As a prophet and a teacher, I talk a lot about the subject of revelation. But in the pursuit of revelation, it is often easy to miss its purpose. The heart of God is that we become the revelation, and incarnate God’s word—in other words, for us to look like, sound like and act like Jesus!
One of the people I have the honor of working with is Jeffrey Thompson, who serves as a project director for God Encounters Ministries. Here he describes a revelatory experience he had with the Lord that expresses this theme well:
“One day not long ago, I was given the opportunity to preach at the church where I serve part-time on the pastoral staff. After I brought the message at the worship service, I felt really good about it. It seemed to have been inspired both in content and delivery. So, I asked the Lord, ‘Lord, have You called me to preach?’
“The Lord responded to me immediately in my spirit, saying, ‘No, I’ve called you to incarnate.’
“He was realigning my priorities, reminding me that the endgame isn’t just the preaching or teaching or whatever—the endgame is the relationship with Jesus Christ; and the more completely I walk with Him, the more I incarnate Him. By ‘incarnate’ I mean He takes on flesh in me. I am called to bring His love and wisdom and peace and hope into the room with me so that people can see Him.”
That says it well. Jesus embodied this perfectly as described in John 1:14, (NKJV): “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”
But it is not only about the historical incarnation of God the Son as a Jewish man named Jesus over 2,000 years ago, but also about Jesus’s incarnation in each of His followers, in you and in me.
Each one of us has been called to incarnate Him.
Transformed by Revelation
How does this incarnation occur?
First, Jesus enables us to receive His revelation and to discern His message out of the chaos of many competing voices. Then He enables us to become the revelation! We grow in our likeness to the very Word of God. We incarnate the Word.
The walk of faith that begins as a personal relationship with God moves into a revelatory relationship as we learn how He expresses Himself in so many ways. For most of us, this is enough.
And it is true that there’s no end to what we need to learn about relationship and revelation in our continuing, lifelong adventure with God. But our end goal is to become so fully transformed into His image that we can represent Him while we live on the earth.
It is a holy progression: relationship produces revelation, and together relationship and revelation give rise to incarnation.
Somehow, much of the body of Christ and the global prophetic movement has sometimes failed to appreciate these fundamental truths. We are not supposed to only receive revelation, but we are also to become living epistles for all to read!
The only begotten Son of God still dwells among us; His Spirit lives in each of us who has named Jesus as Lord. He speaks to us, and we can hear Him. With grace, He reveals His truth to us. His revelation takes many forms, and we share it within and beyond the body of Christ.
That revelation transforms us. Increasingly, we become more like Him in His love. We may feel as though we wobble and fall like babies learning to walk, but we do learn to walk. Eventually our steps become steadier.
Relationship has led to revelation, and revelation has led to incarnation.
Walking in Incarnational Christianity
All of this is to say one thing: the whole purpose of prophetic revelation and therefore the purpose of the discerner of revelation is incarnational—presenting Jesus to the world. This is the reason for our interactive hearing and communing with God in all its dimensions.
Together, all of us who walk with Jesus carry His message to the world.
As the apostle John was recording the magnificent revelation that he received when he was on the Isle of Patmos, he wrote:
I fell at [the angel’s] feet to worship him. But he said to me, “Do not do that; I am a fellow servant of yours and your brethren who hold the testimony of Jesus; worship God. For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy” (Rev. 19:10, NASB).
The key phrase here is “your brethren who hold the testimony of Jesus.” If your receiving revelation does not lead others into a greater awareness of who Christ Jesus is, and if it does not lead you into a more passionate pursuit of Him, then something is askew.
A lot of people have historical information and even doctrinal knowledge about Jesus, but we must have a personal revelation of Him. We cannot find this without the help of His Holy Spirit because it takes God to know God. One of the Holy Spirit’s roles is to make Jesus real to you, to make you able to know Him and follow Him.
As you know Him, you make Him known—through your words and your lifestyle. We incarnate Him, carrying His testimony far and wide.
When you receive and release prophetic revelation, you are not primarily predicting the future, but rather, displaying the message and person of Jesus to the world around you.
This is what you and I are to do. With the Holy Spirit helping us, we are to “show and tell” to the world that Jesus is Lord and Messiah. (See Matt. 16:13–17; 1 Cor. 12:3.)
Incarnating true prophetic revelation is powerful; it penetrates hardened hearts and unbelief.
Think about how it worked in the New Testament. When Jesus told Nathanael that He had seen him under the fig tree, Nathanael and others believed that Jesus was the Messiah. (See John 1:43–51.) After Jesus revealed to the Samaritan woman at the well “everything she ever did,” and she told the people of her town about it, many of the townspeople came to believe in Him as the Son of God. (See John 4:7–26.)
This is the revelation lifestyle we are meant to be walking in today.
Living a life of revelation can change people’s lives. As you and I walk with Jesus, we step into the same powerful, revelatory stream that He walked in—and we become the revelation and incarnate God’s word to the world!
For the original article, visit godencounters.com.
Bring Charisma magazine home with a subscription today!
Dr. James W. Goll is the founder of God Encounters Ministries. He is an international bestselling author, a certified Life Language Coach, an adviser to leaders and ministries and a recording artist. James has traveled around the world ministering in more than fifty nations sharing the love of Jesus, imparting the power of intercession, prophetic ministry, and life in the Spirit. He has recorded numerous classes with corresponding curriculum kits and is the author of more than fifty books, including The Seer, The Prophet, The Discerner, The Lost Art of Intercession and Praying with God’s Heart. James is also the founder of GOLL Ideation LLC, where creativity, consulting and leadership training come together.
