The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. Him you shall hear, “according to all you desired of the Lord your God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, ‘Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, nor let me see this great fire anymore, lest I die.’ And the Lord said to me: ‘What they have spoken is good. I will raise up for them a Prophet like you from among their brethren, and will put My words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I command Him. And it shall be that whoever will not hear My words, which He speaks in My name, I will require it of him. But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.’ And if you say in your heart, ‘How shall we know the word which the Lord has not spoken?’ When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the things does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him” (Deut. 18:15-22).

 

God declares to the nation of Israel through his servant Moses that the only valid prophetic frequency that we have been called to walk in is the frequency of Moses. For centuries most bible expositors and theologians have applied this prophetic pronouncement as being narrowly and exclusively referring to the coming Messiah – Jesus Christ. There is no question that Jesus was the ultimate fulfillment of this prophetic word, but to narrowly limit its fulfillment to Jesus without seeing the broader context to which it applies is to misunderstand the purpose of Christ’s coming – to be the forerunner and progenitor who would reproduce Himself through a company of prophets in the earth (Acts 3:22-26; Rom. 8:29; Eph. 4:8-11).

 

The entire nation of Israel who originally received this message in the wilderness understood that God was making a very clear distinction between the frequencies of the pagans – which operated primarily through divination – and the frequency of Moses, which was never dependent on outward signs or manifestations, or even dreams and visions, but was based on a direct interface and interaction with the Most High God (Num. 12:6-8). They understood that God was preparing them to elevate their expectation of tapping into a much higher frequency than was commonly known or experienced during that time (or even today) among the nations of the earth.

 

Why is it that we have chosen to accept and settle for such a poor standard? You will notice in the text that the children of Israel were very anxious and willing to relegate themselves to having Moses interact with God on their behalf because they were afraid to die (Deut. 18:16). God Himself acknowledged the wisdom of this decision because they were justifiably afraid. After all, they were a sinful people who had not yet fully migrated internally from the corrupt values and culture they had inherited after having dwelt for centuries in Egypt. So the corporate assembly chose Moses to go in and out before the Lord on their behalf. This entire situation communicates to us a very powerful principle: The technology to experiencing the frequency of Moses is one that cannot be achieved without a willingness to die. In other words, self-preservation or the lack of true selflessness and self-denial is the primary factor which prohibits us from entering into this type of prophetic frequency. And since the majority of ministry today is primarily motivated by selfish ambition, self- interest, selfish pursuits, self-importance, self-indulgence and the overall promotion of self, it is no wonder why the frequency of Moses is so foreign to many of us today. We are unwilling to die and empty ourselves of everything that is worthless so that God can birth this new frequency in us.

 

Angelic frequencies and visitations

 

It is very common today to hear a lot of talk and preaching about angels or angelic visitations. This seemingly sudden and escalating interest in these celestial beings today is nothing new, but has been around for centuries as various people, in various places, and at various times have taken quite an interest in these creatures. Even Hollywood, throughout the past decades and today, has been producing movies that feature these majestic beings.

 

God, in His sovereignty, sometimes chooses to communicate with mankind through angels, who are His heavenly messengers. Scripture is replete with examples of angels being sent to God’s chosen ones with a divine message (Gen. 18:2; 31:11; Josh. 5:13-15; Is. 6:6; Dan. 7:15-16; 10:5-6; Matt. 1:20; 4:11; Luke 1:11, 26-27).

 

Tapping into this angelic frequency has caused quite a fascination in the hearts of many people, and it is this fascination that has caused a major inclination toward error since ancient times, and even today among many in the Church. I have noticed among certain “prophetic” streams today that there is an overemphasis or undue value being placed upon angelic manifestations and communications. Some continue to boast and celebrate in what they refer to as angelic manifestations in their meetings, evidenced by the appearance of feathers, gold dust, diamonds, unique fragrances, angelic voices, as well as other types of phenomena.

 

While it is not my purpose here to seek to validate or discount these so-called angelic experiences, it is important that I remind us that any frequency outside of the frequency of God Himself can be abused or corrupted. God’s divine intent from since the beginning of time has been for man to operate by the most elevated and refined frequency possible – the frequency of God. Therefore, to place undue value or importance on the frequency of angels and their supernatural manifestations is to violate the divine order of God – who is a jealous God – and who has called us to Himself (Ex. 34:14; Deut. 4:24; 6:15).

 

Angels were never sent to glorify or magnify themselves but to glorify and magnify God. Their purpose – like all true prophets – is to reveal and magnify Him! Just as the mail-man in your neighborhood delivers your mail without leaving his call-card or contact information because you’re not interested in him but in what (and from whom) he delivers, even so angels come not to leave us in awe of their magnificence, but to focus our attention on the one from whom they have been sent.

 

None of the Early Church fathers or Patriarchs from Genesis to Revelation ever gloried in angelic visitations or manifestations. And nowhere in Scripture are we encouraged to believe for them, pray for them, or seek to promote their activity in our midst. We are taught to acknowledge them as ministering spirits and as an innumerable company who do the Father’s bidding and sometimes appear to us unawares (2 Thess. 1:7; Heb. 1:14; 12:22; 13:2). We never pray to them and we never worship them, because we are to judge them (1 Cor. 6:3; 2 Cor. 11:14; 1 John 4:1). In fact, one of the temptations of Jesus by the devil had to do with the invocation of angelic activity for the purpose of furnishing proof or evidence of His validity (Matt. 4:6-7). Just as I have heard many self-proclaimed prophets today try to use angelic visions and manifestations as validating evidence of the authenticity of their ministry, or spiritual measure of their meetings.

 

Believers have been afraid to judge these manifestations for fear of being rejected or called “religious” or worse, but it is our Scriptural responsibility to test and prove all things – including prophecy and all spiritual manifestations (1 Thess. 5:19-22). We are not to quench the Spirit when something is truly valid, but neither are we to blindly accept anything because the majority are jumping into it or because there are seemingly powerful manifestations. You are not committing the unpardonable sin by refusing to participate in questionable spiritual activity and voicing your concern, although we should be careful about speaking out against things we don’t understand. And if you’re one of those people who have been running around to every “Holy Ghost” encounter meeting where there are reportedly “angelic visitations” every night, it’s only a matter of time before you’re swept fully into mass deception, if you’re not there already. We quickly forget that it was an overemphasis on angelic frequency that caused men like William Branham to fall into error and that spawned cults such as the Branhamites, Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses.

 

This type of deception has continued for centuries, and will continue to be perpetuated in the days ahead through those who take a fanciful delight in angelic visitations or encounters, and who seek to promote such experiences as the validating evidence of their elite spiritual lifestyle and diligent pursuit of God. They have substituted the presence of angels for the presence of God Himself, and believe me there is a big difference between the two.

 

The corrupt frequencies and practices of the heathen which Israel was warned about were able to find its way through a syncretistic assimilation into the worship forms of the Church during the time of Paul.

 

Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God (Col. 2:18-19 ESV).

 

The Colossian believers were being influenced by certain false teachers to enter into this same type of distortion where they were placing undue emphasis on angelic visitations and manifestations, thus amounting in the sight of God and of the apostle Paul as the “worship of angels”. Instead of acknowledging that they had been operating in an inferior frequency, they began to develop an elevated, or rather, inflated view of themselves because of their disciplined or ascetic behavior (possibly prayer and fasting) that was employed so that they could reach such a high spiritual plateau in their interaction with angels. They then began to use these spiritual experiences as a way of disqualifying others and elevating themselves as being more spiritual than they actually were. What they failed to understand was that with all their angelic visions and manifestations, they were still disconnected from the Head – Jesus Christ – because the presence of angels is no substitute for the presence of God. The frequency by which they chose to operate at this point was not just inferior, but invalid. Because when we attempt to elevate or magnify any frequency – even God-ordained ones – above the frequency of God Himself, that frequency becomes invalid and corrupt.

 

We must learn to reject these false prophetic frequencies in this season, and embrace a prophetic dimension that is rooted and grounded in a direct interface and interaction with the Most High God. And as angelic activity increases upon the earth as we race toward the finish, we must be careful as Kingdom Citizens not to overly sensationalize or magnify them, holding fast to the Head from whom the whole body is nourished and knit together. Accept no imitations and accept no substitute!

 

The new prophetic landscape

 

I know that this may be a hard message for some, but it is a message that we all need to hear. This article was not written with the purpose of criticizing or dishonoring any particular minister or ministry that is currently engaged in the prophetic, but to expose and root out the defilements that have corrupted the entire order as a whole. The prophetic movement as we have known and experienced it in the past is currently under revision and reformation by the Spirit of God. That which was acceptable in the former day is no longer acceptable or valid. We must raise our current standards and frequency of hearing to a new and elevated position.

 

To believe that we cannot constantly and effortlessly connect and communicate with God on a frequency similar to Adam did before the fall is to diminish the redemptive work of Jesus on the cross. And to postpone for tomorrow what God has given us access to today is to restrict ourselves to religious bondage. As Myles Munroe once wrote, “you cannot appropriate what you don’t understand nor experience what you postpone.”

 

We must be delivered from a reliance on outward signs and manifestations. God wants to speak and communicate with us directly. The prophet Elijah’s posture was to magnify the voice of the Lord in his life. He had angelic visitations, but he never allowed them to become the focus of his gaze or attention. And when there were great signs of wind, earthquakes and fire, he didn’t allow himself to become distracted by seeking God in the midst of the manifestations.

 

Then He said, “Go out, and stand on the mountain before the Lord.” And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice. So it was, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave. Suddenly a voice came to him, and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” (1 Kings 19:11-13)

 

Elijah didn’t move until he heard God’s voice. With all the shaking and quaking and blowing and burning, Elijah had determined that he would not be distracted by physical signs and manifestations, because the Lord was NOT in them. May we as a prophetic people adopt the same posture so that we refuse to move or speak until we have heard, not from a sign, but from the mouth of the Lord our God Himself. May we be prophets of sight who can impart sight to others, and not a company of blind watchmen.