ISSUE 405
Prophetic Brief
Insight and Analysis for the 21st Century
New Video Series
We are living in an unmatched time
in the earth; a time when crisis is
erupting through natural disasters,
political destabilization, and
economic meltdown.   As the meeting began the visiting
Politicians and religious leaders are
all weighing in on these events, but
they don’t seem to have the
answers to a world in intense
distress, and are rightly wondering:
What in the World
is Going On?
In this series of Prophetic Briefs,
Scott Webster addresses questions
that are on people’s minds, and
brings prophetic perspective to the
events happening in the earth
today, so that we can stand
effectively in a day when so many
things are falling apart.
View the first five episodes in the
series “What in the World is Going
On” at scottwebsterministries.org.
© 2011 SCOTT WEBSTER MINISTRIES.
MARCH 9TH 2011
Building a Powerful Church to Thrive During a
Time of Crisis - Part 14
Is There Such a Thing as a Bad Word from God? Part 2
In the early 1980s there were few known prophets in the earth, so it was
exceptional to be sitting in the living room of one of those who was
recognized as a global prophet, and serving in his ministry. I was the
newest member of his team. Kathy and I had gathered with about 15
others to meet and be ministered to by another prophet our mentor had
met in his travels. The second guy looked like a prophet according to
religious stereotypes: tall and thin, sort of hunched over in his shoulders
so when he looked at you it was always from a downward angle. His eyes
could best be described as “beady” –
they were close-set and intense and he
had a glaring stare, and to top it off he
had a long bony finger he pointed at
you with. He seemed to have a gift for
finding sin and, from what we could
tell, he was accurate. He epitomized a
prophet who felt he had to be
adversarial with the rest of the body.
prophet didn’t want to worship or
teach, he just said “ask me questions”
so I asked him some question about
prophets in the Word of God. He responded with: “Yeah, prophets.
Hmmm. Why do you ask, do you think you are a prophet?” The last phrase
was almost literally shouted and it echoed around the living room –
THINK YOU’RE A PROPHET????
Well in fact I did think I was called to be one and that is why I was
serving on the ministry team, but that call was not clearly established and
there was little evident fruit of it at that point in my life. So, I sort of
stammered out a “well I think so” but it was more of a mumbled apology
than a bold proclamation. He then said with great authority “Don’t
compare yourself to me, prophets are all different.” He went on to speak
various words to people, many of which could be categorized as a rebuke.
It was quite an experience for our entire team; for years my friends and I
would break out in cries of “Think you’re a prophet? Don’t compare
yourself to me”.
e Intense Prophet’s Public Ministry
A few days later, the visiting prophet ministered at our weekly meeting
which attracted people who were being awakened to the prophetic from
all across the region. If we thought he was a bit bold, rough and possibly
even arrogant in the private meeting, we soon found out that was nothing
compared to his antics at the church. During the course of his 90 minute
message he took potshots at nearly every other ministry or set of truths in
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 ISSUE 405 MARCH 9TH 2011

1 Kings 21:27
When Ahab heard these words,
he tore his clothes, put on
sackcloth and fasted. He lay in
sackcloth and went around
meekly. 28 en the word of the
LORD came to Elijah the
Tishbite: 29 "Have you noticed
how Ahab has humbled himself
before me? Because he has
humbled himself, I will not bring
this disaster in his day, but I will
bring it on his house in the days
of his son." (NIV)
the body of Christ, and sought to set them straight. At the end he gave a
general invitation for all those who wanted a touch from God to come
forward – well I wasn’t budging because I had seen him in operation and I
knew he was itching to rebuke someone. God can speak “hard words”
to us, but the true word of
One guy who did go to the front was a childhood friend of mine named
Carl. Carl came to the church I was in and got saved. – I had gone to God is always intended for
school with him years before but lost touch until a few months before this our good and it points us
incident. As the prophet laid hands on this new convert in front of the toward a redemptive process
gathered assembly of 200+ people, he said: “You have a filthy mind,
always thinking perverse thoughts. There is a spirit of lust on you.” At this which brings us closer to
point Carl began to cry, I can remember seeing his shoulders shaking as he Him. We have a right to
sobbed in the exposure and embarrassment while this tall, beady-eyed, reject the alleged prophetic
long fingered prophet just stood there and looked down at him. Then the
prophet told him “O.K., you’ve cried enough now, go sit down.” No words of those who are
prayer for him, no deliverance, no comfort or hope. Just exposure for the unseasoned or warped due
sake of the prophet feeling powerful I guess, and a life that was shattered to the distortion within their
– I never saw Carl again, and to this day, I don’t know what happened to
him. own heart, but we have no
right to pick and choose
That was the first and last time that prophet ministered in our church, but from among what the Lord is
as the years went by, we heard many reports that he would go into
churches and minister powerfully, but then when he went back a 2nd or actually saying and keep only
3rd time and the church hadn’t really changed, he blasted everyone in the what we evaluate as “good”.
place, from the pastor down to the newest person. When asked about it If Ahab the notoriously
once, he confessed that if churches didn’t respond to his first visit like he
thought they should, he liked to return and “give ‘em hell.” wicked king could receive a
hard word from God and
I understand why people have a problem with the prophetic today, and repent to the point that it got
why so many are afraid of negative words, corrections and rebukes. I
have sat with people all across the earth as they recount to me, oftentimes God’s attention, then every
through tear-filled eyes, how they have been damaged: misunderstanding, believer today should learn
pain, occultism and witchcraft, manipulation, bad leadership, from these examples and
disobedience, people dying, marriages that never should have happened
but which were decreed by someone’s foolish prophecy, factions within a open their heart to the voice
church fighting against each other by issuing competing prophetic of God – no matter what He
words…the list goes on and on. says!

© 2011 SCOTT WEBSTER MINISTRIES. Page 2 of 5

 ISSUE 405 MARCH 9TH 2011

“Giving Units”
A Developed PROPHETIC
There exists a pseudo-religious view of prophets as adversarial, always
opposing and standing against leaders and the wider church. This comes in PERSPECTIVE
part from the many self-appointed ones – like our friend mentioned above
– who glory far too much in their ability to rebuke and chastise others in A fresh look
the name of the Lord. However, if we are honest, I think we must admit at Prophetic
that the view of prophets as adversarial also originates from those who Operations
impose their carnal views upon the Kingdom of God and then get offended from a
whenever their (wrong) policies or views are questioned by an authentic Kingdom
prophet ministering the voice of God. Viewpoint.

A good friend of mine experienced this many years ago; as a new seminary Now
graduate he was hired as an associate pastor and was even added to the Available>
Board of Trustees that was overseeing the fund raising for constructing a
new facility. The board was made of up successful business men, and the
pastor himself had left a lucrative sales career to enter the ministry and once told my friend he had put at least
$100,000 into the church to get things started and he wanted to get his money out of it.

At the first board meeting my friend participated in, the pastor and his business council discussed the budget for
the new facility and how much money needed to be raised. In this meeting the term “giving units” was used and
there was discussion regarding outreach and evangelism that would increase the giving units in the church that
would allow them to get a loan from a bank.

My friend spoke up and said he didn’t think God could bless an outreach strategy that had fund raising as its
primary motivation – and of course he was right. It is fine to construct a budget and plan, but it is not acceptable
to consider people under your pastoral care as “giving units” or to have a financial motivation tied to their
salvation and destiny. The next day, the senior pastor removed my friend from the board, and he lasted only about
a year as the associate pastor – he resigned and left when he realized the actual mentalities that drove this church
behind-the-scenes. Of course the people never knew why he left, and he was careful not to talk about his private
concerns. As is often the case, there were explanations of his departure that were spun to reflect negatively on
him: he was not faithful, not really called, the guy was rebellious to authority, he would not align himself with the
vision, etc.

After my friend had departed the building began to go up, but then a massive storm headed towards the area and
the senior pastor went out and stood on the floor of his incomplete facility to pray the storm away. The winds
were so strong they collapsed the walls and the entire edifice came crashing down, though the pastor was
miraculously not harmed. God was reaching out to this man, seeking to get him to repent and be restored as he
destroyed his idolatrous building while protecting the man himself. This true story has many of the qualities of
Balaam’s deficiency, especially how this man could be so blind that he thought he had the power to stand in faith
against the storm when God was sending the winds to destroy what he had built on a false premise. God warned
him through my friend – and probably many other times we are not aware of – but still he persisted in his own
way.

© 2011 SCOTT WEBSTER MINISTRIES. Page 3 of 5

 ISSUE 405 MARCH 9TH 2011

My friend was a prophet in the making and didn’t know at the time how rotten the ministry he had been hired by
really was. It is only in retrospect that he can look back and realize that he had diagnosed a core area of deficiency
in a man’s life and addressed it to the best of his ability, but because the man didn’t listen God continued to
escalate His interventions into the man’s life to try and save him. What looked at the time like a failure – my
friend having to leave the church and people thinking he wasn’t qualified for leadership – was in fact success.
Although that experience cost my friend his job, his reputation and many friends, his correct stance caused him to
move towards the Lord. In the succeeding decades he has come into the fullness of that calling and he now serves
as one of the prophets in our network.

And what looked like success – a church with many people building a new facility – was experiencing God’s
displeasure. The church eventually folded after the building collapsed and the pastor later had his ministry
finances investigated by federal agencies for allegations of wrongdoing. God is truly watching every interaction,
weighing our heart response to difficult words which are intended as loving correction in order to prevent even
greater future judgment in our lives.

Is God Adversarial?
God told the first man that “when you eat of it you will surely die”, and when man transgressed, God cursed him,
the woman, the serpent and the entire earth. He then drove man out of the garden lest he “stretch out his hand
and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever” (Gen 3:22). This is worse than a “bad word” – God
Himself cursed the man and everything else in sight! Yet when we consider the possible outcomes of man’s sin,
there are only three scenarios which could have unfolded.

First, when Adam rebelled, God could have totally annihilated mankind, wiping his existence from the face of the
earth; but that wasn’t an option because God had eternal purpose for man before he was ever created. Second,
man could have been allowed to stay in the garden and eat of the tree of life after he had sinned, thereby dooming
him to an eternal existence of depravity, fallen-ness and rejection (Gen 3:21). That was an unthinkable reality in
God’s mind and would have been the most severe punishment – eternal life under the brokenness of disobedience
and disapproval. The third option is the one that God exercised – He cursed the disobedience and rebellion of
humanity and consigned man to a temporary state of deficient existence filled with pain so that man would
recognize his lack and move back to God.

The divinely pronounced curses of Genesis 3 – which echo down through the corridors of human history – must
be heard for what they actually are: the opening act in the drama of human redemption. God was good to curse
our mortality so we could move towards redemption and immortality!!! This ultimate example makes it clear that
the only “bad word” is one that does not point to a redemptive process.

Elijah continually rebuked Ahab and when the prophet turned up as Ahab seized Naboth’s vineyard, which he had
gained through deceit and murder, he called Elijah “my enemy” (1 Kings 21:20). If he thought Elijah was against
him before, he was about to get a double portion of rebuke: Elijah told him that dogs would lick up the blood of
his wife, his sons and also of his own corpse. The “hard words” spoken to Ahab were intended to get him to
repent. God cursed man and Elijah cursed Ahab: “Dogs will eat your descendants, and will lick the blood of
Jezebel off the ground.” How else does a person know to repent except through confrontation of God’s divine
standards?

Even Ahab in all his wickedness and disobedience, was at least somewhat impacted by these words: 1 Kings
21:27 When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and fasted. He lay in sackcloth and
went around meekly. 28 Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah the Tishbite: 29 "Have you noticed how Ahab
has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself, I will not bring this disaster in his day, but I
will bring it on his house in the days of his son." (NIV)

God is Looking for a Good Response

Some observations about the Lord’s dealings with Ahab through Elijah: a) we can see how quick God is to forgive
and to accept our repentance – even wicked Ahab received a dispensation of grace. God asked Elijah “have you
noticed how Ahab has humbled himself before me?” God was looking at Ahab’s heart and hoping for a good
response – and He was swift to note it and communicate it to Elijah b) Elijah was just as tuned in and able to hear
God’s forgiveness and cancellation of judgments as he was His decrees of death towards Ahab. Unlike the prophet

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 ISSUE 405 MARCH 9TH 2011

mentioned above, Elijah had no stake in judging people – his internal

man had been conformed to God’s motivation and he was delighted to
see movement in people’s heart towards the Lord.

So from these true life experiences, we can see further into the dynamics
of prophetic operations and realize that yes, God can speak “hard words”
to us, but the true word of God is always intended for our good and it 2778 Cumberland Blvd
points us toward a redemptive process which brings us closer to Him.
We have a right to reject the alleged prophetic words of those who are Suite 163
unseasoned or warped due to the distortion within their own heart, but Symrna GA 30080
we have no right to pick and choose from among what the Lord is Tel: 678.302.3052
actually saying and keep only what we evaluate as “good”. If Ahab the admin@scottwebsterministries.org
notoriously wicked king could receive a hard word from God and repent www.scottwebsterministries.org
to the point that it got God’s attention, then every believer today should © 2011 Scott Webster Ministries.
learn from these examples and open their heart to the voice of God – no All Rights Reserved.
matter what He says!

Releasing The New Prophetic Dimension • Activating The Capacity To Build • Obeying The Command To Finish

© 2011 SCOTT WEBSTER MINISTRIES. Page 5 of 5