The Seven Cardinal Rules of The Prophetic Part 3

Two posts in and I still haven’t gotten to any of the rules yet, but fret not, today we will delve into it forthwith. These rules are in no particular order, none is more important than the other, and all must be adhered to if we desire to remain those true and faithful servants God expects us to be so that we might be of use to the kingdom of God and not bring shame to His name.

Prophecies fail because men choose to break one or more of these rules. To be perfectly blunt, prophecies fail most often because the men delivering them are not hearing from God, but other than fabrication, or calling a gut instinct a ‘prophecy’ just to give your own ideas a little more traction, prophecies fail because men choose to break these rules.

Some do it unwittingly, thinking they are helping God out by adding a little clarification, making things more relevant, understandable, or other such things, while others do it knowingly, having long since had their consciences seared, and using the prophetic as a means of gain, something to monetize, and turn a profit on, something to use as a spotlight and promote themselves rather than the Christ.

You may not think such individuals exist, but I assure you they do. Someone recently forwarded me a clip of one such individuals getting deposed by a judge, who was leasing a 2.8-million-dollar property in the hopes of buying it, and who spent an excess of 50K just so he could take a Mercedes and make it longer.

Your fruit will show sooner or later. The intent, the purpose, the drive, the reason you do what you do will become self-evident to one and all, and if it’s for personal gain, if it’s for the self, if it’s to amass, accrue, and otherwise store up treasures on earth, it will be so blatant even the world wills stand up and take notice.

1. Do Not Editorialize

Add nothing, and take nothing away. This is the golden rule of the prophetic. Do not take it upon yourself to editorialize. Do not take it upon yourself to clarify. Do not take it upon yourself to expound. Do not take it upon yourself to interpret, and do not take it upon yourself to make clear something God did not.

There will always be someone who will want more clarification of any given revelation, there will always be someone who would like a date, a time-frame, something they can sink their teeth into and use to their advantage somehow, but tempting as it might be to offer your opinion, don’t!

Revelation 1:1-2, “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants things which must shortly take place. And He sent and signified it by His angel to His servant John, who bore witness to the word of God, and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, and to all things that he saw.”

John bore witness, and passed on what he saw. That’s it. He reported; he did not editorialize! He did not add anything beyond what was shown him and what was told him to write in the prophecy. He didn’t say, “I saw seven golden lampstands, and this is what I think it meant.”

He faithfully wrote down what God showed Him, and added not an iota to any of it. This is how we are to approach prophecy, dreams, visions, or any other revelatory means by which God speaks to us. Our duty is not to bring clarification or interpretation; it is to relate what we have been shown or told as close to the original as humanly possible.

2. Do Not Melodramatize

The fact that God spoke through His Holy Spirit to you concerning something is dramatic enough. The fact that He instructed you to pass on the message, and promised to give you the means and abilities by which to do it, even more so. Do not try to make it more than what it is, or less than what it is. The message has impact and reaches the hearts of men not because of your delivery, not because you practice inflection in the mirror, not because you dress a certain way, or come up with some gimmick in order to stand out like tattooing ‘Jesus Saves’ across your eye lids. The message stirs the hearts of men because of its origins, because it came from God, and because God will breathe fire and life into it each time you speak it.

3. Do Not Personalize

It’s not about you; it’s about the message. God could just as easily have given it to someone else, or incorporated some other means by which to deliver the message to His people. It wasn’t so you could seek out the spotlight, make some money off it, or somehow build your kingdom on earth around the message God gave you.

Everything God has given this ministry is freely available on our website. Because people asked, we have put the messages in book form, but all you need is an internet connection to get every message we’ve ever released for free.

It’s one of the reasons I rarely if ever speak on my grandfather’s message for America, or other revelations he was given while he was alive. The messages are there for anyone to read, I don’t need to become a coin operated tinker toy that repeats the same thing over and over again every time he gets behind the pulpit. Some men are comfortable doing just that. You hear them preach more than three times and you realize it was the same message, with the same delivery, with the same pauses for applause, as though they were some rehearsed, robotic politician who memorized their lines.

If men of God do not allow for the inspiration of God to flow through them every time they stand behind a pulpit, they are doing both the Body of Christ a disservice, and hindering God from speaking to those in attendance.  

4. Do Not Sensationalize

Every year, without fail, you will hear some self-proclaimed prophet somewhere insist that this is either the year of breakthrough, or that this is the year it will all turn around, or that this is the year that it will all come to a head. Whatever avenue they choose to pursue, whether one of judgment or prosperity, they will make it seem immediate, and use bombastic words as to draw you in and make you act or react to what they are saying. Usually, at least a large portion of the time, their sensationalizing of the prophetic ends with a plea for your hard earned dollars, or an offer to purchase a century’s worth of food for less than a Happy Meal, but that’s another topic for another time, and we have a lot to sink our teeth into with this topic today. 

5. Do Not Aggrandize

I must decrease that He might increase. Every time you deliver a message, every time you deliver a word, let this be the preeminent thought in your heart and mind. You must decrease, that He might increase. Don’t let people raise you to the heavens, don’t let people praise you, don’t let people lift you up as though you were more than some mere mortal. You are you, and you know how flawed you are. Point the way to Jesus. Let Him take center stage, and you will neither fall nor falter.

It is human nature to revel in the praise of others. It is godliness itself to pursue humility, and to humble oneself in the sight of the Lord knowing that it is He who works through you, and not your abilities that connects with others.

6. Do Not Merchandise

We’ve covered this a bit, but it’s worth delving into it a bit deeper. Do not make merchandise of God’s word. Don’t do this tasteless thing where someone can only get the message from the Lord if they pledge a hundred dollars to your ministry, or if they become monthly donors. God did not give you a message to make merchandise of it. He gave you a message to pass on to His people in the hopes that they might repent, or renew their relationship with Him.

As far as those seeking a ‘word from the Lord’ are concerned, any minister, ministry, dreamer, or prophet that requires you to enter your credit card number before you hear from the Lord is a fraud, a huckster, a two-bit dime store thief whose only desire is to milk you of every penny you have. The fact that many of today’s ‘prophets’ can be compared with the gypsy palm readers who defraud the gullible out of their possessions, is a sad and lamentable thing.

7. Do Not Idolize

This is more for those who follow prophecy than those who prophesy. Those who read, and listen, and receive words. Men are men. No matter how mightily they are used of God, no matter how impacting their ministry is, no matter how faithful they have been in the calling to which they have been called, men are men. When you make a god out of a man, you serve an impotent god.

We see enough examples even in our modern age and going back to the advent of Christianity, to make us weary of worshiping and idolizing others. Far too often, something that begins as pure and righteous gets perverted and befouled because the people begin to worship the minister, the minister revels in their praise, and eventually the minister’s word becomes gospel, no one can challenge or question him, and a cult is born.

This is not so much a rule, as it is friendly advice to anyone who operates in the prophetic. Do Not Attempt to Force Revelation. You can’t force it. You can’t make it come to you at will. You can’t promise someone a prophecy if they send you a donation, or if they show up to your meeting. 

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr. 

The Seven Cardinal Rules of The Prophetic Part 2

Before we get into the seven cardinal rules of the prophetic I want to discuss the topic of date setting for a bit, because, well, it has been at the forefront of many a Christian conversation of late. That's right, we're at it again, and like a bad sequel that tries to outdo its predecessor the prognosticators are prognosticating far worse this year than they did last year.

It seems every year around this time there is something that’s supposed to happen. Whether a planet killer, an extinction event, or a catastrophe of untold proportions, September seems to be the month when it’s supposed to go down, and every time, September comes and goes and we’re still here trying to explain to our families why we quit our job, sold off our belongings, and spent the last few weeks windsurfing in Hawaii.  

I was still in Romania around this time last year when people started contacting me about September, and whether I had gone back there to avoid what was coming here. Did I know something I wasn’t saying? Was September really the end of all of it? I even had someone say they would be selling their home and donating the proceeds thereof to the ministry if we promised to spend it all by September, because after that it would be worthless. I told him to hold off, and that we’d talk in January, and if he still felt the same way we would put his money to good use feeding widows and orphans and such.

Now another September has rolled around and the big hubbub, judging from all the e-mails I’ve been getting is an asteroid that will collide with our blue planet by the end of September, and that will be the end of that.

Herein we have two possible options, and a teachable moment. Either what is being said is true, and we are on a collision course with a giant space boulder, or we are not. If it were true, there is absolutely nothing we could do about it anyway, so we should live each day as though it were our last because that’s how we are supposed to be living anyway. If it’s not true, then not only did we give ourselves coronaries by fretting over something we couldn’t control anyway, we told it to other people causing them to have coronaries as well.

Just as a side note, to put this entire matter to rest, we might kind of maybe want to crack open our Bibles and read about all the things that are supposed to take place preceding the eventual stars falling from the sky and the sun losing its light, before we set fire to everything we own and kiss our families goodbye. Just a thought. 

I realize full well we love the notion of specificity. We want to know the when, the how, the who, the why, the where, and if possible, be given detailed instructions as to how to avoid it all.

The only problem with this is that is not how God works. Only once in the Bible did God set a specific time frame, and even then He put it off by 100 years because Nineveh repented. That is not such a good track record, but Christians far and wide seem to ignore the facts and continue trying to set dates ever so often.

By now we should have learned our lesson. Seriously, haven’t we learned our lesson by now? Starting with 88 reasons why Christ was supposed to be returning in 1988, to the sequel, 89 reasons why Christ was supposed to be returning in 1989, to a bunch of other date setters in between, to Harold’s 2011 big fail, to September, to November, to likely next year, and so on. 

When will we realize that looking for dates is a fool’s quest? 

When will we realize that knowing a specific date takes away from the drive to have an ongoing, protracted, lifelong relationship with God?

If our quest and goal is simply to avoid judgment, then our heart is not in the right place to begin with. If we’re looking for a date so we can get out of the stock market a few weeks before it all comes crumbling to the ground, or to hedge our bets somehow, then we are simply attempting to use God toward our own nefarious ends, and there is nothing Spiritual about that.

The plain truth is that I do not know these people who gave the words about September, but I know what they said did not materialize when they said it would materialize last September, so color me skeptical. That is the essence of this entire thing, and it should be a cautionary tale for every single individual who believes themselves to have been called of God to deliver a message.

Measure every word, confirm every message, make sure that you’re not giving words just for the sake of giving words, or because you feel as though it has been too long between messages.

God will speak when He will. Until then, be silent. 

With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea Jr. 

The Seven Cardinal Rules of The Prophetic Part 1

Right off the bat I want to make some things perfectly clear so as to not cause any confusion:

1. I do believe God still speaks to His people.

2. I do believe God uses dreams, visions, and prophecy as revelatory tools to warn His children of what is to come, as well as direct, guide, instruct, and even rebuke individuals and nations alike.

3. I do believe that the Holy Spirit is still active in the church, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit still operate among believers.

It was never God’s intent to keep us in the dark, to keep us guessing, or to keep us ignorant of the times we are living in, or the things that are yet to come. God knows the end from the beginning. As hard as it might be for some to wrap their minds around it, God is outside the realm of time and space, and as such is not constrained by them. God is not surprised by tomorrow, or by what will occur five years from now. He already knows. He has seen it play out, and when He so chooses He warns His children for the specific purpose of having them draw nearer to Him, and solidify their relationships with Him.

God does not warn us of what is to come to scare us, to make us panic, or to make us run off and live in a cave somewhere. He warns us in love, so that we might understand a simple yet profound truth: If God has seen the future play out, He has also prepared your place of safety, your place of security, your place of peace, and your place of protection.

God’s plans are detailed, and He has included you and I in these plans because we love Him and He loves us in turn. If a prophecy, a dream, or a vision causes you to react in the flesh, if it causes you to be fearful, if it causes you to panic, or otherwise lose your peace, there are two possible explanations:

1. Either the message was not of God but was only intended to cause you to fear.

2. Your relationship with God is not as it ought to be, and as such you are uncertain of His providence and protection.

That said, the second thing I would like to make perfectly clear is that I do not consider myself a prophet. I do operate in the prophetic, I have received dreams and visions from God, but I do not consider myself a prophet. Anyone who takes such a title lightly, or goes around identifying themselves as a prophet, does not understand or fully grasp what the office entails, or they use the title as a means to garner men’s respect or approval.

It’s one thing to hear a message from Bob. It’s quite another to hear a message from Prophet Bob. The title itself gives men authority they would otherwise not possess, and for many it is tempting to throw a title in front of their name to make people listen to them more. There are consequences to the choices we make and the actions we undertake. To treat such a thing lightly is no less than foolishness on a grand scale.

Titles are meant to impress men. God is not impressed by titles, especially titles men give themselves, or which are given them by other men. I realize it is difficult to resist the temptation of being impressed by a title. We are engineered from early youth to be impressed by titles.

“Oh, he’s a doctor, oh, he’s a lawyer, oh, he’s a Pastor, oh, he’s a professor.”

Titles are meant to impress – at least for those of the world – but when it comes to the children of God we ought to have enough sense and discernment not to get shaky in the knees just because somebody throws a fancy title in front of their name.

The difference between a doctor, a lawyer, a professor, a pastor, and a prophet is that you can’t go to school to be a prophet. It’s not an elective course at seminary, you can’t buy a manual, and you can’t choose to be one. Please read the following carefully: YOU CANNOT CHOOSE TO BE A PROPHET!

God chooses those He appoints to the office of prophet, and there is nothing one can do to sway God, save live their lives in an atmosphere of righteousness, sanctified and set apart.

It’s an important distinction, and one we must make if we hope to weed out the bad apples, and if we hope to identify the false prophets among God’s children before they can do damage, before they can cause hearts to break and shatter, and before they can shake the faith of the innocent.

One does not choose; one is chosen. I will repeat this and keep repeating it until it gets through, because I meet far, far too many individuals, especially those who are babes in Christ who are overly enthused about the prospect of being a bona fide prophet. When I ask them if this was a calling, or if God had stirred in them this particular gifting, their answer is usually, ‘well, no, but I’ve always kind of wanted to be a prophet, you know?’

I’ve always kind of wanted to be an archeologist/navy seal/trapeze artist/philanthropist, but wanting something and being something are two very different things/ Especially when it comes to spiritual gifting of any kind, the only thing that you can do, the only thing that is incumbent upon you to do in order to even be considered for such a calling is to live a life of righteousness and holiness, having a clean vessel that God might pour into it if and when He chooses to do so.

I realize the world is in full blown madness mode, wherein just because someone identifies as something, they are that thing. There was even an English gent who abandoned his family and started dressing in polka dot dresses because he identified as a six-year-old girl. I’m sorry. I refuse to believe the household of faith is as foolish, mentally challenged, and idiotic as the world is.

Looking at the Christian landscape today, especially those looked as the spiritual leaders and luminaries of Christendom, one might question whether or not Christians are in fact deeper thinkers than the world. An objective person would likely conclude that for the most part Christendom has become the last resort for the semi-literate and intellectually challenged to make some easy money, and some of them, given how much of their souls they are willing to barter and trade for baubles and fame, make a lot of easy money.

It wasn’t always like this. There is no disconnect between intelligence and Christianity. There is no disconnect between rational thought and faith in Christ Jesus. For the past few decades the world’s narrative has been that if you believe in God, especially the God of the Bible, if you call yourself a Christian, then you are by default a knuckle dragger. If you are a Christian, you are by default one step away from having someone feed you pea soup through a straw.

The world promotes this skewed view of believers, because they world does the devil’s bidding. This is why I get a little hot under the collar when our spiritual betters are quick to make any two bit actor an honorary Christian just because they didn’t say anything overtly negative about Christianity.

I don’t want the world’s approval! I don’t need the world’s approval! I am a son of the King, and it’s not we who are supposed to look up to the world, it’s the world that’s supposed to look up to us.

The idea that only a witless buffoon can believe in God is a false narrative that the world has been able to weave into almost everything created for mass consumption.

Do you realize how educated the Disciples of Christ were for their time? From the Apostles, who were largely business owners, to Matthew who was a tax collector, to those who came to follow after Christ due to their ministry such as Luke who was a Doctor, Paul who was to be a Pharisee, and educated beyond anything you or I can aspire to. These were not knuckle draggers. These were educated men, some of whom were naturally skeptical such a Luke or Paul.

Don’t let the world set the narrative. Don’t let the godless tell you that being a believer is tantamount to living in a cave, and trying to light a fire with two sticks and some straw.

Sorry for getting off on a tangent, but it’s a thing with me. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had people show genuine surprise when I told them I was a Christian, because the conversation we had been having up until that point was philosophical in nature, or regarding a topic that required deeper thought.

It’s okay to be smart. You have my permission. You have God’s permission. We are, in fact, instructed to be wise, and prudent, and thoughtful, and introspective, and meditative, and cautious about what we allow to take root in our hearts and lives, cautious about what we choose to believe, and cautious about whom it is we lend our ear to.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr.  

The Battle-Ready Believer!

As promised some time ago, the new book is out, and ready to be consumed. If you own a Kindle device you are in luck. 

Starting today, 9-16-16, and for exactly one week, the Kindle version of the Battle-Ready believer will be .99 cents, after which it will go back up to its normal price of $6.99, or something in that neighborhood.

So, if you do own a Kindle, I would encourage you to take advantage of the price, and get yourself a copy. The paperback version is also out, but I can't do anything about the pricing on that. This is the two edged sword of printing on demand. Not a lot of upfront cost, but the price per book is a bit steeper than usual. 

Is it worth the $18? Well, subjectively speaking, yes. I believe it is because there is a lot of good stuff in the almost 250 pages, and it will go a long way to not only determining whether or not you are battle-ready, but what you must do in case you are not.  

If you decide to get a book, I would ask that you please leave an honest review with Amazon after you read it, whether for the good or for the bad. 

There are more books in the works, as I believe wholeheartedly the truth needs to be trumpeted now more than ever before. I labor because I love the people of God, and I believe the season of their testing will soon be upon them. 

With that, thank you all for your prayers, and for your patience as I was getting these projects completed. 

With love in Christ, 

Michael Boldea Jr. 

The Battle-Ready Believer Kindle Version

What Price Freedom?

I woke up this morning with a thought I’ve not been able to shake, and since I consider you my brothers and friends I thought I’d bounce it off you, let it rattle around your heads for a while and see if my reasoning makes sense.

It’s strange to me that people who have never had freedom, men and women who grew up in oppressed environments and know what it is to live under the thumb of totalitarianism, will often risk their lives to attain it, while those who have had freedom for all of their lives neither treasure it, appreciate it, nor defend it.

Never mind the fact that those who’ve always had freedom do not treasure or defend it, many despise it, and desire to do away with it.

If you want to know how precious freedom is, if you want to know how priceless being free is, you need look no further than Christ’s own words who said that the truth was the only thing that could make us free.

“And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

Odd choice of wording don’t you think? He could have said the truth would make us wealthy, he could have said the truth would make us popular, he could have said the truth would make us famous, he could have said the truth would make us successful, but Jesus said the truth would make us free.

To be free! There is nothing more precious in this world than to be free, to possess the truth which is Christ, and thereby be made free.

And yet, here we are, all but ready to sacrifice our freedom for healthcare or college tuition, or whatever else the politicians are promising the foolish and gullible nowadays.

Anything that men promise you, no matter how attractive, is not worth the price of your freedom. Don’t you see that? Doesn’t that register somewhere deep down? Does it not resonate on a very basic and fundamental level?

I’m watching what is transpiring in this nation as well as the world and I am in awe of man’s self-destructive tendencies and his willingness to voluntarily enslave himself. We have been so dumbed down, we have been so desensitized in our modern age that many consider that if they have their twitter, their Facebook and their YouTube, then they have all they’ll ever need.

Men of past generations sacrificed all they had up to and including their lives in order to taste freedom but for a breath before they died, and here we are throwing it all away as though it were some worthless thing, some inconvenience, something to be ashamed or embarrassed of.

Do we still deserve to be free given our lethargy? 

Do we still deserve to be free given our indifference? 

Do we still deserve to be free given our betrayal of all that is true and just and wholesome?

Does a nation that despises the principles which brought it to its place of prominence in the world deserve to retain its prominence while shunning the principles?

These are questions with which we must contend as sober individuals. These are questions with which we must contend as fathers and mothers, grandmothers and grandfathers because the issue isn’t so much about us, but rather what we leave behind for those who are yet to understand the beauty that is freedom, and the ability to earn one’s way through this present life with hard work and determination.

I don’t know, I’m just frustrated. All things considered I’ll likely be dead in thirty years if the Lord terries, but I have a daughter to think about, I have her future to consider, and this is why I do what I can just so I can say I didn’t sit on my hands, just so I could say I didn’t bury my head in the sand, just so other men’s blood will not be on my conscience when the end comes.

Freedom is a fickle thing. It is something very difficult to truly acquire, and something very easy to relinquish. I for one take no comfort in the ‘whatever will be will be’ attitude, because the Word of God confirms our long held beliefs that the prayer of the saints does sway the heart of God, that we are able to intercede and stand in the gap and be an instrument of change whether in our families, in our communities, and yes, even in our nation.

I will not surrender to the darkness because of the inevitability of its progress. I will resist it with every fiber of my being, I will fight against it, I will rage against it, because although we were called to be humble we were never called to be timid. We were called to do right, to defend righteousness, to stand for holiness, and to savor the gift of freedom while we still have it in abundance.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr.   

All The Worse and None The Better

Every time a nation suffers a catastrophic event it cannot, by definition, remain the same as it was before. Whether the event is an unprecedented storm that devastates an entire region, or eleven men who decided it was a good day to fly some planes into buildings, kill thousands of people, and confirm how dark and wicked the human heart can be, change is inevitable. Something must change. Something will change. There is no going forward the same as it was before because whatever happened marked you, changed, you transformed you, and so you must choose to go either left or right.

Whether it wakes you up or just opens your eyes, when something happens that so marks us that we remember where we were and what we were doing the moment it happened, it is transformative.

I remember plenty of events that happened to me throughout my life, but there are only two things I remember as having happened outside my sphere of influence, and what I was doing at that moment. The first is what I was doing on 9-11-2001 when the first plane hit the twin towers, the second is what I was doing when I got the call from overseas that my mother had passed.

Both events marked me in different ways, and I will remember exactly what I was doing on both of these occasions for as long as I live.

When something so overwhelming occurs, especially on a national level, there are certain choices you must make that up until that time you may have skirted or avoided. You must choose to either seek a closer walk with God and in repentance and humility return to the path of righteousness, or rebel against Him, shake your fist at Him, denounce Him, and scream from the top of your lungs to whoever will listen how your god would never allow such a thing to happen, and how your god would never allow something like that to occur.

Granted, your god may not allow it, but the God of the Bible does, because He is a righteous God and a just God, and He knows that without true repentance and a turning from darkness He will have to judge, and in judgment there will be no mercy.

A question has been posed to me recently, and although the answer seems glaringly obvious, I will attempt to also give you the reasons why I believe what I believe.

The question is this: Do you believe the church has gotten better or worse since 9-11-2001?

Even the blind aren’t that blind, and the answer to this question is an obvious one, but since it was asked, and I believe it was asked sincerely, I will answer.

I believe the church is far worse off today than it was pre September 11, 2001, and these are the reasons why:

1    The godless realized that if they threw enough of a hissy fit, they could cause the children of God to reverse course, apologize for their comments, retract, and otherwise make excuses for the truth.

We no longer pray for boldness as the apostles of old did, because we have come to believe giving the devil what he wants and being altogether silent on matters of eternal import is just easier on our jangled nerves.

We had the opportunity to speak the truth in a time when the world was hungry to hear it, and instead of saying that God judges sin, we gave into the screams of the peanut gallery who insisted that God just doesn’t do that, and if He does, He’s not a God they want to serve anyway.

On and on it went, trying to explain away the righteousness of God, and when the devil saw how easy it was to silence the church, he’s been on a never ending quest to pervert, destroy, and otherwise bring shame to God’s creation.

2    In talking themselves into believing that God had nothing to do with anything that occurred – that it was not God having removed His protection from this nation that allowed the frightful events of 911 – the church lost the fear of God, which is an integral part of true worship.

The Book tells us the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. It is not something cumbersome, it is not something heavy on the soul, it is wisdom. Granted, it seems like more and more people seem to have an aversion to wisdom and run from it as though their hair was on fire, but as children of God wisdom ought to be a goal. It ought to be something we desire and aspire toward.

3    The wolves realized there was far more wool for the taking if you bent the Word of God the right way than there is in preaching the truth.

We’ve always had these weasely, mealy mouthed, outright lying mongrels roaming about Christendom, but they have multiplied exponentially in the last dozen years or so. Not only that, the old school con men are now revered as the forefathers of a movement, looked up to, and treated as demi-gods rather than the loathsome bottom dwellers they are. They are applauded and lauded, they are revered by the new class of wolves as visionaries, and no one seems to be pointing these individuals out. No one seems to be calling a flag on the play.

We’re all just turning a blind eye as two multi-millionaires sit there talking about how God wants them to have private jets, and how it would be unimaginable to fly with all those demons in economy class on a commercial airline.

It would be downright hellish! Can you imagine flying commercial? My oh my, my heart goes pitter patter just thinking about it. And no one says a thing. It seems perfectly reasonable and logical.

“Yep, yep, brother Jesse does needs him a private jet to fly his decaying carcass around from place to place to beg for more money to buy a bigger jet.” Yes, sir, he does indeed.

Every day I just want to throw my hands up in anger, in frustration, perhaps both, and just walk away from ministry altogether. It’s getting lumped in with these con men that gets my goad. It’s being lumped in with these kind of lying thieves that makes me want to disassociate myself from ministry.

4     We started chasing more after prophecy than we did after Jesus.

That’s right, I said it, and no, you won’t hear an apology from me tomorrow. Yes, I am the chairman of what is considered a prophetic ministry. I traveled with a man I considered, and still consider a true prophet. Yes, I operate in prophetic gifting, and I’m telling you it is a dangerous, dangerous thing to chase after prophecy rather than after Christ.

      We got into the habit of holding our breaths from one event to the next rather than redeeming the time and living our lives wholly sold out for Christ.

The only way to still be effective for Jesus is to live for Him with abandon! Seize every opportunity to do all that you can for the kingdom of God, not because you think the world might end tomorrow, or because you believe the dollar is going to collapse, but because you know it is the right thing to do, the noble thing to do, the godly thing to do.

We need to stop holding our breaths for the next big thing just to be let down when nothing happens and focus on living every day for Christ.

6     We have replaced absolute truth with relative opinions.

"Because I don’t feel something is a sin, then it isn’t. If I feel the notion of sin is not in tune with my personal understanding of God, then God must bend to my will and do away with His notion of sin as well."

We’ve allowed Joel Osteen to talk us into believing we’re so special we can make God dance on a dime, and do what we say whenever we so desire. We have allowed fools and liars, heretics and deceivers, demons in fancy suits and Jezebels in fancy dresses to twist our hearts and cause us to doubt the very Word of God, and even God Himself.

We will go to war with anyone who disagrees with our idol, but will do nothing to defend Jesus.

As far as the nation is concerned, I think it goes without saying that we lost the moral high ground if ever we had it because let’s face it, when you start parting out babies like they were chicken at KFC and selling the pieces, you don’t have a moral foot to stand on.

Those are my reasons. They are why I believe we are markedly worse, spiritually speaking than we were fifteen years ago, and the next thing to befall this nation will not be a warning, it will be judgment. 

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr. 

The End of Plenty

Youth is wasted on the young, and wealth is wasted on the fool. Whether that applies to a case by case basis or can be declared as a general statement, I have yet to deduce. What I have deduced, what every fiber of my being is screaming with the clarity of a siren, is that the end of plenty is nigh, and scarcity is about to descend like an unwelcomed and unwanted visitor.

It is a well-established fact that much of what goes on in the world, including the ups and downs of economies, have a cyclical component to them. What goes up must come down, and the higher up we are, the farther we have to fall. Sure, for a season we can keep ourselves afloat by artificial means, but eventually the law of gravity will have its say and bring everything crashing back to the earth from whence it rose.

What is of concern to me is not so much the end of plenty. As Paul once said, I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound. Since my goal was never to attain earthly things, the absence thereof is of no affect to me. If one takes no joy in possessions, then the absence of possessions will cause him no sorrow. It is when we allow things to define who we are, or give us worth, that even the thought of losing them becomes more than we can bear.

What is of concern, and I believe it is a well-founded concern, is that this present generation, overflowing with the entitled and the coddled have not a clue what true scarcity really means. Not being able to afford a new I Phone every six months is not scarcity; not having had anything to eat for three days, is.

Everything is relative until it isn’t. One man’s need may be another man’s want, but eventually, no matter how you slice it, hungry is still hungry.

If now, in the midst of excess and opportunity, during a season wherein any man who desires it to be so and applies himself can keep food on the table and a roof over his family’s head thanklessness abounds and violence is spiking, imagine how it will be on the day the store shelves are bare, the infrastructure has collapsed in on itself, and everyone is left to survive on their own.

No, I am not trying to scare you or make you squirm in your chair this morning, I am just laying out a very possible, and yes, unfortunately probable reality of what the future holds not only for this nation but for the world as a whole.

The difference between this nation and much of the world is that much of the world knows what it is to do without. For a disproportionate number of the citizens of planet earth poverty is a way of life. It is something they have learned to adapt to and live with. They know what it is to go hungry, they know what it is to need, they know what it is to portion out the bag of rice so it lasts for a week, or continue adding water to the pot of soup wherein it sustains the family for days and days.

These are realities much of the world contends with on a daily basis, but realities we have yet to contend with here, at least for the last few decades. No, I am not saying that there are no poor people in America. What I am saying is that even the poor among us are considered affluent in many corners of the world.

I’ve said all that to say this: we do not build up our faith and trust in our heavenly Father in the midst of chaos and tumult. We build up our faith and trust in our heavenly Father before the chaos and tumult ensue, so that when it is unleashed we will be even keeled, unwavering, unaffected, and at peace.

It is in the midst of uncertainty that men look for something solid, and true, and immutable. It is in the midst of hardship that men seek comfort and relief. It is in the near future that your light must so shine, and your hope be so evident that men will seek you out desiring to know the source of your solace, and is then that you will be able to share Christ with more souls than you ever imagined. 

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr. 

Where I've Been!

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything on the blog and for this I apologize. What I’ve been doing, at least the condensed, short story version is I’ve been writing. The long version is a bit more complicated, but in order for you to understand that I have not been neglecting the blog, I need to get into a bit of the long version of the story.

Some two months ago, shortly after arriving back in Romania, I was working on the outline of yet another book when I got this overwhelming urge to stop and pray. This happens to me often enough, but never when I’m writing or when I am attempting to put thoughts on paper.

I knew this was different somehow, I knew there was something to this, so I closed my notebook, put my pen down, knelt at the side of my bed and started to pray. I spent a solid thirty minutes praying, knowing there had to be something more than just the urge to pray but not knowing what that something might be.

Another thirty minutes in and all I received were four words that at the time didn’t make much sense: Finish What You’ve Started!

That was it. That was the extent of the message, and after waiting a few minutes to see if there was anything more to be had, I got up off my knees, went back to my desk, and got ready to return to the book outline when once again the urge to go and pray was almost unbearable.

Thirty minutes later I receive the same four-word message as before, but this time rather than go back to my desk I knelt there pondering what exactly this message meant. As I thought about it, the meaning of this short yet personally profound message became crystal clear, and I realized God was taking me to the woodshed, albeit in a very loving fashion.

I have eight books in various stages of completion, all over half done as far as I can tell by going over them during the last few weeks. Every time I get near the end of one book I get sidetracked by another project or another outline, and there it sits, almost done but not quite there.

If I were to be brutally honest with myself, I would have to say I am horrible at finishing projects, although I am apparently very good at starting.

As such, I have made it a priority to finish what I’ve started, and have resolved to start no new projects, outline no new books, or do pretty much nothing else until I am done with what I set out to do in the first place. Some of these manuscripts go back five, six, even ten years, and as I read back through them I realize how timely they are for today, and even necessary.

I am happy to report that The Battle-Ready Believer is complete, and is currently being laid out. I am perhaps two weeks away from completing the first volume on the book of Revelation, which is in essence a verse by verse commentary, the third installment of When Ye Pray is almost complete, and if all goes according to plan 31 Days to Rediscovering Christ, Fearless Christianity, and the Battle-Tested Believer will be ready by the end of the year, or at the latest the beginning of 2017.

So as you can see I have not been sitting idle, but as I’ve tried to carve out some time to spend with my wife and daughter, keep a roof over our heads, and still write as though I was on a deadline, I will forthwith endeavor to post here consistently because there is just too much going on in the world, and I get many questions that I would rather just answer in a public forum so I don’t have to repeat the answer time and again. Oddly enough, I get asked the same questions multiple times, so this may be a good way to remedy that situation.

Someone has also offered to transcribe the radio program, and if anyone is interested in reading the transcripts of the program, leave a comment, and I will start posting those as well.

Time is short and growing shorter by the day. It is one of those nagging realities that we can never really escape, just push to the back of our minds ever so often hoping it does not resurface.

Because we believe the Bible we know that the shorter the time, the greater the deception, and reason itself would dictate that the greater the deception, the greater the need for truth.

If my absence from this blog has been a source of sadness for anyone, I apologize, and all I can do is endeavor to do better. Please keep myself and my family in your prayers, and thank you for your understanding.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr.