The meaning of the words: Prophet and Christ

Prophet

A prophet is a mouthpiece for God or someone through whom God decides to speak to others. For our purpose in this book, prophets shall include everyone in the fivefold ministry of Apostle, Prophet, Evangelist, Pastor and Teacher spelt out in Ephesians 4:11-15 thus:

“And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers;

For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ:

Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ:

That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive;

But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ:”

From our text of scripture here, it is very clear that prophets are given by God to men. For example, the Apostle is a messenger of God assigned with the task of pioneering God’s work. They thus enjoy such grace that enables them to flow in all the fivefold ministry offices depending on the need God wants to use them to meet.

Next to Apostles are Prophets and they, like the Apostles, are foundation layers but they do not flow in all fivefold ministry gifts like Apostles do. In Ephesians 2:20, while describing the place of the Gentile converts in the covenant of grace, Apostle Paul said in verse 19 that they are no longer strangers and foreigners but fellow citizens with the saints and of the Household of God. Then he describes the household of God or the Church as being built on the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets: Jesus Christ Himself being the Chief Corner Stone.

Next to the Prophets are the Evangelists whose main assignment is to preach to save the lost. God usually grants them grace to work signs and wonders to enable them carry out this task with ease.

The next in line are the Pastors. Their task is to gather the young converts and nurture them to maturity to the point that when mature, these converts can be used of God to raise others.

Finally we have the Teachers. Their main mission is to rightly divide the word bringing clarity and understanding of scriptures in such a way that others can be instructed and know how to live. Their ministry guarantees the continuity of any work of God because without the teaching ministry, no work has a future.

For our purpose, prophets represent all these. One thing we must know about prophets is that they are called by God into that office. In Jeremiah 1:4-5 where the prophet was recalling how he was called to that office, he said:

“Then the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.”

This truth that Prophets are called by God was also emphasized by the call of John the Baptist. We are told of the spectacular miracle that surrounded his birth and divine assignment. In fact, his ministry was prophesied about eight hundred years earlier by Isaiah – an Old Testament Prophet. This is why when John was told to identify himself; he identified himself from the prophecy of Isaiah in Isa.40:3.  In Jn.1:23, he said:

“… I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias.”

All the Apostles of the Lord Jesus Christ were called by Him into the ministry as the Holy Spirit led him. After His glorification, all those who claimed Apostleship were also called by him. An example of this could be seen in Acts 9 when He called Saul who later became Apostle Paul.

Another distinguishing characteristic of Prophets is that they are led by the Holy Spirit and as such they bear the fruit of the spirit as shown in Gal.5:22-23. They also direct people to God and the Lord Jesus Christ and not to themselves. In Jn.16:13-14, Jesus Christ describes the ministry of the Holy Spirit to us thus:

“Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.

He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you.”

In light of this text of Scripture, anyone who is led by the Holy Spirit would therefore not direct people to themselves but to God the Father and Jesus Christ. This was clearly exemplified by Paul and Barnabas when after God worked a miracle through Paul to heal a lame man in Iconium, the people attempted to worship them. They rent their clothes and discouraged the people from worshipping them as gods and took the time to direct them to the living God who they were representing. You will find this story in Acts 14:8-18.  

In summation here therefore, Prophets are God’s agents called of God to represent His interest on earth. They speak and act on behalf of God to bring help to mankind and God anoints them with power confirming what they say and do with signs following. They also bear the fruit of the Holy Spirit and direct the heart of people to God and not to themselves because they are led by the Spirit of God.

Christ

The suffering of humanity today and the various atrocities perpetrated among the human race leaves one in no doubt of the need of a Saviour or Messiah. Clearly, the foundation of man’s problem is sin and anyone who will liberate man from sin, would have taken care of the foundation of man’s problem effectively. Only one sacrifice was required for this and this must be a sinless man who must bear the sin of the whole human race on himself even though He has not sinned.

The word “Christ” means the anointed one or the Messiah. This anointed one or Messiah; for our purpose, refers to the only person whose mission it is to liberate the whole world from their sin. There is only one person who was found worthy to do this and this is the man Jesus Christ who also is God. The bible refers to Him as the word of God and God in John 1:1 and the word which became flesh in Jn.1:14.  Then He is also described as the only begotten Son of God in whom we must believe and be saved in Jn.3:16.

The importance of recognizing only Jesus Christ as the Messiah or Christ cannot be overemphasized as it is the foundation of the faith of God that guarantees eternal life.  This is clearly seen in Matthew 16:13-19 where Jesus exclaimed that Peter could only have known Him by a divine revelation when Peter told Him that He was the Christ. The text reads thus:

“When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?

And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets.

He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am?

And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.

And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.

And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

In His response, Jesus made it very clear here that He would build His Church and the gates of hell will attempt to stop Him but will not prevail. One of the means by which the gates of hell will attempt to do this is through the ministry of false Prophets and false Christs.

This truth that Jesus is the Christ; the Son of the Living God is what the early Church fathers lived and died for. This is the truth Jesus proved by His death on the Cross, His burial and resurrection on the third day. This is the truth Jesus Christ confirmed on the day of Pentecost in Acts Chapter 2 when He sent the Holy Spirit to birth the Church. This truth is what the devil seeks to attack through the ministry of false Prophets and Christs.  This is the truth that made Apostle John raise an alarm that the spirit of the anti-Christ was in their midst when he saw many deceivers entering among the brethren to deceive them. In 1Jn.4:1-4, we read:

“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.

Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God:

And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.”

False prophets as we can see from this text; are controlled by the spirit of the anti-Christ. The word anti-Christ means against Christ. More will be said on this in a later chapter.

The Christ therefore refers to Jesus the son of the living God who came by blood and water and through whom eternal life is delivered to mankind after a confession of faith in Him (see Jn.17:3; Rm.10:8-11 and 1Jn.5:6).

HOW TO IDENTIFY FALSE CHRISTS AND PROPHETS

 {an excerpt from my book of this title}
DEDICATION
To all the saints of God in Northern Nigeria who have suffered untold hardship in the hands of the anti-Christ masquerading with religion. When I think of your suffering for the Cross of Christ, I cannot stop thinking that in heaven some will be more equal than others. You are my true Heroes!
To all the ...

saints of God who have suffered in the hands of false Prophets, Teachers and Apostles due to ignorance born out of want of true spiritual leadership. It is my heart felt prayer that the light from this book will liberate you and set you free to be a servant of the Lord.
INTRODUCTION
Just yesterday, as I write, I heard this story about an event in Northern Nigeria that was even videoed and sent to a man of God in England who visited Nigeria and was addressing us at a gathering of Ministers of the Gospel. He recounted how he was shown a film by a man of God from Plateau State in Nigeria of the persecution of the saints of God in the Northern part of the country. He said that in the film, he saw how Christians were cut on the forehead with cutlass by the children of the bondwoman and forced to run while bleeding. These agents of the devil did not stop at that, but kept on cutting them from behind while they ran until they dropped dead.
Another scene he described was that of a Pastor’s wife whom they forced to lie on her back and drove a bottle into her vagina and forced her up again and ordered her to run. She was running with her legs apart with blood oozing out of her body. This brought tears to my eyes as I imagined the excruciating pain this woman of God must have had to endure for the Cross of Christ.
Another story I heard from a sister yesterday as I write is about a man in Lagos Nigeria; who went in search of a solution from a false prophet. The false prophet gave him an evil prescription which included that he had his bath with soap and sponge given to him by this false prophet. This gullible man did as he was told and sank into the ground where he went to take his bath. Only the sponge and soap were found at the scene until his body was later exhumed from the ground.
As I write, my heart bleeds. I had a restless night as I thought on these events, but I woke up with this song: “IT WONT BE LONG” by Andrae Crouch this morning and my heart was comforted.
From these two real life stories we cannot deny the devastating consequence of ignorance brought upon a people resulting in the thriving of the evil machinations of the anti-Christ and false prophets. This, I believe, is in part due to a want of real spiritual leadership for some and for others an outright rejection of the truth because they want to get something for nothing.
My intention through this book is to unmask false Prophets, false Apostles, false Teachers, false pastors, false evangelists and false Christs. This is with the intent that everyone who truly seeks to know the one true God of the universe in experience be liberated and released to know Him.
By way of introduction, let us look at the definition of our book title HOW TO IDENTIFY FALSE PROPHETS AND FALSE CHRISTS. For the purpose of clarity, I would like to break down the words and define them separately before putting them together again to get a clear picture of what we are looking at here. Your destiny may well depend on your understanding this truth.
To identify means to be able to say for sure or to recognize. False Prophets are people who claim to be prophets of God and are not. False Christs refers to anyone handing himself out as the Messiah or Saviour of mankind apart from Jesus Christ. Thus the title of this book means how to recognize those pretending to be prophets and Christ when they are not.

Food for thought

 Quoted 4rm my bb friend

"I Recall as a kid that a man in my Neighborhood became popular for engaging in money rituals just to buy the 80's edition of the Honda Prelude.

You wouldn't buy that car for 50k today!

 

I Remember as a kid, my whole street converged to watch a truck deliver a very large satellite dish to my neighbour's house.
Today a dish one tenth that size delivers 5 times the value and is in almost every student hostel room.

What about the Volkswagen Santana, Mercedes Benz V booth, 505 cocaine, all overtaken by Camry,Honda discussions and Infinity? .... Vanity.

 

A friend declared drinks for the boys because he just launched the Nokia Communicator for over a hundred grand in 2002.

Today that phone would embarrass the owner and is a joke compared to the low cost and everyday phone!

 

What about d MTN sim card dat many people went extra miles b4 dey bought it for over 30k, today u will not buy it at N200.
People are still making the most amazing sacrifices over the 'vainest' of things, make enemies over worthless material things!

 

Pity!What can I Say? Look back at that one thing you want to kill or die or stress yourself for today and see what becomes of it tomorrow!
Think!! Think!! Think!!!
Slow down with the sense of attachment and blind pursuit of things, for today's 'gold' is tomorrow's 'copper'....or worse!
Have a pleasant week ahead!

OCTOBER OUR MONTH OF TRAVAIL

Isa.66:8-9: “Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.

Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to bring forth? saith the LORD: shall I cause to bring forth, and shut the womb? saith thy God.”

Gal.4:19: “My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you,”

This month of October has been prophetically declared our month of travail based on the revelation given to me by the Lord drawn from these two scriptures. In the first text, we are made to understand that to birth souls into the kingdom of God; we must travail for them in prayer. The second text also makes us understand that to get these souls to mature in Christ; we must also travail like in child birth. In the text of Isaiah quoted above, we receive an assurance of answered prayers from God where He said He will not bring us to the point of delivery and shut the womb.

The Lord Jesus Christ makes us understand that for us to be effective in Kingdom service; we must learn to pray to the Lord of Harvest to send laborers into His field. You will find this in Lk.10:2 where He said:

“The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest.

He clarified this further in John 15:16 where He makes us understand that He has chosen and ordained us to the end that we should bear fruit and that our fruit should abide.

We bear fruit by winning the lost to Him and our fruit abide when the souls won to him are established in faith. Both of these responsibilities are not possible without the ministry of the Holy Spirit which we engaged through travail in prayer.

To this end, this month, as we conclude our message on the future of the world, we shall be learning how to pray kingdom driven prayers for the birth and establishment of souls in the Kingdom. We shall also be demonstrating through evangelism and training of the converts with a view to discipling them for Christ so they can in turn be engaged by the Lord as labourers in His vineyard.

Beloved, the Lord revealed to me that the end is nearer than many are aware of and we must put more effort into soul winning and discipling to enable the Lord return for a glorious Church without spot and wrinkle.

If you are reading this article and you are not yet born again, I believe that you are not reading this by accident. This is your divine appointment with your glorious destiny. You can get born again now by saying the prayer below out loud to the Lord and you will be saved.

THE SINNER’S PRAYER

Father in Heaven,

I come to you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Your word says in John 6:37 that you will not cast me out when I come to you. So I thank you that you will take me in.

You also said in Romans 10:9-10 that if I shall confess with my mouth the Lord Jesus and shall believe in my heart that you raised him from the dead, I shall be saved. For with the heart man believes unto righteousness and with the mouth, confession is made unto salvation. I believe in my heart that Jesus Christ is the son of God. I believe that he was raised from the dead for my justification and I confess him now as my saviour and Lord.

I believe that I have now become your righteousness in Christ whom you made to be sin for me on Calvary’s Cross.

Thank you father that I am saved from this day in Jesus’s name!

If you just said this prayer, CONGRATULATIONS!!! You are now born again. We would like to send you a free e copy of our believers guide to growth. Please indicate your interest by writing to Flourishinggirl@gmail.com or jointheirsfamily@gmail.com. For more of our resource materials please visit and follow our blog at:www.jointheirsfamily.blogspot.com. or check us out on face book by logging on to and liking:   www.facebook.com/alero.nanna1/kingdomjointheirsfamily. Or /Healing and restoration time with Pastor Alero Nanna.  

September, 2012 - Our Month of Perfection

PERFECTION

Welcome to the month of September! This month has been declared by the word of the Lord to us; our month of PERFECTION. Perfection speaks of maturity or completion. It takes perfection for us to walk in the full benefit of the covenant of the New Creation. Gal.4:1 says the heir to an inheritance cannot walk in the wealth allocated to him until he matures. In light of this, the perfection of a planting season is the harvest; the perfection of a pregnancy is delivery; the perfection of a baby Christian is maturity enough to be productive; the perfection of life on earth is the end of time and the commencement of timeless eternity.

The one responsible for making perfection happen is the Lord. This is why we are told in Ps.138:8 that the Lord will perfect all that concerns us. In addition, we are told in Hebrews 6:1 to move on from spiritual babyhood to maturity. The reason is that it takes maturity to be productive as a believer and our primary assignment as believers is to bear fruit [see Jn.15:16 & Rm.7:4]. When we bear fruit, we can be described as perfected as far as fruit bearing is concerned.   

Also, today, while waiting to pick up my friend from the airport, I started conversing with the Lord and began to imagine what the rapture would be like. Then I prayed that it should take place in my life time because I would like to experience it. The Lord told me to work harder at netting souls into His kingdom and that we can actually hasten His coming if we give more attention to the harvest of souls into God’s Kingdom. In light of the perfection of all things, this month, we shall be looking at the theme: The Second Coming of The Lord Jesus Christ and the End of Time. We shall be teaching from my new book “Will this World Really Come to an End”. You may have been hearing about the soon return of the Lord; the questions I want to ask you are: are you prepared for it? Do you know what events to watch out for and the step by step events that would lead to His glorious appearing and eventually the white Throne Judgment and the end of time? Are you confused about this or are you afraid to know of it because you think you are not prepared? All your fears would be allayed by a clear understanding of these events from God’s word and that is what this book will give to you as you read.

To purchase your own copy, send a request by email to flourishinggirl@gmail.Com; jointheirsfamily@gmail.com. or call any of our phone lines.

For more information and our resource materials please log on to our blogs at:

www.flourishinggirl.blogspot.com  

www.jointheirsfamily.blogspot.com     

This month of September, the Lord shall perfect all that concerns you and you will reap the harvest of all the precious seeds you have sown in Jesus’ name!

August 2012 New Beginnings

NEW BEGINNINGS

Welcome to August, Destiny 2012 our Month of New Beginnings. As I examined the book of the beginnings lately, I discovered that beginning again did not start with us. God has had to begin again several times. In Genesis 1: 1 we are made to understand that in the beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth. In verse 2, we learn that the earth became formless and void and darkness covered the face of the deep and we see the Spirit of God hovering over the devastation that the earth had become. Then in verse 3, God did something very remarkable. He decided to start all over again to create a new earth. Do you know what He began with? He began with creating light.

In this new beginning, God is beginning with you by enlightening all your dark areas to enable you know where you may have missed it in the past and what you can do to get back on track. He told us as a Ministry that all our past mistakes and reproach has been wiped off together with their consequences. Halleluiah! This is God’s mercy and grace at work for us.

As I continued in my quest in the book of the beginnings, I realized that God gave our patriarchs in the faith new beginnings as well. For instance, Adam and Eve received a New Beginning following the loss of their first two sons after Cain murdered his brother Abel and ran away from home. God gave them Seth from whom the generations were eventually named. In fact when he was born, Eve exclaimed that God had given them another male child to replace Abel whom Cain murdered [Gen.4:25].

Noah received a New Beginning when God decided to wipe out the then world because of violence. In fact with this new beginning came the institution of the law of seed time and harvest in Gen.8:22.

Abraham was given a New Beginning at the age of seventy five when God told him to relocate to the Promised Land. So you are not too old to start again!

Isaac got a New Beginning when in Gen.26, God directed him to remain in Gerar and he sowed and reaped a hundred fold in a year of famine and the bible says he “waxed great and went forward and grew until he became very great”; to the point of arousing the envy of his neighbors.

Jacob got two chances of a New Beginning in his life when he had to flee to Laban and when he came back and wrestled with an angel until he got a change of name and status.

Joseph was also blessed with a new beginning when he was brought before Pharaoh to interpret his dream and received for that grace the position of the number 2 man in Egypt of that day.

The Nation of Israel received a New Beginning when they all had to relocate to Egypt owing to the famine in the land of Canaan.

Dear reader, this month, God wants you to begin afresh with Him at a higher level that only His grace can make happen for you. He has pardoned your past mistakes and is willing to give you another and a better chance in life. Welcome to your month of New Beginnings. To this end, we shall be looking at How to walk in God’s perfect will and not stumble in spite of the corruption in this world and the mounting pressure of hell against humans walking in righteousness. We shall be drawing from the experience of the Patriarchs and as such our texts will be from the book of the beginnings.

Once again, welcome to our month of New Beginnings. For more details and our resource materials, log on to www.flourishinggirl.blogspot.com. also, check out our page on face book at aleronanna1/kingdom joint heirs family churches. Also see: Healing and Restoration Time with Pastor Alero Nanna on face book.

Carnality Versus Spirituality 2 by Alero Flourish Nanna

The distinction between carnality and spirituality is as light and darkness and like oil and water, the two cannot blend. Some of these distinctions are as follows:

1.    Satan is the lord over carnality or the human nature. So anyone who bows to carnality bows to Satan. On the other hand, Jesus Christ is the Lord over spirituality. [See Ephesians 2:2-3; Col.1:13].

2.    The Carnal man is controlled by the law of sin and death. The spiritual man on the other hand, is controlled by the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. [See Rm.7:21-25; Rm.8:1].

3.    The carnal man is under condemnation. There is no condemnation against the spiritual man. [Rm.8:1; Jn.3:18-18].

4.    The carnal man cannot obey God and cannot please God. The spiritual man on the other hand, is one with God and therefore pleases the Lord. [Rm.8:7-9; Gal.5:17; 1Cor.6:17].

5.    The carnal man cannot receive and experience the things of the Spirit of God. On the other hand, it takes spirituality to access the things of the Spirit of God. [1Cor.2:13- 14; Rev.4:1]