How to discern true or false when someone claims to be a prophet or presents what they say as it being as if God Himself had spoken it. If God Himself speaks we need signs to know it is Him speaking else we probably would doubt it is God Himself. This is natural and how we are conditioned. Our defense mechanisms. So we have difficulty telling when someone speaks whether it is their own thoughts they speak or whether God Himself or Christ or the Holy Spirit has spoken to them and they are passing it on. The voice of God or Christ or the Holy Spirit always comes to me with a sign. Ask for signs but beware your inner greed and selfish ambitions might make you tend to label them false or true without faith being given prominence. The eye, said Jesus, can be misleading and give false light to you when it is bad and corrupted by greed and other evils. Be sure your light within is good when you want to use that light to discern another. Even how we use scripture can get corrupted by our selfishness and greed. The Pharisees were experts in scripture but still being lovers of money and human praise they labelled Jesus false. The sign can be important as part of a message of prophecy. A manger was the sign for the shepherds at Jesus' birth and pondering it I would think of a lamb (especially being a shepherd) that this baby is a lamb - the lamb for sacrifice for the temple. A false prophet might try to trump a sign, like one did with Jeremiah's yoke by breaking it. The profundity of God's wisdom is found by pondering a true sign, as the spirit within finds the sign life-giving. I never really doubt true signs given me because they speak to me so well and show how wise God is. The sign of the manger given the shepherds about baby Jesus shows God knew exactly what He was doing when He provided Jesus' birth as His lamb, and in announcing it to shepherds. They say the main business of shepherds in Bethlehem so near Jerusalem was lambs for sacrifice.
