Our Responsibility when Prophesying

DiggingI was tired. We had had a late night the night before. I had had an extremely busy week. I was on the team prophesying in pairs to individuals after the church service. I love prophesying and seeing people get a taste of what God thinks of them and His heart for them and how it can impact them greatly. I love helping to ‘unlock the gold’ within each person. This morning, we had prophesied well. The words had been accurate, encouraging, comforting. Many had tears as they listened and tried to take it all in. Most of the other teams had finished and left. My partner and I were still there, plus another team comprising my hubby and another team member. I glanced at my watch and realised that we had to get going as we had a luncheon appointment to be at. Plus, I was exhausted. The adrenaline was ‘running out’.

We finished with the lady we were prophesying over and then I saw someone else approach the front. My heart sank. This lady turned up every month for a prophetic word. I had given her several over the last six months and I could feel an ‘injustice’ (& a judgemental spirit) rise within me. Why was this person so ‘needy’? She should really chase after God for herself and not continually try and receive a prophetic word from others for herself. My judgemental attitude really kicked in. She approached for a prophetic word and my mouth opened and asked her about what she had done with all the other prophetic words she had received from us over the last 12 months. It was totally inappropriate of me. I was reacting out of my tiredness and frustration with people who chase after prophetic words and don’t do the hard yards putting in time with their own relationship with God. This lady responded by saying that she hadn’t received any prophetic words from us before. I was flabbergasted as I was sure that she had as I could clearly remember prophesying over her several times. My response did not communicate God’s heart as I turned and whispered to my partner that I needed to go. I called over the team leader and shared my response and my team leader kindly stepped in to give a prophetic word with my partner to this lady.

It’s fantastic that we can hear, see or feel God and what He wants to communicate to us and through us, but if we are not aware of the responsibility that comes with this, then we can hurt people. Plus, we can fall in to the trap of not representing God’s heart well. The goal of prophesying is 1 Corinthians 14:3 – to encourage, comfort and strengthen. Our role is to represent Father God well. To communicate his truth, love and heart for others in a manner that befits Him well.

On the day I was prophesying as described above, I did not represent the Father’s heart well. Sure, there was an identity issue with the lady concerned as she was always chasing after a prophetic word instead of listening to God for herself, but that doesn’t justify my response.

Below I have listed some of our responsibilities we need to incorporate when we are prophesying over other people.

  1. Be Prepared

Make sure you are on top of your game by having an early night the night before. Check your heart and confess sin. Keep short accounts with people and forgive quickly. What you take in affects your heart and mind so be careful what you watch and hear. Live a pure life. Devour the Bible. Keep your relationship with Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus as number one in your life.

  1. Treat each person with dignity. Respect and honour the person.

They are a child of God. We need to see them through the Father’s eyes and have compassion on them and share the Father’s heart for them. They are a child of God. When we prophesy, it is not just about what we say but about what we communicate as a whole and how the person felt loved. We are communicating God’s heart to them.

This becomes evident with

  • how we speak ie the tone of our voice, the volume, intonations etc
  • what we say,
  • our body language and what that is communicating,
  • who is around when we share and how ‘public’ we say it ie the volume we use and how many others can hear what is personal for this individual especially if it is something they would not want others to hear.
  1. The prophetic word and how we communicate it must be encouraging, strengthening and comforting.

Thus we don’t prophesy anything negative. If we receive a ‘word of knowledge’ that is negative, we turn it around 180o and prophesy the positive.

  1. Ask permission first.

Do not just presume that because you think you have a prophetic word for someone, that they want to hear it. You need to ask their permission to share it with them. They may say no and you need to respect that. Also, please do not touch the person eg on the arm, shoulder etc without first asking permission to put your hand there.

  1. Stop when God stops.

When you stop hearing from God, stop. Do not add any extra. Do not add your spin (or hobby horse/pet topic) on it or try to expand or explain it. On the other hand, God loves questions, so ask God if there is anything more He wants you to communicate.

  1. They have a choice whether or not they accept it or do anything about it.

It is their choice. We cannot dictate what they do or not. If they choose not to do anything about what you have shared that you sense God’s communicating to them, that is totally their choice. You have not failed. You also cannot make them do something about it. We also are not fully aware of their whole situation. Instead, exude grace.

  1. Accountability

We do not have free reign to go up to everyone we have a prophetic word for and share. We need to come under the authority of our church plus any ministry group we are operating under. We also need to make sure that a ‘third person’ is present or that the person records what is said. That is the beauty of mobile phones these days as you can easily record a prophetic word. This is so important for accountability and being above reproach.

  1. We need to use clean language

We don’t say ‘God told me’. Instead, use language that gives the person a ‘way out’ eg ‘I have a sense that…’ Communicating that ‘God told you’ about another person borders on spiritual abuse. It implies that the person needs to do whatever you say otherwise they are not obeying God. That is not fair or correct.

  1. Remember that we prophesy in part.

We do not have full access to everything that God thinks, says, sees and knows. Therefore, there is always more to the story. 1 Corinthians 13:9 says “For we know in part and we prophesy in part.” We never have the full and total picture. That is also why it is helpful to have someone else prophesy with you eg in pairs as that can help spur you on and you can see and hear more of the picture.

  1. Be humble.

We are not God’s gift to mankind. No matter how skilled and accurate we may think we are, humility is important. We are not God. We represent God when we prophesy but we are not God.

  1. We want to make God look great, not the prophet look great.

A great question to ponder on is “Why am I wanting to give a prophetic word to that person?” Is it because I want to ‘look’ good?

12.Timing

Is it the right timing to tell the person what you are feeling, sensing, hearing, seeing? Is this God’s timing to release it to that person now? Am I meant to share it with them or is it for me to pray about and intercede for them about this?

 

Prophesying over people is exciting and rewarding to be a part of but it also carries with it the weight of responsibility. Keeping in mind these points means that you will be able to release the Father’s heart in a way that reflects who God is more accurately.

 

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Make or buy the cardboard cut-out shapes of a person’s body. Ask everyone to write a person’s name on each ‘person’ and then a word that God uses to describes that person. Then pray over each person and give the cut-outs to the appropriate people.

2. Group Activation: Pair up and make 2 circles one inside the other and facing towards each other ie one of each pair on the inside circle facing outwards and the other on the outside circle facing inwards. Give everyone 30 seconds to hear, see, or sense one word for the person opposite them and then share that one word with their partner. Then ask the outer circle to move 3 people to the right. Everyone has 30 seconds again to get one word for the person opposite them and to share it with them. Then ask the inner circle to move 3 people to the right. Repeat the process.

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time with God and quieten your heart and mind. Ask God what He would want to give you or if there is something He would like to place in your right hand at the moment. Ask Father God more questions about this eg why that object, what is it for, what does it look like etc

4. Intermediate Activation: Prophesy over yourself. Focus on God and imagine yourself somewhere with Him. Start your recording device and begin to prophesy over yourself what Father God thinks of you and feels for you and His plans for your life.

5. Advanced Activation: Record yourself the next time you prophesy over someone. Ask them permission first. When you have finished, spend some time later re-listening to what you said. Ask God if there was anything else He would have liked you to add. Listen and pay attention to how you prophesied and how you communicated God’s heart for the person.

Prophesying as a Group

I love being part of a team when I am releasing prophetic words to people. I usually find that when I am with another person, what we hear as a combination far outweighs what I hear just on my own. The Bible verse from 1 Corinthians 13:9 “For we know in part and we prophesy in part”, is certainly accurate.

When our team give prophetic words to people who come forward for a prophetic word at the end of a church service, I love the fact that we operate in pairs. We team up with another person. The combination may well be a newer team member with a more experienced or seasoned team member. I often find that I tend to quickly receive a prophetic word for someone and release it to them. Usually I begin with just a single word or image or thought. I ask God to show me more. Usually I receive a little more of the picture but my experience is that when I open my mouth to share with the person receiving the prophetic word, that much more comes as I speak. Then my team member usually shares and then God shows me more and confirms what the other person has shared. I find that this creates a greater depth and ‘weightiness’ (almost like you can feel the power and truth) to the prophecy.

Prophesying as a team, whether as a couple or a larger group, helps to spur us on and encourages us as we build a far larger picture for the person. It can be likened to God revealing and expanding the picture further.

It also helps as far as accountability is concerned. There is someone else, apart from the person receiving the prophecy, who has heard what has been said. This is another reason why we encourage everyone to record every prophetic word on a recording device, like a phone.

I have found over the years though, that there are certain ‘protocols’ or guidelines or things to be aware of, especially if you are prophesying in a larger group of people. It can become quite messy if everyone just opens their mouth and starts speaking whenever there is a pause.

These guidelines include:

  1. Flow / timing – stick to the topic on hand. If you ‘get’ something for the person, but it doesn’t ‘fit’ the flow at that moment or it doesn’t ‘add’ to what is being said, wait. Keep your mouth closed. View it as though you are creating and colouring in a picture as a group. Before you speak, ask yourself “Does it confirm what the Holy Spirit is already saying?” Also ask yourself, “Is now the right time to speak?”
  2. It is not about you!! Keep your mouth shut unless it ‘adds’ to the picture that the group is creating. It is not about you and your agenda. Know when to be quiet.
  3. Keep it short. Do not repeat (unless that is what God is saying for a particular purpose). Realise that you are a group and need to operate as a group. The first person should not take all the time prophesying and leave nothing to say or no time for anyone else. Work as a group.
  4. Only say what God gives you to say. Don’t interpret and try to apply the revelation.
  5. Realise that the timing of when you release the word is just as important as what you say. Wait for the prompting of the Holy Spirit in when to open your mouth.
  6. Keep your eyes open. When prophesying – I encourage you, please keep your eyes open and see what God is doing for the person. Looking into the person’s eyes when you are speaking has a far greater impact than speaking with your eyes closed. I realise some people close their eyes so as not to become distracted with whatever else is occurring around them. If that is you – then practice, practice, practise not becoming distracted with your eyes open. In a group setting, it is even more important to keep your eyes open as you can then see and sense what the Holy Spirit is doing and see who He is on to speak next and when etc.
  7. Position yourselves in a circle so that everyone in the group can see everyone else.
  8. Have fun. Enjoy the process. Remember that the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 14:3 that “prophecy is for encouragement, strengthening/edifying and comfort”.

I encourage you, if you have never prophesied before in a team with someone else, give it a go. You may well find, like I do, that your prophetic words have a lot more depth and completion.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Choose a public figure from another country, example Kim Jong-un – the supreme leader of North Korea. Have a photo ready that everyone can see. Outline the guidelines for prophesying – that of everything we say has to be encouraging, building up and comforting. Encourage everyone to ask God what He loves about Kim Jong-un and what God’s heart is for Kim Jong-un. Then ask everyone to take it in turns to share the words that come to mind for Kim Jong-un. Some children may wish to also draw a picture of how God sees Kim Jong-un. Finish with praying a declaration over what was said and that Kim Jong-un will become the person God sees him as.

2. Group Activation: Break into smaller groups of 5-6 people. Choose someone to receive the prophecy. Then practice hearing from God as a group and sharing along one central theme, noting the timing and what people feel is important to say. At the end, have group members share their experience and how they felt during the process. If time, choose a different team member to be the receiver and repeat the process.

3. Beginner Activation: Ask God to show you two other people who would love to grow in the prophetic. Practice prophesying in pairs over the third person and then swap around so every person gets an opportunity to receive a prophetic word. Record the prophetic words and listen to them back, paying particular attention to the flow. Share with each other how it felt to prophesy with another person etc.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to show you someone else to write a prophetic word with. Choose someone or a group or an issue to prophesy over. Come together and craft a prophetic word as a joint prophecy, spurring each other on. When you are both content with the finished prophetic word, submit it to the person or group concerned.

5. Advanced Activation: Ask God to show you someone else or several other people you can team up with to prophesy over a crucial issue currently before policy makers in your country eg abortion in Australia & New Zealand. Ask this person if they will join you and spend time together seeking the Lord on the issue and then prophesying together about it. Ask God if there is anything further He requires of you in regard to the issue you have prophesied over.

Prophesying about Social Issues

In May this year, Australia held its federal election. That night, there was a massive miraculous moment when all of Australia realised that something had completely changed. Everyone expected Labor to win. But half way through the evening, it became apparent that the opposite was true. The Liberal Party had completely turned the tables and had come out on top. Scott Morrison, in his acceptance speech as the New Prime Minister declared at the outset “I have always believed in miracles. I’m standing with the three biggest miracles in my life here tonight (His wife and two daughters). And tonight, we have been delivered another one.”

Much prayer, fasting and prophecy had gone into this as Australia was facing a very sombre outlook, especially in regard to gender identity. The outcome of this election demonstrated that prayer and prophecy can change a nation. Prayer and prophecy can change social outcomes.

We are bombarded constantly with social issues and injustices. Every night the news is filled with issues that are not displaying the Kingdom of God here on earth.

What should our response be?

I encourage you to seek God for His heart and for what your response could be for social issues. I encourage you to use your prophetic gifting to make a huge dent and cause a 180 degree turn around in the social issues affecting your country.

 

How is it best to prophesy over issues such as

  • Abortion
  • Homosexuality / transgender / identity issues
  • The way the government spends money
  • Drug abuse
  • Crime
  • Injecting Rooms
  • Euthanasia
  • Genetic selection
  • Sex Trafficking
  • Abuse – child, domestic, elderly, etc
  • Oppression
  • Injustice
  • Treatment of refugees
  • And the list goes on

The only true way to prophesy over issues like this is to have spent time with Father God, knowing His heart on the particular issue and speaking only what He wants you to communicate. Sometimes there is a place for silence and no comment. Other times, we need to speak up and speak out and prophesy and change the outcome.

In the Kingdom of God, every person has dignity. Every person is valued. Every person has worth. Every person is created in the image of God. When injustice occurs, we need to look at how we can help restore the particular person back to their original design.

In Matthew 6: 33, we are urged to “seek first His kingdom and His righteousness”.

 

Some helpful hints to keep in mind:

  1. Always honour and protect the dignity of the person. Bring life and light and help point the person to Jesus and draw them closer to God’s heart.
  2. Focus on the answer, not the problem. Remember, you are prophesying to bring God’s Kingdom from Heaven to earth. An extremely helpful guideline in prophesying is to never prophesy the negative. If you receive a word of knowledge and get a negative about the person, turn it 180 degrees so that it becomes a positive that you are prophesying them towards.
  3. Timing is important. Just as what you communicate is important, so is the timing. Ask God “is this the right timing?”.
  4. Be wise and discerning about what you communicate, how you communicate and where you communicate it.
  5. Don’t prophesy out of an emotive agenda. Sure, emotions can flow when you prophesy and you are experiencing God’s heart for that person, but please do not put your own personal agenda into it. Ask yourself “Is this what God wants me to say or is this my own personal agenda coming through?”
  6. There is a difference between prophesying and prophetic intercession. Has God shown you something for someone or for a societal group but it is not for you to communicate it to them. Rather, God wants you to intercede for them.
  7. Likewise, who you prophesy to is important. Has God communicated this to you to prophesy to a particular person, a group, a government body, shout it off a mountain top where you are alone, etc.

I would love to hear your thoughts and comments on what you have discovered when you have prophesied about a social issue.

 

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Have paper and crayons/pencils plus hand held bubble blowers on hand. Ask everyone to draw how God wants to bring His Kingdom into your town, state, nation or world. Then release joy over these pictures by placing them on the floor and blowing bubbles over them and releasing God’s goodness and joy over the issues and outcomes.

2. Group Activation: Identify the top 3-5 social justice issues in your community. Break into groups and select one issue per group. Work together as a group to hear/sense/see from God and prophesy the outcome about the issue.

3. Beginner Activation: Ask God to bring an individual across your path this week that is struggling in the area of their gender identity. Prophesy God’s heart over them.

4. Intermediate Activation: Prophesy over a group that is addressing social injustice issues, encouraging them by highlighting a way forward for them.

5. Advanced Activation: Ask God to highlight a social injustice issue relevant at the moment in your nation. Spend time with God formulating a prophetic word to release and ask God how, when and where.

Prophesying over adverse weather

Friends were on holiday in Hawaii when news was received of a hurricane bearing down on the Islands. This was going to cause major issues with their travel plans but, more importantly, the devastation forecast to the people, land etc was predicted to be crippling. So, my friends, realising the authority they had in being a son and daughter of the Most High God, decreed and declared that the direction of the hurricane would change away from inhabited areas and move out to sea and that the force would lessen. They rested in this. They spoke to the wind, the waves, the rain just as Jesus did in Mark 4:35-41 where He “rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!”. Around them the taxi driver, the hotel staff, the shopkeepers were all in a frenzy as they realised the devastating effect that the hurricane could have on the tourist industry and they received phone calls cancelling all plans and tours the following few days.

My friends continued to speak with authority to the hurricane and they slept well overnight. Awakening the following morning, news came of the hurricane miraculously changing direction and petering out to a storm level with no adverse impact.

With this in mind, and seeing the manner in which my friends confidence and authority grew as they continued to grow in this area as they sought God in regard to weather conditions and then decreed and declared and prophesied over adverse weather, I decided that I needed to grow in this area.

The Bible has a number of passages about the weather and miracles with the weather. One such passage in the Old Testament is in regard to Moses and Pharaoh and the hailstorms as recoded in Exodus 9:13-29. It was the worst storm in all the land of Egypt since it had become a nation. Tremendous hail, lightening, thunder reigned forth. Throughout Egypt, hail struck everything in the fields, both people and animals, and it destroyed everything growing in the fields and stripped every tree. Verse 26 “The only place it did not hail was the land of Goshen where the Israelites were.” In verse 29, Moses says to Pharaoh “When I have gone out of the city, I will spread out my hands in prayer to the Lord. The thunder will stop and there will be no more hail, so you may know that the earth is the Lord’s.” How could Moses do this?

 

Because He had first heard from the Lord about what his role was and what he was to do and say.

 

I concentrated on storms around our area in regard to lessening the flooding and damage and redirecting the force. I realised that with any force, the movement has to be directed elsewhere or the force has to dissipate. I didn’t want to pray and have the force changed and then cause a horrific impact elsewhere so I needed to ask God and have an idea of where the force could be directed to with minimal damage.

I would begin by stating my authority that I had in being a daughter of the most high God. I would quote Jesus saying in John 14:12 “Whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing and will do even greater things than these.”

My prayer/declaration would go something like this (realising that the exact wording is not a formula but just a guide): “I hereby give notice to the adverse weather conditions, the storm, wind etc. I have accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour. Thus, I am a child of the Most High God, the King of Kings. As such, I am His precious daughter who has been given all authority to carry out His works here on earth. Jesus said in John 14:12 “Whoever believes in me will do the works that I have been doing and will do even greater things than these”. Jesus spoke to the storm and commanded it to be quiet so with the authority invested in me as a believer of Jesus I can do what Jesus did. Therefore, I decree and declare now that the wind will lessen, the force will dissipate, the rain will ease, the direction of the storm will change and move out to sea away from impacting negatively any person or land. I speak peace to the air, and that the barometric pressure will be stable and remain high.”

When my authority grew in this area, I then expanded. I began to see the effect when I took notice of any storms coming and listen to God for His heart on the storm. As I decreed and declared a lessening impact, I noticed that there were numerous storms which were forecast to cause horrific damage to our area but the impact seemed to be small and the storm petered out.

A short while afterwards, I was involved in a team that went on a mission trip to another country. Once on the plane, the air hostess announced that the destination weather was sunny and hot at 37° Celsius. Now I don’t cope well in hot weather at all. I had been chatting a lot about this with God before the trip as we would be spending our days outside with our hosts and ministering to many people. I really felt to decree and declare on the plane that the weather would drop to 10°C to a more manageable 27°Celsius.

Imagine my fellow missionaries shock when just before landing, the captain announced that there had been an unforeseen, unprecedented and major change in the weather conditions and the temperature had dropped 10°C.

That following week, we were able to manage our activities heaps easier with the lower temperature. The locals would all comment on how the weather had suddenly turned a lot cooler. There were no major implications on the locals, but huge implications for our team, especially me.

Please, in regard to weather, keep this in perspective. Jesus commanded us to preach the gospel and disciple those who believe, heal the sick. Jesus did not say that we are to focus on changing the weather. He did say though, that signs will follow us.

Mark 16:15-19  Jesus said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

I encourage you, my friends, to go on a journey with God in regard to prophesying over adverse weather conditions.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Choose a country that is in despair and devastation after a cyclone or major flooding eg currently Mozambique or a country that is experiencing drought and thus famine. Prepare a large map of that country to be placed on the floor. As a group, pray and prophesy over that country. Ask the kids to come up with ideas for a prophetic act (something you do in the physical that changes the condition in the spiritual that then impacts back on the physical) to address the issue. Have fun implementing and releasing joy and solutions over that country.

2. Group Activation: Select a country that is currently experiencing or expecting an extreme weather condition. Listen to God as a group for His heart about the situation. Pray, prophesy and sing the result over that area and the weather.

3. Beginner Activation: Ask God to give you a picture or sense of how He sees you. Then make a list of statements about who God sees you as. Compile them into a prophecy about who you are and who you are becoming. Start decreeing and declaring them over yourself. Even draw a picture of ‘who you are’ to remind you.

4. Intermediate Activation: Keep a watch on weather reports for cyclones/hurricanes/typhoons or extreme flooding. Ask God what He wants you to do about the situation. Consider prophesying into the situation and even doing a prophetic act, depending on how God leads you.

5. Advanced Activation: Consider your own nation’s major environmental need as a result of a weather factor eg in Australia – the drought or the bleaching of the coral in the Great Barrier Reef. Spend time listening to God and then implement how He wants you to respond prophetically about the situation.

Prophesying over your home

The other day I had an epiphany. I realised that I spent quite a bit of time praying for friends and their stuff especially when they contact me about urgent issues plus various other societal issues but I realised that I wasn’t spending much time praying and prophesying into my own family’s situation. I was often prophesying into other people’s lives but not stewarding well my own family’s prophetic words. Can you relate?

This realisation enables me to reassess my priorities in this regard and put in place some helpful practices.

I also spent time with God brainstorming some simple things for around our home. Various ideas came to mind during this time.

I remembered back to when my friend was redoing her flooring and she asked a number of her close friends to write prophetic words and draw prophetic pictures about what her house was going to become, and she placed these under the new flooring in the house. Whenever we visit, there is such a warm hospitable atmosphere and her home is often full of guests sharing deeply.

Have you physically placed any prophetic words around your home, under painting or flooring, dug them into the garden, placed artistic or creative expressions of them on your wall?

A number of friends have created canvas paintings depicting their children’s prophetic words and placed those canvasses on the children’s bedroom walls. They often refer to them with their kids.

I remembered back to when I first dealt with our original prophetic words and finalised them into a one to two sentence declaration. Sticking these declarations on the bathroom mirror and keeping a copy in my journal, Bible and handbag meant that they were always near where I was if I wanted to grab them out and meditate on them and declare them over myself and my family.

I realised that when I had kept worship music going continually in one part of our house, it changed the atmosphere in that area significantly and brought an amazing spiritual cleansing to that area.

I became acutely aware how we all flourish, but especially children, in an area of praise and encouragement and realised that I could adapt that to speaking positive declarations over my house and garden.

I also downloaded a copy of Arthur Burk’s (www.theslg.com) album “Deliverance for Children”. This is an absolutely revolutionary and transformational method of bringing freedom to people by playing the album quietly of a night in your bedroom (so quietly you can’t hear it but your spirit who never sleeps can) and dealing with any negative stuff in our lives. I highly recommend this album not just for children but for every person. The blessings and freedom that have come out of this for people have been huge. This can help release us from any negative stuff over our lives and aid in helping us become all whom we are created to be, thus being in a position where we can move forward in the process of fulfilling the prophetic words spoken over us.

I realised that it had been awhile since I had deliberately gone into every room in the house and released a blessing in that room and for the activity that usually occurred within each room of the house.

I realised that I needed to be asking God for new insights and prophetic declarations over our teenagers and hubby’s business.

How have you prophesied over your home? Have you discovered an amazing difference?

Start dreaming big with God and then look at ways that you can have ‘memory stones’ of that vision or prophecy by practically doing something in your home to remember often.

Friends, our prophetic gifting is for a myriad of uses. Let’s start using it to change the atmosphere in our own home.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Buy a canvas each, or use paper then laminate it, and have the children spend time painting, writing, or drawing something that depicts how God sees them and what He thinks of them. They may also like to add an appropriate Bible verse. Then mount the canvas or laminated sheet on their bedroom wall.

2. Group Activation: Get into groups of 3-5 people. Taking it in turn, focusing on one person at a time, spend time prophesying over each other’s homes and releasing a blessing on them.

3. Beginner Activation: Spend some time brainstorming with God and hearing His heart for your home. Write a 1-2 sentence statement/decree that you can then use to speak over your home. You may also like to write it out and place it somewhere within your home to remind you.

4. Intermediate Activation: Go on a prophetic walk around your street and neighbourhood prophesying over the area, especially any communal land like playgrounds, roads, footpaths etc If there are any houses for sale, prophesy over the selling of the house and new owners etc.

5. Advanced Activation: Find a barren area in your region (if need be, use google earth to see photos etc). Alternatively, you could identify a really rough area full of vandalism, drugs, prostitution etc. Spend time hearing God’s heart for this area and then prophesy and declare into the atmosphere God’s heart for that place.

 

Prophesying over Land Issues

Prophesying over Land“That corner of the land has had something bad happen on it and there’s something black on that corner,” my kids both stated. I then realised that I was standing in such a way that I had my back to that corner as if I was subconsciously shielding myself from something ‘dark’ over that corner.

We were standing on a major country road with a Pastor and his church’s intercessors. The Pastor had asked our family to come and pray with them as they were selecting a new site for the church premises. We had already checked out a town block that they were deliberating over but didn’t get any real sense of yes or no. Now we were standing outside a block of land several acres large.

I shared what the kids had quietly stated with me and also my feelings, all information that our spirits were picking up. The Pastor and the intercessors gathered and chatted for awhile and then shared how there had been a murder on that corner of the land years before. Once this was openly realised, we received a good sense of the use of the land and that the corner of the land would need cleansing but that there was a great sense of hope for the use of the land.

Another occasion presented where we were assisting another group of people. They were wanting to buy a house block for ministry purposes. As we started walking over the land, a strong sense that the land had something under the ground that wasn’t good began to surface within me and became extremely strong. I sensed that whatever was underground would potentially cost so much more to fix. The ministry leaders then shared that there were many underground tunnels and mines in the area that weren’t mapped and people had no idea of where they were but if one was on your property, then it was extremely costly to fix.

The group became quite dejected and expressed major disappointment as they had searched for the right property for so long and this was the ‘best’ option. As we hopped back into our cars to drive to a place for lunch, the leader briefly suggested that we drive past another house that he had heard that morning was being put on the market that next week. As we drove past that new place, there was such a strong sense that we needed to stop. This was definitely the place. The group went on to purchase the property and it is still being used majorly for God. The position is excellent and there were no major issues.

Another time a friend of mine purchased a residential property to use it for commercial purposes. Others were doing similar things in the same street and it was very straightforward for the other people. My friend’s property, however, was still tied up in council issues twelve months later. I can remember asking her one day about it and she explained that she had no idea why there was all the holdups but could I please drive past the property and see if I ‘picked up’ anything to do with it and to pray about it. The next time I drove past, I glanced up the long driveway at the side of the house with the garage at the end. There seemed to be a huge black presence covering the garage.  Now I didn’t stop, I was just driving past. I rang my friend, told her and we prayed about it. Shortly afterwards, the police rocked up with a warrant to tear down the garage due to the remains of a body being buried there. I drove past the property after that, and sensed all was clear and there was definitely no black presence up the driveway. Shortly afterwards, the council permitted the property changes to go ahead.

Praying and using our prophetic gifting in purchasing and selecting land and/or buildings is something that we can all do and upskill in. But we need to do it wisely. It can have huge implications!!

Several keys I have found useful when prophesying over land:

  1. Prepare – pray, research etc.
  2. Make sure you have spiritual authority over that piece of land
  • Are you the owner or occupier?
  • If there is a business on the land, are you a customer?
  • If it is a church, are you committed to that church and pay tithes and involved in ministry there?
  • Have you been asked by the owner?
  • Is someone in authority with you if you don’t have the ‘land authority’?
  1. Quietly worship on the land if you can. Try and sense what happens when you worship.
  2. Be certain that what you are sensing, hearing, seeing is from God. It can have major financial implications for people.
  3. Ask God for a sign. With the first example above, once the group had chatted about the murder and realised what the darkness over the corner was about, a rainbow appeared (even though it wasn’t raining) and then a flock of eagles came from seemingly nowhere and swooped over the land.
  4. Practice and obtain authority over land issues. I have found that the more I practice and sense stuff in regard to land issues, the more authority I gain in relation to this. A great way my friend does this is to find blocks of land that are for sale but not selling or businesses that keep changing hands. Go and buy something at that business and ask God what is happening there. Start blessing the land and business. You don’t need to tell the owner. Just release joy, peace, prosperity, blessing over the land and watch to see the results.
  5. Decree and declare over the land. Release Biblical promises over the land. Read Scripture and worship there.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Go to a local park that has a playground and spend a few moments asking God what His heart is for this park. Find a creative way of expressing God’s heart for it there – speaking it out, drawing it, playing with laughter, doing a prophetic act etc.

2. Group Activation: Prepare beforehand by finding several parcels of land nearby that don’t necessarily have the best reputation or are the home of corruption. Try and have a photo of each piece of land for people to see. Divide into small groups with one parcel of land each group and spend time listening to God for His heart about the land and its use and then prophesy as a group about that parcel of land. Finish by having a time of blessing each parcel of land.

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time with God asking Him how He feels about where you live and the land your building is on. Grab some oil and anoint the boundaries of the land, praying a blessing over the land and its use and everyone on the land. If you have any issues with neighbours, ask God what the issue is really about and prophesy into the outcome.

4. Intermediate Activation: Find a struggling business and make a purchase there. Ask God to highlight to you the real reasons that the business is not going well. Prophesy into the reversal of the reason and prophesy the outcome of the business. Finish by blessing the business.

5. Advanced Activation: Ask God to reveal to you a land issue within your local community, state, or nation. Spend time with God listening to Him and asking Him what to prophesy and decree over the issue. Ask God what you are then to do with this prophetic word – speak it out, visit the land and speak it over that, send the prophetic word to a certain person, pray and intercede for God’s heart to be realised in relation to the issue etc.

When I can’t hear God for myself?

My 13 year old son has recently joined Air Force Cadets and, on Anzac Day, as I watched him march with his unit, I began crying. Not sobbing but crying enough that my response shocked me. Why was I crying? When anything unexpected occurs, I try to ask God “What did that trigger in me?” or “Why did I respond like that?” or “What’s underneath that emotion?”

Nothing came. My mind was spinning with a thousand thoughts – was it because our son wanted to join the Defence Force and he may be fighting in a war one day? Was it because…. Numerous what if’s came to mind. But God seemed to be deathly silent in answering me.

I sat with it a bit longer and it suddenly struck me – I think I was asking the wrong question. A more appropriate question was “Was it appropriate the emotion I expressed?” Immediately I heard God’s voice – “Yes. You are extremely grateful for those who served and fought to save this country and your future.”

Wow – I suddenly realised that often when people say to me “I can hear God for others but I find it hard hearing God for myself”, then perhaps they need to change their question.

I encourage you, next time you find it hard hearing God for yourself, to change the question you are asking God.

I believe that there are also several other things we can do so that we open up the communication lines between God and ourselves for ourselves.

Listed below are a few ideas to implement when you feel a blockage in hearing God for yourself.

  1. What am I asking God? Can I reframe my question? Am I asking God the wrong question? Am I wanting to hear a specific answer ie treating God like Santa Claus, thus not hearing God because I’m not hearing what I’m wanting.
  2. Change things up a bit. Do something different. Perhaps put on different worship music. Try spending time with God in nature or a different place than normal. I love going to the beach on a stormy day and ‘feeling’ God in the storm.
  3. Have I been obedient in doing what God has asked of me? This is a question I ask of myself. If I haven’t been obedient in following through on what God has already asked me to do, how can I expect Him to then tell me the next step?
  4. Is there any sin in my life that I am aware of? Sin has an amazing way of blocking the relationship between God and myself.
  5. Facilitate an encounter with God. In your imagination, go to a place where you feel close to God, a place where you hear God’s voice easily. Imagine yourself there. What is it like? What does it feel like, look like, smell like, taste like, sound like? Imagine that Jesus walks to where you are in that place. Look for Jesus in your imagination and imagine that He has a present in His hands for you. Watch Him place it down next to you or place it in your hands. You have a choice what you do next. Do you want to open it? Go ahead and open it. What has Jesus just given you? (Usually something like this can open up those lines of communication between God and ourselves again.) Another encounter to try is to imagine yourself under a waterfall. Look around and feel, hear, smell, see what it is like under that waterfall. Imagine next that that waterfall is God pouring out good stuff over you. What is He pouring over you? Revel in what is being poured over you. Enjoy. Splash around in it. When you finish imaging this, try spending some time just enjoying God for who He is.
  6. Am I prepared to really lean in to God over a longer period of time – fast, meditate, pray over a period of time, enjoy being with God, spend time listening.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Have paper and crayons/pencils ready. Ask everyone to find a partner and ask God to show them what sort of present He wants to give their partner. Encourage them to draw what the outside of the present looks like. Then ask God what the actual present is and draw that. Ask them to give the paper to their partner and share what it was.

2. Group Activation: Play a harder version of Prophetic UNO. You will need some UNO cards (you don’t need the whole pack – just select a few of each colour) and the instructions below copied so that people can easily see them. Take it in turns going around the circle turning over the next card. Follow the instructions as to what to do with that colour card. This works best when the group is about 6-8 people in size. If your group is larger, perhaps form two groups, with enough UNO cards and instructions for each group.

UNO Prophecy Instructions – remember to be encouraging, strengthening and comforting

RED – you give a prophetic word to the person on your left about their financial situation

GREEN – you give a prophetic word to the person on your right about their relationship with someone close to them

BLUE  – you give a prophetic word to the person opposite about something that concerns them

YELLOWyou choose who to give a prophetic word to in the group about their career/employment/job

DRAW 2give any 2 people in the group a prophetic word about their identity

DRAW 4choose 4 people to give you a prophetic word

WILD CARD  – choose whether you give a prophetic word to someone about their destiny or choose someone to give you one about your destiny

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time with God asking Him about something you have felt He has been quiet on. Brainstorm with God several different questions about it. Perhaps facilitate an encounter with God eg present encounter or under a waterfall etc and see if you can hear God easier.

4. Intermediate Activation: Spend time with God asking Him for a prophetic word/picture for me (Jane – the author of this blog). Feel free to email it to me at [email protected]

5. Advanced Activation: In Australia, we are in the lead up to voting for the leadership of the country and for the Prime Minister for the next three years. Spend time with God hearing from Him about this and what He desires. (If you are in another country, please feel free to join with us in Australia and listen to God for what He desires for our nation.) Devise with God a prophetic act to do that ushers in spiritually and physically what’s on God’s heart.

Easter Blessing

Dear Readers and Subscribers to my blog,

As we journey towards Easter over these next few days, I want to release a blessing over you that incorporates the values of Easter and the journey Jesus made.  I encourage you to say this blessing over yourself out aloud. Feel free to read this aloud over your family and significant others in your life. There is power in not only reading a blessing but speaking it out aloud over you and calling your spirit to attention first. It helps grow your spirit on the inside.

 

“I call your spirit to attention and bless you throughout this Easter season.

I bless you with being able to communicate yourself fully and articulately. I bless you with intimacy and fun in your relationship with Jesus. I bless you with knowing your true identity and allowing people to know the real you. I bless you with being celebrated for who you really are. I bless you with allowing others to extravagantly express generosity towards you and it to flow abundantly from you. I bless you with ease and acceptance with those few close people in your life, that you can truly be yourself and disclose your true feelings. I bless you in discerning the flattery and the ability to see the lies and the truth.

I bless you in keeping focussed on what God is focussed on, your gaze focussed where God’s eyes are focussed. I bless you with peace in the uncertainty of the future. I bless you when you dread the immediate future. That you will be able to glimpse the other side of the huge mountain just in front of you and it will sustain you in the plodding onwards. I bless you in keeping alert when the things of this world press upon you. With not slumbering but having an alert spirit at all times.

I bless you with integrity. Compassion. Standing firm amidst any false accusation and that you will see your name cleared and your reputation upheld. I bless you in being able to forgive the betrayal and the lies. I bless you when it appears to be the end of your dreams and I bless you with perseverance to see the start of redemption. I bless you with being able to see things as God sees them.

I bless you with journeying close to Christ during the dark times. With knowing the love of the Father so intimately and realising that one day you will understand more fully the dark and lonely times. I bless you with holding on to hope when everything seems hopeless. I bless you with realising Jesus is with you in that crushing, seemingly senseless time of pain that overwhelms.

I bless you in the waiting season. For perseverance. For joy in the journey. I bless you with intimacy and finding shelter in the secure and intimate place. I bless you with having people support you through all times. I bless you with being prepared to last the journey that is your call, despite the circumstances.

I bless you with seeing the answers to your greatest prayers. I bless you with experiencing the risen Christ and the full impact of that in your life – joy, life, hope, freedom, reconciliation, fulfilling potential and reaching your destiny. I bless you with a new and renewed perspective of God’s love, goodness, grace and mercy. I bless you with being able to celebrate and celebrate well. I bless you with enlarging your supernatural gifts and seeing miracles in your everyday life. I bless you with seeing and taking opportunities to share God’s goodness with others and your testimony of what God has done in your own life. I bless you in living in a new way with a new attitude. I bless you with a burning desire to devour the Bible, the Word of God, and love reading it. I bless you with allowing the Holy Spirit to permeate and access every part of your life and fill you to overflowing, accessing deeper levels of empowerment and intimacy.

I bless you with finishing well. With staying the course. With being a world changer.”

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to practice to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Ask the children present to pray a blessing over each adult. If they have never done this before, pray a blessing over them first. Practice calling each other’s spirit to attention first as this commands your spirit on the inside of you to stand to attention to fully hear and absorb what is being said.

2. Group Activation: Partner up and spend a few minutes asking God to show you what He would like you to pray for your partner. Then turn the prayer into a blessing and pray aloud a blessing over your partner that incorporates what God showed you.

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time with God listening to Him about what He would like to bless you with. Then write out the blessing for yourself. Say it aloud over yourself and begin a practice of daily praying it over yourself.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to show you His heart for your local church and the leaders. Compile this into a blessing that you can pray aloud daily for the next little while, calling the spirit, heart and identity of your local church to attention.

5. Advanced Activation: Spend time with God aligning His heart for your nation with your heart. In Australia at the moment, we have an election in a few weeks and this is a fantastic time to be blessing the heart and identity of the nation as it can significantly affect the future of Australia. Compile a blessing for the nation, the leaders and politicians. Pray it aloud daily over your nation for the next little while.

Keeping your Prophetic Gift ‘Clean’

“I felt worse after that person prophesied over me” a number of people informed me. “I don’t know what it was as he was so accurate about my past, but I came away feeling yuck.”

I Corinthians 14:3 says that a prophetic word is to be encouraging, edifying and comforting. Thus, when we receive a prophetic word and we don’t feel encouraged, built up or comforted, then something has gone wrong. The person giving the prophetic word may have been not hearing God clearly and using more soulish thoughts than spiritual sensing. We may also not be in the right spiritual space and it may be incorrect timing to receive the word. Another issue may be that the person giving the word may have their psychic door open.

Psychic door open? What do I mean?

Sometimes before people become Christians, they may have dabbled in some witchcraft, New Age or Clairvoyancy, thus opening their psychic door. Conversely, someone in their generational line may have opened the door and it remains automatically open down through the generations. Satan loves jumping on the bandwagon and taking full advantage of any slight little opportunity he gets. Thus, if someone in your generational line has looked to sources other than God for their wisdom, insight and prophetic insights, then they have opened a door that continues down the generational line until it is closed.

If it has never been closed, then it is still open and Satan can just as easily confuse your thoughts and tell you about a person’s past, present and future. Revelation can come from both sides. If it is a generational issue, you may be totally unaware that you are receiving insight from the dark side.

Arthur Burk from the Sapphire Leadership Group (www.theslg.com) has a great teaching on this called “The Druids and the Psychic door”. You can watch this on Youtube free, roughly 20 minutes long. The druids violated their stewardship of the prophetic gift and they delivered true words but from a defiled source, pursuing revelation from the dark side. Arthur goes so far as to say that if you have a generational line that goes back to England, Wales or Scotland, then it is advisable to pray this prayer as many of these family lines were defiled by druids, either having druidic blood in the family line or a carrier of uttering curses about them. Likewise, finish your prayer by asking God to overtly release to you and any other descendant any treasures that belong to you.

The great news is that this is really easy to ‘close’ and deal with (unless you are still dabbling in witchcraft). There is a simple prayer you can pray along these line…

“Heavenly Father, I repent on behalf of myself and every person in my past generational line who has looked to someone or something else apart from you Heavenly Father for wisdom, insight, truth and discernment. I am truly sorry for myself and my relatives not looking solely to you for these things. Heavenly Father, I ask you to come now and cleanse my family line of all times that we sought wisdom, insight, truth and discernment not from you. Heavenly Father please come and shut that door and seal that door closed now with the blood of Jesus. Heavenly Father, would you also please release all treasure stored up for our generational line that has never been released to us yet. Thank you so much Father God.”

Spend time with God asking Him if there is any further action you may need to take eg have some inner healing prayer ministry to deal deeper with the issues if there has been a major involvement in any witchcraft etc. Our aim is to draw closer to God, able to hear His voice clearly and to release His promptings to others to encourage, strengthen and comfort. Anything that comes in the way of this should be dealt with as soon as possible so that it doesn’t hinder or defile the process.

Other important steps to keep in mind include:

  • Be careful what you fill your mind with eg what you watch on tv, what you read etc. Garbage in = garbage out.
  • Cultivate your personal relationship and intimacy with Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus.
  • Devour the Bible. Love reading the Word of God and applying it to your life.
  • Be accountable to someone for your prophetic gifting.
  • Always get the person you are giving a prophetic word to to record the prophecy. If they can’t do this, then at the least have someone they know and rely on to be there with them.
  • Have regular prayer ministry eg annual check up. This deals with little things before they become major footholds in your life.
  • Be accountable to someone re your blindspots or prophesying out of your passion. This can skew your thinking.

My prayer for you, my readers, is that

  • you grow in your intimacy with Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus
  • and that you will grow in your prophetic ability to see, hear and sense what Father God is communicating so that you can release accurate words to everyone you meet for the purpose of encouraging, strengthening and comforting them.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Make up glasses/jugs of different coloured liquids to resemble various drinks. Ask everyone to select a person and then imagine with God what sort of drink that person would be and why. Then allow time for everyone to draw or share it.

2. Group Activation: Ask for the names of any businesses connected with people in the group ie business that people own. Get into groups around those people. Spend a few minutes hearing from God and then ask people to prophesy into those businesses. Warn the business owners that they are not to make business decisions based on a prophetic word shared at this time but to weigh it correctly. Remind people that they are to hear God’s heart for the business and to be careful re any prophesies that would sway decisions needing to be made etc.

3. Beginner Activation: Spend time reading about a prophetic person in the Bible and their life and the prophetic words they gave and the impact of those words. Ask God to show you how this Biblical person is similar to you.

4. Intermediate Activation: Ask God to highlight to you a failing business or a business that is not going well at the moment. Spend time with God asking Him for His view on the business. Ask God what He would like you to do with the information that He has shared with you.

5. Advanced Activation: The massacre in Christchurch, New Zealand occurred yesterday. Spend time with Father God asking Him His heart for this city and formulate a prophetic word that you decree over the city. (You don’t need to travel to Christchurch. You can declare and decree it from your home.) Ask Father God if He requires any further action from you eg send the prophetic word to someone in Christchurch etc.

Prophetic Activations – fun, simple, and important.

My biggest growth in the prophetic has come from me practicing prophesying. The most fun, though, has come from doing prophetic activations in a group. It is a great way to build community and, since I value community, I thrive on this.

A prophetic activation is an exercise where you practice and try to develop in the skill of hearing God’s voice for someone else.

I believe that prophetic activations are important in helping us to grow in the prophetic – both for adults and kids. That is why I always include 5 prophetic activations at the end of each of my blogs – one each under kids/families, groups, beginner, intermediate and advanced. Please feel free to do as few or as many as you wish. (The groupings are just a guideline.) For families, I encourage you to set aside one dinner time each week where you can practice prophesying over each other or doing the prophetic activations attached to my blogs.

I also believe that prophetic activations usually work better when they are:

  • fun
  • simple
  • quick

They provide energy and inspiration for group dynamics. Most times they can be done in pairs, sometimes in larger groups. It is also important, I believe, to ask for short feedback or a quick testimony at the end of the game.

Finding a partner:

I try and be creative at getting group members into pairs or small groups when doing an activation. When you are creative with this and people have fun, without it taking too much time or taking the focus away from doing the activations, then it helps relax people and gets them feeling easier about trying new activations. After each question, I get people to find a new partner using a different method, so have a few methods of matching people up ready.

  • I might use ‘find someone born in the same month’ or ‘find someone with the same colour socks on as yourself’ etc.
  • I sometimes use coloured lollies that stain the tongue and I give the lollies out and then people need to find a person with the same colour on their tongue as themselves.
  • I have used the chocolate clinkers and people bite into their clinker and find someone who has the same colour clinker interior as yourself.
  • I usually have a pack of cards / UNO cards handy and give out cards to people so find ‘a person with the same UNO card as you, or same number card with a pack of cards’ etc.
  • A favourite of mine is using a set of animal cards I made up using pictures of animals taken off the internet. I then laminated these cards so I can use them again. I give out the cards and get people to make the noise of the animal that is on the front of their card. They then have to find a partner who is making the same noise as themselves.

Some activations for pairs:

One the group is divided up into pairs, then give everyone a question to ask God about their partner. Give them a limited time to get an answer. After 30 seconds or a minute at the most, get people to share their answer with their partner.

  • God, if my partner was a tree, what tree would they be and why?
  • God, if my partner was a vehicle, what vehicle would they be and why?
  • God, if my partner was some confectionary, what would they be and why?
  • God, what do you see my partner clothed in and why?
  • God, if my partner was something in a supermarket, what would they be and why?
  • God, if a book was written about my partner, what would the title of the book be?
  • God, if my partner starred in a movie, what would the movie be about?
  • God, if my partner was an animal, what animal would they be and why?
  • God, if my partner was a person in a hospital, who would they be ie their role, and why?
  • God, if my partner was something at a playground, what would they be and why or, alternatively, where would they be on the playground and why?

Key points to remember:

As with any prophetic activations, there are a couple of key points to emphasise.

  • Make sure you only speak what is encouraging, edifying or comforting.
  • God speaks back to us instantly, like a friend on the phone. We don’t ask our friend a question and then have to wait 2 minutes to get a reply. We get an answer immediately.
  • A key here is the ‘first thought’ principle. The first thought that flies through your head when you ask God a question, capture that thought. If it is encouraging, edifying or comforting, then go with that thought.
  • God loves questions, so ask God some more questions about the thought that came to you to find out more. Eg why did you show me that God?

Pass the parcel:

Several years in a row for our prophetic group breakup, I organised a game of ‘Pass the Parcel’. I modelled it on the children’s party game. It was a huge hit and we continue to do it annually as it was so successful in both enjoyment and stretching everyone. Since there were about 40 people, I wrapped up 5 different parcels to be passed at the same time. (I wanted maximum effect and practice from the time!)

In every layer of the parcel, I placed an item I had bought from either the supermarket or the $2/discount shop or scavenged from around home. Items included things such as:

  • pen
  • highlighter
  • torch
  • Princess birthday candle
  • toy army men with parachutes attached
  • bath toy – rubber ducky
  • soap
  • packet of mixed lollies
  • chocolate advent calendar
  • a very sharp knife
  • balloon
  • bottle of bubbles to blow
  • a map of the world
  • a can of spam
  • a teabag
  • etc

No item was repeated and there were 9 layers each parcel. Creativity is encouraged so walk around your supermarket and see what catches your eye. I am always astounded at the variety of items I wrap in the parcels and how God uses them to speak to people.

As the music played, the parcels were passed around the circle. When the music stopped, the people holding the parcels had to unwrap the next layer of paper and find the object. They then had to ask God 2 questions – “Who do I give this present to?” and “Why?” They had only 20 – 30 seconds to get their answers. They would then go up to the person God had highlighted and give them the present and say the reason why as a prophetic word. We didn’t go with popular culture and ‘make it fair’ so that everyone got a go of giving and receiving. It was just whoever had the parcel when the music stopped gave the present and prophetic word to the person who they felt God highlighted. Some people received several presents and prophetic words and some received none. The point of the game was to realise that you can see a seemingly insignificant object and use it as a basis for a prophetic word.

Prophetic UNO:

Play “Prophetic UNO”. It works best in groups of 6-8 people. Get a pack of UNO cards. One at a time, turn over the top card. Follow the instructions eg if a red card, then you give a prophetic word to the person on your left. This is most effective when you play it quickly ie people need to start giving a prophetic word within 20-30 seconds of turning over the card. If you have more than 6-8 people, divide into groups with a pack of UNO cards for each group.

UNO Prophecy Instructions

                     RED            – you give a prophetic word to the person on your left

                     GREEN       – you give a prophetic word to the person on your right

                     BLUE          – you give a prophetic word to the person opposite

                     YELLOW    – you choose who to give a prophetic word to in the group

                     DRAW 2    – choose 2 people to give you a prophetic word

                     DRAW 4    – choose 4 people to give you a prophetic word

                     WILCARD – Choose whether you give a prophetic word to someone or choose someone to give you one.

Duck, duck, goose:

Play prophetic ‘Duck, duck, goose’. If it is a group of children, sit on the floor in a circle. If adults, arrange chairs in a circle and ask everyone to sit on a chair. Ask everyone to close their eyes. Walk around behind the group and ‘tap’ one person on the head (or shoulder if more culturally appropriate). This person will know they are the receiver. You will also know but no-one else should be aware since everyone would have had their eyes closed. Ask a leader to be a scribe. Ask everyone else to ask God what He would like to say to this (unknown) person with the scribe taking notes. After 5-6 people have shared, ask the receiver to raise their hand, thus they were the person whom the prophetic words were said about. Pass the written notes to that person for encouragement. Then repeat the process taping someone else on the head/shoulder.

Musical Chairs:

Play musical chairs. Place enough chairs (or if space limited, place coloured pieces of paper) in the middle of the room for everyone playing minus 2 people. Play music and ask everyone to move clockwise around the chairs. When the music stops, everyone runs to sit on a chair. The 2 people without chairs are out. Whilst the music plays for the next round and you remove two more chairs, have those 2 people who just got out, prophesy over each other. The next two people out then prophesy over each other until the remaining two people are the only ones left in the game. They then give each other a prophetic word.

Prophetic Tag:

Choose a person to be ‘the tagger’. They stand in the middle of the room and everyone goes to the other end. These people have to try to get to the other side of the room without being tagged by the person in the centre (the tagger). If someone is tagged, that person has to give ‘the tagger’ (the person who tagged them) a prophetic word. They then become ‘the tagger’ and the previous ‘tagger’ joins the rest of the group trying to cross the room without being tagged. If you have a large group, consider having several people in the middle being ‘taggers’.

Prophetic Ping Pong:

Get into groups of 3. Elect one person to receive the prophetic word. The other 2 people in the group will play ‘prophetic ping pong (or table tennis)’ – one person starts giving a prophetic word, the second person then carries on giving the prophetic word in the same vein of thought, then it returns to person number one to expand even deeper on that thread, then back to number two to expand deeper still. Try not to introduce anything that doesn’t follow that thread. Instead, ask God how you can go deeper with just the one thread of thought. After you finish that one concept/thought etc, switch positions for someone new to receive a prophetic word.

Lucky Dip Bag:

Have a bag that you can’t see through and place a number of items in the bag. Get people to take turns to put their hand in the bag, choose an item and pull it out. They then have 30-60 seconds to ask God who in the group they need to give the item to and why. They then give the item to that person and share how that item relates to them as a prophetic word.

Blindfolded Lucky Dip:

Beforehand, place a number of various supermarket objects in a bag. Pair up everyone and blindfold one person in each pair. This person places their hand in the bag and selects an item. Based on what that item feels like and reminds them of, get each blindfolded person to give a prophetic word over the person standing in front of them. At the end, ask each person who received a prophetic word to give feedback to their blindfolded person based on how accurate and ‘weighty’ the prophetic word felt and whether or not it raised any emotions within.

Prophetic Activations / Exercises to incorporate into your week:

Every week I list 5 prophetic activations/exercises under children/family, group, beginner, intermediate and advanced. The purpose of these exercises is to help us hear God’s voice in a clearer manner. They sharpen our senses to hear and see and sense God 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: Find up some magazines with pictures in them that you can cut out. Glue and blank paper will also be needed. Ask each person to think of someone and then find a picture or some words from the magazines that God highlights to them that will communicate God’s heart to that person. Let people cut out the pictures and words and arrange on the piece of paper. Then give the piece of paper to that person.

2. Group Activation: Get people into pairs. As you play a piece of instrumental music, ask God to highlight to everyone something from the music as a starting point for a prophecy over their partner. Ask people to share with their partner.

3. Beginner Activation: Grab a cup of tea or coffee. As you do, ask God to highlight something about your drink to you. Then ask God to show you how this relates to a prophetic word to release over a family member. Share it (the prophetic word) with your family member.

4. Intermediate Activation: Look up the latest movie releases and ask God to highlight one of the movie titles to you. Ask God who this relates to prophetically and why. Contact that person and share with them.

5. Advanced Activation: Ask God to highlight a major disaster in your state or country. Ask God to show you His perspective on this and what He would love your part to be in helping or prophesying good over the situation.