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New Testament Prophets
While being prophetic is about being free in the Holy Spirit, the early church also saw that they needed to follow some parameters in their prophetic ministry.
Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others pass judgment. But if a revelation is made to another who is seated, the first one must keep silent. For you can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and all may be exhorted; and the spirits of prophets are subject to prophets; for God is not a God of confusion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints.
God does have parameters for us to follow as He restores the ministry of New Testament prophets in these days. Hopefully, this booklet will be helpful as we look at this strategic subject.
Here is a question. Do you track what the Holy Spirit says when you gather together with your local church? Obviously, He is not looking for our applause but for our obedience. Therefore, it is important to track, to follow what the Holy Spirit is saying and then take notes. For example, aren’t you glad that Doctor Luke tracked what the Holy Spirit was saying when he travelled with the apostles? His notes and observations ultimately became the book of Acts. Clearly, Luke was a faithful scribe.
One of the functions of leadership is to teach and train people to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit. In Romans 8:14 it says, “for all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” When we hear Him and obey, it is so freeing. But it is all going somewhere. When you read the end of the Bible, you see Christ’s Body coming together, His Bride making herself ready. On the other hand, when we look at her in our own day, we sometimes wonder, “Lord, I don’t know how You’re going to get us to the full stature that we see in scripture.” Then the Lord reminds us of Ezekiel when he saw the valley of dry bones. The Lord asked him, “Son of man, can these bones live?” And Ezekiel answered, “O Lord God, You know.” Then, the Lord had him prophesy into what was happening, to prophesy to the wind/the breath of the Lord.
So, in my own life, I am constantly prophesying myself into God’s strategy. “Lord, you know that the Body will come together. Hallelujah. You’ll remove what needs to be removed and you’ll pour out the grace we need so that Your Church can become one.” Scripture says that the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy (Revelation 19:10). When God sends someone to testify about what He has done in them, that is their testimony. But to those listening, it is prophetic. God is showing them what they too can have. And so, the testimony of Jesus, the spirit of the prophetic, releases faith – faith to know Him. Here is why we gather together – to know God, to discover Him.
Just for some context, I would like to share some of the history and development of a number of relationships that have been strategic in my life and that have carried prophetic significance for me.
Back in the 1970s, God established a number of spiritual epicenters. An epicenter was a place where He sovereignly poured out His Spirit and then from there impacted a region. We saw Him do this in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Mississippi, and California. In Kingston, New York the Fountain of Life church became an epicenter. The same was true in the wonderful work He was doing among us in Laconia, New Hampshire.
In the beginning of that particular move of the Spirit, He used a prophetic man named George Henry. I have talked about him many times over the years. He received a prophetic word in the early 1960s that he was to go to northern New England and pray for a move of the Holy Spirit. When the Lord gives clear prophetic direction, we have two choices. We can either reject it or obey it. George Henry chose to obey the Lord.
And so, though he was old, George quit his job, picked up his family and moved to northern New England and began to pray. For three years he went from church to church, scouting the land. But in place after place, He knew that he hadn’t found what he was looking for. He knew there was more. So, He continued to pray. Prayer and endurance are so important for us if we want to participate in what God intends to birth. Sometimes, we quit so easily. Yet after three years of praying, George finally in his frustration decided one Sunday to stay home. Turning on his radio, he heard a Baptist minister preaching. God said, “Start listening to him. Pray for him. He is one of the men I am going to use in the move of the Holy Spirit.” George, being a good ol’ Pentecostal, said, “Lord, he’s a Baptist!” But the Lord said, “You pray for him. I’m going to do something.”
After that, every Sunday, George got up and turned on the radio and listened to this evangelical Baptist minister named David Gbur for about six months. Then one Sunday after turning on the radio, the brother he had been listening to wasn’t there. Some other man was preaching. George thought, “What’s going on?!” God said, “Keep praying!!” About six months later, George was invited to a meeting. He came in, sat down, and heard one man talking to another. And as he heard the men speak, he recognized one of their voices as the man he had been hearing on the radio. So, he asked, “Are you David Gbur?” And sure enough, he was. So, George knew he was right where he was supposed to be.
What had happened was that there had been much discussion about the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So, the local pastors had invited David Wilkerson to come and preach on that subject. Guess what happened. The Holy Spirit fell! With that came a storm and turmoil because the men involved had come from such a diversity of Christian backgrounds. In that room was David Gbur, an evangelical Baptist minister and with him Don Littlefield and a few other men who had all come out of their local church (they had gotten the “right foot of fellowship” out of their assembly). There was also Bob Mears who was an American Baptist who had gotten filled with the Holy Spirit. And with him was Al Graustein who eventually ran our Christian school. Also, there was Percy Abbott who was an Advent Christian minister. And then there was Keith Bryar who owned Bryar Motor Sport Park which is now New England Speedway.
And so, these men continued to gather together and to seek the Lord about what was to happen next. They began to ask themselves, “If we were wrong about the baptism in the Holy Spirit belonging only in a past dispensation of time, what else have we been wrong about?” So, they decided to not do anything until they heard from God. And like good Baptists/Evangelicals, they went to the Word of God. If it wasn’t in the Word, then they weren’t going to go along with it. Out of their search came an absolutely incredible move of the Holy Spirit. Some years later, in 1979, Dave Gbur took a church planting team to Savannah, Georgia; I took one to Concord, New Hampshire. Then in 1981, John Harwood, a Pentecostal brother who was planting the church with me invited me to go with him to a conference in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.
Overseeing that conference were three Latter Rain men (they had participated in the Latter Rain revival that began in Saskatchewan, Canada in 1948) – Joe Crandall, B.J. Pruitt, and Philip Saunders. All the other men who were there were pastors of different churches. I’ll never forget one of those meetings. They started it by saying, “Okay, tonight is a Nugget of Truth night.” I thought, “A Nugget of Truth. What’s that?” It meant that each of the pastors would get up and give a synopsis of their latest sermon or revelation from the Lord. As the sharing went on, I was thinking, “Man, what will I share?!” Then one of the brethren, Jose Dross gave his Nugget of Truth. And when he did that, the Holy Spirit gave me a prophetic word for him. I was saying to myself, “No. No. No! I don’t know anybody here!” And since Jose had to leave because of other appointments, he put on his overcoat and began moving toward the door. Then as he was being stopped by various brethren for fellowship, I was debating with the Lord, “Please, please, O Lord. . .”
Finally, it was my turn to share a Nugget. So, I said, “I could give a Nugget of Truth but I’ve got a prophetic word for that Hispanic brother over there. What should I do with it?” The leadership was quite clear. “Go give it to him, brother. What’s the matter with you?”
So, I did and God began to move by His Spirit! People from all over the room were prophesying over one another. And it went on for the rest of the night. It was awesome! When the meeting ended and we were going to get meals or snacks, these three old Latter Rain brethren came up to me. “Brother Carey, we want to have breakfast with you tomorrow. We’ll pick you up at 6:30 am.” “Uh oh,” I thought. “Why didn’t I give just one word? Why didn’t I keep my mouth shut?” John Harwood saw me going through this and came up to me and said, “Well remember what you always teach in the churches. ‘If you want to ACT, stay Accountable, Correctable, and Teachable.’ So, just listen to what the brothers have to say. It might be time to take some of your own medicine.” All right. All right.
When John and I got back to our motel, he went into his room and I went into mine. After about fifteen minutes of seeking the Lord, I sensed the Holy Spirit drawing me to a particular scripture verse. Immediately, I opened the door to go and tell John. But he was already at my door about to knock! God had given us both a word at the same time. And they were both in Ecclesiastes. Both were in chapter seven. In fact, they were the exact same verse!
It is good that you grasp one thing and also not let go of the other; for the one who fears God comes forth with both of them.
We didn’t have a clue what it meant but we knew it was supernatural, that God was speaking to us. We went to bed and then the next morning those three men picked me up. We went to a restaurant and as we sat there, they said, “Brother Carey, you have the marks of an old Latter Rain man in your life.” “Really?” “Yeah, do you know George Henry?” “What?! Yeah, how do you know him?” So, I told them the story of how God had used him in New England. Well, they got up and started dancing around. What in the world was going on?! Then they said, “Well, brother, Joe Crandall here was the one who prophesied over George in 1964 that he was to go to New England. And by the way, the Lord also told us that you are to preach the word tonight.” “Me? I don’t even know you people. Are you kidding?” “No, that’s what God told us. He told us that He gave you a word.” Then I remembered Ecclesiastes 7:18 and how the Lord had given that verse to me. When I told them, they replied, “Well, there you go then.”
All day long, I tried to find something fresh from the Lord from the verse in Ecclesiastes. I looked in my concordance, at various other passages in my Bible. I got nothing – except to fill the trash can in my room with crumpled paper. Finally, in my frustration I went to the evening meal. I was sitting there and John came up. “What are you going to share?” “I’m not sharing anything. I’m going to tell them I don’t have anything.” Sure enough, the leaders got up and told the story of George Henry. And then they said, “We have a brother here who told us this amazing story. Brother Carey, come on down to the front!” But when I told them that I didn’t have anything to share, one of the leaders said, “Oh just get down here. God will give it to you on the way.”
So, I did. And by the time I got to the front I knew exactly what I was going to say. At that time, because God was pouring out His Spirit in the various places where we ministered, we had begun using phrases like, “We’re on the cutting edge of what God is doing now.” After all, we were working with quite a few elders, we were planting a number of churches. “We must certainly be on the front lines of God’s work on earth.” But then as I was walking to the front of the meeting that night, the Holy Spirit convicted me. And I immediately knew that I had to confess to the men of that gathering what God was saying to me. “What I’ve seen here tonight for the first time is that there have been other men who have gone before us. And we have simply entered into their labors. Therefore, on behalf of the brethren that I labor with, I want to repent to you, for our pride and our arrogance.”
While I was talking, unbeknownst to me, one of the men had gone out and come back with a towel and basin. After sharing that scripture, “It is good that you grasp one thing and also not let go of the other; for the one who fears God comes forth with both of them,” I said, “I don’t know how God’s going to do this but somehow there is something old and something new that He is going to do in our midst and we need to be open to it.” Then they came up and began washing my feet. And I just sat there crying like a baby. It was an amazing move of the Holy Spirit. Since those days, I have tried to honor those who have gone before us as well as try to move with what God is emphasizing in the present.
Some years later, I was helping a group start a church on Long Island and one day as I opened my wallet, a slip of paper fell out with Jose’s name and phone number on it. Since I didn’t remember his last name, I asked one of the brothers if the number was local. He said that it was. So, I dialed it and Jose answered. “Jose, I am on Long Island. Where are you?” It turned out that he was in Sayville, the next town over from Bellport where I was. How amazing is that?
The truth is that God was making connections among brethren from all kinds of different backgrounds – Pentecostal, Latter Rain, Charismatic, various denominations, and us – whatever we were. As for us, we were just trying to represent the Kingdom of God the best we knew how. But there were those who just didn’t quite know what to do with us. Some would ask us what Bible college or seminary we had attended. My usual response was, “I went to J.C.U., Jesus Christ University. I majored in the Holy Spirit.” So, they’d ask, “Well where is your home office, your headquarters?” “Well, I guess you could say it’s in heaven!” “Really? Do you guys follow a curriculum?” “Well yeah, the Bible.” To be honest, we didn’t feel like we needed to apologize for our lack of formal education, but at the same time I think there were some who thought that maybe we were being prideful, that we thought of ourselves as better/more spiritual than them. And again, as I discovered in the Williamsport conference, there was indeed an element of pride in our hearts. But since the days of that conference, we really have tried to honor those who went before us, to see ourselves as connected to the works of God in past generations. At the same time, we want to learn from the mistakes of history and not reproduce some of the same weaknesses we see in the larger Church.
So, as best we knew how, we studied God’s Word and tried to build in His house according to what was written. Later in 1981, Don Rumble and I were invited to speak at a conference in Springfield, Massachusetts. We hadn’t met before and I don’t remember who spoke first but we both proclaimed the centrality of Jesus. Later, we were up almost the whole night fellowshipping around that theme. It was clear that God was connecting us relationally. The church that Don was from had been founded through an emphasis on teaching from the word of God. On the other hand, our experience had been more rooted in prophetic ministry. And so, as we discovered each other, God began to strategically connect the prophetic and the didactic. Clearly, prophets and teachers must see their need for each other and learn to walk together as peers in accountable relationship. And the Lord has continued to strengthen that relationship and many others over the years. In fact, you could say that God’s Kingdom was like leaven hidden in the lump of those days and yet also slowly spreading. And it continues to expand today.
Then we found out that the brother of one of our elders was Dr. Chuck Farah, a professor of theology at O.R.U. He too was a member of an epicenter New Testament church that met there in Tulsa, Oklahoma. They were building with a plurality of elders and seeking to keep Christ central in their midst. And they were also proclaiming in the city a proper understanding of faith. Dr. Farah had written an extremely strategic book called “From the Pinnacle of the Temple,” where he taught the difference between faith and presumption. But because there was so much teaching on the power of faith in that city, Chuck found himself embroiled in a certain amount of controversy. But God was with him and he functioned at O.R.U. as a professor until he retired.
So, God was connecting us to another epicenter. He had sovereignly poured out His Spirit in Tulsa and the brethren there had gone to the Scriptures as we had. One of those men, Jim Garret began calling together an annual Conclave of elders in St. Louis, Missouri. Brethren who functioned as local elders would come from all over the country. Some were from big churches, some from little ones, and some even from house churches. We would come to worship and to prayerfully discuss topics that were relevant to the day. Since Jim was a Greek and Hebrew scholar, we could get into some pretty in-depth studies. He along with some other brothers would do papers on various aspects of New Testament church life. And then there would be times of discussion around what had been presented. “How does that apply to California? How does that apply to cold, dead New England?” We all began to be broadened and deepened in our relationships with the Lord and with each other.
Then three years ago, it began to change. We began to realize that because some of the leaders from these churches were young, they could not afford to go to the Conclave. It would simply cost them too much to take a week off from work and then travel to St. Louis. While they might have a wonderful time attending, their families would suffer. So, to address this problem, we sought the Lord. And in our hearts, we felt that He was saying, “Break up into regional gatherings.” So since then, we have had two regional gatherings out of which then came the Prophetic Conference that we had in Kingston, NY in September 2019.
I wanted to put this history down on paper in order to more clearly present what God was doing in our part of His kingdom leading to where we are today.
In my own local church, New Testament Christian Fellowship, we are seeking to walk together as a prophetic people. One example of this is what we call “Remember the Deeds of the Lord” Sunday. On the last Sunday of each year we ask everyone in the Body to come and be prepared to share at least one testimony of what the Lord did for them the previous year. Then as people testified, faith was then built up in the hearts of everyone else. We would conclude by then saying to the people, “Okay. Thank you for sharing what God has done for you last year. Now next week we’re asking you to come prepared to tell us what you believe God will be doing for you this coming year.” So, for us, the next Sunday, the first of the new year has become known as “Prophetic Sunday”.
And like clockwork, every year, God has shown His faithfulness by pointing us back to what He had spoken prophetically and how he fulfilled His word. At the same time, He then always points us forward to the coming year. We are discovering how important it is to be a prophetic people. The problem is that there is way too much weirdness that seems to accompany so much of what is called prophetic in the Lord’s Church. This year (2019) God spoke to us about change, change in the midst of turmoil. All throughout the year that is what we heard. Then a few months ago when I visited the Kingston, NY area, Bertha Rumble (Don’s mom who is 98 years old) had a word, “A storm is coming! Sharpen the point of your sword and get rid of all fear.” Then God gave me a word to preach to the churches based on what she had heard.
Today as we seek to be a prophetic people, problems abound. There can be a certain amount of weirdness that people can fall into and we must learn to shepherd the issues that arise. I think that is why Paul instructed the church in Thessalonica to, “not despise prophetic utterances. But examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good” (1Thessalonians 5:20 - 21). Separating out what is worthless from what is precious is a major part of the task we face as we move forward in the purpose of God.
He has taught us many lessons in the last fifty years since the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in the 1970s. And what we have learned has been well worth the blood, sweat, and tears.
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