Prophets constantly represent God before people. They drive God’s agenda in the earth in the various spheres where they are needed. The prophet must first be a believer in Christ, this means that he or she must have access to the New Covenant blessing of God. Even though the prophet enjoys a rather free access to various unseen resources that others not necessarily enjoy, they are still subject to the renewal of their mind.
There might be many areas that the believer, hence the prophetic type needs some godly perspective on. The most important of all the aspects is certainly the covenant that is currently active between God and his people. It is quite concerning that the foundations of the New Covenant and the basic implications of its understanding is not central to much of the Christian life and prophetic training. The current covenant is the defining document between God and His people and therefore must arrest our attention.
You can challenge your understanding of the Old and New Covenants by answering some of the questions below. I have added my understanding of them in short. They are more to get you to think about the covenants, than to give you a specific answer.
Does God remember the believer’s sins? No – One thing God says that under the New Covenant “…I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more” (Hebrews 8:12). This is an amazing verse. You can explain it away until there is nothing left, but in essence God does not only give us forgiveness of sins, He also forgets the sin that He has forgiven.
Do we need to forgive others before God will forgive us? No – You might have been taught this incorrectly from the “Lord’s prayer,” which actually belongs to the Old Covenant. The New Covenant says teaches that we are forgiven and therefore should forgive. “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you” (Ephesians 4: 32).
When did the New Covenant start? At the birth or death of Christ? The Bible teaches that Jesus was born under the Law. His whole earthly ministry was subject to the Law of Moses (Galatians 4:4). It is only at the death of Christ that the New Covenant came into effect. – “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you” (Luke 22:20). Adding these two Scriptures together we can see that the earthly ministry of Jesus was transitional. It ended with the fulfillment of the Law in His death and the inauguration of the New Covenant in His blood.
Is the Old Covenant essentially different from the New Covenant or is the New Covenant simply a development or an outflow of the Old Covenant? It should be obvious that they two covenants are materially different.
Although one might disagree with the answers given, it should become clear that we have much work to do on the New Covenant, if it is in fact the founding text of the relationship between God and believers. Prophetic types should seek to understand the New Covenant with urgency before engaging in other work. The New Covenant contains the express framework withing which every believer finds themselves. It should be important for the prophet to take into account the implication of this agreement that is in force in the heavenlies before engaging with God’s people.
The study of the New Covenant is the study of the Gospel – the good news. We should allow our prophetics to be molded by such a divine text until we are completely under its guidance in all we do.
Get the Basic Prophetic Training Manual.