Desperate For A Word

I went through a two-year period where my thinking and emotions seemed to "go crazy" when I got around someone who was giving personal prophecies. I wanted to receive a word so desperately. When I did not receive one, I would go away feeling very frustrated, and often miffed (upset at the situation). Most of the time I kept my emotions/feelings hidden, but occasionally I would become so frustrated I would mutter complaints about the prophet and/or the ministry time under my breath. I remember one time some of my friends heard me muttering after I'd not received a word and I was so embarrassed.

When mature and reasonable people are really frustrated, they can think and react in childish or "crazy" ways. We see this happen in prophetic settings where people can get anxious about whether they will receive a word. (I just shared one example from my own past.)

Now I am on the other side of the fence. I seldom struggle with that desperation to receive a word. But now I end up ministering to a lot of people who struggle with it. Many struggle with this anxiety to some degree or another. There are a lot of very reasonable people who become unreasonable or demanding because they want to receive a word. The worst in them can manifest itself when this happens. Most of the time, people do not express their anger or frustration directly to the prophetic minister, but some do.

The Reasonable Scenarios

There are many ways people may express this frustration or manifest "craziness" for a word. The "socially acceptable" way is to talk to someone about it. I remember doing this late in 1994. I was at a meeting where they prophesied to everyone except two of us. I went to the prophet after the meeting to ask him about it. I shared how I always seemed to get skipped when almost everyone else got prophesied to. I asked him if he knew why this was happening or what I might do about it. It was a very friendly and reasonable conversation, but also a very short one. The prophet was clueless as to why I never received any words. (In the back of my mind, I hoped that he would give me a word, since he did not have an explanation for me. But he did not do that.) The prophet was polite, but not very helpful. He had no idea why I was skipped and suggested I "pray about it and ask God." I walked away feeling just as frustrated because I had nicely asked for advice and had been "politely brushed off."

If a person comes to you in a nice way at an appropriate time, please try to help them understand some of the reasons why they may not receive a word. (You can give them the URL to this teaching series if they have Internet access.) They are genuinely puzzled and they are seeking answers to help them understand what is going on. If you have the time and desire, you might give them a short word. If you are exhausted from ministering (or if you are one of those who can give words only when the Spirit is leading you that way), then you might want to pray a short encouraging prayer with them. Give them enough of a personal touch that they go away feeling loved, even if they don't get a prophetic word. Love them and give them some understanding of the principles shared in the first three lessons, and it will help them.

Let me share another "reasonable" scenario. Assume that you have ministered some personal prophecies in a public meeting. Then someone (frequently a long line of people) comes up to you after the meeting. If they are bold, they may ask you point blank if you have a personal word for them. Usually, most people will share a "prayer request" with you. They will describe a complex situation where they feel the need to hear clearly from God. When they ask you to pray for them, most of the time they really mean, "will you prophesy into this situation for me?" In this particular context, they don't usually want your prayers, they want answers from God. If you do what they request and merely pray for them, they will often go away still feeling frustrated because they did not get any answers.

If the Holy Spirit quickens a word to you or gives you some sort of prophetic insight, by all means share it with them. If the Lord tells you to minister to the person, be sure you do so. The Lord may want you to give them pastoral counsel instead of an "answer." That is a perfectly valid response. Just be clear that you are sharing pastoral counsel or your personal advice with them and that it is not a prophetic word. Or you may feel led to pray prophetically for their situation. By all means, when God gives any sort of clear leading in a ministry situation, follow His leading.

Most of the time, the Lord doesn't jump in with some sort of immediate guidance. That means you have to decide whether or not to prophesy to that person. A lot of factors enter into this. For instance, you may be too drained from earlier ministry to do prophetic ministry. Or you may feel great, but have some real time constraints. Or there may be so many people waiting to talk with you that you don't want to minister to everyone or you will never get home. You should always throw up a quick prayer -- "Lord is this one You want me to minister to right now?" If He says "Yes," you have to do what He says. But if He says "No," then you have the option of not having a word for them. Do not allow people's needs and desires to drive you in ministry. Your target is to be Spirit-led at all times. If the spirit is not leading, it is OK to put up limits and say, "Sorry, I can't minister to you right now."

In the early days, I used to think I had to minister to everyone who asked me to. The problem was that there were so many people who came up for ministry that simple logistics made this next to impossible. I remember one conference I had so many people come up for ministry that I missed my entire dinner break, had no rest between sessions and was not able to eat. I found that I was not very sharp as I preached in the evening session because I was exhausted from ministering through the entire break. And it was harder to hear words for people during ministry time. I was upset afterward. In my quiet time that evening, I asked God why He did not release an extra anointing to carry me through the evening service. He told me that He had given me common sense to know that I needed to eat and rest between sessions and I did not exercise it. He told me point blank that I needed to set limits and not minister to everyone who comes to me. I have to look to Him for direction instead of just ministering personally to everyone.

Last March, I started to get into a similar situation. Every time I tried to leave the afternoon session, another person would come up and request ministry or want to talk to me. Someone was making a special dinner for me that evening, so I really did need to go. So I began explaining to people that I was sorry, but I needed to go to dinner now and that I could not talk to them now. I tried to be loving in the way I said it, and everyone appeared to understand.

If you can't minister to someone when they come up to you, give them a short explanation of why you can't. Use warm tones. If you have time, pray a short blessing on them. If the matter is pressing, you might arrange a better time to meet with them later, or you might just do a short prayer for them regarding their situation. If you have to say no to someone who comes with a reasonable request for ministry, do it in a loving way. Most people are reasonable and they will accommodate you or understand if it is a bad time for you to minister to them.

Other Ways To Facilitate 'Fair' Ministry

If you come in as a guest minister, plan some prophesy time into your "speaking time." E.g., Instead of doing an hour teaching, teach for 40 minutes and plan to prophesy for 20. Check with the pastor or meeting facilitator before the meeting and see how much ministry time has been allotted, what the people there are used to or expect, etc. Plan accordingly. If you feel you will be too worn out to do an in-depth teaching and personal ministry, shorten your teaching time to have something left so you can do personal prophetic ministry. In general, you should minister to at least four or five people at a meeting if you give longish words. But it is better if you can minister to more than that. If you spend five minutes per person, you can minister to nine people in 45 minutes. There should be a time in most meetings were you prophesy to individuals as a part of the service. In other words, you pick out specific people and share their words through the microphone so everyone can hear what God says to them. I advise that you don't do this for more than 45 minutes, or it will become too much for those not receiving words to sit through. If you tend toward short (one- or two-minute) words, try to hit at least 15 to 20 people.

Be fair about who you select to prophesy to. Don't select only members of the staff and the worship team. When you select people to minister to, try to select people from different parts of the room. Don't favor the front or the back, the left or the right side. Remember that you are ministering to the entire room, not just a little section of it. So don't select people who are all sitting in the same area.

If there is a large crowd, plan to do some corporate ministry instead of only personal ministry. You might want to intersperse corporate words with personal words. There are a couple of ways you can do it. You can give corporate words that apply to everyone in the room. Or you can call up groups of people who meet some special criteria ("couples who have young children living at home," or "those who have been going through a dry time for several months," or those who have a certain type of physical illness, etc) and prophesy to them. If you have ministry teams at your disposal, ask the ministry teams to individually pray for those in the group you just prophesied to. While the teams pray for them, you can select a person sitting in another portion of the room and begin prophesying to that person.

If you can't minister to a lot of people during the ministry time, you might want to announce that you will be available to minister to people individually after service. You can dismiss those who need to go and invite those who want personal ministry to come to a designated area (usually the front) to minister to them. This gives people who have not been selected a chance to come up for ministry. That way they don't feel left out or passed by.

The next suggestions are more for the organizers of the services and meetings. When you have a guest prophet in for a prophetic service or conference, realize that everyone who comes will want a word, but the prophet(s) won't be able to minister to them all. Set up prophetic teams, using your own people if possible, who can help with the ministry load at specified times. (It is helpful to have ministry "slots" that people can sign up for.)

Another suggestion is to have a trained ministry team who is able to pray for people and give short prophetic words. Have the ministry team come up front to the ministry area after the main speaker is through and the meeting is over. Announce an open ministry time where anyone who desires ministry can come up and the ministry team will pray for them. It is helpful if you can have the worship team or a worship tape playing softly in the background while they minister. In other words, provide opportunities for those who urgently want ministry to receive it from your trained teams.

The more people you have ministering, the greater number of people will have ministry opportunities. This means that they can go away feeling their needs have been dealt with and that they have been ministered to.