One of the gravest mistakes a Christian can make is to visit a fake Prophet or false prophet before realizing the prophet is fake. You may be wondering why I made such a statement. The reason is not farfetched... I did because most fake prophets now use diabolical powers to manipulate their first-time visitors.
That is why we can't blame people who do obnoxious things in obedience to the instruction given to them by some of these fake prophets, as these people are not even aware of the evil that has befallen them.
At this point, I feel the sudden urge to drop this note of warning: never, I repeat, NEVER ever visit any prophet for any reason until you are done reading this Christian insightful article.
Onward...
I've heard times without number that to recognize a fake Prophet, all you need is Deuteronomy 18:22, which says...
when a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him.
No doubt Deuteronomy 18:22 is a much needed verse of the Bible when trying to know whether a prophet is fake or not. In fact, it is the first factor needed to recognize the identity of a fake prophet.
Howbeit, if that is the only Bible verse that comes to your mind when carrying out this important recognition work, then you've missed it all.
It is and has never been a good idea for anyone to judge any matter using a standalone Bible verse. Even the Bible itself has made it clear in 2 Corinthians 13:1 that... In the mouth of TWO or THREE witnesses shall EVERY WORD BE ESTABLISHED.
Yet most Christians saw nothing wrong with using only Deuteronomy 18:22 in recognizing a fake Prophet.
What are we even insinuating?
Gone are those days when false prophets could be known through fake prophesies. Today, fake prophets give accurate prophecies. And to cajole the people of God, they give out these accurate prophecies — done through diabolical means — in the name of the Lord.
My memory connections, so to write, will not allow me to forget the popular prophet of one of the greatest Yoruba gospel singers in Nigeria, Tope Alabi.
Her prophet who bore the name Prophet Elijah Ajanaku was known for great and accurate prophecies when he was alive (let me hope you know him, too).
In fact, this so-called prophet of God predicted the rise of Tope Alabi amongst numerous other prophecies until the day he died.
His demise shocked the whole world as 27 Oro cultist group — a popular Ogboni fraternity — came for his corpse at the time his 6,000 members congregation were still mourning him. Believe you me brethren, that day is one of the days Nigerian Christians will never forget.
The man using the name of Jesus manipulated thousands of Christians using an occultic power without anyone figuring it out — not even the professors in his church nor his wife — while he was alive.
Consequently, if you think a false prophet cannot give accurate prophecies, you'd better think twice. Perhaps, for the above stated reason, you may think Deuteronomy 18:22 criterion for recognizing a fake Prophet is not effective. The gospel truth is that the criterion is effective. However, you are not allowed to establish anything as a Christian until you have atleast two to three witnesses, in this case, the witnesses stand for two to three other Bible verses pointing to the same thing.
Intuitively, using Deuteronomy 18:22 alone can still lead one to a fake Prophet.
So, what are the other two criteria or factors you need to add to Deuteronomy 18:22 before you can recognize a fake prophet?
Heck unto me, you will get them in 2 minutes' time. When you see them, you will then see how easy it is to know a fake prophet without ever jeopardizing your life by visiting them.
Did I even tell you that it was God through the frantic efforts of tens of real powerful prophets of God that saved Tope Alabi from the hands of that her so-called prophet, as the man promised to take away the glory of her musical career from her right in the presence of his congregation?
Oh! That is a story for another day.
Now let me show you the other two factors that are needed in recognizing a fake prophet.
For the second factor, let's read 1 Samuel 9:6
And he said to him, “Look now, there is in this city a man of God, and HE IS AN HONORABLE MAN; all that he says surely comes to pass. So let us go there; perhaps he can show us the way that we should go.”
In that quoted verse above, the servant of Saul who followed him in search for his father's donkeys suggested visiting a prophet of God as time was already against them.
Going by the conclusion of that story, you will agree with me that that Saul's servant suggestion was a good one.
It was that suggestion that birthed the second factor needed to recognize the identity of fake prophets.
And what is that factor?
It is simply a third-party report about the prophet.
This means that at any point in time you want to know whether a prophet is fake or not, after using the Deuteronomy 18:22 factor, your second factor is to listen to what people are saying about the prophet. If people's reports about the prophet is not good, that is a huge red sign for you.
Mind you, the report about the prophet must come from people who are not his followers, else you will be getting a fake report because the followers of a prophet will never, in most cases, give bad report about their leader.
Quintessentially, it is not possible for everyone to keep giving you bad report about a good or real prophet. Similarly, it is not possible for everyone you come across, in your quest to identify a real prophet, to give you good report about a fake prophet.
For Saul's servant, who had no business whatsoever with Prophet Samuel, he gave a good report about him. From his report, you will figure out that the servant knew Prophet Samuel quite well. He said, as written in 1 Samuel 9:6... HE IS AN HONORABLE MAN.
So, note and never joke about the report you hear about the prophet you are checking up on.
Believe you me, you will never go wrong on this factor as long as you don't have any affinity for the prophet you are checking up on. Even if you do, forget about your affinity for the prophet and check out the reports you get from different people living in different places about him. If the reports match what brought about your affinity for the prophet, you are good to go. Otherwise, your love for the prophet has been clouding your judgement without you knowing, in the first place.
Perhaps, you missed something in the report that Saul's servant gave about Prophet Samuel. See that 1 Samuel 9:6 again below...
And he said to him, “Look now, there is in this city a man of God, and HE IS AN HONORABLE MAN; all that he says SURELY comes to pass. So let us go there; perhaps he can show us the way that we should go.”
Can you see my underlined statement? That of course is factor one of Deuteronomy 18:22 about Prophet Samuel. Consequently, for prophet Samuel, he passed the 1st and 2nd factor.
WhatsApp Continuation...
Lastly, for the third factor... Let me show you the conversation between Saul and his servant again.
1 Samuel 9 :7-8
Then Saul said to his servant, “BUT LOOK, IF WE GO, WHAT SHALL WE BRING THE MAN? For the bread in our vessels is all gone, and there is no present to bring to the man of God. What do we have?”
8 And the servant answered Saul again and said, “LOOK, I HAVE HERE AT HAND ONE-FOURTH OF A SHEKEL OF SILVER. I will give that to the man of God, to tell us our way.”
Can you figure out the third factor from those quoted Bible verses?
Don't be perturbed... You will figure it out in less than a minute from now.
As you read above, the conversation started with Saul asking his servant what gift they would give the Prophet when they get to him. Then, at the end of the conversation, the servant said he would give one-fourth of a shekel of silver to him to tell them their way.
That sounded like... let's give him something so that he can tell us our way right? WRONG.
The conversation had no bribing motive whatsoever. Let me tell you what brought about the conversation in the first place.
You see in the Bible days, prophets of God worked solely for God. There was nothing like part-time prophet who had other means of livelihood. For those prophets, all their needs were provided by the Almighty God himself.
So, these prophets never ask anyone that came to them for prophecy for money or material things. Even when God had not given them food for the day and someone rich showed up for consultation, they never saw such as an opportunity to make request for money or food.
Are you surprised?
That act was known by all and sundry. That was why anyone in the Bible days always deemed it fit to visit prophets of God with gifts any time they needed to hear from God through them. It was more or less a bad act to visit a prophet without going with a gift, as those prophets of God worked more or less for free.
Now, listen to me... At any point in time, you ask about the prophetic service of any prophet or prophetess, and people tell you that he or she will ask for cash for some good or obscure reasons, look no further, you've found a fake prophet.
This reminds me of a time a Muslim lady ran to my house for safefy after discovering a close-by church prophetess with her subordinates wanted to use her for a ritual purpose. I discovered after questioning the girl in that same middle of night that the prophetess charged her #70,000 so that she could get some spiritual materials for the lady's work. Right in that instance, I doubted the Muslim lady no more about the ritual allegation she narrated to me earlier, as I knew only fake prophet would request for money for some seemingly genuine reason.
Mind you, some of these false prophets and prophetesses are wiser these days. They may not ask outrightly for money if they don't want to give one a bad impression of themselves. So, they use different tactics to make their visitors become members of their church, even though their visitors already have churches they attend.
After becoming a member of their church, these first-time visitors who came for consultation, will know start paying money for different spiritual stuffs, offerings, tithes etc overtime.
So, instead of a one-time payment thing, they stylishly make it a continual payment for as long as their visitors-turned-members keep attending their church.
For me, I still find it difficult to understand why someone will tell another Christian to attend his or her church when the invited Christian already has a church he or she is attending. IS THAT EVANGELISM?
or
Do we now have different God in different churches?
May the Lord God Almighty help us, all, not fall victim to the schemes of these devilish people disguised as Prophets of God...
Amen.
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