Profile in Prophetic Wisdom: Dr. Kim Maas

Photo by Javier Vinals on Unsplash

I recently had the pleasure of speaking with minister of the Gospel, author, and prophet Dr. Kim Maas over zoom. Our conversation was wide ranging, touching on her personal testimony, call to ministry, and the training and character development required for those called to prophetic ministry.

The interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

MU: Kim, some people may be unfamiliar with who you are and your story. I've had the privilege of hearing it, but if you wouldn't mind, tell us a bit of your story— how you were saved and called—because it really is incredible.

KM: When I was 13, a group of friends invited me to a youth revival meeting at a Baptist church. Even though I had been going to church, and I think I already loved Jesus, we were there being silly and talking about boys. The preacher that night was walking back and forth across the stage, and he was preaching his guts out. All of a sudden my heart started to burn; I felt this burning inside my chest. And I began to be riveted by what he was saying, and then came the altar call. There is something about having to publicly respond—I wanted Jesus so much. I had to stand up and walk through all of my friends and down the aisle, from the second balcony all the way down to the front, to get to the altar to publicly acknowledge that I wanted Jesus as my Lord and Savior. It was a powerful experience for a 13-year-old girl. I sobbed and wept the entire time. And that's how I got saved.

I don't remember much after that, except that, you know, I went to my home church, I told them I got saved and I got baptized. And it was a beautiful experience. And then, you know, in my teenage years I didn't continue to walk with the Lord. I stopped going to church altogether and never read my Bible. Then when I was 19 I was engaged to be married and was basically left at the altar, and this caused me to have a nervous breakdown. I would just sit in my dark room in my rocking chair and rock and rock and cry and cry and pull the shades and that was it. And then one day, I remember getting up from my rocking chair, opening the shades and hearing the birds chirping and traffic going past. I realized the world didn't stop just because I did. So, I went back out into the world. My parents were thanking God, thinking I was better, but actually I became very self-destructive because of that experience. I really thought I wasn't good enough. I thought I deserved everything that happened to me, so I heaped abuse upon myself, and it was at the end of that year that I met my husband, God bless him. He was not a Christian, and I was not a practicing Christian. I got pregnant; we got married. That's how that went. And about three months after we got married I realized that he was a drug addict and an alcoholic. It was so dark, and I thought I deserved all of it.

It was so bad. He was the kind of addict that was drunk all weekend and wouldn't come home at night. He’d sleep it off and go back to work. At least he worked, but he smoked pot three times a day and snorted coke. I was a wreck. I was working full time as a labor and delivery nurse. I was taking care of my daughters; I was dealing with all of this at home. At the end of almost four years I remember telling God, “I can't do this anymore.” So I left my husband; I filed for divorce. It was the darkest time in my entire life.

Then I met a woman who told me that she and her husband were planting a Vineyard church. I didn't know what that meant, because I didn't understand there were different theologies in the Church. You know, I just thought everybody in the world was Baptist or Catholic. And I didn't know anything about the Holy Spirit at all. She invited me to go to her church, and after the service I told her every ugly, horrible thing, and she invited me to church again. She never once condemned me. She just prayed for me, she was so kind to me, and it opened me up to the possibility that maybe my life with Jesus wasn't over. So I bought a Bible and started reading the word again and going to church; and after two weeks back at church I was sitting in my apartment one day, and my kids were sleeping in the bedroom. I opened up my Bible, and I heard the audible voice of God. And I freaked out!  

I had no context for this. I didn't know that God speaks. I didn't know God spoke except through scripture. And I didn't know that God would speak to me personally about my situation. But he did, and he said: “Go home and I will take care of everything.” After I was done being shocked, I got mad. I said to God: “Do you have any idea what you are asking of me? Do you have any idea how I was treated? You're asking me to go home and trust you? Trust that you'll take care of everything?” But God doesn't argue with us. He didn't say another word. 

I knew I had to make a choice. I knew inside myself that I was either going to obey God and follow him for the rest of my life, or I was not going to obey God and then walk away. I knew it was that kind of fork-in-the-road. So I picked up the phone and called my husband. I invited him out to dinner; he thought I was crazy. We reconciled that weekend.

I'd like to say that the change was instantaneous, but it wasn’t. Four years went by and he did not change. We had another child. My family thought I was nuts. At the end of that time, the night before Thanksgiving, my husband had been gone all night drinking and doing drugs. I was up all night praying. I got up in the morning and I said, “God I can't do it anymore. You said! You said! Did I not hear you? Was that my imagination? Did I somehow conjure that up with some kind of magical thinking?” God didn't say anything to me. I didn't hear his voice. I hadn't heard his voice in four years, I was just going to church and reading my Bible. But when Mike, my husband, came home that morning he was different. He said a presence filled his car, and he knew it was Jesus. He said he heard an internal voice say, “You're about to lose everything you've ever loved. And this time I won't bring it back, unless you give your life into my hands.” Right then and there he accepted Christ as his Savior. He said yes to God. 

He was instantly delivered of all of his addictions. He never had another drink or did any drugs after that moment. After that we started healing as a family and learning how to be Christians together. Four years went by of healing and going to counseling; we did all of that. We started going to a Foursquare church. I was invited to a church women's retreat to share my testimony. I gave my testimony at the retreat and this young girl (I'm 35 at the time) said she felt like she was supposed to pray for me to be baptised with the Holy Spirit. And I said, “Go ahead,” so she laid hands on me and I had a radical encounter with the Holy Spirit. I was completely changed in a moment. I was called to full-time ministry. I had a fire for God; I started to hear his voice again, and I hadn't heard his voice in eight years. He told me what he wanted me to do, every single day, for the next five years. He told me the things that I would encounter and difficulties that I would have. He has fulfilled every single promise and I have been faithful to obey His Word. And he's brought me to this place.

MU: Wow. I almost feel like we don’t have to say anything else for the rest of this interview. The power of that testimony is enough on its own to inspire anyone who reads it. Our God is so gracious.

KM: He is so good! Scripture says that the testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of Prophecy. When we give our testimony, what we're really doing is being a witness to the power of Christ in our own lives. I have seen him do miraculous things, but this is not unique to me. He's able to do this for you as well. He's able to save marriages. He is able to bring you through challenges to a new place. He is able to shift your whole life into something that has meaning and purpose. This is what God does.

MU: Kim, could you talk a little about what it is like to be called as a prophet or to prophetic ministry?

KM: Most of the prophets I know experienced a personal call; they heard the voice of God, and they noticed that they operated in the gifts of a prophet. They not only hear God's voice, but they also have seen miracles, signs, and wonders in some way; they have an unusual gift. They also have a gift of leadership. And then their gifts start to be recognized and tested by other leaders in a church environment. And then at some point there is usually a public affirmation or confirmation, whether it comes in front of 2000 people, or their pastor says, “I acknowledge that you are called as a prophet, and we acknowledge you before the entire congregation.” And that's usually how it  goes. There is a lot of training, character development, and testing that God puts you through. Nobody gets to skip that. I've heard people who are called into not just prophetic ministry, but other areas of ministry say things like: “Well, God's doing an accelerating thing, so I'm not gonna have to go through challenges. It's not going to take 20 years to develop my gift, or for me to be set in a public sphere or office of ministry.” And I think, “Oh? Well, we'll see about that,” because many of us have said that and most of us have been proven wrong. But every prophetic minister is different. They all have their own backgrounds and upbringing, personality, gifting, calling, and no two of us are alike, just like in scripture. The prophets of scripture are called to different people, different places, and for different reasons.

MU: I’ve heard you speak before about your own calling to help move the church and the people of the church forward into deeper life in Christ. What would you say to a layperson who doesn’t think they have a calling in Christ?

KM: If you're living and breathing, you have a calling. When Jesus said, “Go into all the world and, and preach the gospel,” he wasn’t just talking to clergy. We have turned calling into something that can only be expressed in positional authority inside the church, but this is not what we see in scripture. In scripture we do see ordination of clergy, but we also see God raising up pastors, teachers, prophets, evangelists, and apostles. 

We're all called to preach the gospel, We're all called to do signs, wonders, and miracles, We're all called to hear the voice of God and speak his words, we're all called to heal the sick and cast out demons. So that means whatever you do, you take your calling with you into that place. Are you called to be a businessman? Good, you're going to be a businessman who advances the kingdom. 

My husband was called to leadership as a battalion chief in the fire department. He would do his job, he cared for the citizens, he prayed for his city, he prayed for his men, he prayed for people on the job. Sometimes when somebody was sick and dying he would very quietly lay his hands on that person on the gurney and pray silently for their healing, or for their well being; he prayed that they would know Jesus if they were dying. We take the commission with us wherever we go. 

So the question we all have to ask ourselves is, Where has God placed me? Who are the people I am called to serve? What might be the reason that God called me to this place and these people? Discern the answers to those questions and apply that information to whatever assignment or role you find yourself in. Be a disciple wherever you are. That is the general call for all Christians. It’s from serving in that role as a disciple that people can discern their particular call. For instance, I'm called broadly as a disciple to fulfill the great commission wherever I go, and I’m specifically called to be a prophet, to preach the word of the Lord to nations and to hear for the times and seasons and prophesy in those places. 

MU: Kim, what would you say are some key characteristics of healthy growth in prophetic ministry? 

KM: If you can, try to find a prophetic mentor. I personally did not have a mentor coming up, but I was called when I was thirty-five. I had a little more life experience behind me. A mentor is a wonderful thing and something to be pursued. More and more I find prophetic leaders are creating institutes or ministry schools where you can receive training and be in an environment of accountability. There are practices that we must engage in if we’re going to have any sort of effectiveness or credibility in prophetic ministry, primarily studying scripture. Every single day, you must read scripture. The first test of any prophetic word is against scripture, so a prophet must be filled with scripture. You should memorize scripture, study scripture; if God calls you to go to school to study scripture, do that. There came a time in my own life when I was reading commentaries, but I knew there was more, but I wasn’t getting it. So God called me to go to seminary. I went, and for me, it wasn't a “cemetery.”  For me, it fanned the flame so I burned even hotter for the Lord, because scripture is so rich. When you have scripture on the inside of you, you are less likely to prophesy incorrectly. When you have scripture inside of you, you begin to understand who God is and how he works with his people. You are less likely to be mean and condemning towards people. 

It is also important to be faithful and go through all of the challenges that come with life in Christ. Cultivate your intimacy with God and allow him to test and refine your character. I tell pastors all the time, just because someone is wildly prophetic and they can prophesy your socks off doesn't mean they have character, and it doesn't mean they're going to love the people of God. I'm telling you, if a prophet doesn't love the people of God, he or she has no business prophesying to the people of God. Scripture says this. I can prophesy and make the mountains shake until the fig tree dies or move mountains, but if I don't love—I'm just noise.

Dr. Kim M. Maas holds a Master of Divinity from The King’s University and a Doctor of Ministry from United Theological Seminary. Kim is ordained under the Foursquare Church International. Her latest book is The Way of the Kingdom: Seizing the Times for a Great Move of God

Maggie Ulmer is Resource Director for Spirit & Truth, Managing Editor of Firebrand, and one of the hosts of Plain Truth: A Holy-Spirited Podcast.