Exercising Dominion through Power Sharing. The Prophetic is an Exercise in Power Sharing Genesis...

Exercising Dominion through

PowerSharing

The Prophetic is an Exercise in Power Sharing

Genesis 1:28

• And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

God communicates with mankind to

empower him to rule.

Description of life in the End

Visions that describe:

• Culmination of Time• Beginning of Eternity

Rev. 2:26-27

The one who conquers and who keeps my works until the end, to him I will give authority over the nations, 27 and he will rule them with a rod of iron, as when earthen pots are broken in pieces, even as I myself have received authority from my Father.

Revelation 3:21

“The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne.”

The Ethics of Power Sharing

Power must never be held by the few, but distributed to the many until, eventually, everyone is empowered.

Dying to Self

A revoking of power in the flesh (self will) produces one who can share ultimate spiritual power (Divine will)

The Nature of Partnership

“For the Lord God does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets.” Amos 3:7

For behold, he who forms the mountains and creates the wind, and declares to man what is his thought… (Amos 4:13)

“declare” = nagad (Heb)

• To reveal; to make known or expound, especially something not understood before or concealed and mysterious.

An Exercise in Power Sharing

• Amos 7:1 – 3

• “How can Jacob survive? He is so small!”

God “relented”

• “to breathe a deep sigh of sorrow or regret; to have pity and compassion.”

Jeroboam = political powerAmaziah = false church

• Amos’ warnings:

• Expressions of mercy• Promised judgments were sure

Amos 9:1

I saw the Lord standing beside the altar, and he said:

“Strike the capitals until the thresholds shake, and shatter them on the heads of all the people; and those who are left of them I will kill with the sword; not one of them shall flee away; not one of them shall escape.”

Jonah as an Anti-Type

Book of Jonah:describes one’s lack of understanding of the Prophetic as a dimension of Power-Sharing with God.

Jonah - misunderstood the redemptive nature of God

• They were meant to be spared by Jonah’s prophecy -- not destroyed

The Disconnect Between Heart and Prophetic

Utterance

Key Need for Understanding:

1. God does destroy and pass judgment on humans and nations.

2. His essential nature and purpose is:

a) Redemptiveb) Restorative

Effective Power Sharing requires that we take on God’s redemptive nature.

What must we learn?

An effective prophetic view of the Nations

is heart-based, not gift-based.