Other Voices: Rick Joyner (Morningstar)
I love this word- it’s doing the rounds online right now. it’s something Rick Joyner saw many years ago and wrote about it his books ‘Visions of the Harvest’ and ‘The Harvest’. I love it. These books shaped our thinking and journey. Dreaming of nations burning… greater works…” the leaves of the trees (of heaven) are for the healing of the nations”…
The Magnitude of the Harvest
When a tsunami is traveling across the oceans, it is barely a discernable ripple in the water, but when it approaches land, it begins to rise fast, sometimes to a height of several hundred feet. In minutes, a calm sea can rise up and sweep away everything in its path. Even though it may seem that we are in a spiritual calm now, a spiritual tsunami is coming, and we must prepare for it.
The biggest problem virtually every church will be facing is how to handle explosive growth. In the vision, I saw small churches of less than a hundred people adding a thousand new members a week at times. Of course, this happened on the Day of Pentecost, and then there were other days in which thousands came to Christ in a day. Even with a dozen apostles personally trained by the Lord, there was stress caused by this. Pressure points gave birth to new ministries such as the deacon. The infrastructure of church life that this produced is still the model that works, and we need to return to its effective simplicity to handle what is coming.
I saw churches that grew so large that they started renting football and soccer stadiums in which to hold their services. At times, hundreds of thousands would gather in parks and huge outdoor meetings just to hear Bible teachers to pray and to worship. Not only were whole cities coming to Christ, but also entire nations were coming so that the state itself became like a large church.
A few years ago I decided to watch the news for several hours a day for a week to determine what percentage of stories could be considered good news. During that time I did not see one good news story. They were all about problems, crises, disasters, and suffering. This was during the time of some of our greatest economic prosperity. Now it’s worse. However, change is coming. When this next wave hits, the news around the world is going to be dominated by good news.
We will see events like hundreds of thousands of people gathering spontaneously for prayer and worship, becoming the biggest news stories of the day. News teams will be following apostolic teams and evangelists like they do politicians and business leaders now. Much more is happening now than most are aware of, or that is making the news, but when the Lord “suddenly comes into His temple,” it will be the news, and the whole world will be aware of it.
There will be individual newscasts from secular networks that will cause more to come to Christ than Christian networks have in their entire existence. This is not to negate what has been accomplished by Christian networks but rather to stress the impact that this revival will have. We will go through a period when the news of the great things God is doing will crowd out just about all other news around the world.
Both the Welsh and the Azusa Street Revivals made front-page news around the world repeatedly for nearly two years. That was just a foretaste, a seed being planted for what is to come. The coming move of God will in some ways be a composite of many of the great moves of the past, but in one basic way it will be different—this will not just be a move of God, but it will be God moving.
This is not just semantics, because every true move of God is at least initiated by God, but He will bless many things He will not inhabit. His manifest presence will be so great in what is coming that people will not chase after individual truths, or acts of God, but they will be after the Lord Himself. He will be the conversation, not just what He does. This is a move that will lift up Jesus. When He is lifted up, all will be drawn to Him, not just to doctrines, projects, or missions, but to Him.
Doctrine certainly has its place, and there is a great need for sound Biblical doctrine to be imparted to all new Believers, and for all other Believers to build stronger foundations on His truth. There is a need for projects and missions that are His will, but “the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing,” and the Main Thing is Jesus. The true apostolic Gospel was Jesus: “They preached Jesus and the resurrection from the dead.” Jesus will again be the Message, and it will be what He is doing that gets the attention.
What is coming is the return to the apostolic Gospel. The Way is a Person.Truth is a Person, and if we don’t know that Person as our Life, then we don’t really know the Way or the Truth either. He is coming to take His rightful place in His Church. When He does, the Church will be profoundly changed. When Jesus becomes our desire as He should be, the Church will become the ultimate society on the earth that multitudes will be streaming to. There is no greater adventure than the true Christian life, and there is nothing more boring than religion. Religion is about to be displaced by the true Christian life, and the great adventure will supplant institutional religion.
Guest Voice: Bill Johnson
If you’ve been reading our blog you’ll know we’re on an inspired theme right now – face time with Jesus! Blurring the boundaries and crossing the lines. In today’s blog I’d like to share an extract from Bill Johnson’s book “Face to Face with God” by Bill Johnson of Bethel Church USA. This is truly inspiring-
Setting up an Ambush by Bill Johnson
“HUNGER FOR GOD IS ONE OF THE GREATEST SIGNS OF LIFE A PERSON CAN HAVE.
It reveals an inner awareness of the existence of a greater destiny and personal fulfilment. Some people have a theological concept about God’s presence with them, but they are struck with no true interaction or experience. We must press past intellectual awareness to hunger for heartfelt encounters that change and transform.
The desire itself is a testimony that there is more, and the fact that we possess this desire to seek God should encourage us to pursue these encounters. It is nearly impossible to hunger for something that does not exist. I crave sweets only because sweet things exist. In the same way, my heart cries out for God because I was created to find complete fulfilment in Him alone. And the more I come to know Him, the more I become sure that He will be faithful to satisfy the desire He put in me.
One of Jesus’s most important promises was given to His disciples prior to His death “He who loves Me… I will love him and manifest Myself to him (John 14:21 NKJV). He promised that they would see Him again. This is clearly not merely a promise that they would see Him in heaven, because that was a given. It was also not a promise for these disciples only, but rather for all who love Him. (Otherwise we might think that this promise only refereed to the appearance Jesus made to His disciples before He ascended).
This promise was for every generation of believers, and it can mean nothing less than that He would make Himself conspicuous to us and that we would surely see Him again and again. We are not only to receive the Holy Spirit in power; we are also to see Jesus over and over again. That has to be the best of both worlds. God has given us these promises explicitly that we might seek Him with abandon, confident that He will be found by those who love Him and seek Him will all their hearts.”
(From Face to Face with God, 2007, Charisma House, page 113-114 Bill Johnson)
There may be tension seeing this new day established, but there is a company of new mystics and cloud walkers who will see His face on an ongoing basis and engage in the strategic council of heaven, to shape a generation, rebuild cities and nations. For a time they may be hidden but in due course their influence will work its way through the landscape to redefine it and reshape it with the contour of above. Landscapers, architects and blueprints are being released. A new spiritual era is rising. With all our hearts we want to position ourselves for that manifestation. The future belongs to the courageous.
Blessings, Justin Abraham
Book: Face to Face Appearances
For the last year I’ve been sharing in Spirit School on encountering Jesus and blurring the boundaries. I’ve talked about getting a welcome mat and slippers for Jesus. Making space for him in you’re heart. Expecting him to come. Someone took my advice and got the slippers and mat in Hong Kong (they heard the Podcast) and Jesus actually came to visit them. She told me it was life changing encounter.
This stuff is so real. It’s the real world- the unseen is where we live from to the seen. It is where Paul said we are to fix our, desire, affections and sights (Col 3:1-2) on things above. To live in that reality.
I believe God is in our generation blurring the boundary. Things like feathers, manna, gold dust, jewels and visible clouds are all hints are a greater truth – we can see and encounter God and heaven now. We’ve had a man come to the door walking past the window five times and then vanish. One time a guest in our house actually opened the door for this fella but he was gone! There’s somebody knocking at the door-
“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.” Rev 3:20
Who’s coming for dinner! Could Jesus & angels eat with you just like Abraham (Gen 18:7)?
This is eternal life- to know through intimate experience for yourself God the Father and Jesus Christ who he sent (John 17:3). We get to be friends with God and enjoy him forever. A family. Jesus our brother. God our Papa. Access to him without shame. Friends.
The bible promises that Jesus would come and manifest (reveal, come out from hiding, appear) himself to us (John 14:21). Bill Johnson (Bethel USA) says this is nothing less than a promise that we would see Jesus over and over again. Every scripture is an invitation to an experience, an encounter. It’s a living breathing word.
I’ve often said to God I don’t want to wait until heaven until I see you. I want to be you’re friend now not a stranger. It strikes me often when I hear people preach and teach about God week in and week out in church, that they don’t really know him. They have not stood in his council (Jer 23:18 and Jer 23:22). They’ve not seen or heard him experientially. They are just saying what they think he thinks. But they don’t really know him directly. I think in this generation that is changing.
In light of this great subject (yummy) I’d like to mention a book to you today that I’ve just started digging into – it’s called “Face-to-Face Appeareances from Jesus” by David E Taylor. I was told about it a few weeks ago so picked it up of Amazon.
It’s a book about David Taylor’s life of meeting Jesus face to face from the age of 17. It reminds me in style of ‘Good Morning Holy Spirit’ by Benn Hinn – I guess you could call it a kind of ‘Good Morning Holy Jesus!’ It’s a simple book and it comes with a promise from Jesus that everyone that reads it will begin to have a greater degree of encountering him personally. That’s a good promise!
It’s worth checking out if you’re on the same journey as me that you- “may become progressively more intimately acquainted with and may know more definitely and accurately and thoroughly that mystic secret of God, which is Christ the Anointed One” Col 2:2 AMP.
Justin Abraham
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