Thursday, October 25, 2018

End Times - Mathew 24:11 - False Prophets


By Odon Bulamba

It’s a joy to be here and I praise God to see all of you.  This morning I wasn’t sure if I will be here today because I felt sick and I was telling myself, if I feel sick now, what is going to happen, no one will have the opportunity to hear what God wants us to hear this morning.  I started to feel better and now I am here.

Mathew 24:11, here Jesus is talking about the end of times.  Many prophets will arise and will mislead a lot of people and believers.  How can false prophets will come into the church and mislead so many people who have known God for many years? 

First, we have gifts of the Holy Spirit and ministries and we also have the Word of God but many Christians today hate the Word of God and don’t have time for it.  When you talk about other ministries, they find it boring but when a prophet stands up and talks about what will happen in their physical lives, people will be happy.  For example, “in two days’ time you will win lotto”.  Or someone tells you, “God has said what you are going through will end and you will get healing, God spoke to me,”  we feel it’s a good message because our ears only want to hear what pleases our feelings.

This is how satan has set the trap in the church.  When I was child, my uncle asked me what would I choose between money and wisdom?  I said, “Money.  What about you uncle?” and he said, “wisdom”.  I said, “I choose money because money because I need money”.  My uncle asked, “Do you say that I don’t have wisdom and that’s why I ask for it?”.  He was offended.

My mother slapped me, “never say that to people”.  As an innocent child, my choice was money and my words told my uncle it was a wrong choice.  Today prophecy relies on people.  If you look in the Bible, the prophets will tell you exactly what God wants you to say but prophets today are vague so you find your own interpretation.

Jesus is warning us, when false prophets come, that is the end times.  A prophecy is to tell you what is going to happen in the future.  It’s not the best gift because we don’t need it every day because we all know what is going to happen.  The false prophets don’t stick on the Bible but say things about your day to day life but when it’s a matter of spiritual things, they talk less about eternal life.  Good prophets will say, “it is written in the Word and you church have forgotten”.  False prophets tell you, you won’t pass away.  To pass away is normal but they just want you to feel happy and please you. 

In Africa, we have plenty of those prophets.  Most of them consult with witches and they meet with you and tell you your entire life and tell you what you did yesterday and it is the truth but they are false prophets, they are being used by satan to tell you what is going to happen.  “In 10 mins, you will receive a call and they will tell you this and that”.  Then the friend calls you and it’s exactly what the false prophet said would happen.  How not to believe such a person and once you believe, you will start to follow him.

In many churches, believers don’t follow Jesus but their pastors and prophets.  When they face a challenge, they go back to the prophet and the prophet says, “you face that because of this and that but you can change it by doing this”.  We discover that people no longer put trust in Jesus but in human beings.  If your pastor is not there, then you feel that God doesn’t exist and your prayers are blind because the pastor is the only person who can help us.

These false prophets are like mobile phone, “I can’t live without it”.  I trust my phone to send a message to where I want.  Once I opened a Facebook page and I had hundreds of people who wanted to request my friendship.  If you have lots of friends, you might become famous.  The only friend you need is Jesus.  None of those friends on Facebook spoke to me about Jesus.

When the false prophets come to church everyone wants to talk to them.  For example, everyone in the church wants to talk to the prophet (maybe called Elijah) but he won’t have the courage to them those coming to him to go to Jesus, instead he will say, “I will pray and God will take care of it”.  The false prophets use the name of God but what they are doing is not from God.  Don’t be foolish to think that because someone uses the name of Jesus, that they are from Jesus.  Jesus warned us that those that come in my name are not all from me.

Why do we prefer prophets rather than Word of God?    The Word of God is life and truth but prophets are not life and not always truth.  Why give our heart, soul and mind to prophecies?  Jesus said, “follow Me”.  There is only one way to heaven but we focus on prophecies and put aside Jesus.  Satan uses that gift more and more because it is our weakness.  We don’t want prayers or preachings, just prophecies.

When was the last time your heart felt that you need to hear from a prophet about a situation?  We change them to be magicians – they give solution to our problem.  I had someone calling on my phone and it looks like it comes from Australia but it’s from another country and they don’t explain what they are doing but they tell me it’s about business.  Some people could be trapped.  When we talk about money it’s easy to fall into a trap.  False prophets come to your ears to hear something you like (like the phone call) to buy your soul. 

In Africa, they don’t talk about the Word of God but healings.  Prophets only talk about healings, becoming wealthy, being happy.  If your marriage is not good, see the prophet.  Prophets are the ones standing up in the church, if you want God to bless you, come and see me.  They pass a handkerchief above your head and whatever you ask for, you will get it.

Apostle (someone Odon knows), he will do miracles and people say amen using his name.  If you want to disturb someone, steal their phone.  I’ve seen someone leave their handbag behind but not their phone, they must go back for their phone.  If you ask to see someone’s phone, they won’t let you because there are secrets held on the phone (even between married couples).  Those are the type of things I am using as example about false prophets.

A phone can be destroyed, it’s not confidential (the phone provider can see it and even keep a copy), and when you send a message, they can block the message and it won’t reach the destination.  Satan uses the false prophets to come in our lives like spiritual phone provider and controls all the situations between God and ourselves.  At some point the false prophet will interrupt your communication with God and you won’t be able to talk any time to God without first talking to the prophet.  I’ve seen women do all things for the prophet but not the husband.  E.g. the prophet says o be at church at 6am, she will be there but if her husband asks her to do something, she doesn’t.

We can spend hours listening to prophets but not even one hour to pray to God.  We can’t even be there without falling asleep.  Whenever we leave Jesus to be by Himself, we fall asleep. When Jesus wakes us up, we will wake up for 2 seconds but fall back asleep.  When you are tired and your faith is dying and things are tough in your life, satan knows this is the right time to attack, “because they love God, let me send a prophet”.

A prophet will tell you what you are going through and tell you, “God has told me this and that will happen”.  When Jesus left the earth, He said He will leave us the Holy Spirit to find consolation but today we find consolation in human beings.  We forget about the Holy Spirit.  When I feel sad, the Holy Spirit comforts me because I know that human beings can’t take away my sadness.  I need someone who can comfort me.  My solution should be Jesus, not human beings.  God can use human beings to bring solution but we must pray to God first.

Satan knows we love those who bring nice messages.  One day my phone went dead.  I had all my contacts in that phone.  Everything was in that phone.  How will I get back those messages?  I went to Vodafone and they fixed everything and it all came back to normal.  Who is that person who knows you inside out?  Is it Jesus or the prophet?  Many Christians will go astray.

I encourage you to love Jesus and the Word of God.  Whenever you face a challenge, talk to Jesus rather than giving your faith to a prophet.  Look at the prophets in the Bible, people never went to see prophets but rather prophets went to see the people and the prophets didn’t give prophecy every day.  Today, prophets must give a message every day you see them and it’s only about your physical life, they don’t talk about spiritual things. 

Prophets today won’t tell you about your sin and to repent but tell you it’s ok.  One day you will stand in front of God and He will tell you, “I warned you about false prophets, why did you get mislead”.  God has given us intelligence to not be deceived.

Three friends were together walking and one was in trouble.  The second one said, “drink alcohol and you will forget the problem”.  He drank until he was drunk and he lost his mind and instead of taking the problem away, it created greater problems. 

The Holy Spirit is the only one we were given to guide us and teach us of the things that will come.  Our target is to go to heaven.  Do we pray only for our physical problems or to prepare our eternal lives? Take your life seriously.  You must carry your own cross.  It might be heavy but accept to carry it.  A prophet might give a message but ask God to confirm it.

Pray for God to help us to be awake and to see God every time.  Pray God to keep our eyes open. Sleep can take you far away in your dreams and many false prophets can take you far away from God.

No comments:

Post a Comment