At my month one debrief we had multiple talks about spiritual gifts. A lot of what the Bible says about spiritual gifts comes from 1 Corinthians. During one of the talks they were talking about 1 Corinthians 14.
“Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy. For one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men but to God; for no one understands him, but he utters mysteries in the Spirit. On the other hand, the one who prophesies speaks to the people for their upbuilding and encouragement and consolation. The one who speaks in a tongue builds up himself, but the one who prophesies builds up the church. Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues, unless someone interprets, so that the church may be built up.” 1 Corinthians 14:1-5
During that message and hearing that you should seek the spiritual gifts, especially prophecy really convicted me. So I started praying a prayer like, “Lord give me more of the gift of prophecy,” daily for a while. What that looks like isn’t as crazy as you would think. The most insane thing that has happened was I saw a vision of my squadmate, Gina, handed my teammate, Sav, their key for the journey not five minutes before it actually happened. This was only a few days after first praying that prayer. This was also the only time that praying this prayer actually resulted in seeing a vision of what was about to happen. But the verses say that the purpose of prophecy is to encourage the body. This resulted in encouraging the body because when I told Gina what I saw it reassured her that it was God telling her to give it away.
Another result in praying this prayer was that near the end of my time in Albania God told me that He wanted me to write notes for everyone on my squad from Him, including our squad mentor and coaches. So I wrote most of those notes during my time in Kosovo. The way I went around making these notes is that I would write the person’s name on the note and then ask God what He wanted to tell them. Most of the notes were verses that God wanted to share with them. Some of them were letters written as if they were by God. Then last week my whole squad came together again for debrief. That is when I gave everyone their notes during our first session of debrief. When I wrote the notes I wasn’t sure if I heard from God correctly but multiple of my squadmates told me that what I wrote was exactly the verse God had been talking to them about or that it made them feel seen by God.
Most of the time the gift of prophecy for me looks like asking God what he wants to say to someone. What I tell them is supposed to help them connect with God personally. Once I share what I heard that is between them and God.
As Paul wrote in that passage in Corinthians seek the spiritual gifts. Pray for God to give you more of the spiritual gifts that are talked about in 1 Corinthians 12.
