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Jan. 21, 2019 - Jim Bakker Show
04:55
New Era of Prophecy - Larry Sparks on The Jim Bakker Show
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Time Text
Revival After Revival 00:03:52
That's excellent the way you put it.
Larry, what is the new era you're talking about?
Well, for 2,000 years, I mean, I'm a little bit of a revival history kind of geek.
I don't know how else to say it.
I got my Master of Divinity from Regent studying church history and renewal.
And for the last 2,000 years, we've been in a season where we've seen revival after revival, awakening after awakening.
And a lot of them have not been sustained.
A lot of them you see, they start in this year and they end in this year.
And I'm like, God, why aren't we seeing revival sustained?
And now all of a sudden, you have all these people prophesying, Tim Sheets, Dutch Sheets, Chuck Pierce, Lana Vosser, talking about a new era.
I'm like, God, I don't want hype.
I don't want something that's repackaged in new language that we've been saying year after year after year.
Because can I just, I'm going to have a therapy moment right here on stage.
Like, as a prophetic person, a prophet, for the last several years, just being honest, okay?
We need to be honest about this stuff.
Yes.
I've heard a lot of words, a lot of prophetic words, from people I trust and respect, and I know they're globally recognized prophets.
And I feel like I'm hearing the same word year after year, maybe repackaged in different language, of course.
And I'm like, God, why aren't they happening?
Why aren't they coming to pass?
And I started getting aggravated and frustrated.
And the Lord said, Larry, the prophets will prophesy.
And I'm like, okay, that's a no-brainer.
Of course, the prophets will prophesy.
He said, no, the prophets will keep prophesying.
They will keep saying what I'm saying until people actually partner with the prophetic words.
Until my church, until my people actually live, think, function, act, and pray like that prophetic word is actually true.
Because a prophetic word is conditional.
New Testament prophetic word, there are some things that, you know, Jesus is coming back.
You can vote yes, you can vote no.
Jesus is coming back.
That is an established, set-in-time prophetic word.
But it is one of those things when you get personal prophecies, promises that you know are from the Lord, corporate prophecies, prophecies over nations.
There is a responsibility.
There is an obedience.
And while I was here in this wonderful facility, I was up in the room and the Lord's like, I'm going to tell you how prophecy comes to pass.
I said, okay.
He said, look at Genesis 12 with Abram.
Abram gets a word of the Lord.
God tells him to go somewhere.
He tells him to leave his family, leave that country and go to a different place.
God gives him an instruction.
God gives him this amazing promise.
I'll bless you.
I'll make you a great nation.
And you know, we love those prophecies and promises of blessing.
We love the prophecies that tell us of all the great things God is going to do.
And then we get frustrated.
Why isn't happening?
Well, Abram answers the question.
You know what he did?
It says, he did as the Lord instructed.
He did as the Lord instructed.
So that's why we have this prophetic words 2019 book.
These aren't just words to encourage us, although they will, but these are words that invite us and summon us to participate with God through prayer, through activity, through obedience.
Because you know what?
We've been in a new era since Pentecost.
Pentecost was a new era 2,000 years ago when the Holy Spirit came and was released into the earth.
Here's the deal: we've had revival after revival, awakening after awakening.
Why aren't we seeing things sustained?
Every revival was an invitation for the church to actually change its wineskin.
Every revival was an invitation for Christianity to look different, to actually change its operating system.
To the degree that we accommodate what God is saying and doing, that is the degree to which we will step into a new era.
Powerful.
Good.
Very good.
I understand that.
Why was it important to put this book together, do you think?
I want to represent a community or a collective of prophetic voices that God's raising up.
Excellent.
How did you choose these people?
Yeah.
Through prayer.
Honestly, prayer, relationship, accountability.
Different Streams, Same Source 00:01:17
Anybody in this book are people I know.
They're people I trust.
They're people I walk with.
They're people who I know are two things.
They are aligned with their peers and they are accountable to spiritual mothers and fathers.
That keeps prophets in a place of safety.
When you begin to research for the book, did anything surprise you or shock you or any of the words that they were sending to you for this book?
Yeah, what surprises me and shocks me in all the best ways is that you have different streams.
You have different people and different groups in Christianity represented in this book.
How much some of the language is similar, how close, how similar we are sometimes when we let we cannot let distinction become division.
That's good.
Because there's different denominations, there are different streams.
Obviously, we all want to stand on the uncompromised word of God.
We do not want to go off the page.
But there are different distinctives about these different prophetic voices.
And rather than see it as a point of division, saying, you know what, I don't like how they do that.
I don't like how they do that.
If it's wrong and not biblical, then we don't want anything to do with it.
If it's just different, unique, and maybe representing another side of the character and nature of God, I want to learn how to celebrate distinction.
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