Hearing Gods voice, discerning the Spirits and other prophetic stuff

Practice is what tunes your discernment to the Spirit of God.
Practice is obedience to what you believe is God is directing you to do.
Praying and obeying and looking carefully at the results.
Not jumping to conclusions and having to end up putting you hand on your mouth and repent of your hasty words like i have done way to many times in my hasty days.

You test a spirit how?
You test it against the word of God.
You test it in prayer with God
if all that seems good.
You test in by putting it into practice and judging the results.

Remember how it came to you, how if felt to you, write it down so you don't forget.
The taste and see flavor of the spirit. Then come back and fill in the results of your testing.

Next time you get something it may already be a known on your list.

God has seven different spirits in his nature. all within with the One Spirit.
God is Spirit.
God is also Light.
Like light divided in a prism, Gods throne is made out of what we make prisms from.
The bow of God, a weapon. we call it a rainbow. is the result of light or spirit being divided into its component parts or natures.
Each of the seven spirits of God are represented in the rainbow of God.

If you have a problem with the term spirits of God it may be easier to understand it as the seven natures of God.
But the seven spirits of God is the biblical term.

The point here being each spirit has a different function and flavor for lack of a better word.
That is what you are getting to know.
Satan has his counterfeits, those you also will need to get to know

The deeper you move into the things of the Spirit and power of God the more these things become important.
But for just starting out and for your own spiritual walk focus on the results and take your time in making your final assessment, don't be hasty, bring it before God and get his assessment, of your assessment, He might just have something to say about it.

On other bit, the more you are embracing holiness the more God is able to lead you out of your own desires or will, as it becomes purified, sanctified it becomes a more reliable indicator for you.
God is at work in you to will and to do of his good pleasure - Philippians 2:13

Guard your heart and stay in your First Love with God, be motivated by fervent love for God.

It's so easy to get off track and think we have to do everything and God is expecting us to work hard for Him.

He wants us to know Him and to love Him by so doing, EVERYTHING falls into place and is much easier.

Otherwise, we end up in a bunch of works and get upset with other Believers because we don't think they're doing it right.

Look at this statement you made:

The deeper you move into the things of the Spirit and power of God the more these things become important.
But for just starting out and for your own spiritual walk focus on the results and take your time in making your final assessment, don't be hasty, bring it before God and get his assessment, of your assessment, He might just have something to say about it.

You're just getting all of us back into WORKS, getting us focused on spiritual works --- Where did love for God go?

It's LOVE FOR GOD that motivates us to submit to the Holy Spirit to do the works of God.
It's LOVE FOR GOD that motivates us to read and study God's Word - the Holy Bible.
It's LOVE FOR GOD that motivates us to obey God's Word.
It's LOVE FOR GOD that motivates us to not resist, grieve, quench or neglect the Holy Spirit.

We get to love God, He does His works in us and through us.......all we need to do is love Him.

Because of love we do A LOT of spiritual works without even thinking about it.

Focus on loving and knowing God - the spiritual works will just happen automatically - spiritual works just become part of our lifestyle with God -we just do them because we've learned to walk by the Spirit so we do not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.

read it again, you missed it.
focus on the results of your testing the spirits.

The more these things become important.
the more you grow the more the details become import AKA useful.

If you are going to go about judging things take the time to understand them first.

Hi Lafftur, I apologize for our brother treating you rudely

You're so sweet @shittim! No worries, I actually like the topic of spiritual works but, it's so important to not lose our FIRST LOVE. I'm enjoying the discussion.

@Lion222 - Please know I do not take any offense with you and count you as my brother in Christ!

Hi Lafftur, I apologize for our brother treating you rudely

Do you remember your first car?
I remember after I got mine suddenly my car was everywhere?
The grandma had one. the pizza guy. everywhere I went there was my car.

That is just how our brains work.
When you are focused on something that is what you see.
So one test for me when i started to walk in these things was to be sure that what I thought was God was not just seeing my first car.

Test 1 - Was it what I was currently focusing on or thinking about.
Test 2 - Was it connected to my recent thoughts, concerns or fears.
Test 3 - Did it seem all too familiar like the theme of a recently binged watch movie series.
Test 4 - Did i have a lot of pepperoni pizza the night before?

The more out of nowhere it came the more I tended to consider it from God.
Especially if it just kept showing up, the more impossible ways the better.

But these are just a baby tools, toys of reason.
You come to discern the Spirits in the following.
You test them against the written word.
You get the advice of those mature in it.
Still it is on you to do with it what you know is good to do,
Don't let the advice of others be an excuse to sin against your own conscience.
Eventually you will just recognize his voice as you keep going and testing and discovering.

ALL Christians are to do this!
Hearing his voice is just what his sheep do.
It is just coming under Christs direct leadership of your life.

Those who have a Prophetic gifting just have this in quantity for a different purpose.
For the equipping of the saints.
To help them grow in hearing and following for their own spiritual walk.
To speak directly to those stubborn sheep going there own way
To speak to ones lost pointing them in the right direction.
To head out into the wilderness and meet those crying out to God with their answer.
To deliver a message of Gods life to the dying.
To operate as a watchman in and over your fellowship.

Unfortunate the place of the prophetic has been dishonored in the Church and She is worse off because of it.
I do believe God is changing that, restoring.church, bringing back what was lost to the centuries.

LOVE is a Fruit of the Holy Spirit, NOT a spiritual gift.

God is actually aligned with your thoughts and even what you watch or is familiar to you. So he can speak through all.

To know if it's from God can be tough.

Love is is a fruit of the Holy Spirit and a spiritual gift, along with faith and hope. Faith and hope are closely linked:

Faith/hope:
1 Corinthians 12:9 "to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit,"

Hebrews 11:1 "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen."

And love is grouped with faith and hope.

1 Corinthians 13:13 "And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love; but the greatest of these is love."

The whole point of 1 Corinthians 13 is to show how love is the greatest fruit/gift of all. And that without love everything else is nothing.

Faith is both - a Fruit and Gift of the Holy Spirit. However, Love is never referred to as a spiritual gift of the Holy Spirit - only as Fruit of the Holy Spirit.

Galatians 5:22-23 King James Version (KJV)
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,

23 Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

1 Corinthians 12:4-11 King James Version (KJV)
4 Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit.

5 And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord.

6 And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.

7 But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.

8 For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit;

9 To another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit;

10 To another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues:

11 But all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will.

Notice LOVE is not listed as a gift but, it is listed as a fruit.

1 Corinthians 12:31 "But eagerly desire the greater gifts. And now I will show you the most excellent way."

1 Corinthians 13:1 "If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a ringing gong or a clanging cymbal."

1 Cor. 12 & 13 are about spiritual gifts. Love is of the great spiritual gifts and the most excellent way. It's the greatest spiritual gift of all and, yes, is also the greatest fruit as well.

Do you see that now?

If you are saying.
What God uses to communicate has specific meaning to the intended recipient.

Then Yes I totally agree.
It is their understanding of that meaning that is usually the correct understanding.

I am trying to focus on things to help with that other bit.
Knowing if it is from God or Just me or something else

OOH do you still have it if you do can I see a picture?

Even prophetic words have to aline with scripture.