Thank you for joining us on this journey of studying the Book of Revelation. We will continue this study next year as we are just getting into some of the most exciting parts of it, many of which give great clarity on what is unfolding in our times. However, I like to use the last WFTW of the year as a special message for the coming year.

 

         There will never be another 2017. Many are thankful for that and are ready to start another year, but 2017 was an awesome year. Every year is for those who love God and are called according to His purpose. He has promised to turn all things into good.

 

As we are told in I Corinthians 10:11, which speaks of the things that happened to Israel in the wilderness, “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.” Every trial that Israel went through in the wilderness was a prophetic map of what every believer must go through to get to their promised land—the fulfillment of their promises. The first major trial they faced was at “the waters of Mira,” or the waters of bitterness. The first thing Israel had to learn if they were going to make it to their promised land was how to turn the bitter waters into sweet, or how to turn every bad thing they endured into a good thing. We must do the same.

 

         To begin 2018 the right way, we need to thank the Lord for 2017 and everything that happened to us in it—both the good and the other that will work for our good. Every bitter thing must be turned into sweetness if we are to continue toward our promised land, the fulfillment of the promises we’ve been given.

 

         Each year, I send a letter to our international publishers. The following are excerpts from this letter that I feel is for all of us:

 

         Every year it seems that we look back and say that the current year was more interesting and challenging than the previous one. As I began to say many years ago, this will continue—meaning that every year is a greater opportunity for the Gospel.

 

The Gospel is “good news.” It is the best news the world has ever heard or ever will hear. We have been given a hope greater than any other religion or philosophy. We are now the main purveyors of hope for the world, and soon we will be the only ones. As we see in Isaiah 60 and other prophecies, when darkness covers the earth, the Lord’s glory will appear on His people. As we read in verse 3 of that text, the nations will then come to the light. The light will win! We must never forget that, and we should become even more encouraged as darkness grows--we are closer to the glory of the Lord being revealed.

 

  My purpose, and a main purpose of MorningStar, is to know the times and what God is doing to prepare His people for the times. A main way we seek to help this preparation is to prepare ourselves for the great harvest, which is already unfolding. The main way to prepare for this is for the church to become the pure, spotless bride that she is called to be--and that our King deserves. The church becoming all it is called to be is a main key to the harvest. It is also a key to the highest calling we have in this life—helping to prepare the King’s bride.

 

In the last two months, I have had two of the most expansive prophetic revelations I have had yet. Each was so expansive that I felt that a lifetime would not be long enough to process them. I was then shown that they are linked to the “eternal Gospel.” I always thought this was the simple Gospel being recounted for eternity, but now I see that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is so expansive that we will be learning about it, and be perpetually fascinated by it, for eternity. No other subject in all of creation is as interesting and expansive as that which we are called to publish. How can we not love this job?

 

My prayer for you this year is that you grow “in the hope of His calling”--that hope and vision would be a special diet for you this year, and that you convey it to others wherever you go and through all that you publish and distribute.

 

This is also my prayer for all of you doing this study. I pray that hope and vision will be multiplied to you and that you will be contagious with it, spreading hope and vision in the coming King wherever you go.

 

Rick Joyner