06/07/2019
I like to say, "Prophet is as Prophet does."
I also like to say, "Prophet lives as Prophet is."
What kind of Prophet prophesies but doesn't live like a Prophet? "Prophet" is a lifestyle that represents Prophet Jesus in His Prophetic Function.
Prophets are leaders, not mouthpieces. They are a voice, but they live "the life" so the voice has layers of spiritual sound.
For John to say, "A voice crying out in the desert" was much more than the location of his ministry. It was an indicator of his lifestyle, an invitation to enter into that environment to experience more than the sound of his voice and the message of his ministry.
No ministry is strictly "prophetic" without accompanying Kingdom leadership dynamics. It is not a ministry if that is all it is. It is a ministry school from which to release leaders into Kingdom culture.
To experience prophetic ministry in a way that releases all the layers of the Prophet's lifestyle, you need to go out to the wilderness to hear the voice crying out.
John didn't enter into the Temple to confront the Temple mafia because he was not the One to do that. Jesus did it twice. John called people out to prepare them to enter into the most significant kingdom reset of history.
Father sent the King Himself to reset the kingdom of God. John prepared the Lord a people ready to respond to that reset; but to get into the ministry of John, you needed to enter into his lifestyle.
There is always a bit of "other than" in the preparation ministry that is integral to the new whole.
The kingdom reset Jesus established reset the prophets. John reached the apex of prophets, but he was least of those coming in the kingdom. The context of the prophetic was so fundamentally altered and improved by Jesus that the prophetic lifestyle, in kingdom culture, would be a vast improvement, not a replacement, upon the previous function.
Prophets live a prophetic lifestyle that is "other than" within the kingdom culture. This is not a superior "elitism" or a fundamental separation from the kingdom itself. It is an integration of the Prophet at the foundational levels of the leadership function.
Having a restoration of the Prophet's office or function or leadership without kingdom culture leaves us with prophets as hangers-on or oddities instead of integrated aspects of the restored kingdom culture.
The people of God rejected prophets, stoned them, killed them, dishonored them before Jesus reset the kingdom culture because they could be integrated into the traditions of man that replaced the authentic expectations of God. However, when Jesus reset the kingdom and kingdom culture, the Prophet as leader function was integrated into the foundations.
Now, all may prophesy, but all do not live the Prophet's lifestyle. This distinction is evident to the mature. The Prophet voices a message with layers. A gift of prophecy operation lacks these layers.
Instead of going out to the desert to hear the voice, the cultural aspects of the prophetic are integrated into the foundations of kingdom culture. All kingdom leaders lead prophetically, whether they are prophets or not. Prophetic living is the reality of the spirit. However, prophets live a prophetic lifestyle with layers of revelation available to the whole kingdom culture.
When someone says, "I am a Prophet," look for the prophetic lifestyle. It won't look like a circus show, a magic mirror, or an odd "other-worldly in the glorious reality" fantasy land aspiration. The authentic Prophet is part of the culture.
The authentic Prophet has no "I went to heaven and saw Jesus, so what I say is a superior revelation" in his resume. If that were true, you would need to visit heaven with him to enter that environment and receive at the level of his experience.
As John called them out to his lifestyle, you would need to enter into the lifestyle of the "I go to heaven on a spiritual escalator" to receive the message.
You do not.
The authentic Prophet has a lifestyle that speaks for itself. His life is a message. His life is a revelation. His lifestyle says, "I am for real."
Recall Paul's "other than" experience was so strong he couldn't share its message: "I heard stuff I can't share because I have no voice to speak it: I heard stuff in paradise that you cannot hear unless you go there with me."
Then, Paul says, "I'll show you what that means in real life by sharing my story of a thorn in the flesh. I'll show you the lifestyle of someone who enters into paradise. Graced with abundant grace to endure. Weakened to the point that no strength but God's is available."
In other words, about 87% of the stuff we attempt in our exaggerations of prophetic reality is bogus, lacks authenticity, and creates the wrong impression of "how things really work in the spirit."
