The role of the five-fold ministry is to train the people in the things of God. We are to teach and train people to become the full measure of the man that God has ordained. The goal is to lead people to the place where they are able to stand solidly upon the word of God and onto produce ripe, mature fruit in God’s timing.
Pharaohs were considered to be both man and god. The “Pharaoh Mentality,” teaches and trains believers to look to the pastor(s) as a type of both man and God to fulfill their every need, pray every prayer for them and be at their every beck and call. This ultimately keep them in the perpetual state of a spiritual immaturity. The Pharaoh spirit works on the other side of the equation to feed the ego of pastors and sets them up, wittingly or unwittingly, to be objects of idolatry. This spirit works to change the focus of the believer from worshiping the True and Living God to worshiping the pastor. The believer often unknowingly worships and adores the ‘charisma’ of the leader rather than God. This worship, in all forms, is merely a charismatic version of the substitution of man in between the believer and God. We have seen the same type of substitution of man for God via the substitution of Mary instead of Jesus Christ within the Catholic Church. Wise pastors will always point the believer to God and take themselves off the pedestal of idolatry. This practice of the Pharaoh Mindset in churches MUST STOP!
Every child of God must take the necessary steps to develop his own spiritual walk, study the Word of God and exercise his spiritual muscles. We are all called to that place where we will eventually stand strong and lend a helping hand to others. Part of this process is developing our spiritual eyes and ears.
“The hearing ear, and the seeing eye, the LORD hath made even both of them.” – Prov. 20:12
Learning to discern the voice of the Spirit needs to be an earnest daily quest. Hearing His gentle voice and partaking of His sweet fellowship must be the desire of our hearts. In doing so, we eliminate the need to pull upon others to give us what only God can give us that being His direction, His words of encouragement, wisdom and knowledge. It eliminates the need for us to look to others to give us a “word” at every turn as is so often found within certain prophetic circles.
As we walk and develop our prophetic gifting, we must not yield to those who will undoubtedly pull upon the prophetically gifted to become their own personal prophet or ‘genie in the bottle’. We must remember that prophets and prophetic people are God’s mouthpiece. Refrain yourselves from allowing others to pull upon your gift, to make you a Pharaoh and hoist you to the top of the pillar of idolatry.
We remember being in relationship with a lady at one time who would continually call us for a “word” for her life. Initially, we would pray and seek God on her behalf, then share what God had given us. However, over time we saw a pattern develop. She would pull upon us, we would minister to her but in the long scheme of things, the words were rejected. She would continue doing what was in her heart to do all along. We became a religious trinkets to her that tickled her sense of religiosity. She did not want the true “word of God”. She was only seeking a word that would line up with her will rather than seeking God’s Will. If we had continued to give her words after we had discovered her pattern, we would have become Pharoah pastors and mere prophetic trinkets to her.
Judges 17 tells the story of a man named Micah. This man was an example of someone who wanted the appearance of God but was an idolater. He sought after and found a man who was a Levite (of priestly heritage) to be his ’godly’ mouthpiece made in his own image. How many times and how often do people attempt to make their leader(s) into their own image of who they think they should be? Let us not be those who are made in the image of man, but rather that of God. Let us not make prophets into our own image but embrace the truth that God releases through them.
May God’s Grace Abundantly Rain In Your Lives,
Apostle Ric & Prophetess Kathy Steele
The Prophetic Voice 