our prophecies are inconsequential. We’re not dealing with famines, we’re not dealing with wars, we’re not dealing with serious issues most of the time. And so because people cannot get let me say this, because, because our society has become so individualistic and atomized, people are not positioned to receive love. We do not know how to be loved, we do not know how to have community. And so, therefore, when someone jumps in the prophetic stream, well, this person’s gift and I’m not saying God’s not speaking through, god’s not speaking truth, but they give me edification and hope and they see a destiny and purpose when I’m drowning in my life. And so I I think that if we are go back and take a look at scripture, in the narrative of scripture, it’s incarnational. So let me say this the incarnation of Christ is not a response to the fall of Adam. The logos would have all was was always going to incarnate. This is back to basic principles. So so, psalm 8, david, reveals something to us that we need to pay attention. He says who is man that you’re mindful of us? Who is man that you’re mindful of him? That you made him a little lower than the angels and you crowned him with glory. So Adam and Eve possessed a glory Okay, that covered their neck in this text was always supposed to be a part of who they were when they send that glory list. And they are indeed created a little lower than the angels. But how is it that we are to judge the angels, as Paul says, if we’re lower them? Impossible. The way that we were to judge the angels, even though we created lower the angels, is because the word Was going to manifest and become in the union with humanity and thereby elevate the entirety of humanity above the angelic creation.
And so the problem is is, let me say this when I read the Old Testament Through the lens that the, that it’s the spirit of Christ Speaking through them, I see the word Pre-incarnate itching to, to insert himself in his creation. I’m seeing the logos itching to take on place. I think that’s what David. I think David wrestled with that reality. He had so many messianic Psalms he could feel especially tabernacle David mentioned for the Prince of the earth that he could feel the desire For for Christ to once again walk in the cool of the day, as he did them, because that’s Jesus. Jesus says, isaiah saw him, and, and so when we have an entertainment driven model, that’s that there’s basically it’s a spiritual arms race and we don’t understand the narrative of what the spirit of Christ is attempting to accomplish, we actually work against the spirit of Christ, and I dare not say what that actually is theologically Because it’s scared. Okay, thank you, that’s why you’re here.
0:45:52 – Speaker 2
So Ned and Ned, let me ask you this you know, we opened our meeting last year and like there were all these different streams, leaders from different streams, and this is my opening thing Can we stop clapping at the next generation of profits for being able to prophesy to a hundred people? Can we start clapping when they have integrity, when they like let’s, because let’s change our clap, because here’s what’s happening. They’re responding to clap because already fatherless and they’re being saved and coming in the church and unless they Understand that, oh you clap for my integrity. I want to be more integrist, and so what they?
0:46:27 – Speaker 4
do is get a crowd to clap for your integrity, because not a crowd doesn’t know you’re integrity.
0:46:31 – Speaker 2
Yeah, but this is where fathers and mothers need to come in the church. So tell me where you think that went wrong, because the purity of the and and the call of the prophetic movement God put in the earth. Where did it go wrong?
0:46:43 – Speaker 4
I have an answer. Give me this a second, because I’m wrestling a question you already said before. But where did it go wrong? It it? I think it’s. It’s a hermit, I think it’s partly a hermeneutical issue and I think that it’s also a breaking of continuity. So here’s, let me. Let me say this Respectfully the prophetic wasn’t restored at a later date.
The prophetic has been going on for a long time and that’s that’s. That’s actually. It’s never been broken. So but there are. There are Christians that in a Premodern age we didn’t have communication with that. We’re still manifesting the gifts on levels actually I don’t know anyone who scratches into right now, I’m talking post ascension All the way through the Pentecostal the, you know, through through Western Pentecostal outpourings, whether it’s Barney Creek in North Carolina or a Zoo’s a street, and so we’re still in an age of discovery in the prophetic. We we are just now getting to where we have are starting to get into the interpretations Of what certain things actually mean functionally, because we said when let me say this, okay, so People are gonna probably want to filet me for this so Certain aspects of the Reformation went too far, and certainly aspects of the Roman Catholic Church went too far. And then and and by like, after 1054, the Eastern Church really wasn’t in the discussion, and there’s a lot of gold there, to be honest with you, a lot of gold there, and and so we’re actually so it feels like discovery. But what’s actually happening is God is catching us up and so like for me. I just be honest.
I take Alan Hirsch’s approach to Ephesians, chapter 4. Actually don’t think that there’s Apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers and evangelists and everybody else. I actually think that the reality is is that letter was given to be read in front of everybody. There wasn’t a. This is a session for leaders and this is a session for everyone else. Everybody’s there.
So here’s the issue is. Here’s the issues is that if you examine scripture, just because you may function in a gift doesn’t mean you’re qualified to lead in the body, because the qualifications that Paul lays out is not that you have had hands laid on you and commissioned, are recognized as a five-fold minister. Is that your marriage is right. If you’re married, that you have it, you have it. So, so, so, so. So I would say this in a, in a New Testament, ancient Christian Environment, you would never clap for a prophet to have integrity. They would never even be allowed to have that place for people to think about it If they weren’t really proven in integrity.
So what we’re doing is we are we are mistakenly elevating Spiritual gifts into offices of leadership. I’ll be honest, even some music there’s, there’s, here’s, here’s. So Let me wrap this. Real stupid about that. Okay, sorry, I gotta be funny, I’m tired, I’m sorry, it’s funny to me. My wife not, might be laughing, and Elizabeth is, and Frankie, so I feel good about myself. So, so, so, here’s, so, here’s here.
Let me say something there is a reality that there is a people on planet Earth that they so embody profits that we have to recognize, that we have to recognize that they need to spend so much time with God, to the point that you must protect the prophet from the people and the people from the prophet.
Sometimes and you gotta know when Now we don’t like that idea, because we don’t live in an age of continuity, we take a break from Old Testament, new Testament that I don’t think God breaks, and so we misunderstand, we misunderstand the John the Baptist. John the Baptist had a certain job that he executed well, because we actually the function of profit. We don’t want to get into all that right now because we’re not in a place of emotional health where we can handle that. But God wants to bring us there. We can understand certain things and we’re a Demptive way and I don’t want to get into that right now because it take too long to explain that in a healthy way. But but let me say this there are so. So what we do in America, when you start getting you know, a following, well, you start a ministry.
