The Purpose of New Testament Prophecy

The following program is recorded content created by the Truth Network. So what is the purpose of prophecy in the New Testament?

How does it apply to us today? It's time for the Line of Fire with your host, biblical scholar and cultural commentator, Dr. Michael Brown. Your voice for moral sanity and spiritual clarity. Call 866-34-TRUTH to get on the Line of Fire.

And now here's your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Welcome friends to the Line of Fire. We are here to infuse you with faith and truth and courage. We're here to dig into the Word together and to equip you to take your stand for the Lord. Welcome again to the broadcast.

Michael Brown, delighted to be with you. Here's the phone number to call if you agree with me or disagree. If you have a question, if you have a comment, 866-34-TRUTH. If it's on topic, we'll get your calls earlier. If it's off topic, we'll try to get to them later in the show.

866-348-7884. I have taught on the subject of prophecy and prophets in the Bible for many years, going back to the early 1980s. And I have written a commentary on Jeremiah.

I'm writing a commentary, it's on the back burner now because from other projects, but writing a commentary on Isaiah. I've had a great interest in prophetic literature over the decades and have often carried a burden, a burning heart to see repentance, a burden to see America revived lest we perish. A burden that many of you also carry that is a prophetic kind of burden. In other words, you read the words of the prophets and you feel that same pain and you pray and you groan and you want to raise your voice and shout to the world.

I know many of you feel that same way. So the subject of prophecy in the Bible has been of interest to me for many years and is something that I carry in my own heart in terms of how I relate to this world. Not only so, but personal prophecy, one of the aspects of New Testament prophecy has been of interest to me, coming to faith in a Pentecostal church and then for some years rejecting those things for today, then becoming convinced scripturally they were for today, then seeing some beautiful, wonderful manifestations of prophecy over the decades and then seeing some abuses over the decades.

These things remain of perennial interest to me. So because a question has been raised to me recently, I meant to address it on yesterday's broadcast and then I never got back to it. Because the question of prophecy is really swirling today and a very specific question has been addressed to me, I thought, let's take some time and not just talk about specifics of prophets today or so-called prophets today or true prophecy or false prophecy today. What about the Trump prophets and what if it's proven that Trump won the election and there was fraud, then would the prophets be proven true and would I have to apologize for calling them to repent for getting it wrong in such a public way? So we'll tackle those issues, but I want to look at a larger issue first and say, okay, according to the New Testament, what was the purpose of the New Testament prophecy? So as I've taught on it from years past, just taking from an outline that I used, oh going back like I said, to the early to mid-80s, here are the purposes of New Testament prophetic ministry. So one is what you'd call prophetic preaching. Prophetic preaching.

That's the first. By that I mean when someone is anointed by God, someone is anointed by God to bring a very specific targeted word from God that cuts to the heart and brings about transformation. You might call it apostolic preaching if you like, but it is not just another sermon or another message.

It is like Acts 2 where Peter preaches under the unction and empowerment of the spirit and when he does, boom, the arrows pierce the heart, there's massive repentance and 3,000 are added to the body that day. Or here's a message just in the midst of, you know, Stephen speaking in Acts 7, right, empowered by the spirit, filled with the spirit, bringing a rebuke to the nation as the prophets did of old and then stoned to death in a moment for his preaching. That to me is prophetic preaching in the same spirit, the same spiritual genre as the prophets of the Old Testament. A second aspect of New Testament prophetic ministry, and these are not all in order of where they occur or priority, just as listed, the second is revelation. So miraculous words of knowledge where information is given, where someone sees something that was not available to the naked eye. You know, Paul talks about when he's writing to the Colossians and seeing the order in which they are conducting themselves, seeing that in the spirit. Or, you know, 1 Corinthians 5, he says that he will be present with them in spirit. That's not prophecy there as much as just the reality of the spiritual realm. So when Jesus tells Nathanael in John 1, I saw you under the fig tree, he saw him in the spirit, he saw him prophetically. So this is part of prophetic ministry in the New Testament, revealing information that wasn't there or known to others.

And there are countless examples of that things I've witnessed with my own eyes, things at times I've been used in, but otherwise stories I've heard firsthand from people where there is this supernatural revelation information. A third is prediction. Prediction. So for example, in Acts the 11th chapter, Agabus predicts a famine that's coming.

In Acts 21, he predicts Paul being arrested in Jerusalem. So prediction. So some hear prophecy and they only think prediction. Well prediction is part, but it's not all.

All right, and then warnings, stop signs, rebukers. So the prophetic word comes to say you're heading in the wrong direction, turn back, turn back. Now that's often just done with the Word of God making application from the Word of God to a situation, but there are times when there's a special unction in it. You know, for example, Peter's warning to Simon the sorcerer in Acts the 8th chapter, that's a prophetic warning. That's a prophetic warning.

That's a prophetic rebuke there. Another, based on 1 Corinthians 14, 3, that prophecy is for edification, exhortation, and consolation. I can think of examples where you have a word for someone, you don't even know the significance of it, next thing the person is weeping and weeping and weeping because that word touched something very deep in them. Or they were in such pain over loss and that word spoke directly to it. Or just a truthful word of God being with his people, a word of encouragement.

So that's another function. Direction, as in Acts 13, 1 through 3, where the Spirit speaks, separate me, Barnabas and Saul, for the work I've called them to. So here's the Holy Spirit speaking, that's a prophetic word, prophetic direction, speaking that. And then laying foundations with apostles, according to 1 Corinthians 12, 28 and following, and Ephesians 2, 19 and following, that prophets can be used by God with apostles to lay church foundations.

Now let me be as explicit as I can. I do not believe that every church needs to be under, quote, an apostle. I do not believe every church needs to be under an apostle or prophet. I do not believe every church needs to be able to identify, that's my apostle, that's my prophet.

If that is an alleged characteristic of NAR, New Apostolic Reformation, that is yet another aspect of so called NAR that I differ with. At the same time, I do believe that there are people with apostolic and prophetic calling that can work together to help lay strong foundations for the local church. Then personal prophecy. Jesus has personal prophecies over Simon, right? He prophesies over him and his name is now going to be Peter, right? So Shimon Kepha, Kaphan Aramaic and Petros in Greek, then he prophesies to him that he's going to be sifted by Satan.

Satan's going to try to destroy him and then, that's right before his crucifixion, then after his resurrection he prophesies about Peter's death. So personal prophecy very greatly used there and then you have again examples like Agabus prophesying personally over Paul. Prophetic presbytery. Paul writes about it in 1 Timothy 4.14. 1 Timothy 4.14, Paul talks about Timothy receiving a gift through the laying on of hands and talks to him about the prophecies that were spoken over him, also in 1 Timothy 1.18. So installing someone into ministry, installing them for office, laying hands on them together and speaking a prophetic word or prophetic words that now become very valuable for Timothy's life where he contends for the faith, he contends for the gospel.

God called him to do this, God spoke this over him, Lord bring that to pass, bring your words to pass. So that's another confirmation that you're called to make a surprising move, you're called to quit your job and move to another state and serve a missions organization there. You believe it's the Lord, you've shared it with your family, they trust you but they're a little uneasy and then you get three texts in the next two hours from people who don't know anything about this and say, hey I just see you being called by God to work with missions and someone else says, I see the Lord calling you to leave your job soon and then someone else says, I see you called to go to a particular state. Oh yeah, these things happen, they're friends of mine.

That happened at different levels in my own life where you're laughing with joy. Praise God, what glorious confirmation. A discerning of times and seasons, discerning of times and seasons in the same spirit of 1 Chronicles 12.32 that the sons of Issachar understood the times and knew what Israel should do. I look at men like Francis Schaeffer, Francis Schaeffer and Charles Colson who are not doing this so much as charismatics but who understood the times and were speaking to them with prophetic accuracy. We seek to understand the times on this broadcast and to be your voice for moral sanity and spiritual clarity one reason, one way by understanding where the world is going and sounding the alarm and helping us navigate our way and again the prophetic spirit is given broadly to God's people to be used in many many different ways. Pronouncing judgments that you know for example Acts 13 Paul speaks to Elemis the sorcerer and speaks of judgment on him for his resisting of the gospel. Conviction of sin, 1 Corinthians 14 24 that if every 24 and 25 if everyone brings a prophetic word someone comes into the meeting the secrets of their heart are laid bare, their sins revealed they fall on their face and worship God and then lastly rocking the boat, stirring things up not not to stir them up but as a result of obedience to God bring your word that shakes things.

All of these are aspects of prophetic ministry in the New Testament and I believe every one of them applies on some level to this day. We'll be right back. It's The Line of Fire with your host Dr. Michael Brown. Get on The Line of Fire by calling 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks for joining us friends on The Line of Fire. Michael Brown here. You know it's a great joy when I go and speak at a congregation and I'm able to meet some folks afterwards sometimes at the book table and they'll come up to me and they'll say I drove four hours my wife and I drove four hours to be here with you this weekend or oh we heard you were coming so we came over we live a half hour away but we we go somewhere else but we just came for this day and I let's go how'd you how'd you notice oh we got your email so I love that when we're able to notify you when I'm coming into an area and this way you get you get an email and it just just goes to the people in that general area that are following us and sometimes you know from distant areas they'll come anyways because it's an opportunity to see each other but to make sure you don't miss that get our emails askdrbrown.org askdrbrown.org just sign up for that and we've got a neat mini book an ebook on how to pray for america we want to send you as well so get those emails all right 866-348-7884 if you have a question for me or a comment something you want to ask me about talk about like you would on a friday that's completely off the topic of new testament prophecy that's great that's fine because I will take some calls a little later but now's the time to call and then we can get your calls in a bit so why do I say that prophecy is still for today because the new testament tells me it is that's that's my primary reason my secondary reason is that I've seen it with my own eyes in undeniable ways but my primary reason the the the vast bulk of weight I put on what scripture says and the fact that it's confirmed by experience is beautiful but that's secondary to what the witness of scripture says right so in acts two when the holy spirit's poured out and 120 are now speaking new languages and the crowd is hearing something and they're drunk others hearing the praises of god in their own uh their own language so peter gets up and he says hey these men are not drunk as as some of you think it's just the third hour in the evening it's just the third hour in the day it's just nine in the morning but this is what Joel spoke so he's now going to quote from Joel 2 28 following if you're reading it in Hebrew it starts in the third chapter but same verses right peter adds in the words not found in in the Hebrew not found in the Greek Septuagint in the last days he adds those words in to say these last days in which we live these last days from now until the the return of the messiah in the last days god says i will pour out my spirit on all flesh and your sons and daughters will prophesy and your young men will dream dreams excuse me your old men will dream dreams your young men will see visions and upon all flesh right servants handmaidens i'm going to pour out my spirit and they'll prophesy so when is that for that's for the last days on whom on everyone who calls on the name of the lord and then peter preaches his whole sermon and then calls for repentance and when the people say what do we do repent be baptized in the name of jesus every one of you for the forgiveness of sins and acts 2 39 you will receive the gift of the holy spirit for the promises to you and your children and all that are far off even as many as the lord our god will call so when he says so here we have the outpouring of the spirit for this period called the last days from the death and resurrection of jesus until his return and it's reaffirmed numerous times in the new testament the holy spirit will be poured out on all flesh those who repent believe will receive the spirit and sons and daughters male servants female servants not just an elite few they will prophesy so that's that's pretty clear now you get to paul's explicit teaching on it in first corinthians 12 and 14 with the the love chapter in the middle of it and everything operates through love the gifts etc operate through love so we get there and he lays out the gifts but then he says earnestly desire the gifts especially prophecy especially prophecy now all of you who are word word loving people word-based people please show me where he ever says until a certain time then stop oh first corinthians 13 he does when jesus returns right we know in part we prophesy in part right so so we we have these things in part when when jesus returns then we'll see him face to face then we'll know god even as we are known until then not until the complete of the can the canonization of scripture the thoughts nowhere in paul's mind first corinthians 13 is he's writing it absolutely not and it was it wasn't even a concept he was thinking of at that point but but not only not only so the fact is we still have disagreements we're still debating these things so obviously we don't know as we are known we don't see face to face obviously so there's faith love knowledge right uh and and we know in part we prophesy in part but when he returns when the perfect comes then it won't be in part anymore and then we won't need prophecy and in the world to come we won't need faith and our knowledge will be complete until then we're to pursue the gifts show me in the bible here i'll show you in the bible where it says pursue the gifts especially prophecy please show me where it says don't pursue them they're not for today it's not there if the word is your guide if the word is the final authority then we should be pursuing earnestly the gift of prophecy to this day to this day to this moment you see that's adding to the bible it wasn't adding to the bible when they prophesied the new testament how many prophetic words were delivered in corinth and elsewhere there could have been thousands hundreds of thousands of prophetic words delivered in the early church i mean we read about the gifts of the spirit these things for centuries after and exorcisms and prophecies and things like that and healings so no one was worried about being added to the bible because it's not adding to the bible if if i come up to you and say the lord spoke to me to tell you that that terrible injury that you got in that car wreck 10 years ago you're total stranger i don't know you but i feel impressed by the lord to do this that terrible injury you got in that car wreck 10 years ago god's about to heal you look to him put your trust in him you're like who are you it's like hey i don't know you but the lord laid that on my heart to tell you did i add to the bible no of course i didn't add to the bible it's not adding to the bible oh and now in addition to that everyone must believe that no we're not adding to the bible it's a word that god speaks to someone it's not the word of god it's not the bible but that's understood that in the early church because there are all these prophecies and they were not being added to the bible they were not becoming part of the bible or part of the new testament of course not they were not the word binding on all people they were a word to be tested and then in first thessalonians 5 Paul says don't quench the spirit don't put out the spirit's fire don't despise prophecies test everything hold to the good he doesn't say now while you have these things temporarily no no this is a guideline this is a guideline so the new testament tells me explicitly that these things are for today until the end of the age right till jesus returns explicitly lays that out and explicitly tells me to earnestly pursue the gifts especially prophecy so who am i to listen to a church tradition or to some other teacher who contradicts the bible with all respect i'm going to stay with the word so even if i never saw this in operation i would believe it's for today and i would question where is it but by god's grace i've seen it in operation many many beautiful and wonderful times and and when i was writing the book playing with holy fire came out a few years ago dealing with a lot of the serious abuses in the charismatic pentecostal movement of which i am a part and calling these abuses out with a chapter on unaccountable prophecy and a chapter on mercenary prophets as i was calling these things out i was also giving examples of the true and the more examples that i was reminded of and many of them i was an eyewitness to or knew the accounts uh first or second hand you know reliable witnesses i was edified by wow these some amazing beautiful things are happening okay question i was asked what if somehow it's demonstrated at this late date that there was actually election fraud and it's actually demonstrated that trump won would i now apologize for calling out those who prophesied trump's victory and when it didn't happen saying you need to apologize and you need to understand how you got it wrong and do some serious soul searching would i have no no of course not because the prophecies were that trump would be in office the prophecies were not that trump would theoretically win an election it would be so why didn't the prophets get the information why didn't god tell them yeah he's going to win numerically but it's going to be stolen and and joe biden will be inaugurated and will be the sitting president we don't care who theoretically was going to win if the thing's going to be stolen right lord are you really sending me that car i believe you promised me a car so i could get to work are you sending me that car yes i am sending you that car by the way when it was a block away from you someone hijacked it and drove off with it but i'm not going to tell you that part and you'll never get it no of course not and there were prophets explicitly saying explicitly saying donald trump will serve eight consecutive years donald trump will be inaugurated in january donald and telling us you watch this state's going to turn this state's going to turn that state's going to turn and none of it happened none of those specific words came to pass so no nothing changed i covered that months and months ago what if there was fraud what if the elections were stolen what if that's what's really happened and and therefore trump did win in the profits right they didn't just say win they said he'd be in office they said biden would never sit i mean look i i i've watched clips that were sent to me in context with people guaranteeing joe biden will never serve a day in the white house donald trump and then when it didn't happen well donald trump is the real president in heaven and it's come on friends you know their approach that that is brought to the name of jesus did you realize the amount of ridicule that that brought to the things of the spirit do you know how many people's faith was was shaken over that so let us not look for another cop-out let's be responsible if we're going to claim to speak on behalf of the lord whether it's teaching the bible or delivering prophecy let's be responsible people these are serious matters we will be right back you can't resist us it's the line of fire with your host dr michael brown get on the line of fire by calling eight six six three four truth here again is dr michael brown thanks so much for joining us today on the line of fire i want to go to some calls shortly eight six six three four eight seven eight eight four so like we do on fridays any question of any kind that you want to talk to me about or if you want to weigh in on something i've said agree or differ by all means give us a call phone lines are open now eight six six three four truth before we do that i want to focus on something very important i have been reading and hearing more and more about the plague of fentanyl related deaths in america i knew it was growing i knew it was becoming epidemic i knew that people were accidentally overdosing on fentanyl hearing some personal anecdotes that were just gut wrenching and and i've i've leaned into it at times by leaning into it i mean i'll study it more about it i'll get more data on it and open my heart lord you want me to say something about it you won't want me to add my voice you want me to write something about it and it was it was last night then i got an email from a colleague who lost his grandson to an accidental fentanyl overdose he thought he was taking a prescription pill for pain and ended up dead his parents finding him i mean who can imagine the pain of it he's just a teenager and what i was not aware of was that may 10th is national fentanyl awareness day so i want to play this clip for you it's from a dad who lost his son he's telling his story but here we had to say and then i wanted to share a little bit with you about this and point you to some sites where you can get involved to make a difference let's listen they say there is no greater pain than a parent losing a child i can verify that as i lost my 18 year old son to a counterfeit prescription pill laced with a fatal amount of fentanyl if you're not aware of the fentanyl epidemic that's taken over 70 000 lives in 2021 and is projected to possibly double in 2022 you're watching this video at the right place and at the right time fentanyl is now the number one killer of people ages 18 to 45 years old what's worse is the drug cartels are disguising it in what appears to be legitimate prescription drugs such as xanax percocet adderall and oxycodone and this emerging crisis is only getting worse as drug dealers are using cryptic messages on social networks like snapchat tiktok and instagram to push these counterfeit pills it's exactly how my son obtained what he thought was a painkiller that was going to help his injured shoulder but sadly it was laced with enough fentanyl to take his life my family experienced the most tragic nightmare to find him in his room deceased at three o'clock on a beautiful sunday afternoon i'm sharing the story because i don't want you to experience such a tragic nightmare like my family did so here's the bottom line 45 of kids will experiment with the drug by the time they reach 12th grade the drug enforcement agency has confirmed that four out of ten seized pills in 2021 contained enough fentanyl to kill if they don't die of the poison in these pills it will leave them brain damaged or on life support experimentation with counterfeit prescription pills is like playing russian roulette with five bullets and a six-shot revolver i didn't know anything about counterfeit pills laced with fentanyl and how easy they were to get and what a national crisis it is had i known i would have those talks to save my son chase in his beautiful life but i never got that chance today is national fentanyl awareness day please i'm urging you to talk to your kids about the dangers of fake prescription pills laced with fentanyl and please make every day to be an awareness day thank you all right one pill killed dot org one pill killed dot org stop there today get information see what you can do to make a difference just being aware being aware and alert look you may be really strung out and thinking well i i need pain pills and i can't get them from my doctor i can get them in black market it's a bad move to make number one but it could be a deadly move to make today so in other words this is not you you go to your pharmacy and you get a drug from the pharmacy and it's somehow laced with fentanyl it's drugs that you're not going to get at the pharmacy or friends say oh i got some extra painkillers i got yeah i can't tell you where i got them but yeah yeah take one that may be the last thing that they do so one pill killed dot org just a few stats just a few stats so people dying of automobile accidents between 18 and 45 people dying of suicide people die of covid nope by far by far deaths by fentanyl overdose outpace them any one of those by far here's a here's a note in 2019 politifact west virginia gave a mostly true rating to the statement that quote just two weeks ago customs and border protection seized an effect note to kill every person in west virginia 32 times over remember what's behind this is greed greed greed greed literally killing people also as i was reading up about this as a former drug user myself you know my story i was i was shooting heroin at the age of 15 getting high at 14 lsd at 14 shooting speed heroin 15 cocaine at 16 and getting radically dramatically wonderfully saved and i experimented i was crazy just having fun as a kid see how much drugs i i could do i would literally do as much as i could have an hallucinogenic drug to see how far i could go without like flipping out losing my mind just having fun challenging pushing to the edge as a foolish teenager if i played around with one of these drugs i'd be dead in the spot why listen to this fentanyl is a powerful synthetic opioid that is similar to morphine but it's 50 to 100 times more potent 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine so go to one pill killed.org and find out what you can do these are not statistics these are people we're talking about when i heard from a grandfather last night saying dr brown you have a loud clear voice on cultural social issues would you speak to this i suggest it's definitely time i'll do it you can also read an article about this with links and links to the video that we just played at askdrbrown.org the idol the article is entitled fentanyl is killing our young people and if you have a fentanyl related story a tragedy and you want to warn us to sound the alarm by all means give us a call 866-348-7884 all right we're going to switch gears now but please take these things to heart please take these things to heart we're going to switch gears and go to the phones on a whole assortment of different topics and we're going to start with trevor in corona california welcome to the line of fire hey dr brown so i have a question about uh linguistic precedent and how many uh counterexamples to a linguistic precedent you need to overturn that linguistic precedent if you have like five or six examples or eight examples of a linguistic precedent in hebrew but then you have two counterexamples is that enough to say oh there's not really any linguistic precedent here at all or can you still stand on the the five to eight examples as a good linguistic precedent it's going to be like anything else in other words forget hebrew forget linguistic precedent the principle is what establishes a rule and at what point is something an exception to the rule and at what point does something challenge the rule right you know at what point can you say okay this is this is a rule and when something comes outside of that rule then it is clearly anomalous it's it's the exception that proves the rule as opposed to saying this questions whether it's really a rule or not so for example when i was studying the the rafa in the in in the hebrew language and then did it occur in other semitic languages i found that in syriac there is one attestation of it in one of the writings of the church fathers so in the lexicons it was listed as in syriac it means heal but there's only one reference now we know that in aramaic a different word became the primary root for for healing the root asah and asha would be a physician so we know that and then that works its way through various forms of aramaic syriac etc so when i looked at this and i found that in all of the vast amount of ancient syriac literature which was known and documented this only occurred once then you called it a nonce word in other words it's it's it's like a highly educated play on words that someone would get with linguistic knowledge but not evidence of what actually went on in that language because you've got a mountain over here saying it didn't exist and only one example right now with ancient hebrew it's a little different because the corpus is not as big right we we don't have as many words that are used we don't have as much documentation so it's a little harder to say so if i've got five or six examples where there seems to be a precedent and two or three questioning it no i don't i don't have a precedent yet in my mind unless we have outside confirmation that it seems to be more like this but it could also be like this if i have 50 or 60 examples of something consistently or 20 or 30 and just one that's different i would say that that one is anomalous that one is just the exception to the rule and it's it's it's a matter of seeing how fixed the thing comes that's the other thing does it become more fixed after the hebrew of the bible can we see that it does become a precedent well in this case we saw how it was developing when it became the norm and then got fixed so those are the ways that you evaluate it if if that makes sense to you yes sir so the last thing you the last thing you mentioned was after the hebrew of the bible if it becomes more of a precedent that is clear in the case i'm talking about or i think it's clear but is that how strong is that way into what the hebrew of the bible might have meant right so what we have to do is look at it diachronically we have to look back at it historically we have to see okay to the best of our knowledge how did this develop and and then we could say ah so if we seem to have more exceptions when you go back further that means it was probably developing at that time and becoming more and more fixed and then later it became the absolute norm like spelling changes they'll happen in english gradually then become fixed hey stay there i've got a quick question for you on the other side of the break then we've got some prophecy questions we'll come to stay right here it's the line of fire with your host dr michael brown get on the line of fire by calling eight six six three four truth here again is dr michael brown thanks for joining us on the line of fire eight six six three four truth all right before i go to the other calls trevor uh if you can concisely explain what was the the precedent that you were looking at yes sir so the word is uh the word zara in genesis three six no 315 and uh jack collins argues that every time the word zara is used with a plural pronoun it refers to posterity that is multiple descendants and every time it's referred to as a singular pronoun it refers to just one future descendant in genesis 315 it's referring to a it has a singular pronoun so people say this singular pronoun indicates it's referring to one future descendant that is jesus christ and that's why they call it genesis 315 the proto-evangelion but john walton says that there are counterexamples namely genesis 22 17 and 22 60 where zara is clearly referring to multiple future descendants but it's used alongside a singular pronoun that says that makes it sorry go ahead yeah so i i agree with john walton on on that because zara itself is commonly used as a collective noun so to to say a single offspring it could be meant by that but zara itself so if you say zaro his seed or zara your seed it's referring to posterity normally taken as plural just that the word itself is a collective now it could be used in a singular way uh but unless it was you didn't really have to hyper specify that so i i agree with john walton on that and i have studied that in depth myself just the larger question of the usage of of zara but thank you thank you for that i appreciate it so i'm with john walton on that one all right let's go to joshua in st cloud florida welcome to the line of fire hi uh thank you so much for taking my call sure thing um yeah i uh i i just realized he's translated my name um yeah um that's uh that's a that's a good thing since you know hebrew well it's just it's on the screen is as j-o-s-u-e if it was h-u-a i would have said joshua but i didn't know anyway either way welcome sorry anyways never mind that um i have two questions if i can ask and um they're kind of connected to one another um and uh i just want you to know that um i was raised in the pentecostal churches classic pentecostals i'm going to tell you you were raised for 27 years and you're now lutheran how do i know that not by revelation but the fact that i'm going to answer your questions on friday your twitter questions so i i we just recorded that right before the broadcast and the spelling of the name yeah so i i happen to remember it but i i actually answer your question uh in terms of this is saying these should be normative today is at an undue burden so how how about that you just tune in on friday because i know that that i'll answer your question if if you have a follow-up question feel free to follow we won't count that you called today against you you can call right in and with a follow-up question is that fair yeah certainly all right let's let's do that then only because i answered and and tried to get into some depth when i answered uh so if uh if there's a follow-up question if my answer leads to another one then normally we don't have we don't let folks call within a few weeks of of it we'll we'll put you to the front of the line all right hey thanks man i look forward to talking but i know i i just we recorded this right before right before the broadcast so the moment i saw the name and heard your question yeah all right thank you sir we we will interact further god bless you all right let us go to greg in raleigh north carolina welcome to the line of fire hello dr brown the question i have is is regarding prophecy um how are you able to uh to check or you know test the validity of a prophecy uh without having to wait till it actually has ended up fruition or it came to an end the prophecy and you know what i'm saying yep let's say someone has a word for you that xyz is going to happen in your future how do you test it well one thing is was there anything about it that itself was unscriptural was there anything in the prophecy that was contrary to the bible or spoke about god in false ways if that's the case you throw it out another question would be did it give you inaccurate information about the present uh did did the prophecy say you know i i the lord says i saw you tuesday morning weeping in your car as you were praying and it's like actually i wasn't in my car tuesday and i wasn't weeping you know so are there factual inaccuracies if so then then you reject it as false another would be does this person have a bad track record are they known to be unsound spiritually are they known to be in doctrinal error or or morally unreliable or they have a history of false prophecy those would be giant red flags that would make me question things the other would be if you are solid and mature in the lord you've got a good a good walk with the lord and a good history of discernment if something's spoken and it bears witness with your spirit that the holy spirit comes on you is that word is spoken or you have a deep affirmation witness in your spirit that would that would be of interest or if it confirms something that the lord has previously spoken to you then that would get my attention as well that being said i would never ever make a decision for my future based on a prophetic word that god did not make real to my own heart in other words if someone says the lord showed me that you're going to be moving to the west coast and i see you in california in the days ahead and then three months later out of the blue i get an invitation to join a ministry team in california that prophetic word will will be in my mind but unless i know in my heart that the holy spirit is calling me to move to california i'm not going to do it based on that prophetic word so in that case there are words that you put on the shelf because you don't know either way there is accuracy to it there's things about the future that are not clear you put it on the shelf and if it's really the lord it'll come back the lord will bear witness with your own heart or multiple people will speak those same words and that will bring further confirmation so again there are ways to immediately eliminate it another thing is if there are other prophetic people and they say we all hear the lord saying the same thing then that carries more weight but still you have to know in your own heart that it's right and true and accurate because we each have a relationship with god by his spirit today hey thank you for the question it's certainly important for those of us who believe in these things for today let me say it again never make a decision based simply on a prophetic word that someone spoke unless you know in your own heart that it is true and right that's how you make your decisions before god the wisdom of the word the wisdom of counsel and the leading of the holy spirit you know we've we've been talking about this concept of paying forward paying ahead i was speaking at a church scheduled to be with them again in vero beach fine congregation there and they they have a portion of the mall that they use for their meetings then they've got a fitness center next to it and then a cafe and so if you go in there there's a menu but there's no prices on the menu no prices on the menu so you go in there and how much is this well the last people they paid forward for you so order whatever you want to order go ahead this way people that don't have much money they can be blessed but you now are given the option to pay forward to the next so whatever you want to pay for your meal you're really paying for the next people that come in and some are able to pay for multiple meals and others like but i don't have anything hey enjoy someone's paid ahead for you so we're asking you to do that for the next listeners that we're going to reach on the radio for the next listeners that we're going to reach in our various ways of getting this message out if you've been blessed and we've poured into you would you pay forward for the next to say well how do i do that join our support team a dollar a day a dollar a day makes a massive difference because we have a growing army of supporters called torch bearers and together we get this message out we don't we don't have some rich person underwriting us we don't have some contracts that bring in all kinds of money we pay for the air time to reach people so you're paying forward to the next generation of listeners so to join our support team go to askdrbrown.org askdrbrown.org click on support and then monthly but before you do it i want you to see all the ways that we pour back into you because that remains our goal we want to bless you pour into you edify you strengthen you so look at all the things that get poured back into you as you join our support team askdrbrown.org click on donate thank you for becoming a torch bearer and i love love love when i'm on the road and i run into someone or even at the airport someone else to say i'm a torch bearer it just it it brightens my day because they've got a big smile and i'm thinking oh they're amazing things that are happening we just got some incredible testimonies and you know someone's and you help make that happen you're part of that so thanks for joining our team and samuel in atlanta i can't bring you on the air for shortness of time but when does life actually begin i believe the case that says life begins at conception is the right case that we can make a biblical argument for it the bible certainly speaks of the humanity of the people within the womb they are looked at as if they are individuals as if they are people and not just a clump of cells but having said that i do believe scientifically we can argue that life begins at conception and right from the start something happens when when when you bring together the the union of the sperm and the egg something unique is formed right at that moment by god and that's why we say life is sacred beginning with conception we get some really interesting and controversial topics we're going to tackle tomorrow god willing right here on the line of fire is another program powered by the truth network