Prophecy XIV

 If a word of prophecy attempts to excuse sin, duplicity, or rebellion, no matter how good it may make you feel in the moment, know that it was not a true word of prophecy. God will not speak something through a vessel that is contrary to His word, His nature, and His righteousness. When you know there are issues in your life that require repentance, yet the word you received speaks nothing of it, it’s not God giving you a pass; it’s the enemy trying to make you comfortable and at ease in your current condition so that he might more securely ensnare you.

There is always a compounding ripple effect when someone believes a word that is not from the Lord, or that is contrary to the Bible itself. It’s not a one-and-done proposition, because believing a lie as truth will affect how you proceed from that point forward. The world is magnetic, sin is magnetic, rebellion is magnetic, and if someone believes God has given them permission to stop resisting evil, to go with the flow and let themselves be buoyed along, the pace at which they distance themselves from truth and light will only increase.

What once seemed anathema becomes a common practice, and what once was deemed sin because the Bible calls it sin is treated as acceptable. It all started with the supposed word from the Lord they received, insisting God has become more lenient, that the rules no longer apply, that there are no guardrails or standards for those who call themselves sons or daughters of the Most High.

It’s likely that Ahab conflated the positive words of the four hundred prophets with God’s own approbation of him and his actions. Why would God promise victory if I were truly living in rebellion? Why would God promise a breakthrough, or that I would be a prophetic voice to the nations, if what I’m doing was so bad? You see how that works? You see how subtle, devilishly deceptive, and duplicitous the enemy can be?

We see it from the serpent’s first interaction with God’s creation in the garden. The serpent didn’t come out and demand that Eve eat of the forbidden fruit; he asked questions meant to sow doubt in her heart as to what God meant, or whether He meant what He said.

Is it really a baby or a clump of cells? If it’s your body, why shouldn’t it be your choice as to what you do with that clump of cells if it isn’t really a baby? Well, yes, the baby in Elizabeth’s womb leaped upon Mary’s greeting, but that’s just anecdotal, isn’t it? And so we stray, further and further from the truth, to the point that we’ve given ourselves permission to murder a baby up until the point of birth without thinking anything of it.

We are where we are because we entertained the question that the serpent posed to Eve: “Has God indeed said?” Why change your approach if it’s still working? If it’s not broken, why try to fix it? Sure, you can improve upon it; you can get compromised individuals posing as shepherds of God’s people to co-sign and validate the wickedness, but the genesis of it all was still that seemingly innocuous question: Has God indeed said? Even if He did, did He really mean it, or was He just having a bad day? Even if He meant it, doesn’t it seem a bit legalistic?

Doubt, drip by miserable drip, poisons the hearts of the innocent, strengthens the hand of the wicked, and makes the hearts of the righteous sad with lies. Some have lived the lie for so long that the truth is alien to them. Their instinctual reaction to it is all the clue you need to know where they are spiritually, and though all you’re doing is quoting Scripture verbatim, they rage and gnash while insisting they are the bride of Christ, spotless and unblemished.

We’ve gone from calling murder what it is to simply stating that it’s not God’s best, as though it’s no more egregious than getting second place at the regional spelling bee competition for failing to spell kumquat. False prophecy does not occur in a vacuum, and neither does believing it. It has both real-world and eternal consequences.

Perhaps if more people professing to be the body of Christ believed what the Bible says about the return of Christ, and not what some dreamer of dreams insists is the truth, less of us would be as indifferent, purposeless, apathetic, and checked out, just waiting around, bags packed, checking our watches and wondering why we’re still here.

If the attitude of your heart isn’t right before God, expecting a word from the Lord other than to repent and seek His face isn’t simply unrealistic or improbable, but impossible.

Consider that once Micaiah was summoned and repeatedly asked to tell the truth of what he heard from the Lord, he finally relented and said that the Lord had put a lying spirit in the mouths of Ahab’s prophets because the Lord had declared a disaster against him.

Seeking words of prophecy to validate or approve of things you know the Word of God does not, ignoring the call of repentance because you do not desire it, and going on to seek another word that makes no demands but promises breakthroughs is a form of tempting God to the point that He may allow a lying spirit to tell you exactly what you want to hear for having not heeded His warnings and reproofs.

“Lord, should I marry this girl or this man?”

“Be not unequally yoked with unbelievers.”

“But Lord, she’s so pretty, or he’s so handsome; are you sure?”

And you get the same answer not once, or twice, but three or four times. God confirms it multiple times, and still you persist in seeking a different answer to the same question because you don’t want to hear what the Lord has to say; you want the Lord to say what you want Him to say. Finally, you hear, “do as you will”, and you think to yourself that you’ve worn God down; He finally saw it your way, and years down the line, when all that remains is ash and ruin, you shake your fist at God and demand an answer to why things went so sideways.

If you ask and God answers, the matter is concluded. He doesn’t stutter. He is not double-minded, nor is He double-tongued. Even if the answer you receive isn't the answer you hoped for or wanted to hear, it was nevertheless the answer God gave to your query, and you must accept it as such.      

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.