Cleansing and Igniting the Prophetic: An Urgent Wake-Up Call by Jeremiah Johnson
This book did cause me to question and look at my heart on a number of matters. Alexander Pagani – Endorsements says the following:
“This book is a must read for every person genuinely called to the prophetic, and the first read to be taught to every prophetic school to ensure the pitfalls outlined in these pages aren’t perpetuated in this current prophetic generation.” (Page 1)
Jeremiah is calling the contemporary prophetic movement to make sure that their hearts are pure. He is suggesting that the prophetic movement may have fallen into the trap of trying to please people, to give words like horoscopes, wanting to have successful, powerful ministries and forgetting listen to God’s heart and to call God’s people to repentance.
He made me consider if the Words I’d given were actually solely about encouragement, warm and fuzzy or if they included a call to repentance and instruction. Jeremiah talks about the prophets in the bible having the mandate to call people to repentance, and are we doing this in our contemporary prophetic movement? As I thought through this I came to conclusion for myself, that if you are truly chasing after the heart of God then this really isn’t an issue. In this case if there is to be repentance, encouragement or redirection it is His decision. However, I do agree that each word has to be tried and tested against scripture and if it does not line up it should be discarded. I also realise that we are in a fallen world, where people want words spoken instantly, where we sometimes only want to listen to the good and people may easily fall into wanting to please the listeners/recipients rather than the one giving you the message. Sometimes the Father is silent and when he is, so we should be. When he tells us to speak then it is time to speak. We must constantly be looking to Him regardless if you are a prophet or are operating in a prophetic gifting.
Jeremiah touches on other areas but essentially is calling the prophetic community to keep their eyes on God, operate the way He calls, with a repentant heart, with pure intentions.
It is a good, challenging read, because whoever we are we do need to come before the Father and give an account. We need to continue to direct people into a relationship with Jesus, where there is repentance, growth and a journey with the Father.
“An urgent wakeup call is being released in the contemporary prophetic movement. It’s time to arouse from our slumber. Our greatest days are truly ahead of us! A mighty cleansing and igniting is coming. The prophets and prophetic people must be pure and full of the fire of God. Great hope and vision will mark the days we live in, but so will a spirit of sobriety and deep repentance.” (Page 146/7)