Introduction

For the past couple of weeks in 1 Thessalonians, we’ve been talking about the Holy Spirit. We’ve seen that

  1. He wants to be close to us as we spend our days rejoicing always, praying constantly, and giving thanks to Him in all things, and…

  2. He is a Person who can be grieved and a fire that can be quenched.

    • We can never put Him out completely—that would mean we have as much power as He does—but we can suppress that fire in our souls; we can grieve His heart.

But here’s the problem we all face: how do you know if it’s actually the Spirit speaking to you?

I mentioned this toward the end last Sunday, and I saw a lot of head nodding. “Lord, is that you?” My encouragement then was “just say yes!”. Sort of the Nancy Reagan slogan of the Eighties, but in reverse! Just say yes! Let your default be obedience.

But that still doesn’t answer the question, how do we know for sure that it’s Him? And specifically when we’re not talking about just internally, but externally, when someone else is telling us that the Spirit is telling them something. How do we discern His voice in that?

I’m not going to be able to give you a simple answer to that question this morning, because there’s not really a simple answer, some plug-and-play formula for every situation. The Bible doesn’t gives us that.

But what it does provide us are some principles, actions, and attitudes we can have in order to be listening for the Spirit’s voice, and discerning whether it’s actually His voice or not.

There’s a good chance at least some of what I say today is going to feel very foreign and awkward to you. The main reason I can say that: some of it feels foreign and awkward to me!

Now, as we’ll see, you’re to test everything I say today! But to the best of my ability, everything we’re going to talk about lines up with what Scripture teaches. I think the reason it feels so foreign to us is that it’s been an aspect of the Christian life so neglected for so long. Or as J.D. Greaar put it in his book on the Holy Spirit called Jesus Continued…

Many Christians have not only thrown out the baby with the bathwater, but have thrown out the institution of bathing altogether!

J.D. Greaar, Jesus Continued

Don’t stifle the Spirit. Don’t despise prophecies, but test all things. Hold on to what is good. Stay away from every kind of evil.

1 Thessalonians 5:19–22

So… “don’t despise prophecies.” What’s that mean? And what are prophecies, specifically? Was that just for that time, or is it for now as well? What does prophecy look like today, anyway?

All good questions we have to answer this morning. Let’s talk for a few minutes about…

Prophecy in the New Testament

When we think about prophecy, we tend to think some grand overarching vision, some audible voice, some miraculous understanding. And that’s really kind of the way it was in the Old Testament.

In the Old Covenant, all of God’s people (the Israelites) didn’t have the Holy Spirit. In fact, none of them experienced Him the same way we do.

And so when a person came along who was filled with the Holy Spirit in this special way, that was a very special, unique thing. They were referred to as a prophet, and very highly regarded, because they spoke for God Himself.

Wayne Grudem, is a NT scholar and professor and the most influential systematic theologian of our time. Back in the late 70s/early 80s, his P.hD dissertation was actually on this very topic, prophecy in the NT.

Thankfully, that dissertation de-academia-ized and published for popular consumption in 1988, and been through a couple revisions since then. It’s called The Gift of Prophecy in the New Testament and Today, and it’s a really helpful book if you want to dive deep on such topics. I read a good portion of it in preparation for talking about this topic, and I’ll be referring to it a couple times today.

And here’s part of what he said about OT prophets:

Old Testament prophets had an amazing responsibility—they were able to speak and write words which had absolute divine authority. They could say, “Thus says the Lord,” and the words which followed were the very words of God… Therefore, to disbelieve or disobey a prophet’s words was to disbelieve or disobey God.

Wayne Grudem, Gift of Prophecy

On the Day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came in power, Peter got up to preach, and he quoted from the book of Joel:

This is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:

And it will be in the last days, says God,
that I will pour out my Spirit on all people; (not just a few)
then your sons and your daughters will prophesy,
your young men will see visions,
and your old men will dream dreams.
I will even pour out my Spirit
on my servants in those days, both men and women
and they will prophesy.

Acts 2:16–18

Peter says, “This is it.” What God promised through the prophet Joel 600–800 years ago is coming true right before your eyes. Now the Holy Spirit is given to all God’s children, not just a select few. Now hearing the very words of God Himself isn’t limited to a special, small group, but for all those who believe in His Son.

But as the Good News spreads, the church expands, disciples are made, and the rest of the New Testament is written, you see some of the differences start to emerge between OT & NT prophecy.

The biggest difference of all is that one was authoritative, while the other was not.

You can see that right here in our text this morning: “Don’t despise prophecies, but test all things” or in the NLT, “test everything that is said.”.

When the prophet Isaiah stands up in Israel and says, “Thus saith the Lord:”, it was not followed by, “but you should test everything that I’m saying, hold on to what is true in there and discard the rest.”

If anything that Isaiah said was not true, that was proof that he actually wasn’t a prophet of God. And according to the Law (Deuteronomy 13), the leaders of the city were to take him outside the city and execute him.

That’s not the way the gift of prophecy works in the NT, thank God! That’s exactly what Paul just told these believers to do.

Definition of NT Prophecy

Grudem’s definition from The Gift of Prophecy.

Prophecy in the New Testament is telling what God spontaneously brings to mind.

Wayne Grudem, The Gift of Prophecy

That’s a lot simpler than having some grand revelation. It’s just simply a person, filled with the Spirit, feeling the Spirit speaking to them, usually directly connected to His word, and then sharing that with someone else or the whole body of Christ.

Because I’m up here, there is an aspect of this that I see more often, because I’m speaking to all of you. And any pastor will tell you, sometimes people will say, “How did you know? You looked right at me. When you said…” And you think… “I didn’t say that.” Or you did, off hand, not in your notes, not a part of the message.

But it’s not just for pastors… we just have more frequent built-in opportunity. Not a special class, every believer.

J.D. Greear gave example of a young man named Justin in their church. He was walking through a park, noticed this East Indian woman sitting by herself on a park bench. Never seen her before, but had an inexplicable urge to go tell her that though her brother had recently died, God loved her and would never forsake her. He told me this kind of thing never happens to him, but this impression was so strong… but still, he couldn’t just bring himself to go up to her and say such a thing! What if he was wrong?

Several hours later, he ran into the same woman at a Starkbucks in another part of the city. He understood, this to be God giving him another chance to be obedient. So he took a deep breath, walked up to her, and said, “Ma’am, we’ve never met, and I’m not sure why I feel this way, but I have the sense that God wanted me to tell you…” and he gave her the message.

She stared at him with wide eyes for several terribly long seconds. Then she dropped her head and began to cry. “How did you know? I thought no one in this city new. Actually, he was not really my brother, but my cousin, but he grew up in my house and I always thought of him as my brother. I even introduced him to people that way. He died last week.”

She was Hindu and had just moved to the United States from India. Justin told her that he could only guess that God gave him that message so that she would know that God cared for her and had a plan for her and her family. Eventually, through further conversation, the lady came to profess Christ as her Savior.

What do you do with that? Could such a thing happen to us? Could the Spirit use us like that? I believe the answer is yes… if we don’t despise the idea, if we don’t quench His work in us, if we are open to the possibility.

Is it still a thing for today?

Many godly, well-meaning Christians, even Baptists, would say “No!” Those folks are generally referred to as cessationists, because of their belief that these supernatural gifts have ceased.

Their line of reasoning is fairly complicated, kind of involves how you interpret the entire storyline of the Bible. We’d have to go back to a few weeks ago when we were going over all the different beliefs about the second coming, because the two are related.

We don’t have time to dive into all that this morning. Here’s what I would say: I see no evidence in the New Testament that leads me to believe any of the spiritual gifts are not active today.

When this spiritual gift of prophecy is mentioned, it’s right along with all the others, like encouragement, mercy, service, and teaching. And in places like our text this morning, the apostles just assume that it’s a normal part of life in the Church.

If you’re still having trouble with the idea that God speaks by his Spirit through his Church today, let me just ask you a couple questions: (from Jesus Continued…)

I’ve never met a Christian who has walked with God for any length of time who would answer a categorical “no” to all those questions. And to that I’d say, you may not have used the same terminology, not known exactly what to call those experiences, but I believe they’re what the New Testament is talking about when it talks about prophecy.

And that also explains why some people seem to have those experiences more than others. Ever heard someone talk about their experience of the Spirit’s working in and through them, and thought, “Why has that never happened to me? What’s wrong with me? I must not be as close, must not be as surrendered.”

You should examine yourself and see if that’s true, the answer might just be that you haven’t been given the spiritual gift of prophecy. Which brings us to 1 Corinthians 14, the main chapter in the Bible devoted to this topic.

Anybody remember what 1 Corinthians 13 is? The love chapter, probably read at your wedding! In that, Paul says, “If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge… but do not have love, I am nothing.”

Pursue love and desire spiritual gifts, and especially that you may prophesy.

1 Corinthians 14:1

What’s the purpose?

The person who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening, encouragement, and consolation.

1 Corinthians 14:3

So Biblical, New Testament prophecy in the church should accomplish these things: strengthing, encouraging, consoling. That’s it.

If you feel like you have a word for someone, but it won’t accomplish one of those things, you shouldn’t be speaking it!

1. Be careful without being cynical.

Don’t stifle the Spirit. Don’t despise prophecies, but test all things.

1 Thessalonians 5:19–21

Why say “don’t despise prophecies”? The only logical answer is that there was a tendency in some of the believers in that church, a tendency in some believers in every church, to despise prophecies. And if you’ve been a believer for any length of time, you probably understand exactly where those folks are coming from. People come up with some stuff.

Bad Methods of Hearing from God

Those are funny examples, but here’s the reality: you hear about stuff like that often enough, practice that “polite head nod” often enough, and it’ll be really hard not to want to roll your eyes whenever you hear someone start telling about God telling them something.

That’s why we have this warning to not despise prophecies. This is about the attitude of our hearts. It’s realy, really easy to become really, really cynical and critical.

I don’t want to go through life with the assumption it’s not the Spirit, and you’ve got to convince me that it is.

God may reveal something to someone else, for me, that lights a fire in my soul. I don’t want to quench that.

  1. Be careful without being cynical.

2. Judge without being judgemental.

How exactly are we to “test all things” (NLT “test everything that is said.”)

Does it line up with God’s Word?

The Holy Spirit doesn’t talk out of both sides of his mouth. He will never lead you to say/do something that is contrary to Scripture.

Does it sound like God?

I know, this is also somewhat subjective, but I think it’s an important test nonetheless, and especially when we’re talking about the entire body of believers.

Does it come true?

Later on in 1 Corinthians 14, Paul says that we “see it part, we prophesy in part.” Remember, we’re not talking about prophecy in the OT sense.

In the book of Acts, there’s this character that appears a couple of times whose name is Agabus. (if you’re planning on having another son, there’s your name, Agabus. I feel the ladies testing the Spirit on that one!)

After we had been there for several days, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. He came to us, took Paul’s belt, tied his own feet and hands, and said, “This is what the Holy Spirit says: ‘In this way the Jews in Jerusalem will bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him over to the Gentiles.’” When we heard this, both we and the local people pleaded with him not to go up to Jerusalem.

Acts 21:10–12

Now, here’s the deal, that prophecy came true… almost. The meat of the prophecy is right, but some of the details aren’t quite right. The Jews were actually trying to kill him, and it’s the Romans that bound him up to protect him from the Jews.

In the OT realm of prophecy, that would have probably been enough to say, “He’s a false prophet” and he should have been killed. But this NT prophecy, it’s supposed to be tested, because all the rest of us are filled with the Spirit, too.

But I said, “Judge without being judgmental.” You can say, “that’s not biblical or “I’m not sure.”

  1. Be careful without being cynical.
  2. Judge without being judgemental.

3. Be gideable without being gullible.

Maybe what they’re saying seems mostly right, but not quite. “Hold on to what is good, reject what’s not.”

Eat the meat, and spit out the bones.

Hold on to what is good. Stay away from every kind of evil.

1 Thessalonians 5:21–22

Know the Word and the Spirit well enough that you can tell the difference.

The more you tune your ear, the more you can tell when something’s not in key.

Be willing to step out in faith, even when it feels weird.

Step out in faith.

Never say, “God says:” or “Thus saith the Lord.” That’s over.

Instead, say, “I feel like God is saying…”, “I feel like the Spirit is putting on my heart…”

Pursue love and desire spiritual gifts, and especially that you may prophesy.

1 Corinthians 14:1
  1. Be careful without being cynical.
  2. Judge without being judgemental.
  3. Be gideable without being gullible.

Conclusion

Driving around town yesterday, what would a movement of the Spirit look like in Frankfort?

Wind blowing through the car, Spirit blows where He wills. Let us be willing to roll down the windows of our lives, feel the breeze.