HEAD of Whole Life Ministries Rev Dr Al Miller yesterday described Dr Phillip Phinn’s recent prophecy in which he publicly declared victory for Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller in the upcoming general elections as unwise.

Miller said, too, that Phinn’s public declaration could be perceived as a ‘manipulation’ of the process rather than ‘influence’, which is legitimate in democracies.

Miller, a pastor who also has the gift of prophecy, made it clear, however, that the problem with Phinn’s declaration was not primarily of content as God can and does speak to his people via the prophetic voice. The issue, he said, was that such utterance could invariably be seen as indicating selection by Divine edict rather than the people’s choice.

“The issue is the wisdom and correctness of public declarations on “the who” in a democratic society,” Miller told the Observer yesterday.

At an annual prophetic conference at the Hilton Kingston Hotel last week, Phinn repeated an earlier claim that God had ordained Portia Simpson Miller to continue to rule as prime minister.

In defence of the prophecy, Phinn told the Observer yesterday that he was representing a prophetic company which spanned the gamut of Kingston, Mandeville, Montego Bay, the Cayman Islands, New York and Atlanta, whose prophets prayed at different times and concurred that this was the word of the Lord.

He said the result would speak for itself after the elections, “and if it don’t come to pass, we know that it wasn’t God, but I have no doubt or fear because I have used every method that is scriptural.

The prophecy, Phinn told the Observer, was derived after all the prophetic camp within the Word of Life Ministries International prayed and fasted before giving their prophecies.

“At the end of it all, the tapes come to my headquarters and we go through and see where there is more than one prophecy saying the same thing and we make special note of it for extra special prayer and that is how we did the process of selection,” he said. One of the overwhelming recurring prophecy, he added, was about Simpson Miller.

“People are free to believe what they want to and we live in a place where there is freedom of religion and of speech, and all I am simply saying is that thus saith the Lord that the next term is in the bag for Portia Simpson Miller and they can’t beat her,” Phinn said.

But Miller, who pastors Fellowship Tabernacle in Kingston, said yesterday that such a prophecy could easily be interpreted as the abuse of one’s position of privilege to advance personal belief interest.

This, Miller said, could also confuse and create wrong concepts about the justice of God, especially if there is growing inequities in the practice and performance of the declared leader and or party.

Miller said more consistent biblical pattern was for the people to select leadership by observing the guidelines from divine edict.

Citing the scripture passage Exodus 18:25 – ‘And Moses chose from able men out of all Israel and made them head over the people’ – Miller cemented pointed out that when the people of Israel requested a King, God, through Samuel the prophet, chose the first King Saul, whose performance disqualified him, so God replaced him with David.

“All subsequent kings were done by an accepted societal process, in the exception, not the rule for prophetic interference, the prophet spoke directly to the individual, not the public,” he said.

He said, however, that if one feels compelled to make public predictive prophecy, motive must be right and just and the reason for God’s choice must be made known with the benefits or consequences so that the people are edified.

Such predictive prophecy, said Miller, must also indicate whether the prophecy is stating simply what will happen as a result of the people’s choices, or if it is what is ordained by God to be so. “If ordained, it makes the leader God’s choice for either the blessing or judgement of the people. The prophet must make clear,” he said.

Miller said the declared prophecy must be judged not by novices or students of the prophet, but elders or apostolic authorities.

He added that if Phinn felt strongly about sharing such a word, it should have been done privately or in a private setting.

“Challenging prophetically, systems structures, and acts of sin, oppression, corruption, injustice and pronouncing judgement, warning or direction are clear realms of public utterance which we should have been hearing more frequently,” Miller said.