What’s Your Prophetic Expression?

If you listen to my teachings on prophetic ministry for long enough—and maybe even just for a few minutes—you’ll hear me say this: “You can’t put a prophet in a box.”

What do I mean by that? Well, no two prophets are alike. I talk about this at length in my new book, The Making of a Prophet, as it relates to the office of the prophet. But you could take this saying—“You can’t put a prophet in a box”—and apply it with equal truth to prophetic people. In other words, you could rightly say this: “You can’t put prophetic people in a box.”

Think about it for a minute. God created us all as unique individuals—masterpieces. (See Ephesians 2:10.) No two of us are alike, so wouldn’t it make sense that there would be different prophetic expressions?

Prophetic Bible Writers

Consider the Bible itself. It has a number of authors, all chronicling the oracles of God. But if you know the Bible well, you can easily distinguish the Holy Spirit-inspired writings of John from the Holy Spirit-inspired writings of Paul from the Holy Spirit-inspired writings of Isaiah.

Although the Holy Spirit inspired them all to write the words they recorded, there is some uniqueness in their expression because it flowed through their individual beings. In other words, God didn’t turn John, Paul, Isaiah and others into expressionless robots to record His words. You’ll find their personalities expressed in their writings. Their personal stories are woven through the pages of the Old and New Testament. And the language they use is unique to their level of education and understanding of God’s past words.

The Bible writers have unique prophetic expressions. Prophetic psalmists are another good example. God is speaking to the heart of these minstrels, but how they express what God is speaking to them varies—and thank God it does. Would you like to hear the same song forever, or don’t you enjoy a little variety? Prophetic preachers have unique expressions based on their own personalities and life experience. The same holds true for prophetic teachers, prophetic artists and prophetic people of all sorts.

Yielding to His Spirit

So, what’s your prophetic expression? Our soul, our flesh and the devil too often tempt us to mirror someone else’s prophetic persona. That’s a mistake because it robs the world of the unique gift God wants to share. There’s nothing wrong with having role models, but we need to yield to the Holy Spirit and allow Him to express His prophetic ministry through us and with us. (See Galatians 5:25.)

God has created us all in His image, but I believe we manifest different expressions of His image. (See Genesis 1:27.) God is like a diamond with many beautiful facets. If you notice, some people have a grace gift; others have a mercy gift. Some people are bold; others are gentle. Some are all of these things wrapped into one. The Holy Spirit has distributed different gifts to us all in different measures, including the prophetic. (See 1 Corinthians 12:11.)

God has given you a unique prophetic expression. You don’t have to be a prophet to flow in that prophetic expression. Again, you just have to yield to His Spirit and allow Him to move through you how He wills. If you are going to morph yourself into another’s image, morph yourself into the image of Christ by gazing on His beauty. What a prophetic expression you would manifest then! (See Psalm 27:4.) Amen.

You can download a sample chapter of Jennifer’s new book, The Making of a Prophet, by clicking here.

Jennifer LeClaire is news editor at Charisma. She is also the author of several books, including The Spiritual Warrior’s Guide to Defeating Jezebel and The Making of a Prophet. You can email Jennifer at [email protected] or visit her website at www.jenniferleclaire.org.