The Gift of Prophecy: 16

How do we know the difference between a true and false prophet? Let’s think in the realm of teaching to begin with. The Bible says there are true and false teachers, so what makes a teacher true or false?

2 Peter 2:3 (BSB) – In their greed, these false teachers will exploit you with tales they have concocted

(NLT) – In their greed they will make up clever lies to get hold of your money

A false teacher can say things that are true, and quote the Bible really well, but there is an issue with their delivery. What makes them false teachers is their heart/motive. If a teacher has greed in his heart, he can be moved to sculpt his teaching around whatever he deems necessary to get the money he desires. Tithes and offerings are biblical principles, so he can try to disguise his motives, but God looks at the heart:

1 Sam. 16:7 – the Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart

Satan does the same. Satan is a false god and an anti-Christ. He quotes scripture to us, making us believe we are listening to God’s voice, yet he twists the context God’s word so that we fall into sin:

Matt. 4:5-7 – Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. 6 “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written: “‘He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’” 7 Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’

Jesus knew the difference between God and Satan’s voices by comparing God’s words to the rest of God’s words. The way the word was being presented did not line up with God’s character as seen in the rest of the Bible. So, how do we know the difference in a true and a false prophet? Let me state yet another way:

Lev. 19:11 – Do not lie. Do not deceive one another.

Do not lie is one of the Ten Commandments, right? Yet, during the Holocaust people deceived Nazi soldiers by hiding Jewish people. They lied to the government to protect God’s people. Was this a sin? Let’s look:

2 Kings 5:15-19 – Then Naaman… said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel… please let me, your servant, be given as much earth as a pair of mules can carry, for your servant will never again make burnt offerings and sacrifices to any other god but the Lord. But may the Lord forgive your servant for this one thing: When my master enters the temple of Rimmon to bow down and he is leaning on my arm and I have to bow there also—when I bow down in the temple of Rimmon, may the Lord forgive your servant for this.” “Go in peace,” Elisha said.

Naaman was a Syrian soldier with leprosy. When God healed him, he gave God his full heart, however it was part of his job to help the Syrian king bow to a false god. Naaman asked God’s forgiveness in advance and God knew the condition of his heart–that he didn’t want to bow to the false god. Naaman’s heart was positioned correctly with God, as were the hearts of those who protected the Jews during the Holocaust.

Sin is a heart issue and so sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between a Pastor who truly wants you to grow closer to God, and a pastor who is trying to take advantage of you somehow. If Satan can disguise himself as an angel of light, how much more can a person:

2 Cor. 11:14 – And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. It is not surprising, then, if his servants masquerade as servants of righteousness.

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What is a false prophet?

2 Peter 2:1 – But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you.

For there to be something false, there has to be something true. Just because there are false teachers, false pastors, or false prophets doesn’t mean we get rid of all teachers, pastors, and prophets. We should be wary against anything false, but should also praise God for giving us true prophets.

A false prophet, just like a false teacher or pastor, is a prophet whose heart motives have turned toward wickedness. Just like the false teacher or pastor, the false prophet can speak the truth and prophesy correctly what God is saying, but they will twist God’s words into something that benefits themselves:

Jer. 28:15-16 – Then the prophet Jeremiah said to Hananiah the prophet, “Listen, Hananiah! The Lord has not sent you, yet you have persuaded this nation to trust in lies… you have preached rebellion against the Lord.

Here we see a true prophet confronting a false prophet. The reason Hananiah was a false prophet was because he preached rebellion against the Lord.

Rev. 2:20 – Nevertheless, I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophet. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols.

This false prophet taught people that sexual immorality was okay. Many false pastors today are teaching that the gifts of the Spirit aren’t for today. Both of these are sin and preaching rebellion against the Lord.

A true prophet, teacher, pastor, etc will be known to be true by the fruit of their work. Their words will line up with God’s character as seen in the rest of the Bible.

Matt. 7:15-17 – Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.

Judging the News

Do not judge by appearances – John 7:24

If you hear… anyone saying… then you shall investigate and search out and inquire thoroughly – Deut. 13:12-15

The Lord said, “The outcry… is so great and their sin so grievous that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know” – Gen. 18:20-21

Judge according to facts, never by appearances. Taking a snippet of anything, out of it’s original context is asking for a major misunderstanding. I’m sure you’ve had someone take your words and twist them into something you didn’t mean, or had someone enter the conversation at the wrong time–just in time to hear something that sounded off as a standalone comment. We are told to investigate, search out, and inquire THOROUGHLY before we draw conclusions. We have to see the whole picture first, and we don’t get that from a video snippet. God set the example, when He went Himself to investigate things instead of relying on the report of humans or angels!

Jesus replied, “Man, who appointed me judge… between you?” – Luke12:14)

Jesus, the only truly righteous Judge, even refused to judge in situations where He was not yet in authority! It is for the justice system to decide matters of justice. You have the authority to go to the hearing and protest at that time if you feel the trial was corrupt.

Judge nothing before the appointed time – Luke 12:14

Goodness knows, we have some corrupt government, but that does not make them all corrupt. If they are proven corrupt, sentence them. If they made a mistake, then FIRE them like you would a doctor who messed up:

Bring it out in the open and deal with it… Hold this man’s conduct up to public scrutiny. Let him defend it if he can! But if he can’t, then out with him! – 1 Cor. 5:3-5

Doctors and cops, have stressful jobs and stressful decisions to make. Mistakes happen. Rarely is a death with corrupt intention. These people don’t take killing someone lightly. A cop can go 20 years without shooting a person, then one day has to pull a gun and weep over the loss of life–being forced to make this decision.

Research the facts, instead of jumping on the bandwagon of hearsay:

• Cops killed nearly twice as many whites as blacks in 2015. ‪#‎DoWhiteLivesMatter‬? Data compiled by The Washington Post shows, 50% of the victims of fatal police shootings were white, while 26% were black. The majority of these victims had a gun or “were armed or otherwise threatening the officer with potentially lethal force.” Although more whites were killed than blacks, The Wall Street Journal, 2009 statistics from the Bureau of Justice Statistics reveal that blacks were charged with 62% of robberies, 57% of murders and 45% of assaults in the 75 biggest counties in the country, despite only comprising roughly 15% of the population in these counties; meaning even though blacks comprise the majority of criminal, whites comprise the majority of deaths. MacDonald also pointed out that blacks “commit 75% of all shootings, 70% of all robberies, and 66% of all violent crime” in New York City, even though they consist of 23% of the city’s population.
• More whites and Hispanics die from police homicides than blacks. According to MacDonald, 12% of white and Hispanic homicide deaths were due to police officers, while only four% of black homicide deaths were the result of police officers. More so, a police officer is 18.5 times more likely to be killed by a black, than a cop killing an unarmed black person. However, according to WSFA, Montgomery Black Lives Matter is asking the police department to let citizens police their own neighborhoods instead of sending in white cops, even though we are now witnessing something called the “Ferguson Effect” in other cities, as murders have spiked by 17% among the 50 biggest cities in the US as a result of cops being more reluctant to police neighborhoods out of fear of being labeled as racists.

Our unrighteous judgment, suspicions about racism, and refusal to let cops do their job is about to cause even higher rates of murder in Montgomery, and other cities in the nation, that already struggle with this crime.

How long will you defend the unjust and show partiality to the wicked?… all the foundations of the earth are shaken – Ps. 82:2,5

The world will be a disaster zone as long as we continue to judge in favor of the wicked. When a criminal has a weapon, or is trying to attain a weapon, the police have the right to take action. America needs to understand the role of police. They will try everything they can to arrest someone without shooting them, but when forced, they shoot to kill. That means unloading a full clip. In the case of criminals who are hopped up on drugs or adrenaline–who don’t feel pain and continue to rush people despite being shot–it is even more justified to shoot these people until they quit moving.

We cannot defend criminals. We can however, wisely and righteously, bring corrupt government officials to justice when all the facts are well researched and presented–proving the matter. We should be rioting that Hillary Clinton was guilty of treason and yet not charged, and is being allowed to run for a higher position, not rioting that a cop shot a criminal who was about to pull a gun, or over the number of times they were shot. Some of the cases over the years could be corrupt, but they are not all corrupt.

Some government officials didn’t want to actively patrol heavy crime areas even decades ago. They allowed drug cartels and gangs to do their thing. Now, many of those criminals are the very ones trying to blind and deceive our nation with racist talk and lead us into orgies of unbridled sin (riots). Our news stations after decades still refuse to tell the whole story. Our citizens are unspiritual, untaught, and unjust in their judgments. It’s a perfect storm of all the things that have gone unchecked through the years.

Yesterday, a black cashier ignored me while helping two black customers behind me. As a white girl dating a white cop, there’s no way to hear about a handful of hate crimes without opening my ears to similar situations. While I do not believe this was an issue of race, but perhaps an issue of crowdedness, I do understand how a race that experienced 250 years of enslavement can easily listen to promptings of suspicion and assumption. If I, a christian who has not experienced much racism, am tempted, how much more will the world and those with much experience be tempted? God however, asks us to base everything on truth, and calls listening to suspicion and assumption a sin. When we act on the suspicion or assumption that something is a racial issue, we only perpetuate racism. It’s only when we take those thoughts captive, and choose to act out of a Holy Spirit that the cycle of racism ends.

Be sure of this: The wicked will not go unpunished, but those who are righteous will go free. – Prov. 11:21

It is a Biblical principle that the righteous not be condemned as the wicked. It’s a principle that runs throughout the Bible from start to finish! We cannot condemn all white cops because a couple mess up.

I admire my white cop boyfriend for his ability to handle high stress situations, and treat people with equality. He makes people that look like his grandparents put their hands on the steering wheel/seat when he pulls them over, just like he does someone he suspects, or knows, has committed a crime. He became a cop because he wanted to help protect everyone, and make his hometown a better place.

Thank you God, that YOU protect the righteous and watch over them, and guide their hand in battle (Ps. 144:1). Continue to see America free from racism and corruption. Help us weed out unrighteous rulers in a manner that is honorable. Raise up more judges, teachers, senators who will not take bribes, who judge with discernment, and want to do their job to the best of their ability out of respect for you. Raise up more people who want to lay down their lives for others, who want to pursue and rid America of criminal activity instead of letting it engulf certain areas, who are able to discern who is dangerous and innocent regardless of color. Provide us with more training for both cops and the general population to avoid mistakes. Help us come up with a system that protects the innocent, condemns the wicked, does not cave to human opinion, and is completely unbiased, in Jesus name.