Profit Arise, or was that Prophet Arise?
5 Words in 1
A Lesson of Importance
Sometimes I sit and think about ministry and often I think about why are people in ministry and what are they truly in ministry for. Often people ask me how are you able to survive as long as you have in ministry, and what is it that has kept me going strong.
My answer is I survive because I never put the actions of people above my relationship with God.
You see, when your concept of ministry is perceived as a way to gain popularity, to become famous, to get rich, you will fail because all of these things are achieved through people. If the people don’t receive you, if the people don’t support you, then you feel as if you’re not important or have not accomplish anything in your Christian life. But when you perceive ministry as you being a tool that God is using to bring souls in the Kingdom and to bring the people back to God then you always feel good about yourself and you maintain an attitude of success because you realize that you are pleasing God.
Ministry to me is dedication commitment obedience to God. I have survived because whether I have people with me or not, I yet do what I’m called to do even if I have to walk alone.
One thing I was taught well, is that the people belong to God. That nobody is your personal property. That you love them and care for them, but that you always remember none of them are yours to keep or hold in bondage to you.
This has allowed me to be able to let go when God calls them to other ministries or to their own work. I realize that people are my assignment. I’m assigned to train teach and release them. There are those down through the years whom I have become attached to, but God always reminds me that I can’t become possessive or over indulged in their lives.
He always pulls me back, so that when it’s time for them to shift, I won’t take it as a personal insult, or look at it as a betrayal against me, because my desire is to see people be who they are called to be and to fulfill their purpose and destiny in life.
Does it hurt? Of course I hurt when those whom I loved and watched grow and matured have to leave the nest, but I let them go without fighting their process or progress, because I realize I was only there as an instrument to be used by God to help them.
As a leader, I do understand that my life is a door were people enter in and go out constantly. That God allows them to be there, sometimes short term ,some long term, and I must know how to deal with it without developing attitudes against those I’m assigned to. If those in leadership would understand that they are only available to the people because God has an assignment with them attached to their lives, then they wouldn’t become angry upset or feel like people have betrayed them when it’s time for them to shift!
I’m loving my job in the Kingdom of God! Much love and continual success to all whose lives I have been used by God to touch and help get to their purpose!
Unity
Sitting here thinking and the words He is speaking is blowing my mind.
One thing He dealt with me about is UNITY. In Mark 9:38-41 God begin to reveal to me how many in the Body of Christ are in opposition because somebody believes that they are the only one that God is using. Many churches won’t intermingle with other churches because of denominational or doctrine beliefs. They consider others to be in error because they don’t operate in the same methods as they do.
Many times they will tell those connected to them not to associate with others even though the persons they are telling them not to deal with has wisdom and knowledge that can help them. Jealousy sometimes causing persons to attempt to stop the ministry of another person. They were forbidding them to operate because they wasn’t part of their organization. They wanted to shut them down because they were not under their leadership.
How often this happens in the Body of Christ that because people won’t let someone be their overseer or mentor that they attack the person and try to cut them off in ministry by contacting others to not deal with the individual. Learning how to embrace the diversity of ministry will allow us to grow and to understand that we are not the only one that has all the answers and that there are others that The Lord is using in the Kingdom of God!
“Now John answered Him, saying, “Teacher, we saw someone who does not follow us casting out demons in Your name, and we forbade him because he does not follow us.” But Jesus said, “Do not forbid him, for no one who works a miracle in My name can soon afterward speak evil of Me. For he who is not against us is on our side. For whoever gives you a cup of water to drink in My name, because you belong to Christ, assuredly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward,” Mark 9:38-41.
Profit Arise, or was that Prophet Arise?
Somebody must of thought God said, PROFIT ARISE instead of PROPHET ARISE!
Too many, are using the opportunity to play on those who are fearful and worried about their lives. Instead of them giving the people hope in The Lord they are using their prophetic gift as a money scheme. They are looting the people of God and stealing their finances and hope through lies and deception.
Because the people are in states of desperation, they are selling pieces of their soul to those false and lying prophets trying to find someone that is going to tell them what they want to hear so that they can feel a temporary joy but never be fulfilled. There are far too many persons counterfeiting the prophetic gift by listening and studying the words of other prophets to manufacture a genetic prophesy such as God wants to bless you.
These are words that can happen by chance to anyone but it doesn’t mean that the word was from God. Right now because of the chaos in the world people are grasping for any and everything rather than seeking and pursuing God and trusting in His Word. It seems in this hour people are just looking for a word they don’t care who gives it or whether it’s true or false as long as they can feel good.
This is the hour that they will rise up against you if you attempt to tell them the person speaking is false or a liar and they are speaking lies in the name of The Lord because they rather believe in false hope rather than seek God for answers.
The voices of truth are revealing the truth. They are not attacking the person but the evil spirit operating through them. They are assigned by God to keep people from believing in false and lying prophets so that they won’t open up their lives to demonic attacks that can destroy them.
People, let’s hear with the Spirit and not with our desperation. One can cause breakthrough change and transformation to your life while the other can cause disaster warfare chaos and confusion! Be careful who you let speak into your life you may just find yourself being open up to experience the witch realm of divination!
Don’t try to fix a Word
Prophets, once you have released a Word from The Lord, no matter how much opposition arises after the Word is spoken, never go back and try to rearrange, analyzed, or try to fix what God has said, because the person is experiencing a challenge by Satan concerning the word spoken.
Your job is to only speak what God has given you and whatever test trials persecution comes to oppose it God already knew it was coming. Never let the discomfort of the person provoke you beyond your place of obedience.
Numbers 23:19-20 stands! What God has spoken can’t be reverse by nobody but God! Remember you can always expect warfare when God releases a word of promise!
“God is not a man, that He should lie,
Nor a son of man, that He should repent.
Has He said, and will He not do?
Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?
20 Behold, I have received a command to bless;
He has blessed, and I cannot reverse it,” Numbers 23:19-21.
Reestablish the Relationship between Leaders and the Led!
Leaders, if all you wanted were the people’s tithes and offerings, then they can just mail you a check or give through Paypal.
Some of these ministries need to rename themselves the “ATM of Deliverance,” because all they are delivering the people from is all their money. They are not concern about their souls, about whether they are taught or trained to live victoriously, or how to be holy and righteous lives.
Your focus about the people you serve as a leader, should not be how much they are going to tithe, when is their payday, or what they going to contribute to the pastoral fund. And don’t come to me with that it takes money to run the ministry. We all know it takes finances to run a ministry, but when the person’s money becomes more important than their soul, than the church, we have a problem.
What if they don’t have a job, or any income, would you yet give them the attention you give the ones who are capable of giving?
It disturbs my spirit when I hear people say that their leader was checking on them, and speaking to them, until they lost their job, or were no longer able to give into their leader’s life. Then they avoid them, like they have some contagious disease.
What happened to the leaders, when they begin to look at the people as only provisional sources or financial portals? How did their hearts become so cold that they will deceive manipulate and even intimidate the people just for monetary purposes or some kind of gain?
How do we get the leaders back to a place of being loving and concerned about the people?
How do we get the focus of why leadership has been called to the Kingdom, reprogrammed back into the mind and heart of them?
How do we get those in leadership who are in error and walking contrary to the ways of God, to accept the necessary correction and rebuke that will put them in the right attitude and character that is needful for them to lead the people?
How do we get them to see how pride, greed and status has driven them to a place of being unfeeling uncaring and unloving about those they lead.
One of the hardest things to do is to show someone in leadership that they are leading in error. Because of their title & status they refuse to listen and will not admit that they have fallen in character or that they are doing things outside the will and ways of the word. I know one of the first steps to deliverance and restoration is admitting you were wrong seeing your short coming and repenting to God and allowing Him to do what is necessary to correct us in our errors.
Leaders, lets get back in focus and do what is necessary to reestablish the relationship between leaders and those they lead the way God has ordained it to be!
~ Apostle Barbara R. Thomas
