As I have shared with our local church, conferences, and through our Prophetic Bulletin over the last few months, it was only a matter of time before the media would realize the seriousness of the coming “bird flu” plague. That is now happening. The threat from this flu is very real, and it does have the potential to be just as deadly as the scientific community is stating. Even the terrible scenarios that are being projected are almost all being purposely understated to prevent panic. This is understandable, but even the understated warnings are causing great fear, and even panic with some. However, this is not understandable for a Christian, nor acceptable.
Even the “best case” scenarios would make this plague the worst disaster in human history. The time is now here when Christians must know and abide in the peace of God. If we have true faith, we must also have the peace of God which remains calm in the midst of any storm. We have been given a kingdom that cannot be shaken. If we have built our lives on it, every thing that can be shaken is shaken. We are told this in Hebrews 12, and through even the greatest shaking, we will remain steadfast and a sanctuary in the storm. Do not let anything steal your peace.
If you feel like the situations now coming upon the world are beyond control, you are right. They are beyond human control. This is the primary reason for the great time of trouble or tribulation that is coming upon the world. It is the result of mankind trying to run the world without God. After this time, all of creation will know for all of eternity that this was a bad idea. We need God. We need Him for our personal lives, and we need Him in all human affairs. Everyone who scoffs at this as being “a crutch” will soon wish they had one, and we need to be ready to share ours with them.
Resolve every time that you feel fear and panic rising in you to read Psalm 91, and other Scriptures that promise God’s protection. He will protect His people who have made Him their refuge. If the Word Himself has taken His stand against the devil with “it is written,” how much more should we? There is only one answer to the problems that are coming upon the world, and we know Him. Determine every time when you begin to feel fear that you are going to trust God and grow in the peace of God. Fight the fear with “it is written.” What He has promised us is absolute truth; it is a rock; and it will not shake even when the entire world is shaking.
As I have been sharing in these Special Bulletins, we must learn all that we can from the Hurricane Katrina disaster because we are going to need that understanding for the times that are coming upon the world. The church is not only going to be safe during these times—we will be building while everything else is collapsing. However, we must learn to face the greatest human devastation and chaos, wade into it, bring order, and get the job done. Our resolve and peace will help many others find the same Source that we have.
It Is a Good Day to Die
We must also learn to die well. If that statement alarms you, you are the one I am probably addressing this to. If we truly believe in the resurrection, not just as a doctrine, but as the sure promise that it is from Almighty God who cannot lie, then we, above all people on the earth, should be able to die with joy, not fear. As I have heard from many hospital workers, not many Christians die well. Something is profoundly wrong with this. Regardless of whom we are or what we have, we should be looking forward to the day of our death with great desire for “the joy that is set before us.”
One of the most important Christian teachings and disciplines is the call that we have to take up our crosses and “die daily.” If we have died to this world, as we have been called to do, it is impossible for us to fear. What does a dead man fear? One who is already dead to this world does not fear anything on the earth. This must be our resolve.
The number one strategy of the devil in these times is to control the world through fear. The Lord leads His people through faith. The times are going to increasingly reveal those who have true faith and those who do not. Psalm 32 is an important word for us, especially verses 6-11, which is quoted below:
Therefore, let everyone who is godly pray to You in a time when You may be found; surely in a flood of great waters they will not reach him.
You are my hiding place; You preserve me from trouble; You surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah.
I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go; I will counsel you with My eye upon you.
Do not be as the horse or as the mule which have no understanding, whose trappings include bit and bridle to hold them in check, otherwise they will not come near to you.
Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but he who trusts in the Lord, lovingkindness shall surround him.
Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, you righteous ones; and shout for joy, all you who are upright in heart.
The recent earthquakes, tsunamis, and hurricanes are already taxing the whole world’s relief efforts. The worst natural disasters in human history are continuing to be topped by succeeding ones. The Lord and the prophets have all made it clear that this would come upon the world in the last days, but this should not cause fear in Christians, but rather rejoicing—not because we are rejoicing at the suffering of others, but because our redemption is drawing near.
The kingdom is coming, and our King is going to restore the earth to the paradise He created it to be. He is going to remove all disease, pain, cruelty, and suffering, and wipe every tear away from every eye. The tragic lessons of the part of creation that is trying to live without its Creator are nearly over—and the joys of redemption and restoration are about to begin. The kingdom is at hand, even at the door.
However, we must understand this door. As Paul said in Acts 14:22: “Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God." The Lord does not allow troubles to come upon His people without purpose, and the basic purposes are: 1) to help conform us to the image of Christ, and 2) to help us find the entry into the kingdom in that area of our life. The “great tribulation” (see Matthew 24:21) or the “great time of trouble” are also doors for the whole world to enter into the kingdom, and that will be the result.
It Is Time to Take the Land
After reciting the events and trials of Israel in the wilderness after leaving Egypt, we are told in I Corinthians 10:11, “Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.” Everything that Israel went through is a prophetic parallel of what the church would go through, and how we, too, will enter the Promised Land, the kingdom of God. In this light let us consider the prophetic significance of Joshua 3:3-4, 14-17:
"When you see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God with the Levitical priests carrying it, then you shall set out from your place and go after it.
However, there shall be between you and it a distance of about 2,000 cubits by measure. Do not come near it, that you may know the way by which you shall go, for you have not passed this way before."
So it came about when the people set out from their tents to cross the Jordan with the priests carrying the ark of the covenant before the people,
and when those who carried the ark came into the Jordan, and the feet of the priests carrying the ark were dipped in the edge of the water (for the Jordan overflows all its banks all the days of harvest),
that the waters which were flowing down from above stood and rose up in one heap, a great distance away at Adam, the city that is beside Zarethan; and those which were flowing down toward the sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, were completely cut off. So the people crossed opposite Jericho.
And the priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan while all Israel crossed on dry ground, until all the nation had finished crossing the Jordan.
In Scripture, the Jordan River often represents death. That is why both Jesus and John the Baptist baptized there. The Jordan River also empties into the Dead Sea. There was a reason why the Lord commanded the Ark of the Covenant to be carried across the Jordan “about” 2,000 cubits ahead of the rest of the people. The Ark represents Jesus, and the cubits represent years. This was a prophetic statement that the Lord would pass through death to His Promised Land “about” 2,000 years before the rest of His people.
The Lord said that “...the harvest is the end of the age...”(Matthew 13:39), and we read in Joshua 3:15 that “...the Jordan overflows all its banks all the days of the harvest...” This speaks of how death will be overflowing all of its banks all of the days of the harvest, which is the end of the age. Because of this we can expect such natural and human disasters to increase during the coming times.
As all of the Lord Jesus’ own prophecies concerning these times make very clear, we are coming to the greatest times of trouble the world has ever known. However, the good news is, if we have built our lives on the kingdom which cannot be shaken, we will not only survive what is coming, but we will prevail and prosper. We are now at the time that the church is going to cross over and begin to possess its Promised Land.
We must also understand that at the very time such great troubles are going to be coming upon the world that “the Jordan River overflows all of its banks,” Christians who are walking in the ways of the Lord are going to prosper more than they ever have before. However, this is at the time when death is overflowing all of its banks, so we must learn to keep functioning even when a thousand fall on one side, and then ten thousand on the other.
The present world systems are being shaken, and this will increase, but if we are abiding in the Lord, we are on a Rock that simply cannot be shaken. However, our prosperity is not so we can live luxuriously, but so we can help the desperate and prepare the way for the coming kingdom. As I recently told one of our U.S. senators, the federal government is going to run out of resources for helping the people through what is to come, but we will be open to lend them some!
I was being serious. Even the federal government of the wealthiest and most powerful nation on earth has limited resources and is running out of them now. Our governments are going to be reduced to the role of just trying to keep order in the times to come, and there will be a time when even that will be beyond their ability. However, we have not only been given a kingdom that will not even shake through what is coming, but a kingdom which has resources that all of the earth, even all of creation, could not exhaust. Those who have built their lives on the kingdom will have increasing access to those resources.
I did not see it, but I was told of an article in one of the country’s foremost liberal newspapers that admitted the church was many times more effective at meeting the desperate needs of the people devastated by hurricanes Katrina and Rita. I was just in the disaster area and I can tell you personally that this is true—the church was far more effective than the government in this. The next time we will do much better.
I am not mad or disappointed at the government for this. We are the most foolish of all people if we are putting our hope in the governments of this world. I have actually marveled at how well they have done so far, and I am thankful for a government that will do all it can to help people in need. However, the government does not have the resources that we have—we have the unlimited resources of heaven, and those who have learned how to open the doors and windows of heaven will now see them opening wider and wider.
Paradise Again
In Joshua 3:16,we are told the waters of the Jordan “which were flowing down from above stood and rose up in one heap, a great distance away at Adam.” This could have been translated that the waters of the Jordan “were rolled back all the way to Adam.” It was no accident that this little town was named “Adam,” just as there are no accidents at all in Scripture. This was a prophecy that when God’s people begin to pass through this baptism in the Jordan, we will begin possessing all of the promises of God that we are called to inherit, and death will be rolled back all the way to Adam! This means that all of the death which was the consequence of the Fall will be reversed.
For this reason we must prepare ourselves for increasingly great natural and manmade disasters as we get closer to the end of this age. We will need to learn to cope with death all around us and keep on functioning. Just as no general could be successful if he is overly concerned about casualties, we, too, will have to learn to cope with death—even sending forth missions and missionaries that we know will not return. We must not be overly given to grieving or mourning the dead in order to save the living from an even greater, eternal disaster.
The prophecies of these times are fearful for those who are not abiding in the Prince of Peace. Even so, they are the greatest hope and represent the release that the prophets and righteous ones have longed to see come to pass since the beginning. We must understand that the problems are coming, and to avoid looking for them because they make us uncomfortable or fearful is to live in deception. Those very problems are also our greatest opportunities, and we must be ready to seize them.
If we have built our lives on the kingdom, we have nothing to fear, from anything or anyone. Those who have not built their lives on the kingdom will have many things to fear, and it will increase. It is better for them to fear than to go on in their delusions and be in the terrible jeopardy those delusions keep them in. Therefore, we want to see these things for what they are, and be prepared, not to just survive, but to save many others.
Israel’s inheritance was the land, and they dispossessed the people who were on it. Our inheritance, which is also the Lord’s, is the people. Even though the Jordan will be overflowing its banks, and death will be all around us, the power of His indestructible life will be flowing through us to reap the greatest harvest that the world has ever known. We must not sleep or be distracted while the treasure of the earth is ripe for reaping.
Victory over Death
Baptism is a ritual performed to emphasize an important spiritual reality. The bane of Christianity since the third century has been to substitute rituals for the realities that they represented, and were intended to illuminate. The ritual of baptism was meant to convey the commitment on the part of the one baptized so they would die to themselves to live to Christ. After the third century, one could be baptized in place of living the crucified life, removing the life and power of the cross from the church.
We should not belittle the importance of the ritual. A wedding is a ritual and not the marriage itself, but because marriage is so important it is right to make a big deal out of the ritual. Likewise, it is right to make a big deal out of baptism, communion, and the other important rituals handed down to us, but they must not be allowed to supplant the truths that they were given to us to illuminate. You can dunk someone in the water all day and not have them partake of the death or resurrection of Jesus. There is nothing magical about the water. The power is in the crucified life. The baptism is performed as a commitment to live the crucified life in order that we might also be resurrected with Christ, as we read in Romans 6:4-5:
Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.
For we have become UNITED with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection (emphasis mine).
We must note here that in this text there is no mention of water! This is not speaking of water baptism, but of what water baptism represents—the crucified life. Paul further conveyed in Romans 6:5:“For if we become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection.”
What did the Lord mean when He stated, "I have come to cast fire upon the earth; and how I wish it were already kindled! But I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is accomplished!" (Luke 12:49-50)? Was the baptism that was distressing Him simply being immersed in water? Of course not. He was referring to His impending crucifixion. That crucifixion is also the meaning of our baptism.
Jesus was likewise referring to the baptism into His crucifixion when James and John asked to be seated on His right and left in the kingdom. He said, "You do not know what you are asking for. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?" (Mark 10:38).
It is a basic spiritual principle that death is the path to life in Christ. We are called to live now by the power and authority of the resurrected life of Christ, but by its very definition one cannot experience a resurrection without first experiencing a death. To be baptized with His baptism is to be conformed to the purpose of His death, the laying down of our own lives for the sake of others.
When the church reduced the truth of the crucified (and thereby resurrected) life to a mere ritual, it has robbed the Lord of our consecration, the church of its salvation, and has stolen from the world the power of the gospel. There are many Scriptures that make the meaning of this very clear. The following are just a few of them, which I encourage you to read carefully as their importance is literally life and death:
For if we died with Him, we shall also live with Him;
If we endure, we shall also reign with Him (II Timothy 2:11-12).
The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God,
and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, IF INDEED WE SUFFER WITH HIM IN ORDER THAT we may also be glorified with Him. (Romans 8:16-17 emphasis mine).
That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the FELLOWSHIP OF HIS SUFFERINGS, being conformed to His death,
IN ORDER THAT I may attain to the resurrection from the dead (Philippians 3:10-11 emphasis mine).
For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake (Philippians 1:29).
We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brethren, as is only fitting, because your faith is greatly enlarged, and the love of each one of you toward one another grows ever greater;
therefore, we ourselves speak proudly of you among the churches of God for your perseverance and faith in the midst of all your persecutions and afflictions which you endure.
This is a plain indication of God's righteous judgment so that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which indeed you are suffering (II Thessalonians 1:3-5).
We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing;
Persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed;
ALWAYS carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.
For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our mortal flesh (II Corinthians.4:8-11).
The Lord made it clear in His Word—if we are to partake of His life, we must also partake of His death "that they who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him" (II Corinthians 5:15). Any other teaching is a false gospel and an enemy of the cross. Death separates the things that are natural from the things that are spiritual. Again, to have a resurrection, there must first be a death. If we want to walk in the resurrection life of Jesus, we must be willing to lay down our lives for Him.
Pray for Our Governments
As I recently had a conversation with a high-ranking man in world affairs, and is in a position to know what world leaders are doing, he told me straightforwardly that President Bush is one of the few world leaders who has sought to understand and prepare his nation for the expected unprecedented plague released by the “bird flu.” The best case scenario for what this will do on the earth will make it worse than the plagues of the Middle Ages. The worst case is incomprehensible. We have been given a wise leader for the times, and we do need to pray for him. He is not being a fear monger in asking for the authority to use the military for such things as quarantines of regions of the country. Though quarantines will not really work for this, these troops will be needed to keep order.
It is almost incomprehensible that he has done so well facing so many problems during his presidency. He has not handled any of them perfectly, and only the greatest fools should expect that of any human being in this world. He has done very well, but his greatest trials are likely still ahead of him.
In the coming Bulletins, I will focus more on some very practical things we must do, and more of the lessons we are now learning from the disasters that have been coming upon us. We cannot run from this. There is nowhere to go. Just as true warriors run to the sound of battle, not away from it—we must learn to run to the cries for help and lead them to the Helper, who is the Remedy for every human problem. You already have Him. Let Him fix all of your problems, and determine that you are going to grow in trust in Him every day. Then resolve that you are going to help others do the same. That is why we are here. If we have been chosen to live, it is to do a job. Let’s get on with it.
