![\"Rules_for_Radicals\"](\"https:\/\/z3news.com\/w\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/Rules_for_Radicals-228x350.png\")
In 1971, Saul Alinsky wrote a book called Rules for Radicals. It\u00a0became the guide\u00a0book for communist organizers like President Barack Obama.<\/p>\nIn 1971, Saul Alinsky wrote a book called Rules for Radicals. It\u00a0became the guide\u00a0book for communist organizers like President Barack Obama.<\/p>\n
In the same way that radical communists need rules to help them achieve their goal of world domination, radical Christians need rules to help us achieve our goal of advancing God’s kingdom on earth.<\/p>\n
We might not think of ourselves as radical, but anyone who believes their sins are forgiven because a man rose from the dead has to be considered radical. Anyone who believes the creator of the universe lives on the inside of them and even talks to them has to be considered radical.<\/p>\n
There are lots of different rules we could list, but the ones I have listed here are all for the purpose of helping\u00a0us\u00a0more accurately discern what\u00a0God reveals in dreams, visions, and prophetic\u00a0words.<\/p>\n
I chose this topic because there have been so many questions raised about prophetic words surrounding this current time and the events coming in the near future. These kinds of questions are only going to increase because the shakings are just now beginning. More shakings means\u00a0more people will be seeking answers to questions about prophetic words in the days to come.\u00a0This post is an attempt to answer those questions and provide us with some guidelines to help us keep on track.<\/p>\n
So here are my eight rules for radicals.<\/p>\n
Rule 1: Do Not Despise the Words of Prophets<\/strong><\/p>\n The first rule is\u00a0do not despise the words of prophets, but test everything and hold fast to what is good (1 Thessalonians 5:20-21).<\/p>\n To\u00a0despise prophetic words means:<\/p>\n We all know prophetic words present challenges with trying to discern which ones to believe and which ones to toss.\u00a0There are also\u00a0challenges interpreting what they mean. It seems like it would be easier to just throw them all out, but the Bible\u00a0warns us not to do that.<\/p>\n Some churches have chosen the easy way out by making\u00a0doctrines\u00a0claiming God no longer speaks to His people. They claim all of that passed away after the first century apostles. That way there are no messy prophetic questions to deal with, just reject them all! However, according to\u00a0the Bible,\u00a0God has never stopped\u00a0speaking to His people.<\/p>\n If God no longer speaks to us, why would Jesus say,\u00a0“My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:27). The primary way we hear His voice is\u00a0through the Bible, the written word of God, but\u00a0from start to finish, from Genesis to Revelation, the Bible\u00a0is filled with examples\u00a0of God speaking to His people through prophetic dreams, visions, and words. So He speaks to us by\u00a0both the written word and by His\u00a0Spirit.<\/p>\n If God no longer speaks to us\u00a0why would the Apostle Paul include\u00a0the prophetic ministry as\u00a0one of the five primary New Testament ministries along with\u00a0apostles, evangelists, pastors, and teachers?\u00a0Paul says each type of ministry\u00a0is given by God to equip us\u00a0for the work of ministry, to build up our faith, to bring us into unity, to help us to know the Lord, and become more like Him (Ephesians 4:11-13).<\/p>\n The scriptures make it clear prophetic words should not be ignored, yet many Christians\u00a0do it anyway. Some take it even further by openly attacking, maligning, and mocking prophetic ministry. It really makes me wonder whose side they are on.<\/p>\n The Apostle Paul wrote,\u00a0“God has exhibited the apostles last of all” and “the scum of the world” (1 Corinthians 4:9-13). I cannot argue with him, but I think prophets are not far behind apostles in the race to the bottom. The world seems more willing to accept the ministry of\u00a0apostles, evangelists, pastors, and\u00a0teachers because at least they share things written in a book, which is more like the way\u00a0the rest of the world does things, but prophets are considered total lunatics because\u00a0their whole ministry comes by the Spirit in the form of dreams, visions, and rhema words spoken by God. The world has no reference point for that, so they assume prophets\u00a0are spooky weirdos. So prophets are outcasts,\u00a0unwanted, and unappreciated. They are widely rejected by the church, by their country, and even by their own family\u00a0(Matthew 13:57). Only a small remnant pays any attention to what they say. Anyone seeking honor for themselves should find another job because they are not going to find that\u00a0as a prophet.<\/p>\n Leonard Ravenhill described the prophetic ministry as follows:<\/p>\n Since starting this blog in 2012, I have been amazed by how many so-called Christians believe it is their God given mission in life to attack\u00a0the Lord’s prophets. It really doesn’t even matter what the prophetic word says\u00a0because they have a\u00a0problem with anyone who claims to hear anything from God. They attack every prophetic word crying, “False prophet!”<\/p>\n In the first year or so, I used to reply to their comments attempting to show them what the Bible says. However, I soon learned I was wasting my time\u00a0because none of them\u00a0cared about that. They could not hear\u00a0any kind of correction because they already knew everything.<\/p>\n So now I have learned to be more efficient with my time. I just hit delete and move on. No reply sent. No explanation given. No time wasted. Now I can focus on helping people who have ears to hear, which is far more productive. Other visitors don’t have to be bothered by reading all of that\u00a0nonsense either.<\/p>\n So here is a reply to the prophecy haters\u00a0whose comments have been\u00a0deleted without any explanation:<\/p>\n This site strives\u00a0to help people\u00a0believe God\u00a0and understand what He\u00a0is saying to us today. Since you do not share that goal, please find another website to express your opinions. Any comments you submit here will be deleted. You are wasting your time here, but you are no longer wasting mine. Please go away!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n That might sound harsh to some, but the sad truth is not everyone wants to believe the Bible or follow the Lord. We need to cut the troublemakers loose so we can be more effective in helping those who truly want help.<\/p>\n The prophetic ministry can get messy, but we have to learn how to deal with it. Rejecting the prophetic ministry is a mistake\u00a0because God says\u00a0He does nothing unless He first reveals His secret counsel to His servants the prophets\u00a0(Amos 3:7).<\/p>\n Rule 2: Prophecy is Not a Shortcut to\u00a0God<\/strong><\/p>\n We all have a tendency to follow\u00a0the path of least resistance, seeking the easiest way to do things. Some people follow prophetic ministries seeking an easy way to hear from God without taking time to seek the Lord for themselves. Unfortunately, it will not go well for them.<\/p>\n Just as it is a mistake to ignore prophetic words, it is also a mistake to rely on them too much. God requires each of us\u00a0to come to Him directly, spend time with Him, and stay in right relationship with Him, so we can hear from Him for ourselves\u00a0rather than relying on someone else to do it for us.<\/p>\n That was okay during Old Testament days, but it is not okay today.\u00a0In those days,\u00a0the Lord spoke through prophets because the people did not have the Holy Spirit living in them. But when\u00a0the Lord was crucified the veil of the temple was torn from top to bottom. Then after the Lord Jesus was raised from the dead, He breathed on His disciples and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” Then the Holy Spirit entered\u00a0into the hearts of those who believed. So today we have been given much more and God requires much more from us.<\/p>\n Rule 3: True Prophecies Never\u00a0Contradict\u00a0the Bible<\/strong><\/p>\n Since God speaks to us through prophecies, we must learn to discern the true from the false.\u00a0The first test that must be passed is the scripture test. True prophecies never contradict\u00a0the scriptures.<\/p>\n The Spirit of God never says anything that contradicts the Bible\u00a0because God never contradicts Himself. So if a prophetic word is truly from God it will always agree with His written word.<\/p>\n To apply this test, we must know what the Bible says, which means we have a responsibility to study.\u00a0The more we know the scriptures, the more we can\u00a0recognize false prophecies. The less we know the scriptures, the more likely we are to be deceived by\u00a0false prophecies.<\/p>\n For example, several\u00a0people made\u00a0comments\u00a0on this site recently claiming the rapture would happen on the day of atonement 2015. In each case, I replied with an explanation why that could not happen based on the scriptures, which I documented in my previous post, Ten Things that Must Happen Before the Rapture<\/a>. The scriptures reveal many things that must happen before the rapture and many of them are major events that take years to unfold. So those words were easy to expose as false prophecies because there is no way the rapture could happen this year.<\/p>\n In that example, the prophecies involved an event revealed in the Bible, but that is not always the case. If the event is not identified in the Bible we must rely on other ways to discern the prophetic words.<\/p>\n Rule 4: Prophecies\u00a0Must Bear Witness With Our Spirit<\/strong><\/p>\n If a prophetic word passes the\u00a0scripture hurdle, the next rule is it must bear witness with our spirit. This requires discernment, which means we have a responsibility to learn how to discern.<\/p>\n Babies have no discernment. They pick up anything they find on the floor and put it in their mouth. Discernment is something we learn from experience. That means we are going to make some mistakes along the way. However, if we stay humble in asking the Lord to help us, we can learn from our mistakes and grow in our ability to discern.<\/p>\n There is a gift of discernment given in special situations for the work of the ministry (1 Corinthians 12:10), but that gift is specifically for discerning what kind of spirits are operating in the unseen realm for the purpose of binding, loosing, and casting out unclean spirits. The gift of discernment is not necessary for\u00a0accurately judging prophetic words. The gift of discernment is given for special situations, but the kind of discernment required for judging prophecies is available to every believer in every situation. This kind of discernment can be learned simply by training ourselves through constant practice.<\/p>\n 13 For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. My wife and I have an old friend named Peggy who is very skilled in discernment. Her skill was not given to her as a gift. She developed it through constant\u00a0practice.\u00a0One day she found a snake had crawled up into the engine of her parked car. Most people would not think much about it, but Peggy immediately started practicing discernment asking what does it mean, why did it happen, and what should she do about it. She was always practicing, always seeking to understand why things happened, always asking the Lord to reveal the meaning of things to her. Her eagerness to learn caused her to develop discernment faster than other people who were not paying close attention.<\/p>\n Discerning whether or not a prophetic word bears witness with our spirit is not as black and white as passing the scripture test. With the scripture test we are dealing with things we can see and know because they are written in the Bible. However, when it comes to bearing witness with our spirit we are dealing with things we cannot see and have no way of knowing in the natural realm. We must learn to discern based only\u00a0on the inner witness.<\/p>\n How is this possible? For man it is impossible, but for God all things are possible (Matthew 19:26). We have to learn to listen to the leading of the Holy Spirit within us to either confirm or reject a prophetic word. A\u00a0strong sense of peace and confidence about a prophecy is\u00a0a positive indication\u00a0the word is bearing witness with our spirit. Feeling uneasy and anxious indicates something is not right. We might not know why it is not right, but we don’t always need to know why. We can just learn to trust the inner witness even when we don’t know anything more than that.<\/p>\n For example, consider the prophetic warnings shared\u00a0in my previous post published on September 11,\u00a0Watch Out for Global Economic Collapse Starting in Germany on September 25<\/a>. In that post I shared a prophetic word posted on a Catholic website, locutions.org, claiming a global economic collapse would begin while the Pope was in the United States, which included the day of atonement.<\/p>\n\n
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\n14 But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. (Hebrews 5:13-14)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n