The European Prophetic College

Picture of a Prophet 05

2008-09-04T16:31:00.002+02:00

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He has a heart like a volcano and his words are as fire.
He talks to men about God.
He carries the lamp of truth amongst heretics while he is lampooned by men.
He faces God before he faces men, but he is self-effacing.
He hides with God in the secret place, but he has nothing to hide in the marketplace.
He is naturally sensitive but supernaturally spiritual.
He has passion, purpose and pugnacity.
He is ordained of God but disdained by men.

Cross is radical

2008-08-29T14:49:00.001+02:00

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The Cross Is a Radical Thing

The Cross of Christ is the most revolutionary thing ever to appear among men.
The cross of old Roman times knew no compromise; it never made concessions. It won all its arguments by killing its opponent and silencing him for good. It spared not Christ, but slew Him the same as the rest. He was alive when they hung Him on that cross and completely dead when they took Him down six hours later. That was the cross the first time it appeared in Christian history.

After Christ was risen from the dead the apostles went out to preach His message, and what they preached was the cross. And wherever they went into the wide world they carried the cross, and the same revolutionary power went with them. The radical message of the cross transformed Saul of Tarsus and changed him from a persecutor of Christians to a tender believer and an apostle of the faith. Its power changed bad men into good ones. It shook off the long bondage of paganism and altered completely the whole moral and mental outlook of the Western world.

All this it did and continued to do as long as it was permitted to remain what it had been originally, a cross. Its power departed when it was changed from a thing of death to a thing of beauty. When men made of it a symbol, hung it around their necks as an ornament or made its outline before their faces as a magic sign to ward off evil, then it became at best a weak emblem, at worst a positive fetish. As such it is revered today by millions who know absolutely nothing about its power.

The cross effects its ends by destroying one established pattern, the victim’s, and creating another pattern, its own. ‘Thus it always has its way. It wins by defeating its opponent and imposing its will upon him. It always dominates. It never compromises, never dickers nor confers, never surrenders a point for the sake of peace. It cares not for peace; it cares only to end its opposition as fast as possible.

With perfect knowledge of all this Christ said, ”If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.” So the cross not only brings Christ’s life to an end, it ends also the first life, the old life, of every one of His true followers. It destroys the old pattern, the Adam pat tern, in the believer’s life, and brings it to an end. Then the God who raised Christ from the dead raises the believer and a new life begins.

This, and nothing less, is true Christianity, though we cannot but recognize the sharp divergence of this conception from that held by the rank and file of evangelicals today. But we dare not qualify our position. The cross stands high above the opinions of men and to that cross all opinions must come at last for judgment. A shallow and worldly leadership would modify the cross to please the entertainment-mad saintlings who will have their fun even within the very sanctuary; but to do so is to court spiritual disaster and risk the anger of the Lamb tuned Lion.

We must do something about the cross, and one of two things only we can do—flee it or die upon it. And if we should be so foolhardy as to flee we shall by that act put away the faith of our fathers and make of Christianity something other than it is. Then we shall have left only the empty language of salvation; the power will depart with our departure from the true cross.

If we are wise we will do what Jesus did: endure the cross and despise its shame for the joy that is set before us. To do this is to submit the whole pattern of our lives to be destroyed and built again in the power of an endless life. And we shall find that it is more than poetry, more than sweet hymnody and elevated feeling. The cross will cut into our lives where it hurts worst, sparing neither us nor our carefully cultivated reputations. It will defeat us and bring our selfish lives to an end. Only then can we rise in fullness of life to establish a pattern of living wholly new and free and full of good works.

The changed attitude toward the cross that we see in modern orthodoxy proves not that God has changed, nor that Christ has eased up on His demand that we carry the cross; it means rather that current Christianity has moved away from the standards of the New Testament. So far have we moved indeed that it may take nothing short of a new reformation to restore the cross to its right place in the theology and life of the Church.

A.W. Tozer

Picture of a Prophet 04

2008-08-24T11:57:00.000+02:00

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A prophet is a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, but few ”make the grade” in his class.
He is friendless while living and famous when dead.
He is against the establishment in ministry; then he is established as a saint by posterity.
He eats daily the bread of affliction while he ministers, but he feeds the Bread of Life to those who listen.
He walks before men for days but has walked before God for years.
He is a scourge to the nation before he is scourged by the nation.
He announces, pronounces, and denounces!

Leonard Ravenhill

Picture of a Prophet 03

2008-08-21T12:26:00.002+02:00

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The prophet lives in ”splendid isolation.”
He is forthright and outright, but he claims no birthright.
His message is ”repent, be reconciled to God or else...!”
His prophecies are parried.
His truth brings torment, but his voice is never void.
He is the villain of today and the hero of tomorrow.
He is excommunicated while alive and exalted when dead!
He is dishonored with epithets when breathing and honored with epitaphs when dead.

Leonard Ravenhill

Picture of a Prophet 02

2008-08-17T09:07:00.001+02:00

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The prophet is God’s detective seeking for a lost treasure. The degree of his effectiveness is determined by his measure of unpopularity. Compromise is not known to him.
He has no price tags.
He is totally ”otherworldly.”
He is unquestionably controversial and unpardonably hostile.
He marches to another drummer!
He breathes the rarefied air of inspiration.
He is a ”seer” who comes to lead the blind.
He lives in the heights of God and comes into the valley with a ”thus saith the Lord.”
He shares some of the foreknowledge of God and so is aware of impending judgment.

Leonard Ravenhill

Picture of a Prophet 01

2008-08-13T09:27:00.001+02:00

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The prophet in his day is fully accepted of God and totally rejected by men.

Years back, Dr. Gregory Mantle was right when he said, ”No man can be fully accepted until he is totally rejected.” The prophet of the Lord is aware of both these experiences. They are his ”brand name.”

The group, challenged by the prophet because they are smug and comfortably insulated from a perishing world in their warm but untested theology, is not likely to vote him ”Man of the year” when he refers to them as habituates of the synagogue of Satan!

The prophet comes to set up that which is upset. His work is to call into line those who are out of line! He is unpopular because he opposes the popular in morality and spirituality. In a day of faceless politicians and voiceless preachers, there is not a more urgent national need than that we cry to God for a prophet! The function of the prophet, as Austin-Sparks once said, ”has almost always been that of recovery.”

Leonard Ravenhill

Revelation or relief

2008-08-08T09:55:00.000+02:00

Our Father provides. He has set forth the ministry of the prayer-chamber as the many-faceted means leading a heart into a development of true seeing.
The life of a praying Christian formulates itself in terms of a quest for a revelation of God as He finds Himself pleased to reveal His nature and purposes.
Answered prayer contains something of His own character, His mind and His way planted as a resource in our daily struggle.

Asking and demanding will never open for light and revelation. Praying and waiting respects and uplifts His name. Intercession glorifies His name. The very use of His name to secure man’s will desecrates any heavenly intention. Prayer begins on the inside of His name, in the chambers of His council.

David, the king, the man with a tongue as the pen of a ready writer prayed with words and definitions which were specified – this I need, this I see, this I fear, this I expect. This King of Prayer always expressed the need of revelation – be my Rock, act as my Shield, sing songs of deliverance, surround us with loving-kindness, allow help to descend from the sanctuary, allow us to see Your hands at work.

Prayers, reverently persistent. Prayers specified, but never pressing man’s agendas. Penetrating prayers simply because of the intercessor’s trust in and abandoning to God’s ability to cause all things to work together for good. Piercing, productive prayer because the Lord is trusted to diagnose and differentiate, to determine and decide regarding proper measures to be applied.

Oh, that He would reveal Himself. Pain is involved in the process of securing true revelation. There is always and ever a perennial pain in a heart which is set for true seeing. Two polarities confront man in the prayer-chamber – revelation or relief. An either/or situation constitutes true prayer and true seeing.

Modern man is set to avoid pain and to pursue pleasure. Thereby he disqualifies himself for a praying which secures true seeing. God is there to be seen by the man, or woman, who is ready for spiritual work, a following hard after the Lord. There has to be an “Oh” in a praying man’s heart – to somehow reduce this reality, even praying to be relieved of such an “Oh” is to cut off the life of the prayer-closet.

But revelation is relief – light in darkness, peace amidst pain. Revelation is relief – a seeing, tangible glory amidst hardship. Revelation is relief – “I have come to reveal the Father.” Revelation is relief – deliverance because of His songs, surrounded by His loving-kindness.
Seeing Him is relief. Enjoying Him is relief – relief from a crooked presumption of what is glorious living. Rejoicing in Him is relief – a severing from, a cutting off from contemporary means and modes of operation aiming at securing pace and prosperity.

True seeing finds a burning bush.
True seeing finds a calling to a ministry in the chambers of prayer, in the council of God.
True seeing formulates life, maturing life.
True seeing is Life, newness of Life.
True seeing finds God. True seeing rests with God.
True seeing is secured by the willingness to carry a radical “Oh, that. . .” in your heart.
True seeing is yours by choice.

Lars Widerberg

A Vessel of Recovering

2008-08-05T13:14:00.006+02:00

What is the nature and the condition of a vessel to be used by the Lord in recovering His full testimony - the testimony concerning His Son? That vessel - that instrument - is, and must be, one upon whose heart, genuinely, the condition of things as so clearly contrary to the thought of God lies with very great pressure.

It is one thing for us to get a kind of public concern about things and then begin to make a lot of noise about it amongst men - to advertise, to demonstrate, and to give it a public form in utterance and effort and organization; to join ourselves to some cause or to join some cause to ourselves. . . and then, in that cause, to make a great big affair of it; - that is one thing.

It is quite another thing for the Lord to put into our hearts in secret an almost unbearable, intolerable burden, which is His own heart-burden, and for us first of all to bear that thing upon our hearts in a deep outpouring of travailing prayer secretly in the presence of God; - quite another thing to come to the Lord’s interests in that way.

It is one thing to come to a situation from the outside, link ourselves on with it, and take it up and make it our bit of work for life - our life-interest. There are plenty of people whom you could get interested in a cause, whom you could get to take up a piece of work requiring help. But it is another thing to have that spiritual fellowship with God which results in God’s putting His travail into your soul.

What kind of vessel must the Lord have in order to do things? He does not want “workers” to take up His work; He wants travailers to travail with Him for His spiritual interests. He does not want employees; He wants sons. He does not want experts; He wants those who have a passion - those to whose heart the whole thing comes so closely that it bends them down before Him in an anguish. . . who are so much in the matter that it is their matter before God - it is theirs. It is no mere mental apprehension of teaching and of truth; it is a heart burden, a desperate concern for the Lord because of things as they are spiritually amongst His people.

Have we taken up work for the Lord? Have we associated ourselves with the cause of Christ? Or, have we come to know God’s own burden of travail in our souls to the point that this is to us a thing which saps our life, saps our very vitality - the thing for which we are pouring out our very blood, the thing which costs everything? And yet we can do no other. There is no question of resigning - of giving up; the thing is ourselves. For His purpose, God must have something like that at the end.
Oh, let us wipe the slate of all these other ideas of organizing something, running something, getting a movement going. Let us see that God brings His thing into being out of travail.

He baptises a soul into an anguish; He throws upon someone - or some little company - the mantle of His own terrible disappointment, dissatisfaction, and grief because of things as He sees them spiritually amongst His own people. That is how God brings things into being. Men do it in other ways, but that has always been God’s way. It has cost the instrument its life every time (not necessarily that it has died a sudden death, or even laid down its life in martyrdom, but it has cost the instrument its life).

Oh, may the Lord save us from having the preponderance, the greater measure, before men and the lesser measure before Himself. May all that is before men come out of what we are before God. That should be a matter of exercise for us, and we should ask the Lord that our secret life with Him over these matters shall be kept well abreast of all our public ministries and our outward activities.

If the balance is on the side of what is public and toward men, there will be weakness and failure. Strength and effectiveness will be the measure of our secret history with God, and others too are able to take account of us and say: “There is nothing put on in this matter; this is no mere professional thing; it is not some habit - something they are interested in. This is something which to them is a matter of life and death; it is a matter which goes right to the heart with them.”

And men are able to discern whether it is like that or not. Oh, they know, better than perhaps we think they do, whether we are real or whether it is put on; whether we are speaking out of a book or out of our hearts; whether the thing is something we have collected or something born of anguish.

May I urge this upon you, that you seek ever to have your own heart deeply exercised in everything that you have to say publicly. Yes, it will cost, it will be anguish, it will be sorrow of heart, it will mean a price; but it is the way of spiritual fruitfulness and effectiveness.

The Lord can make you His messenger in His message; that is, a sign unto the people of what you are saying. Men are able to say: “Yes, that is not something he has read or studied and prepared; that has had a working in the life, and it has cost something. It will cost, but it is the way of effectiveness and fruitful service.

And what is true as to public ministry will be true in relation to any instrument that the Lord will use for any special purpose; it must have the thing wrought into it, and it must not be something that it has adopted. The Lord keep us from adopting things. . . but work the thing right into us.

T. Austin-Sparks

The Old Cross and the New

2008-08-01T14:34:00.006+02:00

By A.W. Tozer

All unannounced and mostly undetected there has come in modern times a new cross into popular evangelical circles. It is like the old cross, but different: the likenesses are superficial; the differences, fundamental.

From this new cross has sprung a new philosophy of the Christian life, and from that new philosophy has come a new evangelical technique—a new type of meeting and a new kind of preaching. This new evangelism employs the same language as the old, but its content is not the same and its emphasis not as before.

The old cross would have no truck with the world. For Adam’s proud flesh it meant the end of the journey. It carried into effect the sentence imposed by the law of Sinai. The new cross is not opposed to the human race; rather, it is a friendly pal and, if understood aright, it is the source of oceans of good clean fun and innocent enjoyment.

It lets Adam live without interference. His life motivation is unchanged; he still lives for his own pleasure, only now he takes delight in singing choruses and watching religious movies instead of singing bawdy songs and drinking hard liquor. The accent is still on enjoyment, though the fun is now on a higher plane morally if not intellectually.

The new cross encourages a new and entirely different evangelistic approach. The evangelist does not demand abnegation of the old life before a new life can be received. He preaches not contrasts but similarities. He seeks to key into public interest by showing that Christianity makes no unpleasant demands; rather, it offers the same thing the world does, only on a higher level. Whatever the sin-mad world happens to be clamoring after at the moment is cleverly shown to be the very thing the gospel offers, only the religious product is better.

The new cross does not slay the sinner, it redirects him. It gears him into a cleaner and jollier way of living and saves his self-respect. To the self-assertive it says, “Come and assert yourself for Christ.” To the egotist it says, “Come and do your boasting in the Lord.” To the thrillseeker it says, “Come and enjoy the thrill of Christian fellowship.” The Christian message is slanted in the direction of the current vogue in order to make it acceptable to the public.

The philosophy back of this kind of thing may be sincere but its sincerity does not save it from being false. It is false because it is blind. It misses completely the whole meaning of the cross.

The old cross is a symbol of death. It stands for the abrupt, violent end of a human being. The man in Roman times who took up his cross and started down the road had already said good-by to his friends. He was not coming back. He was going out to have it ended. The cross made no compromise, modified nothing, spared nothing; it slew all of the man, completely and for good. It did not try to keep on good terms with its victim. It struck cruel and hard, and when it had finished its work, the man was no more.

The race of Adam is under death sentence. There is no commutation and no escape. God cannot approve any of the fruits of sin, however innocent they may appear or beautiful to the eyes of men. God salvages the individual by liquidating him and then raising him again to newness of life.

That evangelism which draws friendly parallels between the ways of God and the ways of men is false to the Bible and cruel to the souls of its hearers. The faith of Christ does not parallel the world, it intersects it. In coming to Christ we do not bring our old life up onto a higher plane; we leave it at the cross. The corn of wheat must fall into the ground and die.

We who preach the gospel must not think of ourselves as public relations agents sent to establish good will between Christ and the world. We must not imagine ourselves commissioned to make Christ acceptable to big business, the press, the world of sports or modern education. We are not diplomats but prophets, and our message is not a compromise but an ultimatum.

God offers life, but not an improved old life. The life He offers is life out of death. It stands always on the far side of the cross. Whoever would possess it must pass under the rod. He must repudiate himself and concur in God’s just sentence against him. What does this mean to the individual, the condemned man who would find life in Christ Jesus? How can this theology be translated into life? Simply, he must repent and believe. He must forsake his sins and then go on to forsake himself. Let him cover nothing, defend nothing, excuse nothing. Let him not seek to make terms with God, but let him bow his head before the stroke of God’s stern displeasure and acknowledge himself worthy to die.

Having done this let him gaze with simple trust upon the risen Saviour, and from Him will come life and rebirth and cleansing and power. The cross that ended the earthly life of Jesus now puts an end to the sinner; and the power that raised Christ from the dead now raises him to a new life along with Christ.

To any who may object to this or count it merely a narrow and private view of truth, let me say God has set His hallmark of approval upon this message from Paul’s day to the present. Whether stated in these exact words or not, this has been the content of all preaching that has brought life and power to the world through the centuries. The mystics, the reformers, the revivalists have put their emphasis here, and signs and wonders and mighty operations of the Holy Ghost gave witness to God’s approval.

Dare we, the heirs of such a legacy of power, tamper with the truth? Dare we with our stubby pencils erase the lines of the blueprint or alter the pattern shown us in the Mount? May God forbid. Let us preach the old cross and we will know the old power.

A prophet’s passion # 03

2008-07-26T08:14:00.003+02:00

A plumb line over people and prophet
By Lars Widerberg

Reading: Amos 7:8-15

Listen to the word of the Lord sent from the throne in Heaven:
“Behold, I will set a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel. I will not again pass by them any more. And the high places of Isaac shall be desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword. Amos 7:8-9

Listen to the utterly severe and irrevocable words sent forth from the throne of God against His own people, a nation chosen to gather as one, a solemn assembly set apart for His praise. Listen to the man standing before the Lord, before the king, the nation and the political and religious establishment, uttering pregnant sentences, devastating words, words of no return.

Listen to the words. The initial reaction must have been one of utter disbelief. The Northern Kingdom had followed a path of independence and had gathered a general political and economical momentum which could not possibly point in any other direction than upwards. A nation blessed to be a blessing. Man elevated and his pursuits and exploits benevolently looked upon by God as something perfectly in line with heavenly plans and prospects. And here is a man declaring every component of this brave social experiment to be a radical opposite to godliness and proper worship.

This man marked himself for controversy. This man set himself apart as an anti-social element. This man triggered anger and resentment. He destabilised the whole social climate within the religious and political community – those who feared him the most was the ones at the front line in the restructuring and transformation of the religious world of that day. The altars and golden calves of Bethel drew greater crowds than ever. Jerusalem and the hills of Zion were long forgotten. This man became a prophetic offence. The role and ultimate work were hidden in his name – Amos, the burden, the burdened man.

Something utterly other must have happened to this man to be able to engage in the Lord’s work in the way he did. Something had upset his sphere of existence and intervened in his regular occupation and routines which changed his outlook and stance to the point of fundamental sacrificial efforts. The herdsman turned priest, he was given a priestly mind to be able to see the suffering people and the source of the ailment of the nation. Prophets stand on their ability to suffer with the people. Prophetic ministry without priestliness is useless and without any value. Something happens and is wrought in the innermost being of a man to be able to live and work as a prophet, something which surpasses mere charismata, something carrying the nature of priestliness, something intrinsically other.

Amos declared himself to be a herdsman, one “who followed the flock”. His authority as a man of God did not come out of his own, it was not for him to handle in any way he might find appropriate. The authority of vocation, of “office”, was fully and wholly with the Lord. This man, and the great prophets along with him, claimed no natural gifting for the work at hand. No personal ambition was ever tied to it – the prophetic assignment would turn completely false and useless the very moment anything from the man himself, or for himself, became a moderating parameter. Self-appointment was, and is, out of question. Statements of endorsement issued by the established order hold no value, it stymies the prophetic dynamics. Prophets form no crafts guild for mutual support. They never allow themselves to become defiled by any tie or connection to fraternities, guilds, orders, leagues or lodges.

Amos declared, “I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was a herdsman, and a gatherer of sycamore fruit”. He did not come out of any school of prophets, he was a well informed man. He was no political or ecclesiastical commentator, but he knew the root of the national predicament. He was not for a moment bent to criticism, his words was therefore sharp and penetrating as a razors edge.

According to Amos personal narrative:
But the Lord took me from following the flock and said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to My people Israel’.
This man, as any true prophet, was arrested and set apart for heavenly purposes. He was apprehended and laid hold of for things far beyond his personal disposition and ability. He was conscripted for royal service. This man became what he was not before. The dear herdsman found himself to be occupied with things he would never have chosen for himself. He was taken away from following the flock. God intervened, demanded, brought out from and into. No resistance possible, no negotiation, no way to get away from it – absoluteness, totality, genuineness, veracity.

The absoluteness guaranteed a work and words of highest quality possible. The non-compromised belonging laid the foundation for pure, undefiled reality. This absoluteness constituted purity and veracity. The man was taken away from, cut off from his own. The prophet was isolated and fully insulated from whatever would spring forth from his own sphere of experience and cravings. He was no longer his own, he did no longer belong to himself – 1 Cor 6:19. There was no “my ministry”, “my work”, “my role, my office, my position”.
This absoluteness as to belonging, as to order and to authority, this totality in regards to the cutting off from what belongs to ones own was the very guarantee for prophetic quality and functionality. Therefore the prophet feared no man, neither king nor priest. Therefore every man feared the prophet.

The absoluteness brought in into a man’s constitution and living by God’s intervention, by the apprehension and arresting of a man’s life and thinking will cause a confrontative mode, a prophetic setting. The totality, the sacrificial status reached by a heavenly declaration over a man’s life according to the pattern of sanctification – You are no longer your own – will generate reactions of offence, prophetic offence. The prophet chosen cannot resist the plumb line laid over his own life. No man exposed to such ministry will be able to escape and avoid the confrontative offence thrown into his conscience.

May this absoluteness apprehend men in this very late hour for the sake of genuineness.
May this totality be established among men in our day for the sake of life restored.
We ask and pray for men to be taken out and away from their own in this very hour for the sake of the restoration of freedom and dignity according to the measures of Heaven.

Formulaic prophecy

2008-07-22T14:28:00.003+02:00

By Lars Widerberg

God requires obedience according to patter, even according to Christ.
God orders and structures reality according to law and procedure.
But, he never sends his word according to formula.

Formulaic prophecy consists of that which is repetitious. The itinerant so called prophet or prophetess moves from place to place, conference to conference, country to country, bringing words to audiences of different background, history and cultural setup, words which do not hold enough specificity to direct mature men’s steps further into the purposes of the Lord.

If ever checked properly in the light of the Word of God these words would immediately fall flat, first of all because they are too broad, too vague, too general. Words of this kind follow modern methods of measurement – one size fits all. The major mood of the prophesying according to formula is outright flattery; it speaks to, charms and entices man’s religious fantasies. It leads man’s mind to misunderstand and misinterpret the mind of God. It deceives the poor and needy into believing that which is not worth believing in. Formula may bring certain truths, but it is never followed by life and authenticity.

God does not tolerate the frivolous prophet, and yet, they are many. God does not tolerate the flippant and superficial prophetess, and yet, they dare to appear and move to and fro in large hordes in these days when so much of the true prophetic word is about to be fulfilled. It does not occur to any of them that they themselves are a sign which declares the near end of this dispensation. Many are they that will come and prophesy falsely – Mt 24:11.

The flippant formulaic prophesying disengages discernment. It results in unruliness, its fruit is a people without discipline – Prov 29:18. Where the Spirit of prophecy is allowed to work according to the rules of Heaven, the people honours discernment, welcomes saintliness and begins to stand for veracity.

Formulaic prophecy presents God as being out of balance, being disordered, not knowing what was said by the prophet before today’s man of God. This kind of approach never tells what God is about to do among his people – except for telling them that it is going to be very new and very different. And, man has no practical role in this new thing except as a cheering audience. Obedience, holiness and the formation of saintly characters are concepts over-ruled and obsolete.

The formulaic prophet is a copycat. He prophesies according to latest trends and echoes men who hold prominent positions. He never dares to go against the tide for fear of loosing his place as one of the boys. Copycats secure mutual endorsement for the sake of overriding processes of discernment. The copycat operates in the realm of the sensational to gather followers who are not too eager to honour spiritual values. He attracts minds and hearts, who do not care for discerning the source of revelation as long it stimulates positively. He misuses the concept of edification, exhortation and comfort to set the mind of the audience to pleasure-seeking and self-exaltation and thereby to fleshliness.

The prophet holds a ministry of spiritual interpretation. He is constantly occupied, trying to find ways to express and explain the heart of God among the saints. His never-ending work includes the revealing of what might be found at the core of a revival according to Christ – which is a bringing of order, a bringing of obedience and a re-establishing of truth among the saints. The prophet holds things to the full thought of God. He represents God’s mind as against the prevailing course of things. There is never any place for that which is formulaic in his appearance. He is a living testimony to that which comes from the Living God.

God requires obedience according to patter, even according to Christ.
God orders and structures reality according to law and procedure.
But, he never sends his word according to formula.

Our prayer includes a desire for, a returning to the necessity of proper discernment for the sake of veracity among saints and Christians.

The Pre-eminent Mark of a Life Governed by the Spirit

2008-07-19T12:28:00.001+02:00

By T. Austin-Sparks

The mark of a life governed by the Holy Spirit is that such a life is continually and ever more and more occupied with Christ, that Christ is becoming greater and greater, more wonderful as time goes on.

The effect of the Holy Spirit’s work in us is to bring us to the shore of a mighty ocean which reaches far, far beyond our range, and concerning which we feel: oh, the depths, the fullnesses, of the riches of Christ! If we live as long as ever man lived, we shall still be only on the fringe of this vast fullness that Christ is.

That at once becomes a challenge to us before we go any further. These are not just words. This is not just rhetoric; this is truth. Let us ask our hearts at once: Is this true in our case? Is this the kind of life that we know? Are we coming to despair on this matter?

That is to say, that we are glimpsing so much as signified by Christ that we know we are beaten, that we are out of this, and will never range all this. It is beyond us, far beyond us, and yet we are drawn on and ever on. Is that true in your experience?

That is the mark of a life governed by the Holy Spirit. Christ becomes greater and greater as we go on. If that is true, well, that is the way of life.

T. Austin-Sparks

Men, Our Most Critical Need

2008-07-15T10:14:00.003+02:00

By A.W. Tozer

The most critical need of the Church at this moment is men—the right kind of men, bold men. The talk is that we need revival, that we need a new baptism of the Holy Spirit—and God knows we must have both—but God will not revive mice. He will not fill rabbits with the Holy Spirit.

We languish for men who feel themselves expendable in the warfare of the soul because they have already died to the allurements of this world. Such men will be free from the compulsions that control weaker men. They will not be forced to do things by the squeeze of circumstances. Their only compulsion will come from within—or from above.

This kind of freedom is necessary if we are to have prophets in our pulpits again instead of mascots. These free men will serve God and mankind from motives too high to be understood by the rank and file of religious retainers who today shuttle in and out of the sanctuary. They will make no decisions out of fear, take no course out of a desire to please, accept no service for financial considerations, perform no religious acts out of mere custom, nor allow themselves to be influenced by the love of publicity or the desire for reputation.

Much that the church—even the evangelical church—is doing today, it is doing because it is afraid not to do it. Ministerial associations take up projects for no higher reasons than that they are scared into it. Whatever their ear-to-the-ground, fear-inspired reconnoitering leads them to believe—or fear—the world expects them to do, they will be doing come next Monday morning with all kinds of trumped-up zeal and show of godliness. The pressure of public opinion calls these prophets, not the voice of Jehovah.

The true church has never sounded out public expectations before launching its crusades. Its leaders heard from God and went ahead wholly independent of popular support or the lack of it. They knew their Lord’s will and did it, and their people followed them—sometimes to triumph, but more often to insults and public persecution—and their sufficient reward was the satisfaction of being right in a wrong world.

Another characteristic of the true prophet has been love. The free man who has learned to hear God’s voice and dared to obey it has felt the moral burden that broke the hearts of the Old Testament prophets, crushed the soul of our Lord Jesus Christ, and wrung streams of tears from the eyes of the apostles.

The free man has never been a religious tyrant, nor has he sought to lord it over God’s heritage. It is fear and lack of self-assurance that has led men to try to bring others under their feet. They have had some interest to protect, some position to secure, so they have demanded subjection from their followers as a guarantee of their own safety. But the free man—never. He has nothing to protect, no ambition to pursue and no enemy to fear. For that reason he is completely careless of his standing among men. If they follow him—well and good. If not, he loses nothing that he holds dear. But whether he is accepted or rejected, he will go on loving his people with sincere devotion, and only death can silence his tender intercession for them.

Yes, if evangelical Christianity is to stay alive, it must have men again—the right kind of men. It must repudiate the weaklings who dare not speak out, and it must seek in prayer and much humility the coming again of men of the stuff of which prophets and martyrs are made. God will hear the cries of His people as He heard the cries of Israel in Egypt, and He will send deliverance by sending deliverers. It is His way.

And when the deliverers come—reformers, revivalists, prophets—they will be men of God and men of courage. They will have God on their side because they are careful to stay on God’s side. They will be co-workers with Christ and instruments in the hands of the Holy Spirit. Such men will be baptized with the Spirit indeed and through their labors He will baptize others and send the long-delayed revival.

A prophet’s passion # 02

2008-07-13T11:20:00.003+02:00

By Lars Widerberg

I will stand on my guard post and station myself on the rampart; and I will keep watch to see what he will speak to me, and how I will reply when I am reproved.
Then the Lord answered me and said “Record the vision and inscribe it on tablets that the one who reads it may run.” Habakkuk 2:1-2.

Holiness will allow itself to be apprehended and known as it pleases the One who Himself is holy to be known. Majesty and greatness, missing gems in the attire of the Church, will manifest as common revelation to men of pure heart, even to national bodies when days approaches which the Lord has set aside for his glory to shine forth. Righteousness will be served at tables, rich tables in Zion, to each and every man who carries a hunger and a thirst for such. There is something there to see. The gates of Heaven are open to show forth the splendour and beauty of the Holy One.

There is something there to see and to lay hold of, something which is different from ours, something which arouses passion, something which changes a man’s heart and brings in prophetic quality. There is something there, something costly. It is hidden, at the same time revealed in glory. It cannot be captured or grabbed as spoils, yet it is there within reach for the meek and lowly. It cannot be described, no words will ever be enough, but the prophetic mind cannot but try to tell about the things seen, write a text and re-write it and write again There is something there to see, to reach out for, something of incomprehensible value.

There is something there to see, diligence and integrity are natural results of true seeing. Watchfulness and waiting are components accompanying true hearing. God is eternally present and He is not silent, but He will not give things glorious to a frivolous man. The prophetic mind is set for quality and integrity. The prophetic mind will never set for less than heavenly standards – as in Heaven so on earth. Does it look like Heaven? Does it stir passion as Heaven generates passion and ardour? Does it induce fervour according the crystal clear motives of Heaven? Can one find intensity and integrity of the kind which reflects Heavenly standards?

Passion reveals a prophets heart. The fervour of the prophetic mind reveals the prophet’s heaven. The integrity and intensity of a prophet reveals the prophet’s God. Heaven confronts what is earthly and unholy and it is done through a man apprehended and sent. Man is God’s method, a man apprehended, imbued and sent. This man, the prophetic person, is the herald of the New City. This heavenly person is drastically jealous for the Word of God. Veracity is his passion. Fidelity motivates his thinking and activity. His striving for correspondence, as in Heaven so on earth, is the only possible way for him to live and move. He has seen. He has heard. This kind of hearing, this kind of seeing makes him a man of passion as well as a man of confrontation. He becomes a statement, a declaration of otherness among the many who choose not to see.

The prophetic mind is a mind apprehended and shown things pertaining to Heaven, its absoluteness, its fundamental oneness and integrity, its veracity, its holiness, its glory – and therefore this prophetic mind is burning as an altar contains fire.

The prophetic mind is a mind apprehended for the sake of seeing, a seeing which produces a knowledge of the Holy and a knowing of Him who alone provides Life which is holy.

The prophetic personality has been brought to a state of trembling, a profound respect for the Word of God as the only solid and impeccable testimony among men set up as markers unto glory.

The prophetic man has encountered the fundamentally other which carries no stain of the earthly, the worldly. This drives him away from common settings of man, and produces a heavenly offensiveness for him to carry as a confrontational tool to be used by the Holy Spirit to bring conviction.

The prophetic mind and heart has made a transition from that which can and shall be shaken to a realm in which everything is eternally stable and reliable. This mind can be trusted, it reflects Him who for ever sits on the throne to rule justly and with righteousness in Zion.

The prophetic mind undergoes constant formation to be able to carry the fullness of Christ. The prophetic heart is continually dressed and redressed in the beauty of holiness for the sake of the glory of God.

There is something there to see which is fundamentally other, attractive beyond limits of comprehension, worthy passion and fervour which sets any other aspiration to the side – counting it as loss, capturing man’s heart and mind with a burning desire which cannot be quenched.

There is something there to see. . .
There is something there waiting to be said and stated, expressed and declared. . .
Prophetic passion finds its way to lay hold of such things for the sake of the glory of God.

A prophet’s passion # 01

2008-07-12T14:52:00.005+02:00

By Lars Widerberg

And I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of Heaven.
Rev 21:2

A man of God, the prophet stands as a mouthpiece of the Lord among men because he has been brought by the Lord to a point of seeing. A man of God, the prophet is what he is based on a heavenly purpose and on Heavens acting in his life to bring him to a place of seeing.

A prophet is what he is because the Lord has allowed him to become a seer, called him to seeing and made him able to look into Heaven. The prophet is what and where he is because he has found the ultimate grace to see God and to have been apprehended by the Father.

A seer of the heavenly category is a man who has come out from a confrontation with Heaven, still alive but for ever changed. A seer of this kind has been brought before God to be taken in by and to be given over to a seeing as God sees, abandoning himself to the things of Heaven and to come out from such an encounter as a man made alive, made to live, live what he has been apprehended for. This kind of man is set aside to live what he has seen. He speaks by what he is rather than by the words he is able to engage, and his words are weak representations of the life he is sent to bring to men as he returns from his seeing. But his words holds prophetic substance, a driving force which confronts like he himself has been confronted during his seeing.

The prophet has been made alive to the realities beyond. The seeing of the things beyond is the sole raison d’être of the prophetic man. Prophetic work deepens and intensifies, the prophetic burden becomes the more intense as the heavenly realm and the things beyond are lost to the main lot of men in the haze of contemporary pursuits and enterprises.

The seer has eyed the true city, true city life, and its service. John saw the city, he had been apprehended by its inherent relevance. In it he had found life, abundant life gathered up in service pleasing to the Lord expressed in a kind of worship which held no vain self-interest. He had seen life, abundant living detailed in extravagant service in truth before men marked by willingness to sacrifice.

An abundant life does not show itself in abundant dreaming, but in sacrificial, priestly living among real and tangible objects and to actual and practical purposes.
The seer looses his true seeing at the point where he looses his focus: “As in Heaven, so on earth”. The prophetic realm is to be defined as the realm of relevant and true seeing.

The passion of a prophet springs forth from a seeing of the things beyond.
The passion of a prophet springs forth from a seeing mastered by Heaven.
The passion of a prophet springs forth from a seeing which brings heavenly confrontation.
The passion of a prophet springs forth from a seeing of a service suitable to God and men.
The passion of a prophet springs forth from a seeing which demands radical adherence.

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