Here is my response to the said question, Before going on, i feel it’s important to understand the difference between “prophet” and “spirit”, after knowing the what they are we can begin to know why John used spirit instead of prophet.
A prophet is an individual who is regarded as being in contact with a divine being might be God might be otherwise and is said to speak on behalf of that being, serving as an intermediary with humanity by delivering messages or teachings from the supernatural source to other people. Simply put, a prophet is a seer.
Now a spirit on the other hand can be said to be the prevailing or typical quality, mood, or attitude of a person (from the dictionary). Now, from this distinction we can begin to notice something,
Firstly, you can tell the spirit of a prophet by noticing the words he speaks. And also, different prophets are possessed with different spirits, that might not necessarily be from God. 1 Corinthians 14:32 which says “And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets”.
Brother Eli pointed out that a prophet is recognized by the spirit in him.
How can you tell if the spirit that the prophet possesses is from God. Because the Bible made us to understand that not all spirits are from God in 1 John 4: 1 ”Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world”. So how then can you tell? In the same book of 1 John 4:2-3 2Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: 3 And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world”. So from this we can clearly know the reason why John used the word spirit instead of prophet. Thanks for reading through.
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