There’s plenty of reflection among prophetic camps about the spirit of
Elijah. Doubtless, this Old Testament mouthpiece offers copious
character traits that his New Testament counterparts would do well to
model. However, for all the accurate prophetic decrees and miraculous
moments that characterized Elijah’s ministry, it is his spiritual
fatherhood that is perhaps most needed today.
With companies of young prophets rising up and armies of believers awakening to the order to establish the Kingdom of God throughout all the earth, spiritual guidance is vital to a stable Church that the world will look to for answers.
Governments and other secular leaders won’t bow their ears to the utterances of super spiritual fruits, emotional flakes and hypocritical nuts. The governing church demands unwavering voices that refuse to compromise in the face of opposition, yet with a wisdom and grace that persuades even the hardest heart’s that God’s will is the only way.
The manifestation of the sons of God depends on spiritual fathers who will invest time and energy into their spiritual children. So as we consider Elijah and his miraculous ministry let us also consider this powerful prophet’s role in shaping the life and ministry of young Elisha, who went on to do far greater things than his spiritual mentor.
You don’t have to be an apostle to be a spiritual father or mother, but the Holy
Spirit is surely ushering in a renewed focus on this relational dynamic that will prepare the Church for its Bridegroom. We are seeing the manifestation of the Malachi mandate that proclaims: “He shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers...” (Malachi 4:6)
“There’s a revelation that’s beginning to come to the earth that’s
obviously a part of the apostolic movement,” says Bishop Tony
Miller, founder of Destiny World Outreach in Greenville, S.C. “In
fact, this revelation of spiritual fathers is one of the major
aspects of the apostolic movement – and it’s oftentimes overlooked.
It’s the Malachi 4 model where God is restoring the hearts of the
fathers back to their children and their children back to their
fathers. It’s a two-way avenue.”
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The Emerging Spiritual Fathers
Many church
leaders mourn the dearth of spiritual fathers in the Body of Christ
today. Some, like Apostle John Eckhardt, founder of Crusader
Ministries in Chicago, believes this parental drought is hindering
the purposes of God in the apostolic revolution.
“I believe there are thousands of emerging apostles that have gifts
within them and they are not being released because we don’t have
fathers that understand the apostolic calling and the [need to]
release them like we should,” John Eckhardt argues. “I believe we do have
many young ministers with apostolic callings who struggle to develop
on their own because there is no one in their region that they are
connected to that has a heart to train and disciple them into their
gifting.”
One reason for the scarcity of spiritual fathers is the lack of a
widespread fathering model in former generations. Many of today’s
local church leaders were not fathered themselves, and subsequently
do not know how to father others. The apostolic revolution is
helping to break this vicious cycle with spiritual fathers and
mothers and spiritual sons and daughters who are willing to learn
and grow into their respective roles together for the sake of future
generations.
Doug stringer, founder and president of Turning Point Ministries
International in Houston, Texas, is writing a book on the topic of
spiritual fathers. His passion is to reach what he deems as a
fatherless generation emerging as a prophetic generation in pursuit
of spiritual fathers. In his travels, he frequently encounters young
men and women with a deep craving for spiritual fathers.
“My generation was fatherless,” says Doug Stringer, 50, author of the
upcoming book Who’s Your Daddy Now? “We don’t know how to be fathers
ourselves, but the emerging generation tells me they don’t expect us
to know how to be fathers. They just want us to be willing to try,
and to identify with them and offer a sense of connectedness.”
Anatomy of a Spiritual Father
Of course, the concept of spiritual
fatherhood is not new to the apostolic. Long before the apostles
were fully restored to the Church, Dr. Lester Sumrall raised up
three strong spiritual sons. Sumrall passed away in 1996, but his
ministry lives on, in part, through what he imparted to Rod Parsley,
Ulf Ekman and Billy Joe Daugherty. Sumrall was known as a “pastor of
pastors.” Lester Sumrall, himself, was tutored by British evangelist Howard
Carter and blessed by Smith Wigglesworth.
Rod
Parsley views his relationship with Lester Sumrall as akin to the dynamics
between Elijah and Elisha. In 1992, Sumrall passed his “sword of
anointing” to Rod Parsley, conferring on him the spiritual mantle of his
ministry. “Dr. Lester Sumrall was not only my spiritual mentor and
my pastor, but also he was, above all, my best friend. For more than
15 years he protected me, guided me, instructed me, corrected me and
exhorted me. He encouraged and inspired me to a closer walk with
God, and he increased my understanding of the spirit realm as no
other human ever has,” Rod Parsley wrote in his book
Rod Parsley
Presents Adventuring With Christ by Lester Sumrall.
Rod
Parsley described many of the
characteristics of a spiritual father:
protection, guidance, instruction, correction, exhortation,
encouragement and inspiration. Tony Miller agrees that these are some of
the chief earmarks of a true spiritual father. A spiritual father,
he says, is always willing to give his life for his sons. A
spiritual father, he adds, will always anchor his sons to his
character and purpose. A spiritual father, he continues, will always
see gifts in his son that other people don’t see – and inspire him
to put the gifts to work.
“In this apostolic move we’re moving into a season where I believe
the emphasis of the Kingdom is not in doing but in being. That’s why
spiritual fathers are arising on the scene,” Miller explains. Miller’s
spiritual father is Tom Peters, pastor of Trinity Church
International in Lake Worth, Fla. Miller describes him as man of
godly character, yet not overly charismatic, who has made a
tremendous impact on his life.
“My spiritual father recently said to me, ‘You don’t even need me
anymore. You do far bigger things than I do’,” Miller shares. “I
told him I would always need him. I need him because he was there
when I had nothing. He understood the assignment on my life and he
helped God forge character in my life. Then he told me that if I
stay true to the character of God and walk humbly before the Lord,
God will keep promoting me. It’s more important to him that I stay
in a right relationship with God and posture myself according to
character and the purpose of god than it is that I keep expanding my
borders. I believe that that’s the heart of the true spiritual father.”
Breaking Down Resistance
For all the talk about spiritual fathers,
we must not forget that without willing spiritual sons there cannot
be the two-way avenue that Miller described. Spiritual sons should
respect and honor their spiritual fathers, according to Peter
Sumrall. That means serving the father’s vision and taking his
advice concerning your own. “My dad used to laugh because some guys
would say ‘You are my spiritual father,’ but they were too busy to
pick him up at the airport,” Sumrall recalls. “They didn’t
understand the meaning of serving, or of receiving the spiritual
insight and authority a father has to offer.”
It seems not much has changed today. an. An independent spirit often
causes would-be sons to resist sonship, most notably the correction
that come with the relationship. However, fathers who refuse to
correct their sons will lose their sons as Eli lost his (1 Samuel
2:34; 4:11). And the Bible clearly states that those who will not
receive correction will become bastards (Hebrews 12:8).
Tony
Miller puts it this way: sonship is not visible by how someone
receives encouragement; it’s visible by how they receive correction.
A true son doesn’t make his father adjust the way he leads; a true
son adjusts the way he follows. While ultimate accountability is
surely before the Lord, spiritual sonship goes beyond accountability
to a willingness to submit yourself to a father who can speak to the
blind spots in your life so you can grow.
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 Who's
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 You
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“I think many guys resist spiritual fathers because they don’t want
to have to get permission from anybody to do what they want to do.
It’s not about permission-giving. It’s about maturity. It’s about
wisdom. You can enforce compliance, but submission can never be
forced,” Miller explains. “Submission is an attitude of the heart.
There are a lot of people out there who are keeping the rules but
who are not submitting. They call you father until there is
something they don’t agree with.”
Another reason some resist the Spiritual fathers movement because they have
seen what Miller calls rent-a-father, an abominable act where
leaders attempt to merchandise believers. It sounds something like
this, “Send me your tithes and I will be your father.” That tactic
is not relational and does not fit God’s pattern for fathers –
spiritual or natural. When a child is born, the father doesn’t tell
him, “pay me and I’ll take care of you.” There is nothing wrong with
honoring spiritual fathers with gifts, Tony Miller asserts, but honor is
far more than sending a check.
“True Spiritual fathers will cut away the flesh – that’s what circumcision is
– that would impede the flow of life,” Miller says. “When a father
takes his knife to shape the character of a son, it’s not to harm
him. It’s to release a greater flow of life. That’s the reason I
tell young men, ‘If your spiritual father doesn’t have a knife, go
and buy him one.’ I don’t want my father not to carry a knife
because I want him to deal with the areas of my life that cut off my
productivity.”
The Qualities of Sonship
Beyond submitting to the counsel and
correction – and receiving the encouragement and strength – from a
spiritual father, true sons honor their father. But honor goes
beyond gifts or even submission to include a measure of dependence.
Young warriors are built for exploits, but older men who become
spiritual fathers have a burden to impart before they depart.
Fathers have an urgency to make a deposit in their sons’ lives so
they win the battle.
Just as we honor god by asking him to help us with our challenges,
spiritual sons honor their spiritual fathers by asking them for
insight. This concept is illustrated in 2 Kings 6 when the sons of
the prophets came to Elisha looking for his blessing to go build a
bigger dwelling by the river. The sons of the prophets, Stringer
explains, wanted to build their own place, but they wanted their
spiritual father to go with them in case they needed him. Indeed,
when the young prophets lost their axe head in the river they turned
to Elisha for some insight. Stringer sees that axe head as a symbol
of strength, passion and the first love. Elisha was able to help the
young prophets retrieve what was lost.
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“Sometimes we need to be available to the emerging generation as
apostolic fathers and help them find their passion, their
creativity, their sense of destiny and purpose that God gave them,”
Stringer says. “We need to give them wisdom, another shot in the arm
so to speak, to keep them moving forward because they are full of
vision and anointing. We just have to give them a compass.”
Apostolic fathers lay foundations. Rather than lording a title or
office over a spiritual son, they get under them to push them to a
higher dimension. Miller still remembers a recent trip to South
Africa. A man there made a statement that still pierces his heart
and reminds him of the mandate on his life. The man said, “Your
success is my honor.” Miller tells his spiritual sons that the
greatest thing they could do for him is to take what he’s imparted
to them and use it to expand the Kingdom.
The apostolic is a multi-generational movement. The establishment of
the Kingdom demands spiritual fathers who are willing to propel
their spiritual sons to greater heights. Stringer puts it this way:
“We will either be like Elizabeth rejoicing over the birthing of a
forerunner generation or we will be like Rachael weeping over the
loss of a whole generation. “It is up to us as the Church to carry
the expression of Christ and to really represent the Father to a
generation that has been deemed fatherless.”
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The
Holy Spirit is turning the hearts of the fathers to the children and the hearts of the children to the fathers. Discover the dynamics of true spiritual fathers and sons relationships.
