The Stir The Water Blog

Many people have a hard time understanding how God would speak to them through their imagination. They are interested in the seer gifting, but as they do the Stir the Water Prophetic and Seer Exercises, they are somewhat concerned that they are only strengthening their imagination. How can we know we are seeing “for real” and not just making things up?

There are three things involved with the answer to that question.

First of all, God will speak to us through our imagination. If we tend to be dominated by logic, we may have to do some things we’re not exactly comfortable with to allow our imagination enough room for God to speak through it. Then, when He does, we can expect it to feel like our imagination — that is, we can expect our imagination to be involved.

The issue is if what we are receiving is originating in our imagination or merely passing through it, not whether or not our imagination is involved. Vain imaginings can come from our imagination, but God will speak through our imagination.

That being said, is it possible for us to think we are hearing from God when we really aren’t? Yes. Discernment is always necessary, and being led by the Holy Spirit is vital. If we don’t really want to hear God speak or if we want to hear only certain things from Him, we could find ourselves listening to sources that aren’t God. But if we genuinely desire God’s voice, we’re not opening ourselves to vain imaginings; we’re opening ourselves to Him.

Second, we have to realize that God does not give us a spirit of fear (2 Timothy 1:7). If you are afraid that it’s “just you,” realize that that fear is not coming from Him; it’s coming from you. It could also be coming from the enemy, who doesn’t want you to do anything that would further your relationship with God.

We should be more concerned about being ruled by fear than about being ruled by our imagination. Analytical people in particular seem to struggle with the idea of God speaking through the imagination, but as analytical people, if they are listening to their imagination and that’s all, they will figure it out. However, if we are ruled by fear, we won’t be able to see or think clearly, and until we break out of that cycle, growth could be difficult.

Finally, Jesus says that if we ask our Father for bread, He won’t give us stones (Matthew 7:9–11). In other words, when we ask God to speak to us, we can believe that He is. We can — and should — dismiss the fear that in response to our prayer, He will give us vain imagining instead.

The Bible says to test the spirits (1 John 4:1). It is good to evaluate and test what is coming through our imagination, but the problem is that we can’t do that while we’re receiving. It is very difficult to receive and evaluate at the same time — we tend to get stuck on the first word or picture and not get any further. We start wondering, Did God just say that? Really? How do I know? Once we start focusing on the possibility that it might not be Him, it is difficult to hold onto our faith. So we should receive first, record what we think God is showing or saying to us, and then go back over it later. When we do that, our hearts will be able to tell the difference between what was Him and what maybe wasn’t.

God wants to speak to us. Communication with His people is one of the desires of His heart. If we ask to hear from Him, He will respond. We can trust Him to do that.

If you are struggling with this issue, take a risk, and trust God to be good to you. Again, you should be much more concerned about being ruled by fear than about somehow being fooled.

One of our users wrote in and asked about a painful situation she walked through several years ago. God had revealed to her that the enemy was going to come against one of her friends. She didn’t know what to do with this revelation, so she prayed for him. He later died, and for years she has wondered if she should have done something more.

I know several people who have gone through similar situations. They were given revelation, had dreams, or just sensed that something bad was going to happen to someone they care about. They didn’t know what to do with what God showed them, so they prayed about it, and consequently, some of them have lived with guilt for years, thinking that if they had just handled the situation differently, they could have saved the person’s job, or his or her marriage, or even the person’s life.

Why does this happen? Why does God give us warnings like these, and how are we supposed to respond?

God’s training process

First, God will put us in difficult or potentially confusing situations in order to train us. He knows we don’t understand how to handle certain things, and that is why we’re in the situation — so we can learn what to do in the future.

As people say, hindsight is 20/20. We may know to do certain things now that we didn’t know to do then, but there is no reason for us to feel guilty for that.

When God is training us, He knows we don’t know what we’re doing, and especially in training situations, we are not the ones who are responsible for making sure the outcome is positive. The only burden on us is to do what we know to do and for our hearts to be in the right place. That is all.

When He trains us, He is assuming the role of supervisor. It’s like being in driver’s ed. Yes, we may be the one behind the wheel, but the instructor next to us can grab the wheel if he needs to, and he often has a brake on his side of the car as well. If we get into a situation we can’t handle, the teacher will take over. It’s a safe situation for us to learn in, because we have the freedom to make mistakes, and we’re not fully responsible for everything that’s going on.

If we understand God’s training process, we will be able to do what He says and then let the rest go, without being overcome with guilt. In other words, if we had the burden to pray for someone, and we prayed, we did what God asked us to do. That was all we needed to worry about.

Hand in hand with this, we can do only what we have been given favor to do. Many of us who have walked through difficult situations like this weren’t in a place to change those situations. We didn’t have a lot of favor to speak into others’ lives. We didn’t necessarily have the knowledge or even the vocabulary to articulate what God had told us. All we had was the revelation and the understanding to pray.

The what-if questions that arise after any situation that has turned out badly shouldn’t be used for condemnation or guilt; they should be used as stepping-stones to greater wisdom. What if we had told the person what we were sensing or what we had dreamed? Maybe they would have fought harder and enacted change, or maybe they would have become more depressed. What if we had told other people? Maybe they would have received it and prayed as well, or maybe they wouldn’t have believed it. When God brings up questions such as these, He is not intending us to feel guilty; they’re meant to help us seek Him out and grow in wisdom, stature, and favor.

God’s conviction vs. the enemy’s guilt

This brings us to the second point. Conviction from God is specific: Next time, do this instead. Guilt and shame are diffused; they don’t have a point. Maybe there was something we could have done better, but if there was and God shows us this, He does so because it is part of our training, not because He wants to add to our already guilt-ridden conscience.

Again, we can expect conviction to be specific, and when we respond to it and repent, the weight of it falls away. It’s done. Everything left over — any fear, guilt, or shame — isn’t of God, so we don’t have to pay attention to those things. If they try to latch onto us, we should ask God to help us push them away. If it isn’t from Him, we don’t have to deal with it.

We are responsible only for our own decisions

The last main point is this: God gives us responsibility, and if we don’t do what we’re responsible for, yes, God will correct us. However, we have to understand where our responsibility begins and where it ends. We are not responsible for someone else’s decisions. We are responsible only for our own.

Depending on the situation and the people involved, even if we were perfect in doing everything God wanted us to do, it may not change the outcome. We can do only what God gave us to do, and often, He will give us responsibilities in the midst of a sinking ship. In other words, we can do our job in a bad situation, and that situation can still go really badly. Why? Because we weren’t responsible for keeping the ship afloat. We were responsible for doing only what He asked of us.

Clearly, we can be sad over someone else’s bad decisions; we can grieve and mourn over them, but we cannot take responsibility for them. If we do, we’re assuming God’s role — that we are somehow capable of changing the situation or the person. We are not.

Leave the burden with God

In summation, we shouldn’t feel bad if we’re not perfect in a training situation; our lack of understanding could be why we’re in the situation to begin with. We should recognize the difference between conviction and shame, and we should recognize what we are responsible for. If God gave us the burden to pray, and we prayed, we did what He wanted us to do. He can tell us, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” even if everything around us fell apart.

If you are dealing with any guilt or false responsibility, turn it over to God. Let Him have it. You may even want to act this out physically by lifting the “weight” off your shoulders and giving it to Him.

The simple truth is that we can trust God to bear our burdens (Psalm 68:19). If we try to handle them ourselves, we’re taking on God’s role and building up a wall around us, one that will keep Him at a distance. We are struggling and wearing ourselves out trying to be something He never intended us to be. There is an incredible amount of freedom in realizing who God is, who we are in His sight, and who He wants to be in our lives.

Have you ever been given a prophetic word that never came to pass? It can leave a lot of questions: Was the word false? Does God really speak this way? Can a word be accurate and from God — and yet not come to pass? How can we know when God has promised us something and when it was just the speaker’s nice idea?

Here are four things I believe we need to keep in mind whenever someone gives us a revelatory or prophetic word.

Seek confirmation from God

First of all, we need to hear from God for ourselves on a consistent basis. Depending on what we’re going through, this can be difficult. We can go through days or seasons of turmoil, when it’s very difficult to hear from God because we don’t have enough peace. But here’s the reason this is important: If we’re consistently hearing from God for ourselves, then what He has told us in our alone times with Him will confirm what we’re hearing from other people.

This doesn’t require high, clear, awesome revelation; we just need to go to God on a daily basis. Even if all we “hear” or sense is vague, and we’re not quite sure what He said or if He said anything, over time this builds up within us a fairly high level of confirmation. We will sense our spirits bearing witness to the word. It isn’t just our minds saying, Oh, I like that. That would be nice. Instead, it feels as if our spirits are saying, Yes! Yes!

Every time we receive a word, we should seek God for confirmation. Always. The confirmation may come beforehand, right afterward, in one clear moment or subtly over time. It may happen consecutively or be spread out over several days.

Distinguish between potential and established outcomes

Now, that being said, there may be times when we know a word has been confirmed, but it still doesn’t come to pass. The probable reason for this is that the word was about a potential outcome and not an established-by-God outcome. There’s a difference.

For example, let’s say that Alice is called to live in Africa as a missionary, but she chooses not to go. The potential is there, but she doesn’t step into it, so it doesn’t happen. Or perhaps she wants to go, but her husband doesn’t, and so the word doesn’t come to pass because of someone else’s choice. In some cases, a word that does or doesn’t come to pass may not have anything to do with the person who received it. It may be solely dependent on outside sources.

Revelatory words can be about something that has potential and is later realized, or they can be about something that God has already established. The latter is a high-level revelation about what God is going to do. He has chosen for such-and-such to happen. The choices involved have already been made; the cost has already been paid, and it’s going to happen. A revelatory word about something with potential isn’t a false word; it is simply an outcome that may or may not be realized.

This agrees with what Jesus said in Matthew 22:14: Many are called, but few are chosen. I think that statement is true of almost every potentiality in creation. Many things are called to come to pass, but few things are actually chosen to come to pass.

Distinguishing between a potential outcome and a chosen outcome can be difficult for revelatory people, especially if they don’t understand the dynamic or don’t have clarity or discernment. It can also be hard if they’re trying to sound more certain than they feel. God could be saying, “I am calling this to happen,” and the person assumes that means, “God says this is going to happen.”

Again, connecting this with the previous point, we need to pray about every word we receive, from anyone. We need to ask God, “Is this established? Or is this still just a possibility?” That dynamic is huge.

Recognize issues of timing and metaphor

Long before they come to pass, many prophecies seem like they’re never going to. Some of us wait months and years and then conclude all of those words must have been false. But then another 10 years go by, and we start realizing, “Wait a second. They’re all happening.”

Timing is vital. Revelatory words are often given without a clear sense of timing, and we tend to assume that if God said something today, it must be about today. But often, that is not the case. When we seek God for confirmation about a word, we should also seek confirmation about the timing.

Finally, a revelatory word can be so metaphoric that it seems to mean one thing but actually means something else. It was a good word, but we assumed it must have been false because the way it played out didn’t look the way we expected. That is often the case as well.

What can we do?

All of the above can be issues. In summation, we first need to be in the habit of spending time with God, because then, when someone gives us a genuine word from Him, we will have an internal witness.

Second, we should ask God if the word is about an established or potential outcome. Maybe we need to pray into it. Maybe we need to wait. Maybe we just need to know that it could happen, but it’s based on other people’s faith and choices.

Finally, there is also the issue of waiting for God’s perfect timing, as well as understanding the metaphor and being certain we really do know what He means.

At any given time, we could be dealing with one or several of these four issues. We could be in a season in which nothing seems to be working, and we’re tempted to think all our revelatory words are false. But that may not be the case. It could be that they just didn’t happen the way we expected them to happen. It could be that they haven’t happened yet.

If you’re in a season like that and feel discouraged, know that it won’t last forever. You will also go through seasons in which all the words you receive are right on. All the timing is right. Your understanding is right, and the words aren’t potential outcomes that could happen — they are established by God, and you are able to watch them unfold.

All these things require discernment, experience, patience and grace. We need to keep them in mind and seek God on them whenever we are given a prophetic word.

Many Stir the Water users come to the site with a basic understanding of what it means to be a seer or how the seer gifting functions. However, we also get some users and visitors who aren’t sure if they’re seers and don’t know how the gifting generally works.

In order to begin to understand the seer gifting, we need to start with the basics. A seer is any person who has the ability to receive sensory input from the spiritual realm. This can happen at any level; we don’t have to have experiences like Ezekiel in order to be a seer. In fact, many people are seers and don’t realize it, usually because of one or more of three reasons:

1. No one’s ever told them. Maybe they could relate some odd things that have happened to them, but no one has ever told them that what they’re experiencing may not be “just their imagination.” A lot of seers would say they have active imaginations and that’s all. They don’t realize it’s more than that. For example, they may see brief flashes of light or something move in their peripheral vision and assume it’s just their eyes playing tricks on them, when they’re actually seeing real flashes of light and real movement. They don’t understand that these may be authentic.
2. Along similar lines, seers often don’t realize that what they’ve been experiencing their entire lives is unique; they think everybody can do it. Or perhaps they suspect they are gifted in certain areas, but they don’t realize that all the little things they keep dismissing are actually God trying to communicate with them and through them. For example, they may have always had detailed, extensive dreams; perhaps they’ve “known” things about people they just met or have been able to produce astounding works of art or make sound business decisions that have greatly impacted others. I’m just good at what I do, they may think. Or, Can’t everybody do this?
3. Finally, some seers don’t realize they’re seers because as far back as they can remember, they seemingly have never done or experienced anything of a spiritual nature. Something shut the gifting down in them a long time ago, and at this point, they couldn’t name even just one incident in which they knew God was talking to them. “He talks to other people,” they say, “but He doesn’t talk to me.” Simply because it hasn’t happened yet doesn’t mean it can’t or won’t.

What Is Spiritual Sensory Input?

Here is what I mean by the term “sensory input.” In the natural realm, we have our five senses that help us relate to the world and atmosphere around us. Through them we learn what things are, how they work, what’s real, what something feels like, what it looks or tastes like, etc. These five senses allow us to experience what is going on around us, and without them, we wouldn’t be able to function. These form our physical sensory perceptions.

What are spiritual sensory perceptions? The Bible says that this world is a type of the world to come (1 Corinthians 15:44; Colossians 2:16–17; Romans 5:14). If what surrounds us now is just a reflection of the real, then imagine what the real must be like! Our five senses, therefore, reflect a higher order — an order that is, by its very nature, better and stronger than what we know on Earth because it is the real order: the one that will continue to exist when this one has ended.

When we take the time to think this through, we will be amazed at the implications. If we have any senses on Earth, we also have them in the spiritual realm, because that realm is the foundation of this one. As spiritual beings (Galatians 6:1; 1 Peter 2:5), we should be able to see, taste, smell, touch, and hear what is going on in the spiritual realm around us just as we can in the natural realm. As seers, at times we may be able to smell what’s in the spiritual air around us. We may be able to see it, touch it, even taste it. We can describe it to others. We can experience it just as we can experience the natural realm.

These are our spiritual sensory perceptions, and we pick up on them in different ways. Sometimes, this information will come to us physically. For example, we may feel cold or hot when the natural temperature hasn’t shifted a degree. This is happening because we’re picking up on the changes happening in the spiritual “temperature” around us. At other times, we will receive spiritual information through our spiritual senses, which often feels like “just our imagination” and hence the reason many people don’t realize God is trying to communicate with them this way. Everyone has the capacity to experience the spiritual realm through the seer gifting, just as everyone has the capacity to hear God’s voice.

When Stir the Water talks about the seer gifting, we mean picking up on spiritual sensory data, whether that be seeing, hearing, touching, tasting or smelling.

Why Is This Important?

So how does this affect us, and why is it important to study this gifting? The writer of Hebrews says that the mature in Christ train their senses to discern what is God and what isn’t (Hebrews 5:14). You’ll see this verse all over the Stir the Water site. As we practice and study our giftings, we mature in Him. We grow in our knowledge of Him and His ways.

Again, this world is not our home; our home is Heaven — the spiritual realm — which automatically insinuates it is more important, more real and concrete, than this one. Because that’s true, wouldn’t we want to study it? Wouldn’t we want to know more about it and see if there was any way we could learn to walk in it and be affected by it now?

Hand in hand with this is another reason that is even more important. As we study and grow in this gifting, we will be amazed at who God is, how intimate He desires to be with us and how often He wants to communicate with us. We will fall in love. We will be changed forever.

That is a very good reason.

God is with us, and studying our giftings and training ourselves in them will increase our faith for greater things. It will help us see His presence more and more.