Prophets: A Dime a Dozen

Prophesy pronounced /prä-fə-ˌsī/

transitive verb

1: to utter by or as if by divine inspiration

2: to predict with assurance or on the basis of mystic knowledge

(Mirriam Webster)

Someone recently told me their son had been "prophesied over" in church. The "prophecy" about the young man was that he would become a preacher - that he was called by God to go into the ministry. (I don't know why people tell me these ridiculous things, knowing I'm atheist. Obviously they have no idea what I actually think about their stories.)

So, I'm going to prophesy something about this situation: the kid believes his preacher has had a revelation from God that he is going to become a minister. The knowledge gets downloaded into his brain and begins to work on his mind. His mother and other church members continue to remind him of the prophecy and constantly reinforce it. Everyone involved are determined to help that prophecy come to pass, come Hell or high water. One of three things happens:

 1) He doesn't feel any real desire to become a minister, but has this prophecy gnawing at his psyche. Being a believer, he is tormented by his conflicting feelings of thinking God is calling him to preach and of not wanting that for himself. He tries to force himself into the role anyway since it is apparently God's will and he has to pray constantly for God to give him the desire to fulfill what God has called him to do, but unless he manages to completely brainwash himself, his prayers don't work and he is miserable for the rest of his life because some idiot said something stupid in church one day. If he doesn't go into the ministry, he's even more miserable. If he forces himself to do it, then everyone will think God had actually spoken through this prophet and what he said has come to pass. Praise the Lord!

2) He may actually want to become a minister, in which case he is encouraged by the prophecy and its constant reinforcement from family and peers to go ahead a do it, not realizing it was a self-fulfilling prophesy to begin with since he knew about it beforehand and thought that's what God wanted him to do so he did it, at which point everyone will think God had actually spoken through this prophet and what he said has come to pass. Praise the Lord!

3) He wants to become a minister, or he doesn't, but there's that prophecy, so he goes into Seminary and while taking bible history courses, realizes the bible is not what he thought it was and begins to have doubts and questions and his intellectual curiosity kicks in and he starts studying more and more about the subject until he wakes up one day and realizes the whole thing is bullshit and declares himself an atheist rendering the prophecy null and void. In which case, everyone will think that Satan had been attacking this kid because he would have become a great preacher and done awesome work for God and Satan had "temporarily" won. They, of course, know this because someone prophesied something and they'll all be praying for him even if they've shunned him and told him he's going to hell and cut him out of their lives and have been treating him like a leper since he quit Seminary and came out as an atheist.

I feel really sorry for this kid. I can't completely imagine what kind of burden those words of prophecy put on his mind, but it must have. And the likelihood that it will fulfill itself because of that pressure and because of his perceived expectations of his family and church peers, not to mention his perceived expectation from God! seems very high. I remember people being "prophesied over" in church when I was younger. Then, it just seemed creepy. Now, I find it disgusting.

In my experience from every church I've ever attended (all Pentecostal), prophesying isn't an act performed only by the pastor. Any member of the congregation can do it. Anytime anyone feels overcome by emotion (sorry, I mean "filled with the holy spirit") and some thought pops into their head which they "interpret" as coming from God, they can blurt it out and everyone will automatically take it as prophecy. They have to. They would risk possibly denying a word from God if they didn't. Even if someone had doubts, they would dare not speak it out loud! I won't go into the silent jealousy factor when many of them think "why did God pick him to prophesy and not ME! I want to prophesy too! I could prophesy just as good as that guy!" But the thing is......people are saying shit in church and claiming God is speaking through them and everyone believes it. And in the case of this poor kid, possibly laying some ridiculous burden on them that may screw them up for the rest of their lives.

Just another mindfuck, courtesy of your friendly neighborhood Lord of Hosts.