Tag Archives: what to do with prophetic words

What to do with your Prophetic Words part 5

Posted on by

Prophecy does not end as soon as you have received a prophetic word. It is only the beginning. Prophecy is powerful, and your responsibility as the recipient is to activate it in your life.

Reading through Jeremiah in the Bible recently, I was challenged about my prophetic words, particularly working towards the fulfilment of them.

In Jeremiah 1:12 it says: “The Lord said to me, ‘You have seen correctly, for I am watching to see that my word is fulfilled’.” Sure, that was speaking of a particular time in Israel’s history, but I am sure that God still watches to see what we will do with the prophetic words spoken over our lives.

When we actively pursue that which God has communicated to us, how it must thrill God’s heart. Alternatively, when we are overwhelmed with the enormity and allow that to stagnate us or when we procrastinate in working towards the fulfilment of our prophetic words, I wonder how God feels.

Sometimes those prophecies can seem so vast and impossible that we almost disregard them and thus do not carry out any action towards the fulfilment of them. Other times, we can become side-tracked.

My purpose in explaining the steps in ‘What to do with your prophetic words’ is so you can take delight in becoming who God is calling you to be and impacting the world for that which He created you.

In what area of your life is God watching to see that you fulfil His word in your life?

Over the last four blog posts, I have explained the benefits of having a prophetic word, the first steps to take when you receive a prophetic word, and how to identify your identity words and destiny words from your prophecies and work with them. This blog post addressed the practicalities of implementing your prophetic words into your everyday life.

At the end of the last blog post, I encouraged you to dream with God. To imagine what your future may look like if your prophetic words came true. You were encouraged to:

  • Get your notes from that session and highlight the steps you will need to take to get from where you are to where you will be once you fulfil your prophetic words.
  • List the practical things that you would need to grow in.
  • Look at the first 2-3 steps you would need to take. Write them down. Ask God to impress on you the way forward. You need to take responsibility to action these steps. You can’t expect God to pluck you out of your current circumstances and land you right in your fulfilled prophecy. You may find it helpful to grab another sheet of paper and draw the steps and label them.

List your next 3 steps.

We need to be intentional in who we are becoming and what we are doing. It can be overwhelming when we have too many options. Thus, narrow down your responsibility at this moment by:

  • Writing the first three steps you need to take.
  • Writing a date, beside each step, when you hope to have accomplished this.
  • Highlighting that which is under God’s control in one colour and that which is under your control in another colour.
  • Look at what you need to stop doing in your life to allow you time, finance and energy to accomplish this.

Ask yourself these questions:

  • What is the difference between where I am now and where I need to be to fulfil this prophetic word?
  • What obstacles are ahead of me?
  • How do I overcome these obstacles?
  • What are the things under God’s control?
  • What are the things under my control?
  • Do I have enough faith to carry out what God is asking me?
  • How can I increase my faith for this assignment?
  • What practical skills do I need to gain?
  • What areas of my character need growing/changing?
  • How am I going to do that?
  • What provisions/finances do I need to carry this assignment out?
  • What opportunities/invitation do I have to grow in?
  • What area of my relationship with God is He inviting me to grow in?
  • What is my next step?
  • Is there anything I need to stop doing so I have time, finances, and energy to do this next step?
  • Is there anyone I need to connect with for assistance, development, acquiring skills or qualifications?

Accountability:

I have found that the times in my life when I get someone else to hold me accountable for some goals I have set, I achieve those goals. Needing to meet with someone else and knowing they will ask me how I am going in certain areas helps to keep me accountable and ploughing towards where I am hoping to be. I also find that it is helpful if that person is a person of prayer and will support me by praying for me.

If you have a mentor, it is fantastic to give them a copy of your prophetic words and your next steps so they can see where God is calling you and how to assist.

Who are you going to ask to hold you accountable as you work towards fulfilling these first three steps in seeing your prophetic word come to fruition?

Craft a prophetic declaration.

Every time we speak, we are creating an atmosphere and an outcome. Our words can bring life and power. We can use our words to bring a breakthrough into our current situation. We can speak truth into the atmosphere and engage our future with who God says we are becoming and what we will be doing.

The Bible says a lot about our use of words:

  • Isaiah 55:11 “so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”
  • Proverbs 18:21 “The tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit.”
  • Romans 4:17 “…the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not.”

What we decree and declare brings life and power. Decreeing and declaring speak of commanding, ordering, bringing into being, agreeing in the spiritual to change the physical. Write a prophetic declaration about who you are becoming and what you will be doing.

I encourage you to keep your declaration short and to the point. When I restrict my declaration to a few sentences, I can easily memorize it and speak it over myself numerous times each day. I also write it out and stick it on the bathroom mirror so that when I look in the mirror, I see my declaration and speak it over myself.

I also encourage you to write your declarations in the first person eg “I am a prayer warrior. I will bring healing to ….”

Look at your sheet of paper and choose the words that speak of your identity and calling. Put those words into a declaration.

I begin like this. “I decree and declare that God sees me as….

My calling and purpose in life is…..

I decree and declare that God wants to be …… for me during this season.”

Once you have written your declaration, I encourage you to find a place where you can say your declaration aloud. Practice saying it aloud several times. Then shout it out. I suggest you also find a place where you can be elevated while you shout out your declaration. This changes the atmosphere and engages your spirit differently. When we do this, we are partnering with God’s intentions for our future and helping Him create it. When we declare our future in the same way, the same tone, the same intentionality, and certainty as God declares it, our spirit engages and comes alive.

Finally, write your summary:

  • My decree and declaration
  • The next three steps I need to take.
  • What I need to stop doing to make time to pursue this.
  • Who I need to hold myself accountable to in this journey.
  • Suggested dates for review.
  • Set aside time in your diary to sit with God and review how it is going, read over your prophetic words again, pray through it all.

Saturate all this with prayer and worship, spending time with God, asking Him to reveal more through this process. Enjoy the journey!!

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:  Bake a batch of biscuits and make icing in several different colours. Gather piping tools for writing with icing. Encourage everyone to sit around the table and decorate a biscuit for various people eg each family member. Ask God to show what word, design, colour to decorate each individual biscuit with that communicates how God sees that person. Then distribute the biscuits to those people. Enjoy eating the biscuits and chatting about how God sees them.

2. Group Activation: Ask everyone to bring a gift beginning with the letter ‘B’. Encourage people to get into pairs. Every person has 1 minute to give their partner the gift plus prophesy over them about how that gift relates to them and how God sees them and their future.

3. Beginner Activation: Open your phone/computer and type ‘song heart’ into search. Ask God to highlight one of the song titles that appear on your screen. Spend time with God unpacking that song title and how applicable it is to your life. As God to reveal His perspective on that to you and His heart for you.

4. Intermediate Activation: Spend time with God seeking Him for His view on your partner or close friend. Ask God to reveal something significant to you about this person and their future. Lean into God and ask Him to flesh it out more for you, together with implications and when you are to share it with this person.

5. Advanced Activation: Spend time with God asking Him for His heart on COVID-19, especially in regard to a vaccine etc. Ask God to download to you more about this and the future of your area in regard to COVID-19. Ask God to show you whether you are meant to share this with anyone and, if so, with whom.

What to do with a prophetic word

Posted on by

iStock_000001483815SmallThis past weekend our family was ministering to some families who were part of a small group wanting to help themselves and their children hear from God. During this last week, I had asked our children to draw a prophetic picture for each person who was going to be present. Our children had basically asked God what He wanted to say to that person and had then drawn a picture representing that, and then told me what it was and I wrote at the bottom of the picture what they had said. My 9 year old son had drawn a picture for one lady and had then told me “She is a missionary in jail.” At the time, I thought – wow – that is very specific. Half the time, the pictures tend to be specific, the rest are general about their relationship with God and having fun with God, being able to trust God, their identity etc. This lady later shared how when my son gave her this picture, she immediately thought it was wrong. She couldn’t see how it was right as she wasn’t in jail, had no desire to help prisoners or volunteer in jail and could only think of the Andrew Chan case in Indonesia at the moment and how she wasn’t like that. Sure, my son could be wrong but I encouraged her to not dismiss the picture but to pray about it and see what God says. Also, to feel free to put it aside and return to it in 12 months time and see if it resonates at all then. I also encouraged her to look at how being a ‘missionary in jail’ is about bringing freedom to those who are locked up or bound up or imprisoned by fear etc and how it may not be a ‘real’ jail.

Several things came out of this. Firstly, how we give prophetic words and secondly, what you do with a prophetic word. Today, I would like to address the “What do I do with a prophetic word?” question. Another way of looking at it is “How can I make the most of any prophetic words given to me?”

Biblical precedence: In 1 Timothy 1:18, it says, “Timothy, my son, I am giving you this command in keeping with the prophecies once made about you, so that by recalling them, you may fight the battle well”. Paul is remembering the prophesies given beforehand to Timothy. He considered them significant, he brought them to mind and he gave further instruction in line with them.

1. Record it at the time, if at all possible. If you can’t record it at the time, or the recording didn’t work, don’t despair. Your spirit will still take in what is relevant. As soon as you can, write down what you do remember, asking God to bring to mind the specific content that He wants you to know.

2. Accuracy: 

  • Does it resonate with you and what you already know and feel (like an inner witness in your spirit)?
  • Does it align with God’s Word?
  • Does it line up with the nature of God?
  • Will responding to it bear good fruit in my life?
  • We sometimes talk about ‘weighing it up’. Weigh it up. Test it. (1 Thessalonians 5:20-21 “Do not treat prophecies with contempt but test them all, hold on to what is good.”)

3. Write it out fully so that you have a ‘hard’ copy and can ‘see’ it. (Habakkuk 2:2-3 “Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it. For the revelation awaits an appointed time.”). Use it as a working document. Underline specific phrases and words that appear significant.

4. Acceptance – Do you want to embrace / accept this?

5. Timing – Is it a ‘now’ word, is it something for the future, or is it something I will put up on the shelf and review in 6-12 months time?

6. Pray – If you are ready to embrace it and step into it, I encourage you to pray about it daily for at least the next month or two.

  • Read it through each day.
  • Pray through it.
  • Underline key words and phrases.
  • After several weeks of praying it through daily, change the sentences into decrees and declarations. Eg “I see you as a mountain climber in the prophetic” I would change to “I decree and declare that I am a mountain climber in the prophetic”. Continue praying and declaring it daily. (Isaiah 55:11 “So is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”

7. Clarify with God – Throughout the month, be asking God:

  • “Who do I need to become for this to come true?
  • What character traits do I need to grow and develop in?”
  • “What is the timing in relation to this?”
  • “What action do I need to be taking now?”
  • “How do I need to align how I see my identity with how God sees it according to this prophesy?”

8. Accountability – We are called to do our life in community with others. Ask a friend, a family member, a mentor, a leader for advice on your prophetic word. Does it resonate with what they know of you? When leadership are aware of prophesies over your life, they can hold you accountable, but more importantly, they can also help nurture the gift and call of God on your life, just as Paul did with Timothy. When we returned from Mozambique 3 ½ years ago where we had received one of our family’s first significant prophetic words, I met weekly with a friend and we agreed to pray daily through our prophetic words for two months. At the end of two months, we both knew our prophetic words off by heart. During this time, my friend asked for a copy of our family’s prophetic word. There was a sentence in it that I had paraphrased inaccurately. It was not quite correct. My friend challenged me on this. I needed this correction as it influenced the outcome and what I was declaring.

9. Allow the prophesy to enlarge your vision and stretch your perspective of who you are and who you were created to be. Sometimes it may not be evident immediately. Wait on God. Explore your true identity with God. Remain intimate with God. Allow Him to show you the bigger picture. Our prophetic words are really to help us get a bigger picture of how heaven sees us and are really contingent on our deepening relationship with Father God, Holy Spirit and Jesus.

10. Keep all your prophetic words together and look for the common theme running through them. Regularly read them through and review what is happening in your life in relation to the prophetic words. Ask God for an update on them. Review how you are going in relation to your character and who you are becoming. Enjoy reflecting on them.

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.

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)

1. Children / Families Activation: Have blank pieces of paper and coloured pencils/textas handy. Get everyone to ask God for something for the person sitting on their right. Draw what God showed/told/gave them for that person. Write a sentence or two at the bottom that explains the picture. Then give it to the person.

2. Group Activation: Gather a selection of items eg balloon, feather, candle, piece of string, stickers, toy car, chocolate bar, pen etc. Place them in the middle of the group where everyone can see them. Take it in turn going around the group having each member select an item and giving it to another person, at the same time prophesying over that person about the relevance of that item to that person and his/her situation.

3. Beginner Activation: Imagine God giving another person a gift. Who is the person? What is the gift? Prophesy about this person receiving the gift from God and the outworking of this gift in that person’s life.

4. Intermediate Activation: Sometime this week when you are at the supermarket, walk down the confectionary aisle. Ask God to highlight a particular item eg chocolate bar, bag of lollies, chewing gum, box of chocolates etc. Ask God to show you who you are to buy it for and why? Before you give it to this person, keep asking God for more details about the item and the application to this person’s life. As you give the item to the person, share with them what God has shown/told you.

5. Advanced Activation: Ask God to identify a particular neighbour to you. Ask God to then show you how He sees them and feels for them. Write a note to this neighbour, outlining what God has revealed to you in an encouraging manner without using any ‘Christian/churchy’ language. Drop the note into their letterbox.