I read the blog by a "prophet" who declares the earthquake came because the church did not get on board with his plans for a public thanksgiving of the miracle of the last earthquake that no-one was killed.
I have two overwhelming senses from the blog:
1. that he communicates he was right and EVERY other church leader in Christchurch was wrong - they were all hardhearted, blind, compromised, arrogant, and not hearing from God.
2. the reason we know this was because the church leaders did not get on board with his plans for what should happen
If you buy into this you think wow this guy is amazing and so spiritual; if you don’t buy into it you think what a strange sense of self-importance, a lack of connection to the 'body' here and also, most basically, a misunderstanding of the role of a prophet – shouldn’t you say to the churches "I believe God is wanting a public thanksgiving" and leave it to the leaders to sense the Spirit's inner witness to that (unless of course you are infallible and ALWAYS hear right) rather than coming in, organising events, expecting people to get on board and getting offended when they don’t!
One of the problems is that it is a self-perpetuating, self-reinforcing belief - us prophets who tell things like it is to a compromised church get rejected by the leaders just like in the Old Testament so the very fact that the message is rejected just reinforces that we are right. Oh to introduce one small crack in the whole superstructure - There is of course another possibility: what about the possibility that you are wrong, that the message is rejected because you got it wrong... And then the whole edifice crumbles. So how do we know? That is why we have community discernment - look at Acts 15.
I suppose it feels pretty significant to declare to the world that you were right and everyone else is wrong. At best God is with him in his ministry but this time he got it wrong. At worst... a rogue, unsubmitted and unconnected to the wider body. Sad. Disgraceful. Despicable actually.
The shepherds of God’s flock need to protect His people from this crap.
Listen: Andrew Strom is wrong.
Gods word is not looking backwards but forwards to recover and rebuild a city.
Kia Kaha church. Find hope and strength for the future as you seek to be God's hands of compassion to this city.
Eze 34:2-4
2 Woe to you shepherds of Israel who only take care of yourselves! Should not shepherds take care of the flock? 3 You eat the curds, clothe yourselves with the wool and slaughter the choice animals, but you do not take care of the flock. 4 You have not strengthened the weak or healed the sick or bound up the injured. You have not brought back the strays or searched for the lost. You have ruled them harshly and brutally.
vs 4 gives a great job description for what shepherds need to focus on at a time like this: strengthen the weak, heal the sick, bind up the injured - don't whip them and dump condemnation them! And believe me that first part is what all the church leaders I know are doing, as opposed to outside unhelpful prophets who are "harsh and brutal".
PS come on prophets - speak before the event not afterwards!
