I will stand my watch… to see what He will say to me…” (Habakkuk 2:1)

Simply expressed, prophecy can be defined as hearing the voice of God and speaking what He says. This gift is commonly experienced in two ways.

One is audial, meaning the one receiving the message hears words, which they then repeat/release. The other—the seer—is visual, meaning the receiver sees a message through some type of picture, which they then release. Generally, these pictures are either received while awake by means of visions, or while asleep through dreams. Many prophetic people will experience both aspects at various times, but they tend to have one that is more dominant or frequent.

Office of a Prophet

Varieties Of the Seer Gifting

Visual images or impressions: Sometimes when praying or prophesying over someone, the Holy Spirit will reveal an image. For example, I might see a scripture written like a banner over someone’s head, or get a mental picture that gives direction.

Dreams: Dreams enrich your life by giving encouragement, direction, insight for intercession, and revelation. I get much of my personal prophetic revelation through words rather than pictures, yet I also get many spiritual dreams and visions. Unless you hold the office of a prophet, most dreams are likely for your personal benefit. (See Job 33:14-16.)

Visions: This category would include things like open visions, audible messages, angelic encounters, open heavens, trances, being caught up in the Spirit, and heavenly visitations.

The Seer

Developing The Gift

“Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do, for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner. For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does…” (John 5:19, 20)

Pursuing Intimacy

Scripture does not reveal exactly how Jesus saw all that His Father was doing, but we do know that He and His Father were one. My sense is that Jesus moved more by  the Holy Spirit giving Him knowledge of what His Father was doing, but He may also have had dreams at night, as well as visions in times of contemplation or prayer, which gave Him specific direction.

Regardless, just as Jesus made time to be alone with His Father and spent time in prayer, so should we. The more intimate we become with God, the more we will be able to see what it is that He’s doing. Make the Lord your focus, and prophetic revelation will follow!

Ask!

Once my life was transformed and I became Spirit-filled, I could not get enough of experiencing the Lord’s presence and hearing His voice! I immediately began to cry out to Him to speak to me, especially at night.

Growth And Maturity

“And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries… but have not love, I am nothing.” (1 Cor. 13:2)

For those who wish to increase in their prophetic and seer anointing, some practical guidelines for growth and maturity follow:

– Remember: the purpose of a word is to edify, encourage and build up. Words of a corrective nature should generally be spoken by someone who walks in the office of a prophet (versus the gift of prophecy) and between those who have relationship.

– Be wary of releasing negative words. Ask yourself, “Does what I am about to speak release the Father’s heart and love for that person/group; is the word redemptive in nature?”

– Seek wisdom! Just because you sense/hear/see something does not mean it is supposed to be released. And timing is key—a word spoken out of season has limited, if any, anointing and can actually hinder what Holy Spirit is doing!

– Shortcomings you see in another might actually indicate something is your assignment. Recently, someone I had barely met asked if she could “pray with me”—then proceeded to tell me that in one area of ministry, I was “not doing it right.” When I sought the Lord, He reminded me of a principle I call dust on top of the fridge. A mentor I once had was fairly laid-back about housekeeping. She used to say that if you came to her house and noticed the coating of dust on the top of her fridge, it was likely you were the one who was supposed to clean it!

If you’d like to see more clearly, let me speak this prayer over you: Just as the Lord blesses me with dreams, visions, and supernatural encounters—so I bless you!

Recommended reading for further study:

The Seer

Understanding the Dreams You Dream

Dreams and Visions

Dream On

Understands the prophetic gift

2 Chronicles 20:20 (ASV)
²⁰  And they rose early in the morning, and went forth into the wilderness of Tekoa: and as they went forth, Jehoshaphat stood and said, Hear me, O Judah, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem: believe in Jehovah your God, so shall ye be established; believe his prophets, so shall ye prosper.

a [Prophet] Hebrew: nabiy, one who spoke for God or was moved upon by Him to give a message. See Over Seventy-Eight Prophets and Prophetesses in Introduction to Prophecy

a [he came to day to the city] God was preparing Samuel and Saul at the same time. See note, 1Sam. 9:17

a [in his ear

Notes For Verse 16

a [To morrow about this time I will send thee a man out of the land of Benjamin, and thou shalt anoint him to be captain over my people Israel, that he may save my people out of the hand of the Philistines: for I have looked upon my people, because their cry is come unto me] The 4th prophecy in 1Samuel (1Sam. 9:16-17, fulfilled). Next, 1Sam. 9:19

Answer: Prophetic ministry, as understood by Charismatic groups today, is any ministry that relies on the gift of prophecy and new revelation from God to guide the church to maturity. Those involved in prophetic ministry sometimes refer to it as a five-fold ministry

We see prophetic ministry often in the Old Testament, as God raised up prophets to encourage and rebuke the nation of Israel in times of trouble or rebellion. During King David’s reign (2 Samuel), the prophet Nathan, among others, spoke the word of the Lord to David, giving him guidance and direction as well as confronting him concerning his sin with Bathsheba. Of course, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Hosea, Amos, Micah, Zechariah, etc., also had a prophetic ministry—they were prophets, after all. The calling of a prophet was to speak for God. A prophet would teach, give guidance, counsel, or rebuke as necessary.

gift of prophecy is specifically mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12:10 and Ephesians 4:11. Please note that this gift was given for the building up of the church (Ephesians 4:12

ceased being of use in the church. We can see this in the New Testament in that the early books such as 1 Corinthians and Ephesians mention the miraculous gifts, whereas the later books such as 1 and 2 Timothy don’t mention them. The completed Bible is sufficient for us to follow the Lord faithfully. Second Peter 1:3 and 2 Timothy 3:16–17

There are many Christians today who claim to be involved in prophetic ministry, who believe that prophecy is ongoing, and who present themselves as conduits of new revelation from heaven. Churches who believe in prophetic ministry typically attempt to interpret dreams, predict the future, and speak in tongues—although the New Testament gift of tongues (the supernatural ability to speak in unlearned foreign languages for the purpose of sharing the gospel) is not the type of tongues being practiced today.

Revelation 22:18

 God is restoring the prophetic ministry to the church:

Yes as never seen before. Prophets are springing up from everywhere and people are more than ever aware of the prophetic ministry as never before. Of course this situation, which is quite new to the church in these endtimes, leads to many questions. Both simple church members as well as those called to the prophetic ministry have questions. Some of those questions are:

preparation

As you can see there are many questions and I am sure you have got your own, you can add your own list. I don’t intend to answer all these questions here; I just want to give you an overview of what the prophetic ministry is all about and what it involves. If the Lord has called you and you would like to be trained, then apply to be a student and you will have the answers to all these questions during your training.

The first thing that I what to look at is the word prophetic. Obviously prophetic is an adjective related to two words prophecy and prophet. Here is how strong’s concordance defines the two terms according to the Greek

Prophecy:

Prophet:

The key thing to remember here is that prophecy involves an utterance or communication through words. In a nutshell, prophecy is speaking ahead of time, what God is planning to do. It can also involve preparing the ground for what God is planning to do.

Because prophecy is an utterance it actually covers a lot of what goes as normal preaching. Whenever a person speaks forth under inspiration what God is saying to others at the present time, they are exercising a prophetic ministry. So prophecy can also fall under inspired preaching. But it is of course a lot more than that.

From the above definitions you may be tempted to believe that a prophet is someone who just has a gift of prophecy or who prophesies. But the prophetic ministry is actually more than that as said. keep reading and you will understand why.

gifts of the spirit, body ministries and leadership ministries also referred to as the fivefold ministry

Body ministries can be found in Roman 12: 4-8 and include: Prophecy, Servanthood, Teaching, Exhortation and encouragement, Giving to others and meeting their needs, Ruling or taking charge or leading others, Compassion and mercy and taking care of people. These are called body ministries because they are ministries that every single member of the body of Christ is called to function and operate in. Every believer has got a ministry because the word ministry simply means service; so to minister means to serve. And you will agree that every believer is called to serve the Lord. There is no particular training needed, believers receive them from the Lord and function naturally in them.

Then you have the higher-level ministries, which are the leadership ministries that you can find Ephesians 4:11 and are: Apostles, Prophets, Teachers, Evangelists, and Pastors. These are the governing body of the church. And the ministry of the prophet or specifically the prophetic office falls in this category.

Now you know that for every job that you carry out, you need specific tools and skills. The gifts of the spirit are tools and abilities that the Lord gives to his servants to carry out successfully their functions in the church. Since we have both body ministries and leadership ministries, the spiritual gifts are available to both levels of ministries to carry out their functions and serve the Lord efficiently.

So you can understand that the ordinary member of the body of Christ who has got the body ministry of prophecy will need the need the gift of prophecy to carry out that ministry; likewise the prophet will need the same gift of prophecy. Both ministries relate to the the prophetic. But the latter involves more than just prophesying. This means that a person with the body ministry of prophecy or the gift of prophecy carries out a prophetic ministry but they are not a prophet. The prophet on the other hand can not only prophesy but also carry out many other functions. For example the ministry of exhortation is also a prophetic function. Although it is not prophetic in itself, the prophetic ministry is usually designed to motivate and encourage believers to go on with God and to find their place in the Body.

So what are the other functions that set the prophet apart? What is the purpose of the prophetic ministry?

The first goal of the prophetic ministry is bring the body of Christ to place of maturity. And the only way to know that the body of Christ is a place of maturity is when believers are walking in faith, love and hope.

The second goal of the prophet is to bring believers to a full knowledge of the Lord.

The third goal of the prophet is to help prepare believers for the ministry God has called them to do.

As said, for the prophet to fulfil the purpose of the prophetic ministry, they need some specific spiritual gifts. They are referred to as prophetic gifts. There are three groups of spiritual gifts mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12: the vocal gifts (prophecy, diverse tongues, interpretation of tongues), the revelation gifts (word of knowledge, word of wisdom, discerning of spirits) and the power gifts (faith, miracles, healings).

The main gifts involved with the prophetic ministry are the vocal and the revelation gifts. Regarding the power gifts the major one that the prophet uses is the gift of faith. So the prophetic gifts are given to the prophet in order to fulfil these three goals. Now the question is how? As I said, I won’t go in too much detail, so I will use one gift from each group to show you how the prophetic ministry can carry out its functions using those gifts.

Let’s start with the vocal gift of prophecy, which is the most obvious one. The main purpose of prophecy is to encourage and edify the body of Christ. How can prophecy bring encouragement and edification? Through a prophetic word. A word that tell believers how much God loves them and how valuable they are to Him will certainly bring them closer to the Lord. But sometimes prophecy can be a word of wisdom that needs to come to pass. So the prophet needs to do more than prophesying, he needs to send forth a prophetic decree, so that whatever the Lord is planning for the individual or the body of Christ to come to pass. The prophet can do this while ministering directly to a person or in prayer. By sending forth a prophetic decree, the prophet becomes part of the solution of whatever the person is expecting.

Now how should the prophet use the gifts of revelation? One of the main functions of the prophet is to equip the saints for the work of ministry. To fulfil this function the prophet needs to help them to identify their gifts and ministries and the main tool is the gift of the word of wisdom. With the word of wisdom the prophet can, not only reveal what ministry they are called to but they can go further by giving them direction regarding how to grow in that ministry. Often some believers have some revelations or some impressions regarding their calling that they don’t understand it. The prophet can in this case use the word of wisdom to bring confirmation. When the prophet does this, they really build hope in the lives of believers; they give them something to hang onto and something to live for.

Now what about the power gifts? As I said earlier the main power gift in which the prophet operates is the gift of faith. Without this gift the prophet cannot function properly. I have already said that the prophet is not called to just predict or give revelation. He/she is called to be part of the solution to whatever problem God reveals through them. And the way the prophet does this is through prophetic decrees. Only when the prophet decrees can what they have been predicting or revealing come to pass. But the decree itself is not enough, what makes the decree effective is the gift of faith. It is the spiritual force which when released into the earth accomplishes the will of God. So as the prophet decrees, the gift of faith is released to accomplish the will of God. The prophet fulfils this function mainly through intercession. This is the main characteristic of a prophet. It is not predicting or foretelling, although prophets do these things. Foretelling or predicting is what psychics are busy doing, but they are not giving any solutions. They are just predicting what Satan will do.

Identified by what it does, not by what it says it is

        Just as a true Christian prophet is known by what he does, not by what he says he is, so a Christian prophetic ministry is known by what it does, not by what it says it is.

        A Christian prophetic ministry also provides a way for the priorities, the present-day utility of God’s power, and contemporary purposes to be communicated to man as history progresses (Amos 3:7 “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets.”;