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It has been many years since I've experienced this gift. The first time I didn't actually know what was happening. I was getting what I was going to say about a split second before I said it. It was me speaking, but I wasn't the author of it. I was trying to explain to a group at a Bible study that salvation was not by works when the Holy Spirit spoke through me explaining that.

Does anyone else relate to my experiences? Are there published testimonies from Christians about their own personal experiences with the gift of prophecy?

DDover
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  • FWIW, this isn't the kind of question we usually allow on the site since it invites personal discussion rather than scholarly (or pseudo-scholarly) Q&A, but I'll let the community decide whether to close it. I think all you'd have to do is remove the words "in you" from the question title. – Peter Turner Dec 30 '21 at 15:10
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    @PeterTurner - I made a few changes in an attempt to make the question sound more objective and on-topic. Feel free to roll back. –  Dec 30 '21 at 16:40
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    I believe petitioning anecdotal experience should be allowed in the research of a subject and I'm glad, at least in the subheading, it was re-written to include anyone who can relate to my experience. – DDover Dec 30 '21 at 21:59

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If this falls within the category of "gift of prophesy" then here is how it manifested one time, from my perspective:

Every three weeks, in a job I previously held, I used to drive past a place where a homeless man sat, with a sign, seeking alms. I saw him there on the way to and sometimes from that location for the better part of a year.

One day, on the way in, the Holy Spirit said to me "Give him your lunch." I replied, "My lunch? But I'm already hungry." Silence was the response. This was an internal conversation but it is difficult to explain, if you've never experienced it, how that the Holy Spirit's voice plainly did not originate within me and yet appeared in my mind.

I parked my van to enter the jobsite, making a Gideonesque deal with the Lord, "If he is still there on the way out, I will give him my lunch." This may seem like compliance but, actually, I was trying to squirm out of His command since I would be inside for at least three hours and the homeless man was not always there on the way out. I still had silence as a reply.

After finishing my work and getting back in the van I took my lunch (in a classic little brown paper bag), put in the only $5 in my wallet and a small gospel of John pamphlet, and briefly prayed over it ending with a reminder (to the Lord) that the deal (that I had made) only held if the man was still there.

Approaching the intersection where the man begged I could see that he was still there. I began to wonder if I should just toss the bag out to him if the light remained green or call him over if I stopped several car lengths away. I also began to wonder if the Lord would give me a pass in the name of traffic safety (I was very hungry). Needless to say the light turned red and I had to stop right alongside the homeless man's position.

I rolled the window down and called to him, beckoning him over. As he approached I handed the lunch bag out the window saying, "This is for you". He took the bag and reached out to shake my hand saying, "God bless you". As I opened my mouth to say "You're welcome" or some such I was instead very surprised to hear myself say, with startling vehemence, "No! God bless you! He loves you and He has a plan for your life!"

Wide eyed, the man jerked his hand back as though stung, and I am sure my eyes were wide also as I had felt something pass between us in the touch and the words I spoke seemed to come through me rather than from me. The light turned green just then (I could tell by the car horns sounding behind me) and I drove away, shocked. I never saw that homeless man there again.

  • As a funny side note, the Conservative Baptist Church I grew up in after being saved was palpably uncomfortable with this and similar experiences!
Mike Borden
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    As a funny side note, the Conservative Baptist Church I grew up in after being saved was palpably uncomfortable with this and similar experiences! - did you eventually switch denominations? –  Dec 30 '21 at 20:43
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    +1 Thank you for including the details of your experience so a reader (like me) can imagine how the Holy Spirit might interact with us and how we might perceive and respond. It would be great if one day the homeless man shares with you whether what you said was an especially timely message from God that he needed for his faith life. If that's the case, it can bolster the case for categorizing this encounter as a prophecy similar to 1 Cor 14:24-25. – GratefulDisciple Dec 30 '21 at 22:03
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    @Mike, to clarify your experience, when you said, "very surprised to hear myself say" did you perceive the words were not your own, that you were an audience to what you were saying. Also, you wrote, "Wide eyed, the man jerked his hand back as though stung." I've read the gift of prophecy gives understanding to the hearer; do you think that is what was going on? Like you I was raised in the Baptist tradition where this is not a subject. – DDover Dec 30 '21 at 22:18
  • @SpiritRealmInvestigator I did move on to another church but it was many years later and not directly related. – Mike Borden Dec 31 '21 at 00:06
  • @GratefulDisciple I would like to know how he is doing but I don't know if I will ever see him again. – Mike Borden Dec 31 '21 at 00:07
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    @DDover I did not have the impression that the words were sourced within me. It's like I didn't think them first. As for the touch...I hesitate to make this connection but it is so descriptive as regarding how it felt... When the woman with an issue of blood touched Jesus and he felt power go out of him. I don't know if he felt something or what it may have been like if he did, I can only report his reaction. Other than that, I have no words. – Mike Borden Dec 31 '21 at 00:12
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    @Mike, interesting. I didn't have an experience of something going out from me, as I recall, but I didn't touch anyone. Perhaps since your message said, "Bless you," a blessing was conveyed. I've only experienced this gift twice, both times many years ago. The second time occurred while I was preaching on a passage in Revelation. In both instances I heard people moaning, like in agreement. Not being familiar with the gift I didn't know what was happening. I was told it gives understanding to the hearer, reflected in the moans, I believe. So, your homeless man got something. – DDover Dec 31 '21 at 00:45
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    I don't really know. That particular experience is a stand alone for me. I can only trust that the Lord did something for that man. My personal belief is that the "list" of spiritual gifts is not a limitation but an outline and that most people receive some mix of giftedness in order to display the multi-faceted grace of God. (1 Peter 4:10) – Mike Borden Dec 31 '21 at 00:49
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    @GratefulDisciple - Here is a similar testimony that includes hearing God's voice and a homeless man: My testimony of Jesus Christ changing my life from routine christian to true follower of Christ –  Dec 31 '21 at 16:11
  • @SpiritRealmInvestigator That's a good one for the testimony's specificity (even more than Mike Borden's). Why do I call it 'good'? Couldn't it be from demon? It's good because for Shanomar, and possibly for James the homeless guy as well, the effect / result / fruit of the "prophecy" (or should we call it "impression"?) they become closer to the Christian God. We know this only because Shanomar talked about his understanding about the God of the experience, matching the Biblical understanding of God. Without that "debrief" there is not enough "testing of the spirit". (tbc) – GratefulDisciple Dec 31 '21 at 20:21
  • @SpiritRealmInvestigator The prophetic standard statement is very much applicable here. It is within the realm of possibility, even for a cessationist (who labels this "impression"), because Christians believe in God who is present with us in every situation (Ps 139), who could insert himself & speak to us at timely moments within nature. As for the "miracle-ness" of this experience, I would categorize it at most as type 3, which places an emphasis on the receiver's frame of mind more than anything else. – GratefulDisciple Dec 31 '21 at 20:27
  • @GratefulDisciple - if you want to more examples, here is a testimony about leading people to Jesus through words of knowledge, and here is another one from the perspective of someone who received a word of knowledge from someone else. –  Dec 31 '21 at 21:34
  • @SpiritRealmInvestigator For cessationist like myself (BTW I'm back to being cessationist in the sense that I'm open to timely healing/communication as God initiated action to specific beneficiary but not as God's endowing someone with "spiritual gift") watching more testimonies wouldn't change a thing, since it's the doctrinal aspect of the framing/testing/communal-fruit of that experience that's critical, not the experience itself, no matter whether it is called / came in the form of word of knowledge, dream, impression, prophecy, etc. – GratefulDisciple Dec 31 '21 at 21:54
  • @SpiritRealmInvestigator I know someone who regularly receives this impression/direction, BUT becames over reliant on it (sometimes cannot make a decision like whether to go to a grocery store on a particular day until hearing something from God) and labels someone who does NOT seek and hear the voice to be "cultural Christian" who does not have the Holy Spirit in them. To me this is quite telling that EITHER the voice is coming from demon (if it overrides her own judgment, compelling her to do things she doesn't want), OR she's being influenced by the devil to frame it wrongly. – GratefulDisciple Dec 31 '21 at 21:56
  • @GratefulDisciple - Are her impressions accurate though? Words of knowledge are special because they provide accurate knowledge about something that the person shouldn't have known otherwise. Does she receive revelations that turn out to be accurate? –  Dec 31 '21 at 22:04
  • Let us continue this discussion in chat. – GratefulDisciple Dec 31 '21 at 22:07