One of the things I am passionate about is helping people to grow in their spiritual gifts—especially prophecy. [1]
People regularly share with me that they believe they have a gift of prophecy, but are not sure how to begin developing it.
Sometimes they express fear or embarrassment about stepping out with a prophetic insight, because they lack confidence.
I also come across prophetic people who tell me that they used to flow in the gift of prophecy but feel it has become blocked or closed down in comparison to how it used to be.
These Christians long for the ‘good old days,’ when they felt released in their gifts and saw miraculous things happen as a result.
This is why, over the next little while, I am going to be producing some articles on how to move forward and break through limitations in relation to prophetic gifts and ministry. [2]
Identifying a Limitation is Good News
Identifying a potential barrier to the growth of your gift or ministry is good news—for it is the first step to empowering you to break free and enter into the ‘more’ that God has for you.
In fact, in God’s Kingdom there is always more!
And you can turn that seeming obstacle into a stepping-stone to greater growth and fruitfulness.
Signs that you are Being held back in Your Prophetic gift
Here are eleven signs that there may be a limiting factor holding you back in your prophetic gift or ministry.
If you do not have a gift of prophecy, replace the words ‘prophecy’ or ‘prophetic ministry’ with the name of your gift or ministry.
See if you can identify with any of these:
1. You used to believe you were called to prophetic ministry [3] but now you are not so sure
2. You are wondering why your prophetic gift seems to be hidden and not recognised by other Christians or by leaders in the church
3. It is a long time since you stepped out, took a faith risk, and did something new in the use of your prophetic gift
4. You are drifting and have a lack of direction in your prophetic gift or ministry
5. You feel barren and are wondering where the fruitfulness is that you were promised or initially experienced when you started out
6. You recognise that difficulties in the use of your prophetic gift began with an event that occurred in your past
7. You are not sure what to do to get to the next level of growth in your gift of prophecy
8. You have been hurt or wounded in relation to your prophetic gift and haven’t gotten over it
9. You are not receiving opportunities to use and bless others through your gift that you would like to have
10.You are content with your current level of experience and do not have the motivation to press through for growth in your prophetic gift
11.You do have opportunities to use the gift of prophecy, but it is not flowing as smoothly or as accurately as you would like, or have known in the past.
Over the next little while we will be looking at how to overcome some barriers to growth in your gift. Many of these will apply to other gifts, not just prophecy.
Some of the things I will be considering include:
- Fear
- Not knowing where to start
- The effect of past hurts
- Apathy
- Not being released or given opportunities
Feel free to forward or share these articles with others who may be helped by them.
Notes:
[1] The gift of prophecy is the Spirit-empowered ability to receive and convey a message from God—to make known the Father’s mind, intention and purposes.
[2] If you are interested in developing your gift, the e-book ‘Grow Your Prophetic And Prayer Gifts’ is a tool to help you identify which stage of development you are in and move to the next level.
[3] By prophetic ministry, I do not mean a role or position. Prophetic ministry occurs when you use your prophetic gift to love and help people in a way that brings them closer to God and releases them into His purposes. As Paul says, ‘the one who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening, encouraging and comfort.’ (1 Cor 14:3)
Related Posts:
Why Is My Spiritual Gift Or Ministry Not Being Released?
Break Free Of Hurts That Are Blocking Your Prophetic Gift
4 Barriers to Hearing God’s Voice – and Biblical Insights for Breakthrough
© Helen Calder 2011 Enliven Blog
Enliven Ministries: In the David McCracken Ministries family
Helen Calder is a prophetic minister and writer, and founder of Enliven Ministries. Helen has a unique gift of equipping in prophetic ministry and prayer. She is known for Enliven Blog (est. 2009), an online resource that reaches thousands of people globally.
I can relate to the following: #1, #3, #4, #5, and #7. Sometimes I wonder why we don’t see more of the move of God in our lives, churches and situations. But I know that there are many reasons to that answer and not just one. I think sometimes we are waiting on God when He is waiting on.
Sometimes we are waiting on God when He is waiting on us.
Hi Debra- so true, sometimes God IS waiting for us. :-) I’ve included some more links in the comments above, there might be something there you find helpful, too. Bless you!
I know I’m called to be a prophetess however I was mentored by someone that had an eye of an eagle very sharp in the prophetic however she started getting caught up on the money having money lines to get a word I never understood how she could just rape these poor hungry for a word from The Lord she and her other friends that were prophets always justified this I could go on and on but I pulled myself away from her because I just didn’t feel this was right in the eyes of God
Hi Sonia, like you, the mentoring I received in the early days was a mixture – hold on to the good, and leave the rest. May your heart to give and release and reflect God’s heart to people through prophetic ministry, multiply His word and encouragement to many!
I have had a prophetic gifting and had word’s of knowledge type of thing since I was young. Actually my whole family is somewhat gifted in prophetics of sort. I used to use my gift up until I gave a word about a situation going on in the messianic synagogue I was involved in (which happened to be exactly what was going on), but when a younger leader of it heard me speak, he humiliated me in front of the entire group saying something to the effect of “You think your the only one who hears from God?” to which I replied, that that was not what I was saying and he bashed me so badly it took years to get over it. I recently have started to speak out more and I find that EVERY time I open my mouth, someone bashes me. I could say the grass is green and someone bashes me about it. I find it very frustrating as I feel God just wants me to love on people who do this to me, but I find I take these attacks too personally. I’ve been prophesied over that I would be prophesying to the nations but I’ve yet to see that come to pass. My son has had similar rejections and episodes of bashings as well and he has been prophesied over that he would bring his music to the nations. He has pretty much given up on pursuing his music right now. I personally find these latest bashings to be extremely fierce toward me and often find myself feeling like I shouldn’t even bother to open my mouth. I also have a gift of intercessory prayer and praying in tongues one day caused a raucaus in the church I now attend because someone didn’t understand the gift of tongues and so pastor had to teach on it because they thought I was of the devil. I’ve read several of your articles on the prophetic already and really appreciate any advice and/or prayer. Thank you for your willingness to help!
Bless you, Wendy. The prophetic gifts on our lives take time to develop and we invariably get knocks along the way.
I do find (and encourage others) that it is important to modify our approach to using the gift according to the culture in which we find ourselves. I don’t believe this limits or waters down God’s gift – it actually strengthens it and makes it more receivable to others because it is shared in love and with wisdom. Wisdom means being sensitive to the culture in which we find ourselves, and adapting the way we share in accordance with that.
This article may help: http://enlivenpublishing.com/blog/2013/04/30/growing-in-prophecy-when-no-one-is-cheering-you-on/
The hurtful actions of others are not deserving of holding us back. Seek and receive the healing you need and move forward in Jesus’ grace.
I can relate to number 11. I feel that even though I have been given the opportunity, if I am given an assignment, I am not trusted to fully operate and that my leader still wants to do at least half of the teaching or if God has really moved in an area that there will be less freedom for me to flow the next time. I don’t know if it is even a conscious decision, but it keeps happening. It goes from saying you are released to you are released sometimes