I was involved in an interesting discussion while at Bible College related to the saying “thus sayeth the Lord”. We had been at a baptismal service where a young woman was being baptised. After she came up from the water there was time given if people had any words for her from the Lord. One man made the following statement “Thus sayeth the Lord, I forgetest thy name but . . . [then he went on to give a word of encouragement to her]. Interesting the Lord who has the hairs on her head number forgot her name. There were other Bible College students at the service and the next day it became the subject of discussion in class.
I made a summary statement at the end saying the fact that he used those words was unfortunate. I think what was clear was the speaker had forgotten her name and unfortunately couched the act of forgetting as though it was the Lord forgetting. It would have been far better for him to have said something like “I forget your name but I feel the Lord has a word of encouragement for you” – an example of this I say not the Lord. Maybe we should all begin “prophetic statements” with the proviso “I sense a word from the Lord for you but I strongly suggest that you check it out to determine if it is from Him or from just my thoughts.” A more balanced approach.