Prophetic Writing
Writing in the Spirit Type I & Activation
In this session, students will explore what it means to write in the spirit based on Writing in the Spirit Type I.
Type 1: Writing by command and utterance
The prophetic anointing reveals itself to us through the release of God's will in prophecy, prophetic word, visions and dreams, words of knowledge, words of wisdom, witty ideas and concepts, the song of the Lord, etc.
Most people understand that these areas of the prophetic can be released through spoken word (which includes Sign Language as a form of speech), but not every recognizes that there are those believers who are seldom pressed to speak it out. Rather, they are driven to release these varying streams of the prophetic in written form.
It literally burns in them to write either as they release or immediately after they receive it. This type of writing in the spirit is quite common among prophetic writers. Many of them, especially in the beginning of their prophetic writing ministries, operate with this kind of urgency.
My personal experience
At the beginning of my calling as a prophetic writer, I would find myself waking up in the middle of the night writing psalms of deliverance (poetry, spoken word, comfort, prophecy for myself). As I matured in the Lord, those moments would turn into prayers for people, for friends, prophetic dreams of instruction and strategy, prophecies for the leaders within the local church, prophecies for my city, the arts, prophetic writers and so forth.
For a long time, I was writing almost exclusively by command and urgency and followed by a strong desire to release those written words to those assigned to them. Sometimes, the Lord would have me read what I wrote openly to the people or group. The urgency I experienced was unbelievable.
Many times, those prophetic releases would bubble up in me and pour forth even during my fear and reluctance. Often, the presence of God was stronger than my fear of man. Suppressing the urge would only bring conviction, and intensify the calling to write it out and release it. What I experienced (and what some of you are experiencing) was the same type of prophetic anointing prophetic people receive when prophecy bubbles up and pushes through them like a raging river.
Writing by urgency & command in the scriptures
The Prophet Jeremiah, a prophetic writer and prophet, felt that kind of pressure.
The words in him would build up like a churning river against a weakening dam. He described this experience in Jeremiah 20:9.
Daniel 7:1 NKJV describes how the prophet Daniel awoke from a dream and went directly for his pen and paper by writing himself down the summary.
"In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon Daniel had a dream and visions of his head upon his bed: then he wrote the dream, and told the sum of the matters."
The Apostle John was taken up in a vision and then given this command in Rev. 1:11 NIV,
"On the Lord's Day I was in the Spirit, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet, 11 which said: "Write on a scroll what you see and send it to the seven churches: to Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia and Laodicea.""
Characteristics of writing by urgency & command
While there are many correlations we can draw from "writing in the spirit by urgency and command," the following characteristics should be dinstinctive [sic].
- The prophetic release suddenly and intensely stirs and bubbles up within the writer at the will of the Father. No spiritual atmosphere needs to be present.
- There is always an urgency or a timing component associated with releasing the message in written form.
- The writer does not have time to process the experience or consider the message. In this instance, the writer is simply to obey the Spirit and release it as given.
- The message, in the moment of release, is a strong burden for the prophetic writer.
- As soon as the message is in written form, the pressure to write immediately breaks.
(This is a brief summary of the points above. It should enable you to see what makes this area of "writing in the spirit" distinctive.)
Your Writing Exercise Is Your Activation
Based on what you have learned, your task throughout the remainder of this course (and beyond) is to keep track of the "date, time, subject matter, and actual prophetic releases" that you experience by "urgency and command." You are to do this by (1) obeying God and responding to the urgency and command when it comes by writing; (2) keeping what you receive in a dedicated notebook and (3) by marking each of those occurrences clearly with date, time, subject matter and any other information you decide to include.
BEING OBEDIENT IN THIS WILL ACTIVATE THIS CALLING. If it is already activated, your deliberate stewardship of this area will take you deeper and farther than you could ever imagine in experiencing the prophetic writing anointing in this area.
In addition, this strategy may help you develop discipline and maintain your prophetic writing flow.
A simple prayer: "Holy Spirit help me become sensitive to urgent commands of the Lord to write what he releases to me."