Receiving a prophetic word is like receiving a gift. We need to accept it, unwrap it and then do something with it otherwise having a beautifully wrapped gift just sitting on the bench is a waste. The giver also wishes you to accept and unwrap the gift so that it can be useful as well as the fact that they love to see your reaction and delight. The same applies to our prophetic words that we have received. They are useless just hearing them and laying them aside. Maybe even occasionally remembering back to when you were given them doesn’t change the words.

1. Grab a set of highlighters, coloured pencils, textas or anything where you can highlight words and phrases with different colours. Read through your prophetic word (hopefully double spaced for ease of use) and highlight, preferably with different colours for ease of use:

• Any words or phrases repeated
• Words that really impact you or are very meaningful
• Words that keep being repeated in various other prophetic words
• Any themes
• Any promises
• Any conditions
• Any Bible verses – look them up and write them out fully.
• Any sense of timing

A beautiful lady I mentor received a prophetic word from my husband about 6 months before she received a word from a world renowned prophet. My husband had written in the prophetic word for her “It is time. It is time. It is time.”. This international prophet said to her “It is time. It is time. It is time.”. A couple of months later, another world renowned prophet also gave her a prophetic word and said, “It is time. It is time. It is time.”. Not only was the phrase repeated three times by each person, but it was exactly repeated by the three people. She needed to pay particular attention to those words.

Whenever I receive a prophetic word, I see the themes of healing and restoration. Thus, I tend to look for them now. I also, though, love looking for new themes. We have received some prophetic words about promises and we use these to partner with our faith in our contention in seeing these promises fulfilled.

2. See the opportunity

The prophetic word you receive is an opportunity to partner with God to become the person you need to be so that the prophetic word can be fulfilled. It is not an automatic process. An individual prophetic word, apart from if you were Jesus in the Bible, is conditional. We need to step into it and grow to become the person whom this prophetic word speaks about. When we partner with the Holy Spirit and lean in to the character and identity changes and growth, we unlock the prophetic word in our life.

I have had a number of prophetic words given to me about my gaze being awestruck with the gaze of God, my eyes being locked with the eyes of God, that the Lord and I having the same gaze. This was a foreign concept to me at the time so I went on a journey of exploring this and looking at God through new eyes, trying to look into His eyes, focusing on God and drawing near to Him so that I knew where His gaze was so that I could join Him.

Partnering with our prophetic word is an opportunity to go on a journey with God to become the person He created us to be. It is an opportunity to look at our identity, that of who God created us to be. Our prophetic word usually highlights how God sees us, how we are known in heaven. There may well be a ‘gap’ between how God sees us and how we see ourselves and the prophetic word is an invitation to close that gap.

Grab your coloured highlighters again and highlight:

• Any words that speak about who you are
• Any words that speak about how God sees you
• How you are known in heaven
• Who does God want to be for me
• What part of God’s nature is an invitation to grow in?

3. Get a large sheet of paper and label it “My identity”.

Write down all those words you underlined that speak about your identity and who God wants to be for you. Use this as a working sheet. Group like words together, draw mind-map type of diagrams, be as creative as you want whilst you are drawing all the identity words out of your prophetic word. Find out how God wants to encourage, strengthen and build you up from your prophetic word (1 Corinthians 14:3 “But the one who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening, encouraging and comfort.”) Write it down on your sheet of paper. Then look at it and see what really sticks out to you.

Part of our mandate for being on earth is for us to grow in the likeness of Christ. Therefore, look at your prophetic word and highlight any aspects of God’s nature that are there and that are an invitation for you to grow in. Peace and joy are often mentioned in prophetic words. If peace is mentioned, then that is God’s provision for you. The same with joy. If you currently are not the most joyful person, then this is your opportunity to access God’s provision of joy for you and to grow into your new identity of being a joyful person. How do you do that?

• Choose joy over misery. Make a conscious choice whenever you are feeling miserable or not joyful to be joyful.
• Ask God to help you.
• Find all the Bible verses that speak about joy. Read them over and over.
• Worship God.
• Practice turning your heart to God whenever you don’t feel joyful.
• Meditate on God and His Word
• Look for the joy in your everyday life. Find things to be grateful for as people who are grateful are joyful.
• Look at practical things you can do – practice smiling, read comics, do silly things, be around joyful people.
• Look at what hinders you from being joyful and address those issues.

Our transformation begins with how we think. Proverbs 23:7 says “For how he thinks in his heart, so he is”. What we think about ourselves determines who we become. This then influences what we do.

4. Summarise

Look at the words you have highlighted and the words you have written on your large sheet of paper. Bring it together to summarise:

• What God is telling me about my identity
• Who do I need to become for this prophesy to be fulfilled
• Who God wants to be for me to help me become that person
• What is God developing in my character

Next week I am going to look at working with your prophetic word to reveal your destiny and calling. Please subscribe to my blog so that you will receive the new blog post next week.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

The purpose of these exercises is to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and recognise God’s voice and His way of communicating with us. This enables us to grow in our relationship with God and also to impart to others what God tells us for them. Feel free to use as many of these activations each week as you can. The more you practice, the sharper you become at hearing God’s voice. Enjoy!

Remember that whenever you give another person a prophetic word or picture etc, please make sure that it is encouraging, edifying (strengthening) and comforting (1 Corinthians 14:3) and that it comes from a place of love.

1. Children / Families Activation: Spread flour on a baking tray and place the tray in front of a person. Have them draw or write something in the flour that they feel or sense God is saying for the person on their right. Ask them to share and explain. Then get the next person to have a turn etc.

2. Group Activation: Pray for insight for people to get a picture/scene/image from God and then give out paper and pencils to everyone and ask them to draw that picture/scene/image. Set a time limit of 5 minutes. Then get people into small groups of 3-4 and ask everyone to look at their picture and to share how their picture relates to their life. Pray for each other after sharing.

3. Beginner Activation: Find a calendar that has photos on it. As you ‘flick’ through the calendar, ask God to highlight a particular month to you. Ask God then to highlight what it is about that photo and that month that is especially applicable to you or to someone close to you whom you can share it with to encourage.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to highlight a Bible passage or Bible verse to you and then ask God whom that verse is especially applicable to that day. Share it with that person as an encouragement.

5. Advanced Activation: Spend time with God asking Him to give you a poem or write a new Psalm for someone whom God highlights to you. Share it with them at an appropriate time.