When Elisha was called to be a
prophet, he was out plowing a field.
When you think about it, he must
have been an unusual man. He was out there with 12 yoke of oxen - 24 massive
animals - all under his control, the reins in his hands. Elisha was no sissy!
He must have been a pretty big guy to handle all of them at once.
Elisha knew he was called because
Elijah walked up to him, put his mantle around him and then walked away.
I can imagine Elisha crying,
"What have you done to me?!"
And Elijah replying, "I have done
nothing to you. This is the Lord's doing."
Several years later, after Elijah
was taken into Heaven, Elisha received the mantle a second time. He used it to
perform a miracle, asking, "Where is the Lord God of Elijah?" That began the
double-anointing message Elisha was able to bring. He did exactly double the
miracles, double the signs, double everything Elijah did. He asked God for that
double portion, and the Lord gave it to him.
And it began out in a field, when
a mantle was tossed around his shoulders.
Signs of Your Calling
If you are called to be a
prophet, one of the first things you need to understand is that the calling
makes you absolutely, positively nothing special. It makes you a potential
failure - but it doesn't make you anything special, because "many are called,
but few are chosen" (Matthew 22:14). That statement is very true in the
prophetic realm.
What are some of the potential
signs you've been called by God to be a prophet? You might experience
supernatural events such as trances, visitations of angels or being taken into
the heavenlies, as Paul was.
People might begin to tell you
that you have a "different spirit" about you. When I was very young, people
would tell me that I had a different spirit. I didn't know what they were
talking about. I thought, it's because I've got dark hair and they are blonde
or something. In college, people told me they were afraid of me, because my
eyes seemed to look right through them.
"Well, I can't look right through
you!" I answered. I had no idea. I didn't correlate any of those things with
having a prophetic ministry.
As Samuel experienced, the Lord
might appear to you. Not only did the Lord speak to Samuel, calling him by
name, but 1 Samuel 3 says that the Lord appeared to Samuel "again" or "often"
there at Shiloh.
The people around you might
inadvertently begin to hint at your calling. They might suggest you're strange.
They might say, "How did you know that? That must have been God!"
Then leaders will begin to
recognize your gift. But remember the truth of Proverbs 18:16: If you have a
gift, it will make room for itself. God will open the door to you. He is the
One who called you - He can bring His call to fruition in your life.
Keep in Mind
The first portion of your
training as a prophet is the "called" portion. It is the seemingly ambiguous
time of walking around and doing strange things, parents not understanding you,
friends not understanding you, spouses not understanding you. Sometimes,
depending on your choices, you become a better person during this initial
"shakeup"; sometimes you become worse. In 1980 when I had my first visitation,
I became a better man, and my wife was so happy! She knew something had
happened because I wasn't the same yucky guy I had been before it happened.
Everything began to get better: our jobs, our businesses, our marriage, our
finances. Something cataclysmic and good had happened to me, and it changed our
lives.
Being called to the prophetic
office is not an easy thing. There is "prophetic blood" you spill that nobody
knows about. There are tears you shed in private, and at the time you shed
them, it seems that nobody understands them.
But here's the key: God is the
One who called you, and He is the One who can bring that call to fruition in
your life. The Bible says He actually stores your tears. Why would He do that
if they didn't matter to Him? Not one of them is lost. So if you're dealing with
any of the difficulties we talked about in this article, take heart. God is
your support, and He can cause all things to work out for your good.
John Paul Jackson
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