Prophets visiting Barbados, are they robbing bajans?

Barbados of late has been seeing a plethora of prophets coming to the island speaking and prophesying into the lives of persons.

These prophets tend to come from the United States of America, England, and Nigeria. There stay here in Barbados for a few days, to maybe a week, for which one can suspect might be an expensive undertaking.

The cost of the visit seems to be paid for, and or offset by those who attend the functions, which are held at the premises of the church, the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre, or the Wildey Gymnasium.

To pay for the event patrons are asked to bring their offerings to a collection basket. Those who are carrying hundreds and fifties are asked to come and drop in their monies first in expectancy of a blessing, and then those with lesser denominations.

In other instances envelopes are given where persons are called upon to place from a thousand ($1000), to over twenty thousand ($20 000) which occurred at the last prophetic meeting here in Barbados.

That particular meeting was the one which broke the camels back, as such large sums were requested and the form of doctrine thought.

These prophets tend to encourage persons into giving because they can tell a person their name, address, telephone number etcetera, but is this enough to determine if this is a true prophet of God.

According to the bible the criteria is dependent upon whether or not, what that prophet says comes to pass, and also by their fruits.

Many will be surprised, but agents of Satan can also prophesy, as those who read tarot cards may be able to do.

Barbadians need then to be very careful who their allow as prophets of God, and screen them by their fruits also.

Some of these prophets were able to tell persons their names, addresses, telephone numbers, and even performed what appeared to be miracles on those who were said to be bewitched.

During a service some were chosen from the crowd and were asked to bring their bags, these persons were said to be bewitched, water was "blessed" and poured into the bags. What occurred next was an explosion similar to that of the reaction between potassium and water, where a spark and smoke is seen.

A prophet also asked persons to bring glass bottles to the service in order to pray against their enemies and called for their death By bottling the enemy. Soil was then added to the bottle and it was covered to be later smashed to pieces. Any bottle which didn't break on the first attempt was to be returned to the prophet.

This undertaking was taken from the old covenant of the Old Testament (Jeremiah 19:1). The new covenant under the New Testament, however, calls for persons to love their enemies and pray for them.

Matthew 5: 43-48 states the following:

5:43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
5:44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
5:45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
5:46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?
5:47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?
5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

Some prophets who have come to Barbados for services in Barbados include Prophet Wesley Van Johnson from USA, Prophet J.E. Knotts, Prophet Agyemang Prempeh from UK, Prophet Richardo Gordan from Jamaica, Prophet Itode Iloye from Nigeria, and many many others.

The Nation Newspaper on May 19 carried an article entitled "Don't be fooled by false prophets " excerpts are shown below

Christians, don't go around those so-called "prophets" of God and give your hard-earned money to them. They are out to fool you; they are out to get your money.

They promise that if you give them, let's say $10 000, you will get ten times or maybe 20 times more.

They are prophets??!!

Do you know what a prophet is?

A prophet is God's spokesman. If a prophet says tomorrow you will get a million dollars, it should happen. It will happen if he is a true prophet of God. But in my case nothing happened. I was "scrambling" to find money to pay for my child's education; yes, I had the money for that purpose.

Foolishness must stop

This has been going on for too long. This foolishness must stop! Like my girlfriend who telephoned me to borrow $250 to give a prophet to break generational curses.