Continuing on in our Isaiah study we looked at a lot of End Time prophesies.  But started out in the book of Acts to lay a foundation.

Acts 7:54-56 Regarding the stoning of Stephen When they heard these things they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed at him with their teeth. But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, and said, “Look! I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”

The spiritual realm is a different level of consciousness. Stephen was not one of the original apostles, he was a layman. We, as laymen, are to be able to clearly articulate the Gospel. Stephen saw into the Spirit realm.

Acts 7:57-60 Then they cried out with a loud voice, stopped their ears, and ran at him with one accord; and they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul. And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not charge them with this sin.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

He asked for forgiveness for those who stoned him, Paul/Saul was there, and Paul will later exhort believers to stir up the gift that is within you.

The error of satan was PRIDE, ARROGANCE and REBELLION

Isaiah 14:22 “For I will rise up against them,” says the LORD of hosts,  “and cut off from Babylon the name and remnant, and offspring and posterity,” says the LORD.

God’s statement is concerning the input of satan, lucifer, and world leaders. God will cast him out but there is a form and function that he must carry out. The enemy is preparing satan’s children for the slaughter.

Ezekiel 28 and Isaiah 14 show more about this for us to see. Babylon and Assyria will be destroyed.  These are strongholds of satan. There is an earthly Babylon and Assyria, but also a principality and power that is associated with Babylon and Assyria, so the battle is not only in the physical but also in the spiritual.

Isaiah 14:23-24 “ I will also make it a possession for the porcupine, and marshes of muddy water; I will sweep it with the broom of destruction,” says the LORD of hosts. The LORD of hosts has sworn, saying, “Surely, as I have thought, so it shall come to pass, and as I have purposed, so it shall stand:”

This is an affirmation of the process of power and the sovereignty of God. If God thinks it, it will come to pass.  If He purposes it, it will not stand. Jesus told us that the gates of hell will not prevail against the revelation of who Jesus is. 

History, tradition, and arrogance will not prevent the sovereignty of God from manifesting what He has thought and purposed. No human is infallible from the Pope on down. Pastors have believed traditions that are not Biblical. The saints have messed up the message, but still the purpose and plan of God is set in stone.  Even when King David messed up, the Kingdom of God still stood and the throne of David did not fall.

In Revelation Jesus speaks to each of the churches and warns them of how they can fall. His plans will still go on and be established, but we can miss the mark. There are time periods where we have missed what God is doing, and we have not reached a level of sanctification and righteousness that God wants in our lives. We need to line ourselves up with what God wants so we don’t miss the mark.  We don’t want to fall below what God wants us to do.

Romans 8:35-39 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?  As it is written:  “For Your sake we are killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.” Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

God is the Lord of History, and there is a battle both military and spiritual. We are the Lord’s army and we are going with Him into the battlefield. He is the LORD OF HOSTS, and we want to give the totality of what it will take to win the battle and sustain and occupy with Glory. There are many workers in the army, not all of them are in the immediate battle field. There is the soldier shooting the ammo, the guy that drives the truck to bring the ammo to the soldier, the worker in the factory, the typist that works the orders, the people in town that provide food and sustenance for the workers, the farmers and miners, the wives.  All of these are part of what is necessary to fully equip the soldier. While we may not all be on the battlefield, we can all contribute to helping win the war.

There is an angelic host, seraphim, cherubim – these are not the little sweet cherubs that are sold today as “angels” but real warriors for the Kingdom of God. There is a host of angels in this battle and everything in Heaven and on earth has been ordained from the dawn of time. Angels and saints on the earth are under orders from Heaven. Some do not obey God. God will tell them to march and they think it doesn’t suit them. If we want to participate in the winning of the war it demands obedience to God.

God is coming with the Bride of Christ to fight the battle, we will be in our supernatural resurrected bodies. We will not yield to the right or left, but go where God wants us to go. There are more of us than there are of them – for the host of heaven are more than the enemy on earth, the enemy is outnumbered and defeated.

Jesus knows His Church is theologically divided and confused. We need to seek the truth of God in His Word. Some errors are made in regard to the Sabbath, some recognize Jesus, but do not acknowledge the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, some churches speak in tongues, others consider tongues of the devil. Some feel that there are certain legalistic actions that will determine if you are righteous or not. Not all the doctrines in any church are 100% accurate.  There is sin in the church and some are not seeking the righteousness and truth of God.

God wants to strip away the error and confusion. The eventual end of this will be that we will be glorified and He will take away any error and confusion.

We not only need to teach the word, but we need to walk the talk.  People want us to do what they say, but God is saying that we should expect people to do what we do, and our actions should line up with the Word and what we are teaching others.

2 Corinthians 11:12 But what I do, I will also continue to do, that I may cut off the opportunity from those who desire an opportunity to be regarded just as we are in the things of which they boast.

Many church leaders today want to be regarded as important as Paul, but they are not doing the things paul did, they are lifting themselves up in pride, boasting, but Paul walked what he talked.

2 Corinthians 11:13 For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ.

Not all who claim to be apostles are apostles. The Greek naval term, admiralship, speaks about a leader that leads other ships into battle. The admiralship determines who will go first, establishes communication, battle plans, etc. There are sent ones who are the front guard. The apostles are like the admirals in the navy, they are there to raise up others as disciples, and lead them into the Kingdom battles. They are to go into new territory and break up new ground for the Kingdom.

2 Corinthians 11:14 And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light.

We need to be careful whom we follow, for if we follow a false leader, a deceitful worker, a false apostle we will end up in a disaster and not advance the Kingdom.

We will continue to examine these End Times events in future times, but know that there is a battle and we want to be lined up with God and His truth, not be pulled into the wrong battle or working against God by listening to lying apostles and angels of enlightenment.

Praying your day is blessed.

Heather

This is a longer than usual posting, but I am trying to get the Bible studies up to date and decided not to break it into two entries. Praying this blesses you, it was a remarkable question and answer session.  It always amazes me how Pastor Don can answer a question off the top of his head. I want to know the Bible that well!

Who is doing what?  In ministry we can get to the point where we are operating so fast that we are outside of what the Holy Spirit is doing. People pray not realizing that they have to operate with the Holy Spirit in their prayer life. Too often we want and ask God to approve what we are doing and it is hard for us to realize that we need to change what we are doing to line up with the Holy Spirit.

Romans 8:12-14 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors–not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.

The second death is die physically and obey the spirit. This text is defining “sons of God” as being led by the Spirit. We get confused by people who talk the talk, but don’t walk it. You can tell you are being led by the Spirit by the way you love the brethren. We do not hate the people of God.

The Holy Spirit is ahead of us, leading us. If we encounter a phony or difficult challenge in our field of life and can’t get anywhere, He hasn’t led you to that field. There will be work, but the Holy Spirit prepares the ground for you. When you get to people He will have people ready for you.

We are LED – which means we are following and He has prepared the field.

Romans 8:15 For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out “Abba, Father.”

Abba- Father

Romans 8:16 The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.

How do we know we are led? The Spirit Himself bears witness with our Spirit, manifests in us, in the follower, and what we do will bear fruit. The sign in us is the fruit bearing that is caused by following the Holy Spirit, listening to our INWARD WITNESS. The witness testifies or manifests.

How do we do stupid?  We don’t consult Who’s in us. The Holy Spirit will lead us the right way, and our flesh tries to cancel what we are being told to do by our inward witness.  We are sheep and we are dumb. You won’t become smart or be fully used by God until you realize how stupid you are. Give the flesh an opportunity to lead and you will fall. Go back, look at the mistakes made and you will see that it was a fleshly decision that caused them. If we are following our flesh we will end up with big problems. Our pride can get in the way.

Make an intelligent, spiritual decision that you are going to be led by the Holy Spirit in this situation. When you are led by the Spirit and committed to obeying the Spirit others cannot push your buttons to get you to react.

The Spirit bears witness with OUR SPIRIT. Our spirit hears from the Holy Spirit even before it registers on our brain. Our ego and pride can cause us to not want to yield to our spirit. Our spirit will correct us and we don’t like correction for we feel it is a put-down. But correction is good so that we don’t fall into someone’s hole. Our spirit has to be developed so that we learn how to yield  our spirit. When we yield our spirit we are going to change. The enemy, satan, walks into a room and it gets darker. But hope and light emanates from our inner man. We begin to recognize, here comes old slewfoot to bring everybody down.

Ask for discernment. Do you have a yielded spirit? David prayed that God would not take the Holy Spirit from him.  King Saul’s disobedience caused the Spirit to be removed from him, and King Saul lived in dark despair. For awhile David’s singing brought some ease, but ultimately the enemy took control and King Saul repeatedly tried to kill David, the very thing that brought ease to King Saul.

Our spirit is under construction. Jesus told the disciples that He taught in parables because only the disciples were to know, the others had shut the door to the teaching.

Some are so victimized that the can’t get out of victim mentality. We need to begin healing the inner man. We will grow and heal quicker from the inside out, from the spirit to the flesh.

Pastor Don shared a song called “Jesus on the inside working on the outside, oh what a change in my life.”

Luke 6:45 A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart^b]’> with groanings which cannot be uttered.

Without the Holy Spirit we don’t know how to pray or what to pray about a situation.

Smith Wigglesworth’s wife died and he prayed to bring her back. God rebuked him, for God knew that the next part of his ministry his wife couldn’t go with him. Derek Prince’s wife died and he ended up marrying an older woman that he was not particularly attracted to, but God led him to this marriage and Derek Prince’s ministry expanded quickly. We think we know what we want, but often we do not know what or how to pray for a circumstance. The Holy Spirit wants to lead us.

The Body of Christ is ineffective because they haven’t learned how to pray or be led by the Spirit in prayer. Many denominations have rejected the Baptism of the Holy Spirit and shut themselves off of the guidance of the Holy Spirit for their prayers. The Holy Spirit intercedes for us with groanings that cannot be uttered.

The SPIRIT PRAYING for the heart of man. The Spirit of God interceding for us through the spirits of man. The Spirit of God knows the Mind of God. David had the Holy Spirit resting on him, but because of the New Covenant we have the Holy Spirit within us, and we have the choice to yield our flesh to the Spirit or not. The Holy Spirit will not force us.

Pastor Don was asked a question about the end times. He replied that the angels will not preach until God calls the end of the contract – turns it null and void. Satan’s time is short, so he is trying to do as much damage as possible in the time remaining. There will be 144,000 pure Jews who will assist in the spreading of the Gospel and the work. The Holy Spirit will lead us as to what to do.

When asked about someone who is not listening to the truth, Pastor Don suggested praying for the person, putting their name in the appropriate places in the following prayer from Ephesians 1. 

Ephesians 1:15-23 Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding^a]’> saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

Bride of Christ

Revelation 21:3 And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God.

God with man on earth, a new earth.

Revelation 21:4 And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.”

The former has passed away.

Revelation 21:5-7 Then He who sat on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” And He said to me,^c]’> I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things,^e]’> abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”

BUT – there is the lake of fire, the second death, the end of an era, and the beginning of a new aeon.

Revelation 22:12 “And behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to give to every one according to his work.

Judgment

Revelation 22:13-14  I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last.”^g]’> that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city.

Those who pass judgment will have the right to eat from the tree of life and enter in the gates of the city, but there will be those outside the city gates.

Revelation 22:15 But^e]’> to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit,

Jesus died for all men, but it is the person’s decision to accept this gift of salvation or not. Pastor Don told us to not wait too long to choose if we haven’t chosen for we never know the hour or second of our death and we may not have those few seconds to call out to Jesus.  We can be dead in the flesh, but we are ALIVE in the Spirit.

1 Peter 3:19 by whom also He went and preached to the spirits in prison,

Pastor asked us, why did Jesus preach to those in Sheol, in prison, if there was not a decision to be made.

1 Peter 3:20  who formerly were disobedient, when once the Divine longsuffering waited^c]’> descended into the lower parts of the earth?

Sheol was in the depths of the earth, the earth’s core is fiery. These were the people caught in fire and brimstone, but also in the subsection of Sheol known as Abraham’s bosom. In Abraham’s bosom as we learned from Jesus there was no fire or torment like what Lazarus experienced. They had to stay there until Jesus preached the Gospel and they could make their choice – now Abraham’s bosom is empty, and the only place those who reject Jesus and are waiting for the final judgment is hell – the fire and brimstone.

Ephesians 4:10 He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things.)

Jesus fills all things, He not only descended but ascended. Jesus died for all (past, present, future) and He died once for all. Whoever follows the path of salvation are saved, those who don’t wait the final judgment.  God is just, and each and every person needed the opportunity to hear the Gospel. Without all being given the opportunity, God could not judge all flesh justly.

There will be a rapture – and there are precedents in the Old Testament regarding this. Enoch walked with God, Elijah was taken up in a whirlwind,

Luke 16:26-31 (Lazarus in Sheol) And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’ “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’ Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’  And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’  But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”

God will judge no man until they have heard the Gospel.

Ephesians 4:8 Therefore He says:  “When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men.”

Psalm 68:18 You have ascended on high, You have led captivity captive; You have received gifts among men,  even from the rebellious, that the LORD God might dwell there.

Gifts will be given to God. The Lord was able to lead captivity captive. Who weren’t saved at the time?

We can’t build a theology on a grey area where scripture doesn’t clearly delineate. We can’t judge who will go to Heaven or Hell.

Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 speak of lucifer.

Isaiah 14:12-15 “How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer,^a]’> with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” There were giants on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.

Notice that it says that man’s days would be 120 years.  120 times 50 jubilees = 6,000 years.  The giants on earth from this ungodly mating are the fodder that created the mythologies. God wiped out all but Noah’s family, but now we are seeing more and more demonic activity again, and it is increasing. We are not at the time ordained for God to begin to destroy the seed for the last time – destroy it in the Lake of Fire. 

Pastor Don then pointed out how there are various demonic strongholds in a city. For example areas of prostitution or drug addiction, where there is a higher than normal incidence of those activities indicate a stronghold.

Ezekiel is not speaking of the natural King of Tyre, but of a stronghold of satan.

Ezekiel 28:13b  The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes  was prepared for you on the day you were created.

Workmanship -satan was created perfectly.

Ezekiel 28:14-17  You were the anointed cherub who covers; I established you; you were on the holy mountain of God; you walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones. You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created, till iniquity was found in you. By the abundance of your trading you became filled with violence within, and you sinned; therefore I cast you as a profane thing out of the mountain of God; and I destroyed you, O covering cherub, from the midst of the fiery stones. Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor; I cast you to the ground, I laid you before kings, that they might gaze at you.

Love of money and trade. We see that satan promises lies to us, then when we get settled in that love of money, trade,and riches, he takes it away leaving you in worse shape. The enemy’s greatest desire is to steal your joy. He wants us blinded with pride – our pride will snare us. The greatest tool of the enemy is to get us to focus on our expectations, not on God. We can be unhappy with ourselves and our expectations can drive us deeper into unhappiness. We need to be focusing on what God has told us we should be doing, not on what everyone else is telling us we should do.  Our happiness comes from focusing on God.

Praying your day is blessed.

Pastor Dona came to teach at our Friday Bible study on 2/5/09 and it blessed us greatly.

Matthew 17:14-21 And when they had come to the multitude, a man came to Him, kneeling down to Him and saying, “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic^d]’> for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”

At this point Jesus’ ministry was winding down and He was making His final journey to Jerusalem. Jesus is wanting to impart final teachings to His disciples.about the Word and the power of the Word. Two times he has predicted his death but His disciples will forget those predictions until He reappears to them.  On the road to Emmaus, He caused the disciples finally realized it was Jesus with them, and later they said that their hearts burned within them. Distractions caused them to forget what Jesus had said to them.  We forget that with God all things are possible.

The story from Matthew 17 is also found in Mark 9 and Luke 9.

The disciples should have been able to heal this boy. They had been sent out in Chapter 10 and instructed to go into Israel, town to town, and minister to people. They had the commission from Jesus to do that, and yet in this case they were unable to heal the boy.  Why?

The epileptic spirit is a tough spirit to command to leave.  To have his son throwing fits was frightening for the father and for the disciples. The son kept trying to harm himself, and the enemy was trying to kill him.

Jesus speaks “O faithless and perverse generation…”  Notice, Jesus did NOT SAY “O faithless and perverse disciples”  Jesus was speaking to the GENERATION.  All humans, and this generation  looked at the circumstance with fear.

The dad sought people to help and prayed but in an ineffective way. 

Notice in verse 16, the man tells Jesus that he brought his son to the disciples BUT they could not cure him.

Dona said something so profound:

WHATEVER FOLLOWS “BUT” IS GREATER THAN WHAT PRECEEDES IT.

We can think, I’m going to pray for him BUT he’s pretty bad off.  Remember: YOU WILL HAVE WHAT YOU SAY.

People make excuses such as: But you don’t know my situation.

We don’t need to have answers up front for that is working by sight.  If we are working by sight, we are not operating in faith. If we are not operating in faith we won’t get our answers.

The disciples were looking at what happened to the boy, and thus they were not operating in faith, so the child was not healed.

We need mustard seed faith. Jesus told us to go and heal the sick, to do the things that Jesus did.

In severe situations we may feel we do not have enough faith, or that we need greater faith. We can lean on another’s faith, thinking we need people to shore us up. At some point, though, we need to realize that God gave us enough faith and that what we need to do is stir up our faith.

With our children, when they are little we pray for them and cover them, but when they become young adults they have to stand on their own faith, they can’t depend on our faith for them.

God hears and answers our prayers. We need to stand on our own feet and pray for ourselves. Yes, we disciple a new believer or a convert and begin to show them how to pray and stand in faith. But the disciples had spent three years with Jesus.  They were comfortable walking with Jesus, and knew that Jesus could heal.  When they were commissioned they were able to heal the sick, and now they were puzzled, and asked Jesus why it didn’t work this particular time.

We need a closer look at Jesus in our walk in faith.  We are given mustard seed faith. When we are considered faithless it is because doubt disconnects us from our faith.  The word “perverse” speaks of sin.  Distractions and comforts of the world can distract us.  We can get distracted by family, friends, life. 

The disciples were so used to relying on Jesus that they fell into SPIRITUAL LAZINESS.

1 Timothy 6:5 useless wranglings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who suppress that godliness is a means of gain. From such withdraw yourself

It is our tendency to fall back on previous knowledge and experience, to think of the situation in material terms or as part of humanity.  But we are not to do that, we need to see things as God sees them.

Matthew 17:18 And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him; and the child was cured from that very hour.

Jesus rebuked the demon and the demon came out of the child from that hour. The enemy comes to kill, steal and destroy.  Jesus came to bring life.  The enemy saw the disciples not believing in their authority to cast the demon out.  The man heard about Jesus and came to Jesus’ disciples for help. The demon sought to destroy the boy before the boy could be healed.  There were two kingdoms at war.

Matthew 17:19 Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?”

The disciples privately came to Jesus to ask why they couldn’t cast the demon out. They got disconnected through their unbelief and connected to the world. Jesus needed to show them how to reconnect to God and disconnect from the world. When connected to the world they became full of unbelief and faithlessness.

Matthew 17:20 So Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief;