They were called directly by God.
They were commissioned directly by Him.
They were also sent directly.
They received the Word directly.
They only appeared on the scene by God’s command.
They were seers, beholding visions.
They only said what God had said.
They only did what He commissioned them to do.
They were always rejected and persecuted.
They only knew the one God, Whom they served.
All these marks are missing with the false prophets. They do
not have a direct calling
or a Divine commission. They are not sent by God, do not
proclaim the original Word,
but rather their own interpretations and pursue their own
programs, without
submitting to God’s Plan of Salvation. Signs and wonders by
themselves constitute no
Divine legitimation. The following scriptures cast light upon
this important matter
and clarify it.
“If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams,
and giveth thee a sign or a
wonder, and the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he
spoke unto thee, saying,
Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let
us serve them; thou
shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that
dreamer of dreams: for the
Lord your God testeth you, to know whether ye love the Lord
your God with all your
heart and with all your soul. Ye shall walk after the Lord
your God, and fear him, and
keep his commandments, and obey his voice, and ye shall serve
him, and cleave unto
him. And that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, shall be put
to death; because he
hath spoken to turn you away from the Lord your God ... to
thrust thee out of the way
which the Lord thy God commanded thee to walk in. So shalt
thou put the evil away
from the midst of thee.” (Dt. 13: 1-5).
In the days of the prophet Micah, the “prophet” Zedekiah made
himself iron horns and
shouted, “Thus saith the Lord, With these thou shalt push
Syria until they be
consumed. And all the prophets prophesied so, saying, Go up to
Ramoth-gilead, and
prosper: for the Lord shall deliver it into the hand of the
king.” (2 Chr. 18: 10b-11).
But that was “Thus saith Zedekiah!” and not “Thus saith the
Lord”. Zedekiah and
the four hundred prophets were deceived by a lying spirit. In
the entire Old Testament
there was always one true prophet and many false prophets, who
were under the wrong
inspiration. It would be especially helpful to read Jeremiah
23 and Ezekiel 13.
Through the true prophet Jeremiah the Lord was addressing the
false prophets,
reprimanding them, “... they prophesied in Baal, and caused my
people Israel to err. ...
Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Hearken not unto the words of
the prophets that
prophesy unto you. They make you vain; they speak a vision of
their own heart, and
not out of the mouth of the Lord ...
I have not sent these
prophets, yet they ran; I
have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied . But if they had
stood in my counsel,
and had caused my people to hear my words, then they should
have turned them from
their evil way, and from the evil of their doings. ...
... How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets that
prophesy lies? Yea, they are
prophets of the deceit of their own heart, who think to cause
my people to forget my
name by their dreams which they tell every man to his
neighbour, as their fathers have
forgotten my name for Baal. ...” (Jer. 23: 13-32).
Thus saith the Lord, “Son of man, prophesy against ... them
that prophesy out of their
own hearts, Hear ye the word of the Lord, Thus saith the Lord
God: Woe unto the
foolish prophets, that follow their own spirit , and have seen
nothing! ...
They have seen vanity and lying divination, saying, The Lord
saith. And the Lord hath
not sent them: and they have made others to hope that they
would confirm the word.
Have ye not seen a vain vision, and have ye not spoken a lying
divination, whereas ye
say, The Lord saith it; albeit I have not spoken?
Therefore, Thus saith the Lord God; Because ye have spoken
vanity, and seen lies,
therefore, behold, I am against you, saith the Lord God. And
mine hand shall be upon
the prophets that see vanity, and that divine lies: they shall
not be in the assembly of
my people ... Because, even because they have seduced my
people, saying, Peace; and
there is no peace ...” (Ezek. 13: 2-10).
Whoever takes the real “Thus saith the Lord” to heart, as
presented by the true
prophets, will very quickly come to realise, that the same
enticing spirits are still at
work today and the same deceptions are now taking place.
Well-meant lies are being
prophesied, mixed with well-meant fortune-telling, even
imagined visions are seen.
They speak of salvation in front of the people, but in reality
God’s Salvation in Christ
is not present. Many give in to their own spirit. They want to
help God, but they are
prophesying the thoughts of their hearts. The people are so
glad when they hear “Thus
saith the Lord”, but at the same time they are misled and
remain in the false
Christendom, which they call “the full gospel”.
Then the Lord turns against the prophetesses in the church,
who also prophesy
according to their imagination. Many times they say, “The Lord
has given me a word
for you! He has shown me something.” It is indisputably
well-meant, but self-made.
To them He spoke with a “Woe!”, because of their “cut to fit”
prophecies in order to
hunt souls. Then the Lord takes the prophetesses into special
focus, whom He calls
“women” — like the woman Jezebel who acted as a prophetess —
and pronounces His
judgement. “Therefore, ye shall see no more vanity, nor divine
divinations; for I will
deliver my people out of your hand; and ye shall know that I
am the Lord.” (v. 23).
There is no other spiritual gift by which preachers and
churches have been controlled
— lifted up, abased and manipulated — as with the pretended
gift of prophecy. The
true ministries and gifts always serve for the uplifting of
the Church; never for
misleading or for destroying it. Not everybody will take this
correction, but the Lord
knows His Own. He calls them out, separates and purifies them,
and false prophets
and prophetesses will no longer reign over them. Whoever
listens to false prophecies
cannot heed to the true Word of prophecy. Only those who
remain in the Word and
Scripture prophecy will escape the sanctimonious deception of
the false prophecies.
Once again we would like to point out the marks of a true
prophet: Every true prophet
and servant of God audibly heard the voice of God, which
commissioned him directly.
Every prophet of God received the Word directly from the Lord
and so became the voice
of God to the people. The true prophets and apostles of the
Lord are addressed by Him
as servants, because they are in His direct service, sent by
Him, and they know the
Lord personally.
Micah, the true prophet, said, “As the Lord liveth, even what
my God saith, that will
I speak ... Again he said, Therefore hear the word of the
Lord; I saw the Lord sitting
upon His throne, and all the host of heaven standing on his
right hand and on his left.
... Now, therefore, behold, the Lord hath put a lying spirit
in the mouth of these, thy
prophets, and the Lord hath spoken evil against thee.” (2 Chr.
18: 12-13; 18; 22; 27).
Micah was the prophet of God, the four hundred as listed in
the Bible were
self-appointed prophets, deceived by a lying spirit. Notice
the difference!
Jehoshaphat said, “Hear me, O Judah, and ye inhabitants of
Jerusalem. Believe in the
Lord your God, so shall ye be established; believe his
prophets, so shall ye prosper.” (2
Chr. 20: 20). “... Believe his prophets ...” — for His
prophets have His revealed Word
and His revealed Will.
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