Hearing His Voice #264

In his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well. So if God has given you the ability to prophesy, speak out with as much faith as God has given you.

Romans 12:6

It is astonishing that so many church traditions rule out the prophetic gift as an appropriate practice for today when the New Testament is so open about it. Or that some have redefined it to apply only to preachers in the pulpit. But Paul wrote to the entire congregation at Corinth—young and old, leaders and followers, men and women, high status and low—urging them to pursue the prophetic gift (1 Corinthians 14:1), and here he promotes it to the Romans, too. It’s true that there were abuses in how some of the spiritual gifts were being used, but Paul addresses the abuses without ever denying the gifts. In fact, he seeks to cultivate the gifts as necessary aspects of Christian fellowship and experience. And he couples them, especially prophecy, with faith.

Hearing God’s voice and speaking it to others always goes hand in hand with faith. The assumption that a prophetic word must not be spoken unless the speaker is one hundred percent certain about it is not a New Testament concept. Even Paul sometimes writes, “I say, not the Lord,” as if he wasn’t sure that his words were authorized by God (see 1 Corinthians 7:12, for example). Inspiration is much easier to recognize in retrospect than it is in the moment, both to the speaker and the hearer. Yet the Spirit urges us to speak and hear anyway, exercising faith that God’s voice will be understood in the process. When we think we’ve heard God say something that will be beneficial to someone else, we can say so with appropriate caution—not with “Thus saith the Lord . . .” but with “I sense God saying . . .”

God gives us faith, words, and discernment. We can trust the Holy Spirit who is moving among us.

Holy Spirit, give me faith to speak the words You give me—humbly, yet earnestly. And give all of us among the fellowship of believers discernment to recognize Your words. Prophesy through Your people.