Shane Idleman emphasizes the significance of understanding the prophetic ministry within the church, addressing its often misused or misunderstood nature. He outlines seven keys to grasping the prophetic, highlighting that it is not merely about predicting the future but about sharing what God spontaneously places on one's heart to encourage or admonish others. Idleman stresses the importance of discerning prophetic words against Scripture, the necessity of humility in delivering such messages, and the communal aspect of prophecy within the church body. He encourages believers to earnestly desire the gift of prophecy, reminding them that it is meant for the edification of the church and should be approached with reverence and caution.

1 Corinthians chapter 12 verse 8, I'm going through the whole book of 1 Corinthians and the title this morning, are you ready for it? Seven Keys to Understanding the Prophetic. Seven Keys to Understanding the Prophetic. And why is this so important? Because the prophetic type of ministry is either scorned and ridiculed or it's abused or it's non-existent. And what do I mean about the prophetic? Well God has given the church gifts, gifts of the Holy Spirit and if you've been coming a while it's no secret to you that we believe that the Holy Spirit is still actively moving and giving gifts to the church based on 1 Corinthians 12, 1 Corinthians 13, 1 Corinthians 14, read all three of those chapters this week. We believe that the Holy Spirit is still working. But what do I mean about the prophetic? Well this is probably one of the most misused or abused types of the gifts of the Holy Spirit that there is. Of course there's tongues and that gets sometimes carried away but overall this moving of the Holy Spirit in the prophetic is where a lot of people have questions. So I'm hoping to answer those questions this morning. But let me define what prophecy is based on the Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible. It's this, declaring the purposes of God whether by reproofing or admonishing the wicked or comforting the afflicted. That's what the prophetic would do, especially in the Old Testament. It would either confront and convict the wicked or it would encourage and admonish those who are living for God. So what God does, we believe, is He gives gifts of the Holy Spirit to edify and build up the church. But because there's a lot of confusion in this area, I'm just going to stick with the scriptures. Is that okay? Okay, good. And I've been praying for the last half hour that God would have me, would help me remember all the examples I gave at the first service. So if I don't think of all of them, you might want to watch the first service because I gave some examples of the prophetic operating in the life of the church and my own personal life and things I've seen over the years. But I want to read 1 Corinthians chapter 12 verse 8. And the context is, you'll remember from last week, if you were here last week, is that God gave different ministries to the church. The Holy Spirit gives different ministry, different callings, different functions in the church, all that we can operate as one body, united in the cause for Christ. So what He's called you to do is different than what He's called me to do is what's different than He's called someone on this side of the room to do, and definitely something different in the balcony, right? We all have different callings, and God uses all of those for the furtherance of the kingdom, for the furtherance of the message of the gospel. So here's how He does that. For to one person, He has given the word of wisdom through the Spirit. To another, the word of knowledge through the same Spirit. To another, faith by the same Spirit. To another, gifts of healings by the same Spirit. To another, the working of miracles. To another, prophecy. To another, discerning of spirits. To another, different kinds of tongues. To another, the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works all these things, why? Distributing to each one of us individually as He wills. So in a healthy church, the Holy Spirit is working, amen? But so is the demonic realm. And I've noticed that in dead churches, there's not much going on demonic wise. And in weird churches, there's demonic stuff going on, of course. But when a Holy Spirit is powerfully moving in a church, the demonic realm is awakened as well. A person goes home excited about church, they've been filled with the Spirit of God. Guess what? The spouse might not agree. The family might disagree. The co-workers, have you ever had co-workers get upset at you because you love Jesus? You upset the demonic realm when you're filled with the Spirit. So here's what's happening in this church. A person would be given a word of wisdom, or a word of knowledge, or a prophetic word, or gifts of healings, or faith, so the whole church is built up. And we're going to be working through some of these in the next week or two. But I want to focus primarily on prophecy. And prophecy is, in a nutshell, when God spontaneously brings something to mind that we are often to share with other people. Or it might be He brings something spontaneously to your mind to give you wisdom, or counsel, or insight on a certain situation. Now, why would we think that's weird when God can create the universe? People think, well, that's just kind of weird. You know, why would God do this? And we have God's Word, that's what they say. And as a big proponent of God's Word, thank God for God's Word. But often, sometimes, God will use, the Holy Spirit will use, things that I call supplemental. In other words, if the Holy Spirit puts something on somebody's mind, and they share that with the person, and that person is set free, or that person is encouraged, they didn't really find that in Matthew 1, or John 4, because some things God needs to speak to us prophetically in order to help and encourage. Let me give you a few examples. Oh, they're coming to mind now, praise God. Prophetically, no, I'm kind of joking on that one. I think these are just things I'm remembering from the first service. But there was a man, David Ravenhill, I've shared this example before, and some of you remember it. It's Leonard Ravenhill's son, David Ravenhill, and he was telling of a story about a man that God put something at his heart. They were at a dinner, and there was a missionary girl there. She was in her 20s, I believe. And God put something on his heart that's called a prophetic word to speak to this girl. But what God put on his heart seemed weird. It seemed off. And that was, tell her that I hate mommies and daddies. And the guy was like, I'm not going to tell her that. That doesn't seem to be of the Lord. That's more not of the Lord, or it's my own personal thoughts. I mean, I don't know what to do with this. So he sat there, but the pressure. Have you ever been pressured by the Holy Spirit? It's like, I got to get this out. That's how I feel every Sunday, by the way. And then every Monday, I got to start over again. But when the Holy Spirit is pressuring you to deliver a message or to tell somebody, there's this pressure in it. You have to go to them. So after about an hour, he finally said, listen, I just need to share this with you so I can release this burden. But I believe God put on my heart to share with you that he hates mommies and daddies too. And the girl started crying, and she just kind of just went down in this convulsion, and they didn't know what was going on. But later she shared that she's been a prisoner of unforgiveness and different things because of an abuse by an uncle who used to say, let's play mommies and daddies. And so God used that prophetic word to tell her, I hate mommies and daddies too. I hate what they did to you. And God used that prophetic word to break those chains of bondage and that she was living in that prison. So that's what the prophetic is for. It goes and it speaks into lives, into situations by the power of God. But do we have to be careful? Yes, we wear a seatbelt. We believe in the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and I often say I'm conservative, but I put a seatbelt, or charismatic, but I put a seatbelt on. I believe in the power and the gifts of the Holy Spirit because largely I've experienced them. I've experienced what Paul experienced, and it lines up with Scripture. Remember, we've taught this often, that we don't judge Scripture based on our experience. We judge our experience based on Scripture. So if we see it in the word of God, if it's encouraged in the word of God, it's something to be embraced. So let's look at number one, seven keys to understanding the prophetic. Number one, prophecy isn't really about predicting the future. A lot of people think that is. What are prophets saying? What are people saying about predicting the future? But looking at the New Testament, I like what Wayne Grudem said. He's got a great book on systematic theology. He said, although several definitions have been given for the gift of prophecy, a fresh examination of the New Testament teaching on this gift will show that it should be defined not as predicting the future, not as proclaiming a word from the Lord, nor as powerful preaching, but rather as telling someone something that God has spontaneously put on your mind. It's prophetic, and we'll get into this in a minute, but what he said here is absolutely right about proclaiming from the Lord because we encourage people, don't say, thus saith the Lord. We better make sure that God has put something on your heart. Usually we encourage, hey, I feel impressed by God. I feel led by the Holy Spirit to share this with you, discern it, test it, do whatever you want with it, but I wanna share this with you. But to say, thus saith the Lord, gotta be careful because they would actually test prophets in the Old Testament by if it came to pass or not. If it comes to pass, they're legitimate. If it doesn't, they're stoned to death. So God takes this very seriously, and we don't see people in the New Testament saying, thus saith the Lord because what you're basically saying is, this that has been downloaded in my mind is absolutely of God, thus saith the Lord, meaning no human thoughts have came in there. We didn't add any hamburger helper. We didn't just wanna encourage people that we have to be careful. We don't say, thus saith the Lord. And Jesus no longer calls his followers prophet. He calls them apostles, probably because the Greek word for prophet at the time of the New Testament had a very broad range of meaning. It basically meant one who speaks on the basis of some external influence. That's why we have to be careful in this area. So number one, prophecy is not really about predicting the future, although that could happen. It's really about God spontaneously bringing something to mind in order for you to share with someone else. The edification to build them up, to encourage, to warn them, and it is undergirded by scripture. We'll get to that too in a minute. So number two, prophecy may not be a word of knowledge or a word of wisdom. Prophecy might not be a word of knowledge or a word of wisdom. Now, here's why I say that. Some people put prophecy, a word of wisdom, a word of knowledge all in the same, underneath the same umbrella. And also they do, I mean, they do, there are similarities there, but I believe because the Holy Spirit gave them as gifts, given by the Holy Spirit, I would look at them differently. Word of wisdom, word of knowledge, prophetic type of word, I would look at them a little bit differently. However, Wayne Grudem, back to him, he sees them as non-miraculous or ordinary because the word wisdom simply means the ability to speak a wise word in various situations, and the word of knowledge is to have insight into a particular situation. So he would see that any mature Christian, any mature Christian would have the word of wisdom or the word of knowledge based on their maturity. But I see them more as a gift that God gives at a certain period. And I'm gonna give you the item and paraphrase. Are you ready? Prophecy is to rebuke or comfort, whereas knowledge is supernatural knowledge about a situation, and a word of wisdom is a supernatural counsel on what direction is best, what direction is wise. Now, of course, these could be mingled together, whether they're all one, whether they're separate, really, it's not an issue to divide over. It's more personal preference on what you read in the scripture. But I believe, again, prophecy is to rebuke someone or it's to comfort someone or it's to encourage someone, where God gives somebody a prophetic, a word of knowledge means you know something that was unknown a few seconds ago. It might even be unknown for the person, but God gives you a word of knowledge about a certain situation. You can speak into that situation. Or a word of wisdom. A word of wisdom is supernatural downloading of giving somebody wise advice. So you see how they could all three be intermingled and it's no big deal if a person believes that they are, but because the Holy Spirit listed them as three different gifts, one would think that they are three different gifts in that capacity. But what about dreams and visions? Uh-oh, Shane's getting weird. But did God not lead people through dreams and visions? Jesus was spared. I mean, of course, with God's sovereignty, nothing could have killed Jesus. I mean, here's God's plan. Herod, you can try to kill all the babies under two. It's not gonna work. But he was, Joseph had a dream to leave, to flee Bethlehem, to get out, or to flee where they were and to get into Bethlehem and then dream again to get into Egypt. The wise men had dreams not to go back to Herod. Daniel had dreams a king would warn, or God would warn a king about marrying Abram's wife because of a dream. So God can move in all these areas. We just have to be careful that we don't put too much emphasis into them. So I believe God gives dreams. I believe that he still gives visions today. I don't spend a lot of time on it. I don't think too much about it. We don't get carried away with it, but it is something that I don't think we can discredit because God spoke to people, even in the New Testament, with visions. I'll give you an idea of something that happened to me a while back. I was going into Grace Fest and we had 1,500 books. I was gonna, we were gonna give out different books. And I had this impression of the sprinklers coming on, on the grass. And I'm like, oh, that's crazy. Well, guess what happened? So I park, I get there and I'm like, these people come out, Shane, we're so sorry. Everything's ruined. The sprinklers came on automatically. But I was like, oh, that's okay. I mean, I was prepared for that. Now, you might say, well, that was coincidence. Well, okay, not me. So God prepares us for things like that. And you see certain things. I remember a month ago, I shared this with some of you. I had a dream, very vivid dream. It woke me up. Do you ever have those dreams just wake you up and you're like, thank God, that's not true. Now, is God speaking to you sometimes? And again, being careful, I'm open, but I'm cautious. I trust God, but I don't trust me. I trust God, but I don't trust the enemy. I trust God, but I don't trust human nature. So we have to sift and filter a lot of the stuff through God's word, discernment, waiting on God. But it was about a month ago and there was this huge black jaguar. And it kept coming at me right to my face. Didn't bite me, didn't attack me. And I kept just moving and here it would come. And somebody said, Shane, I remember, put the light in front of them, like the light of the gospel or the light of God's word. And that will change it. And so I tried that and guess what? It just walks around the light right to my face. I'm like, whoa. And no matter what room I would go into, it was just this jaguar. I'm like, Lord, I don't know what to do with that. Well, that week, and I even text a few people, I wonder if this has to do with this situation that's coming up. I had a Jehovah Witness come over for two hours and I debated him with my kids sitting there, listening in. And he was dressed in black. And every time I'd bring the word, just right around it. You know how they're, I mean, they know their stuff. I mean, it's like they know what they're supposed, it's like, tk, tk, tk, tk. And just no matter what I said with the word of God, just always coming around it, always in my, always back into this. And it was the most exhausting two-hour talk I've ever had, bar none. I was exhausted mentally. And it's like your mind is a mental gymnastics. You're thinking of, what do you not see here? We're reading the same scripture, but differently. You're twisting it. That Jesus is not God, that he was an angel, that there's no hell, that we shouldn't even vote, we shouldn't even celebrate holidays. We don't actually, it was the most alarming thing I've ever had. I said, okay, can I open in prayer? And they said, well, I don't know. We don't pray to Jesus. Hmm, okay, and you can only say Jehovah. You can't say Lord, you can't say God, you can't say, it's only Jehovah. It's Jehovah. And Shane, the Bible you have is corrupted because it says Lord and God. And say, I don't care if a deaf person says the wrong word, says the wrong word up in his heart, you can cry out to God. You can say, Lord, God Almighty, a creator of heaven and earth, Elohim, Yahweh, Jehovah, my God, my provider. See, it's a condition of the heart. It's not your lips saying just the right words. Actually, if you wanna get technical, let's get technical. Let's get technical. It wasn't even Jehovah. It was Yahweh, and the word of God was so sacred, they wouldn't even say Yahweh. They used four valves to say God's name. But see how we can get caught up on this legalism. And I was exhausted. I remember that dream, and I was built up and encouraged again. I'm like, oh, okay, that was supposed to happen. Because I thought he was gonna be converted and repent right there. I was a little upset and frustrated. It just, it's just so exhausting. He said, Shane, nowhere in the Bible does it say the word trinity. And I said, nowhere in the Bible does it say the word Bible, right? We use terminology, the triune nature of God. Take it up with him. I just know it doesn't say that Jesus was created. He's an archangel. We're not supposed to, why do we worship Jesus? You can't worship an angel. He said, I and the Father am one. There is a hierarchy, though, Jesus submits to the will of the Father. The Father is greater than me. I don't try to understand God. I just understand what God has presented in his word. I'm not worried about what I don't understand in the word. I'm worried about what I do understand in the word, that God will be highly exalted, that he has given Jesus a name above every name, that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. You either do it on this side of eternity or you wish to God that you had done it later. Every knee will bow. This is not an option. He's not a choice on a menu. He is the Lord Jesus Christ. That's why the demonic realm hates that name. That's why the school districts hate that name. You can go watch any Disney movie and they'll talk about magic and this and that, but you mention Jesus in the movie, you just upset the whole culture. Kanye West went into prison and ministered to prisoners. Now atheists are upset because he mentioned Jesus. Why are people so upset at that name? There's power in the name, that's why. It's the only name that breaks every chain. It's the only name that demons have to, a person filled with God's spirit who speaks the name of Jesus, that the demonic realm has no authority. Do you understand that? They have no authority. People have told me, Shane, there's witches cursing the church. There's people filled with the demons coming to disruption. I don't care. God sits on the throne. They work for him. He is sovereign. He is under your control. No demon in hell is going to scare me out of my destiny. No weapon formed will come against me or you as long as you stay on the rock of Jesus Christ and you build on that solid foundation. What demon is going to destroy the plans of God? I love that song we did Sunday, I believe it was. Who is going to stop God Almighty? That's the title of Wednesday's message, actually, so you might wanna be here. Who is going to stop God Almighty? Can you tell me that? Can you answer that? Nobody, no one is going to stop God. I better get going. I'm not gonna make it. So number two, there's lots of rabbit trails. Number two, prophecy, I already explained this one. Prophecy may not be a word of knowledge or a word of wisdom. They might be separate. This is kind of where I disagree with some people, but again, it's not a big deal. Whether they're all three labeled under prophecy or they're separate, distinct, moving to the Holy Spirit, we know that they are all biblical. Number three, number three. Whoa, I wish I could get this out there in the charismatic community. Prophecy is not equal to Scripture, amen? Prophecy is not equal to Scripture. I tell people all the time, they say, Shane, I got a prophetic word. Don't put it above Scripture. Don't live your life based on what others tell you. Don't live your life on what others say. Live it on what God says. I love godly counsel, but over the years, I've asked godly counsel and they've been opposed. Why don't I think you should do this? I think you should, what am I supposed to trust? God's word and Him speaking to you. You don't need somebody else to speak into your life all the time. It's good, it's encouraging, but there was something many years ago called the shepherding movement. You ever heard of that? You couldn't go buy a car unless you asked your spiritual covering if you could go buy a car. That's dangerous. You couldn't marry someone unless you go to your spiritual covering and ask, should I marry this person? Shepherding, it's control. Now, there's some good aspects of that. There's always good mixed in with the error. The good aspect is you have wise counsel above you. You seek the advice of others, but ultimately, the responsibility's left up to you and to God because not everyone is speaking on behalf of God into your life. They have good opinions and many of us are biased, right? Aren't we biased? If you come to me and you say, Shane, I'm thinking I should move out of state, I'll tell you don't. Because I'm biased, I like you here. See how my emotions play into it? No, don't move, just stay here. God, thus saith the Lord. Thus saith the Lord. You are to stay in California and contend with the rest of us, amen? But you ask, you ask. As soon as my daughters will say, Dad, should I get married? No, you're not gonna ever get married. I'm gonna build five houses out back and we're all, there's a vow, you're taking a vow of virginity for the rest of your life. My wife says, Shane, you gotta start praying for the rest. No, I don't. I can't even, they're little girls. They're just tiny little girls. Stop it, stop it. But see, my desire, my desires will come out in my advice and my counsel. But on the flip side, there's good advice and counsel. I would encourage anyone, if your parents are Christians, ask them what they think of dating such and such or marrying, ask them for their advice. Because often you're in lust, not love. Oh, I just love them. No, you lust after them. You're attracted. And others can sometimes say, hey, this is gonna be very dangerous. But God can work through all that. God can work through difficult situations. So if you're in a difficult situation, look to God, not others is my point. So prophecy is not equal to scriptures. Prophets did not speak with the same authority equal to scriptures in the New Testament. Old Testament, the scriptures were written by the prophets. New Testament, you have the gift of the prophetic, but the canonization of scripture, Paul's letters, the Pauline epistles have already been done and completed. Somebody doesn't have to say, thus sayeth the Lord, here's a new revelation. If I ever say that, there's the exit doors. If I ever say, you know what? I know God's word says this, but he's revealing something different to me that's different than the head, head for the exits. I've lost my mind. And this is what happens if you go back and you watch the hour long audio we did at Fox News in New York with that pastor who believes in gay marriage and would encourage people to embrace a gay lifestyle if they struggle with that. He actually said in that that the Holy Spirit is doing something new today. That's false teaching, that's blasphemous, that's heretical, that's a false prophet, a false proclaimer of God's truth. I'm just saying that in love. I'm not angry, I'm not mean. I email him still and say I'm praying for you, love to meet, love to catch up, because we're contending for truth. But that's what happens when we begin to believe our own, well, Shane, I don't feel that way anymore. I don't care how you feel. What's the Bible say? This was a defining moment in Billy Graham's career. There was somebody actually a more gifted preacher than Billy Graham by the name of Charles Templeton. And he went on to reject the Bible because he let liberal philosophy persuade him. And I believe he even died an atheist. They did a program on him. And people would say, well, see, you can drift away. I don't even know if he was saved, honestly. You can be gifted, you can be charismatic, you can be doing things for the wrong reasons. And I believe he drifted away because of that liberal mindset. And Billy Graham said, God, all I know, it was a stump, he sat on a tree stump where he put the Bible on a tree stump, up in the hills here, Arrowhead, Lake Arrowhead in that area, or Mount Wrightwood or somewhere. And he said, God, I'm standing on the authority of your God's word, on your word. I'm building my ministry on your word. And he, from that moment on, he never rejected God's word again, as far as doubting, I should say. Now, if doubts come into your mind, that's okay. What do you do with the doubts? Sometimes the enemy will hit me with doubts too. You know, like, Shane, do you really think this sermon's gonna be good today? It's not, it's gonna stink. Do you really think, geez, you know, and these doubts, because they're part of our sinful nature, it's where the enemy fires darts at us, but we have to remember, prophecy is not equal to scripture. So if somebody gives you a prophetic word, you say, okay, thank you, and you move on. You don't let it change your course, necessarily, unless you know, man, God brought that, it convicted me, that's exactly what I've been praying about, it lines up with scripture, I need to move on that. That's not a haphazard decision, or a half-hearted decision, because you prayed about it, you waited on God, it lines up with the scripture. Number four, prophecy has boundaries. Prophecy has boundaries. If God brings something spontaneously to the mind of the person prophesying, they would report it in his or her own words. Paul would call this, as we're reading here, a revelation. So when Paul, God would give someone a revelation, have you ever had that? Revelation, God has brought something, he's helped me find my car keys, I'm convinced a couple times. You might think that's minimal, but there's been times where there's not, and I get this idea of where I, oh, that's right, just boom, right to my, right revelation, right to the heart of the matter. Paul calls this a revelation. If a revelation is made to another sitting by, let the first be silent, that's what he said in church. So with prophecy, there are boundaries. In other words, we don't disrupt services. Are the people giving, saying they wanna share something, are they proven, is their character known to the church, or are they just coming in, nobody knows them, and they're gonna speak on behalf of God, we don't even know who this person is. So prophecy has boundaries, and be careful of those who don't wanna sit underneath those boundaries. Motives will come out, and we can tell when we start saying, hey, here's how we do it, like, I knew you weren't spirit-filled church. You're not gonna let me give a word, I don't even know you. I knew, you're quenching and grieving the spirit, no, I think you're quenching and grieving the spirit by your arrogance. I've had people come in, and when we were in Lancaster, you come in and go, hey, I've got this word that God's from my heart, and I'm like, what is it? Like, oh, I don't know, it doesn't seem, and I don't even know the person, it's his first time there, and then that was his last time there, because he got upset that the church wouldn't let him give some word. You see how that works? A true person called by God is humble. They understand, their whole character isn't based on your perception of them. They know who they are in God. This is another beef I have about putting prophet or apostle on your business card. Get that off. We don't need to know that you're prophet such and such or apostle such and such. You should be Christian, humble, such and such. You don't need these flyers that are out there, prophet such and such, coming to the store near you. He's gonna have a great healing service. Look at this, prophet such and such, and apostle such and such. No, just be broken before God and say, we're gonna contend for healing tonight. We invite all who are heavy laden to come and rest in who Christ is. We're gonna pray for the miraculous, but I'm not gonna put my face on a big poster. I'm not gonna put prophet and apostle and highlight me, because all we do is we highlight Christ, and you better get out of the way. That's when the miracles flow. The miracles flow when you humble yourself, and you get out of the way, and you exalt Christ, and you say, God, work through this humble, broken vessel. If you don't heal, we can't do anything. If you don't set free, we can't do anything. The power is in the power of the Holy Spirit, working through a humble believer. Oh, my Lord. I see them all over Facebook, don't you? Healing service. Apostle such and such. Prophetess such and such. And when you challenge him on that, the arrogance is so thick, because they don't understand that you have to come under scripture. You have boundaries. And I'll drop a bombshell on some people right now. The more God grows your ministry, you don't exalt yourself. The more he grows you, the more humble you should become. It's the opposite effect. The more he grows us, the more humble we should become. I pray that I'm a lot more humble now than I was nine years ago. A lot of you guys don't know it, but we have the radio stations, 30, 40, 50 radio stations across the United States have picked up the messages. 30, 40, 50,000 people a week. Listen, that should cause more humility, saying, but wasn't for the grace of God, there go I. It's God's work. You think a stupid country boy from Courts Hill is going to do all this? My Lord, I've got some oceanfront property in Arizona too. Just saw that old country song. George Strait, right? I don't know who it is, but I don't know who that was. That was not a prophetic rabbit trail. But see, the more God raises you up, the more humble you become. The more God raises you up, the more humble you become. If I could tell our president one thing, that would be it. Humble yourself, tweet humility, tweet grace, talk highly of others. So prophecy has boundaries. Number five, prophecy is not about powerful preaching. Because many times we'll say, man, that was prophetic. Not necessarily. Powerful preaching is just coming from someone filled with the spirit of God, proclaiming God's word. They could have been saturating on it all week. And it's not necessarily something God is bringing spontaneously to mind. Now granted, during preaching, I believe often, somebody who's filled with God's spirit, God will speak prophetically during a certain passage and they'll just take a rabbit trail. Or they'll get right to the situation. They'll speak right to something someone is dealing with. And this happens more than any other thing that happens during sermons. We get emails from different people and people in the congregation. You say, that part of the sermon, man, that really resonated with where I'm at. And I'm like, that wasn't even in the notes. I had no clue I was going to say that. I just, as a scripture comes out and God puts it, now maybe it's things he's put in my mind from years ago. I don't know. But something's come out and it speaks to people individually. And what cracks me up more than anything else is probably every other week, maybe every three weeks, somebody will say, that was the best sermon I've heard all year. And then somebody else will say, well, no, that was the best. And that, well, which one is it? I mean, because it's hitting people at different spots in their life. So somebody can leave and go, oh, and just cry in the prayer room. I needed that, thank you so much. And somebody else can go, well, I don't know, there goes Shane again. And he's getting all loud. But then you speak in a different situation. That's the Holy Spirit moving. What Holy, only the Holy Spirit, this is what cracks me up too. Only the Holy Spirit can convict someone of their sin. They go to the prayer room and they repent. But at the same time, it can encourage a single mom who's trying to raise their kids. At the same time, it encourages the wife who's contending for her marriage. How does this all happen? Because God's, how does it encourage a single mom? Because the word of God goes forth and it pours into their heart in the area they're dealing with. So prophecy has boundaries. Number five, prophecy is not about powerful preaching. Although preaching, many people that are gifted, let's say if they have a gifting of, we'll get into this maybe later, but prophet, pastor, teacher, evangelist. What's the other one? Apostle, prophet, pastor, teacher, evangelist. They call it the five-fold ministry. It's basically like, I can grab something with my hand. I've got the apostolic is a church planter. They're going out, the sent ones. The prophetic is like a John the Baptist calling the church to repentance. And then you have evangelists like Billy Graham, Greg Laurie, their messages are all about the evangelism. Somebody just told me, I think it was a, I don't know, we put Greg Laurie on the radio and they're like, Shane, his messages are so like, 30 minutes of just the same. I'm like, yeah, he's an evangelist. Are you leading that many people your whole life to Christ that he leads in one week? Because he's the heart of evangelists. You get pastors, you get teachers, different callings. So God gives us these different giftings. So on the five-fold ministry that they call it, Jesus said, I give some to be prophetic. What does that mean? Chip Ingram said this, the divine enabling to proclaim God's truth with power and clarity in a timely and culturally sensitive fashion for correction, repentance, and edification. The ability to reveal God's word accurately. People with this gift ask, what went wrong? What caused this? It's someone who has a sense of the culture and the needs of the church. And the Whitecliff Handbook on Preaching said this, prophets appeared with distinct commissions to remind the people of sin, to exhort them to repent, and instruct them on how to live. So God gives us different callings, different giftings. There's people up here that are wonderful teachers, but they're very monotone. They start in Genesis and they end in Revelation, and they just stay all the way through. They're teaching to the body of Christ. That's their gifting. And they say to me, Shane, why do you get so excited? I say, why don't you get excited? Right, the different way God has designed us. Number six, prophecy today is not for a select few. You need to realize this. Prophecy today is not for a select few. Paul actually said, earnestly desire to prophesy. Earnestly desire to prophesy. We believe that the church as a body, all of you should desire that God would move in your heart and spontaneously bring things to mind that you would prophesy to others. You would speak truth into their lives. For example, if God put that on you, you'll talk to thousands of people this week that I won't see. So if God puts that gifting on you, you could go to someone and say, you know what? Have you ever stopped anybody at the store? I've done this a very few times, or at Trader Joe's. I'm like, can I just pray with you? And they start crying, you know, because oh, God, I needed that. Thank you so much. And God put something on your mind to help other people. You're not gonna find that in Matthew four. Oh yeah, I'm supposed to stop by Starbucks and pray with someone. The principle's there, right? Don't misunderstand, I'm not mocking God's word at all. This is our foundation. The principle's there, but the prophetic is to supplement that. So God brings something spontaneously to your mind. I've given people $100 before that God's put on my heart, and I try to ignore it. No, that's not God. The devil is a liar. Right? And he keeps, and he keeps, oh, okay, will this help you? And they start crying. I just prayed for that today. See, God often uses you and me to answer the prayers of people. They're praying, God, just bring me somebody I can pray with. Bring me somebody who understands. Bring me somebody who can help me financially. Bring me somebody who can offer wise counsel, and then God will put that something in your mind to reach out to that person. It happens a lot, especially in our prayer meetings. If you ever come to our prayer meetings, that's where this gifting is most pronounced in this church, is people will begin to pray or they'll cry out to God in their heart. Something that just happened this morning, they were praying about the homeless situation in our valley, and I shared with the people there in the prayer room next door that God has really dealt with me recently on this issue of the homeless, because some people, there's a lady that always sits out in front of the whole weedery, a black lady with a little three or four year old, and I buy her vitamins and food and all kinds of stuff. You gravitate towards some, but others, you kind of look at like, I bet alcohol caused that. I bet you have an opiate problem. And I become very like, no, I'm only gonna be selective. And God said, you love them regardless. You love them regardless of why they're there. Who are you to judge them? Would Jesus just walk by them and say, oh, alcohol must have caused that? They actually might need that more. How many of us walk by and we say, oh, they're just gonna blow the money on alcohol. They probably deserve this. And that's our excuse so we don't have to be involved. No, God hit me with a sledgehammer. Now, use discernment. Don't give somebody $100. You know, go buy them food, hear their story, and come alongside and see if you can help them. Sometimes they just need a foot up, a leg up, maybe a hotel room for a few nights and a shower. Don't put any charge card in case something gets ruined. You know, cash and things, but you have to use wisdom and you get them food. And I would even encourage you, get them good food. Why don't we go through our pantry, stuff that's been in there three years, we give to the homeless? Or the worst food that has no nutritional value and not the best food, the best things. So again, I shared that at the prayer meeting. I guess I shared it to you today, too, so that's double whammy. But God's been dealing with me in that area. He probably spoke to some of you in regard to that, too, I'm sure, because we can view the homeless population. We wanna help some, but others are like, well, they created that problem. That is your consequences, I'm not going to enable you. And God says, no, just love them like I would. Don't enable them, but treat them the same way. And then number six, again, I already told you this, prophecy today is not just for a select few. And when people are allowed to speak at the church, they are known by the church, their character aligns with godliness, and it's the setting conductive to prophecy. It's the setting conductive to prophecy. For example, if I'm preaching and somebody says, hey, thus saith the Lord. Like, hold on, hold on, what's your name? Oh, thus saith the Lord, the church needs to repent. I'd be like, yeah, no kidding, that's what I tell them all the time. But see how it's like disruptive. And I believe the demonic element, the demons can come in sometimes to services through people, and they want to disrupt the service as well. Things that disrupt. So the prophetic, at least in this type of setting, I have a feeling the early church was more like our prayer meeting. I have a feeling it was more like, you know, a couple dozen believers, they knew each other, they were gonna potluck, they were gonna have communion. If you wanna be technical, communion should be every time you get together as a church, and not just a certain day, and that's a whole nother sermon. But anytime you come together, and it was a small gathering, people, they would have words of wisdom, they would speak in tongues, they would have, but now with the larger corporate setting, you still have to follow the guidelines of things done decently, and in order, and different things. Let me just give you an example, perfect example. It's at the men's prayer, or the men's gathering yesterday. Right after I was concluding, we were getting ready to release, Ralph comes up over here, and he goes, hey, can I just share something that God's had in my heart? And I know Ralph, I know, absolutely. See how, see, it fit. It was not ruining the message, or the service, and he shared how God just healed him Friday night. They used to walk with two canes, and now he's dancing with his wife, ballroom dancing. He showed me this video, I'm like, this is crazy. So he's tearing up, he's tearing up, and he's testifying. He's saying, God laid down my heart all weekend to testify, to share what God has done to me. And I say, absolutely, come up here. We don't go, no, no, we don't trust you, we don't know you. When we do trust, we do know. And for example, let's just say it wasn't of God, which it was, but let's just say, big deal. Like, is anybody going to hell? You know, was that off, or was that weird? Not really, he came up, he shared how God healed him, and he was just excited about it, wanted to share. That's a testimony, that's what happens in the church. A healthy church is not where you just come in and hear a sermon and go home. God is moving in the lives of people. We should be seeing more healings, more people being set free from deliverance, more activation of the Holy Spirit, and we see that in prayer gatherings that we have. Even, Ria, I know you see that too, Tuesday nights when you guys meet, or Friday nights, or Sunday mornings here. Those are the times where the Holy Spirit is moving. Calvary Chapel used to call those afterglows, where you'd meet after service, and those who were on fire for God would stay, and there would be just waiting on God. And I don't think it's weird because it's in the Bible. So when the people say, well, Shane, that's Paul, the tongues thing, that's all weird. Well, Paul did it, the early church did it. Are you sure you don't want to redefine weird? What you should really say is, I've never experienced those things, so that's why I doubt them. Let's just, you know, I get right to the point. Most people do not like this topic because they've never experienced the Holy Spirit, and they're afraid of what they've never experienced, or they think, well, everybody thinks they're more mature than me because they've experienced the Holy Spirit. And so because of pride, we begin to put down the work of God. And remember, those who were attributing the works of God to Satan, Jesus called that blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. They were attributing the works of God to Satan. Jesus does that by Beelzebub. He casts out demons by the ruler of demons. And Jesus says, what house divided against itself will stand? No house divided against itself will stand. I'm not casting them out by Beelzebub, I'm casting them out by the Spirit of God. And then he goes into what blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is. Now, of course, it's rejecting Christ and the conviction of the Holy Spirit, I got it, but it's also contributing things to Satan that are of God. You might be shocked to hear this, but many, many people in really conservative churches would view our churches as hyper charismatic, emotional. Why? Simply because you raise your hand, you might come to the altar, you might weep under the power of God, you might be open to prophetic words, we might see God move in a powerful way, you're weird. That's biblical historical Christianity, folks. God not moving in a service is out of that realm. A dead church service where all you do is hear the word of God, and that's all you do, and you go home, nobody's influenced, nobody's affected by the power of God, nobody's experienced the gifts of the Holy Spirit, that's what you call a dead church. Martin Lloyd-Jones, D. Martin Lloyd-Jones actually said, and I've told you this before, that living children need rules, dead children don't. And it's funny, D. Martin Lloyd-Jones wrote a book, Preachers and Preaching, one of the top, it's actually, it's one of the top books ever written, John MacArthur said it's actually one of his top 10. But ironically, in chapter 10, the last chapter, last chapter, he talks about the endowment of the Spirit, and he talks about the gifts of the Holy Spirit. D. Martin Lloyd-Jones did in the Reformed churches, he was critiquing dead churches for not being open to the miraculous work of God. Why would we not need God to move today? People say, well, they needed it back then, you don't need it now. Have you seen the onslaught of perversion? We are calling things that are unthinkable and illegal good, and we are calling things that are good, evil. The enemy is on full alert, we are destroying innocent life, we are redefining marriage, everything that is perverted is glorified and lifted up and esteemed. We don't need the power of the Holy Spirit now? I don't get that. So I'll close with this thought, there should be, oh, I'm sorry, number seven, prophecy is to be tested. Prophecy is to be tested. I won't spend a lot of time on this, but you get the gist. Paul says to test everything, let two or three prophets speak and let the others weigh in on what is being said. So if God puts something on your heart, it needs to be tested, and if it doesn't come to pass, a person needs to repent and own it, amen? Say, hey, I know I told you that, it didn't come to pass, I need to own it and I need to repent. I believe God will work in that and through that, because we understand that these things are not thus saith the Lord. I'm speaking from what I believe God put on my heart, but mixed in that is a lot of human emotion, human air, sin, my own agenda, and through that, you try to give a person an encouraging word from God. So close with this, there should be an element of reverence. There should be an element of reverence. What I mean by that is a holy respect for God's word. We're speaking on behalf of what we believe God is putting in our hearts. There should be an awe and a fear of the Lord and a reverence and a respect for that. So if God puts something on your mind, usually it's gonna be a strong impression to go talk to that person, and often I fight it. I'm like, Lord, I need to know if this is you or just me. I need confirmation, Lord, I trust you, but I don't trust me, and God, show me. But sometimes there's an immediate, like I'll pray with people in the prayer room, and immediately, God will just bring, I'm like, where did that come from? I'm gonna give you an example, I know it's gonna convict a lot of people, but oh well, it's okay. This lady said, this lady I was praying with, and she's like, Shane, I just, I can't lose weight, moody, all these things, and just came to me, caffeine. Like, do you drink a lot of caffeine? She goes, oh, all day long. So I talked about blood sugar levels and spiking insulin and her blood glucose levels and how it's craving sugars, and so that was right there. That's exactly what needed to happen. But I had no, that was even, I wasn't even thinking that, but just brought right to my, see, and so things like that, I'm like, well, let me pray for a week on that one. You know, I'm gonna ask, hey, by the way, does this mean anything to you? And she's like, yeah, all day long. Like, well, that's where you need to start. You need to start with that, because that's where God's gonna begin to heal. I've noticed that God often heals, not necessarily through answer prayers, which he does, we saw in Ralph's life and others' life and Jesse's life, who was a Satanist that I baptized up here, and I can think of a lot, but many times, healing comes from taking care of the gift that God has given you. I've prayed for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of type two diabetics over the years, and I wanna say, I can pray with you, but let me change your diet and you can heal yourself. It's diet related. It is diet related in the weight and the types of food we choose, more often than not. So how many people are suffering simply because they're not stewarding the gift that God has given them? For those who can, I know there's people who can't, but for those who can, and I pray for anxiety and depression. How many have needed that? Shane, would you pray for my anxiety to lift and my depression? I'm so anxious and in panic modes, and we'll pray for that, but did you know that high levels of caffeine actually cause that? So I'm gonna pray for something that is self-inflicted, and God will often use a prophetic to reveal the issue in the person's heart that is causing their debilitation. Health issues have been eradicated by changing diet or changing, how many people have been healed by getting rid of negative thinking? Don't worry, I'm not going Joelstein on you. This is just truth. Our thoughts actually produce negative toxic chemicals in our body. Bitterness, anger, it just hurts the body. From adrenaline to serotonin is affected, all these things from all these negative emotions, and people, once they forgive and they're set free, they feel so much better. Many people lose weight, and the light of the Christ shines again in their life because they repented of toxic emotions. See, I can pray for that person all day long, but unless they repent of this, they will not change. Hence the need for a prophetic word to speak right into their life. I'm gonna close here. Don't worry. So the cure for falling away, I just wanna share this with you. It has nothing to do with the sermon necessarily, but I talked to the men yesterday about the cure for falling away, falling away from God, and you can listen to the message, you get the whole thing. But I like verse nine, we conclude it with this. It is a trustworthy statement deserving of full acceptance. Paul told Timothy this. Can you imagine this? In God's word, this is a trustworthy statement deserving of full, full acceptance. It'd be like me saying, hey guys, listen. Before you leave, listen to this, okay? Don't look at your cell phones. Don't look at the clock. Don't worry about what time. Listen, listen to this. For it is for this we labor and we strive because we have fixed our hope on the living God who is the Savior of all men, especially of believers. So he's saying here, fix your hope, fix your gaze, fix your faith, fix your family, fix your kids on Jesus Christ so when the storms come, you will not crumble because you're fixed on Jesus Christ so when the society goes against you, you will not fall and cave in because you are fixed on Jesus Christ. Fix your gaze. It's like I'm locked in and nothing can get me. It's like those laser. When you lock in those lasers in the United States military, when that laser is locked in, nothing is going to sidetrack that missile. It's locked in so he says, fix your eyes on the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ. Fix your hope, fix your faith, fix everything on Christ and Christ alone. It's a solid rock on which we stand and all other ground is sinking sand but I fix my eyes. It's like super glue. You fix, I'm fixed. Nothing's knocking me off. They'll try to knock me off track but I'm fixed on the hope that Jesus is the Savior of all men, especially of believers. Is that interesting? Now, we could go on and talk about limited atonement for 30 minutes. We're not. I believe that Christ's blood was shed for the entire world. I believe that he is the Savior of all men if they were to repent and believe and accept him. So of course, it begs the question, where are you at this morning? Whether you're listening online, whether you're here, is he your Savior? Have you repented? Have you believed in the gospel? If not, I wanna encourage you to do that this morning. Just say, Lord, I want you to be my Savior. I want you to be my Lord. I give my life completely over to you. I repent of my sin. You'd be amazed at how many people in the church have never done that, especially in America. Do you know why? Because we're raised in the church as little kids and people start to say, I've been a Christian all my life. Really? I didn't know that was possible. Yeah. I've loved God since I was six months old. And ever since, I've just been loving God. And they realize that they're not filled with God's Spirit. They've drifted. They don't have a passion for the things of God. It's because they had a religion and they followed their parents' footsteps, but they never embraced that relationship for themselves. On judgment day, there is no one standing next to you. It's you and God alone, bare before him. Make that decision this morning.