When I was a child, I would read from our big family altar bible. I loved the stories in the Old Testament. How the prophets went about doing God’s will. They would perform miracles and prophesied. Everybody knew that they were prophets because they prophesied and spoke in tongues. King David before he was king of Israel, was chased by King Saul. Saul wanted to kill David for many reasons. Mostly that Saul didn’t want David to take his place. Saul persued David everywhere. One day he was about to catch David. Then something happened to Saul. The Holy Spirit came upon him. Saul began to speak in Tongues and prophesy. He did it so much that the priest around Saul ask if Saul was a prophet. When a person is baptized in the Holy Spirit, there are 2 things that will happen. The first is that the person will speak with other tongues. In a heavenly language that only God and his angels understand. The second is that the person will prophesy. When the Holy Spirit comes upon you, you will speak. No one can hold it in, but this isn’t the Gift of Prophesy. The Gift of Prophesy expresses God’s feelings. It is speaking supernaturally in a known language, to edify, exhort, comfort and convict. The known language doesn’t necessarily have to be your native language. I have known a missionary that didn’t speak Spanish. He began to pray in his heavenly language and it came of his mouth in Spanish. I knew another Christian who was in Africa in a church service when she began to pray in the spirit. And all of the natives heard their native language. The Gift of Prophesy is God directing an individual to speak His mind to another person. It is exciting but it doesn’t make you a prophet. It is a gift to help man. Again, there are conditions to receiving this gift. Each person must first accept Jesus into their heart. Then each person must be baptized in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues. When these 2 conditions are met, then God will give the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Again the power of God isn’t for personal use or abuse. God will not give His power to a sinner.
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