Hello Everyone!
It was wonderful to see so many joining is for the Easter Services! We really do hope you were encouraged at this very special time of year. It was very rich and meaningful to have been able to share in communion on Easter Day right across the region. Though we were absent from each other there was a very strong sense of connectedness. Thank you, Lord.
David Wilkerson was an American evangelist who died in 2011. Wilkerson wrote the best-selling book, “The Cross and the Switchblade” in 1963 (I still have a copy on my bookshelf that I read as a teenager), and he was the founder of Teen Challenge, a ministry to the drug addicted that is still in operation today, even in Australia. He was also the founding pastor of Times Square Church in New York City.
Wilkerson was not only an evangelist but powerful prophetic voice in his day, calling the church worldwide, but especially in America to get serious about their commitment to obey the teachings and commission of Jesus Christ – he emphasised righteousness and holiness. He was killed in a car crash in April 2011 after preaching his last message – he was 79 years of age.
Charisma Magazine’s in this last week’s edition features an interview with Mike Evans, a close friend of Wilkerson’s for many years, who came across several prophecies that Wilkerson had written on a piece of paper back in 1986 when they had shared breakfast together in Dallas, Texas. The long-forgotten paper happened to fall out of an old Bible Evans picked off his bookshelf recently. Written on it was one prophecy about the fall of Praise the Lord ministries (remember Jimmy Bakker?). Wilkerson wrote in 1986, “Within a year of the date of this letter, the judgement of God will fall on PTL ministries.” That prophecy was fulfilled just under a year later. On that same piece of paper was another prophecy, too. This is what Wilkerson wrote:
"I see a plague coming on the world, and the bars and churches and government will shut down. The plague will hit New York City and shake it like it has never been shaken. The plague is going to force prayerless believers into radical prayer and into their Bibles and repentance will be the cry from the man of God in the pulpit. And out of it will come a third Great Awakening that will sweep America and the world."
Evans recalls the conversation that morning saying, “He (Wilkerson) then pointed to Isaiah 24 and said to me ‘a plague will hit the globe and America.” He said, “every house will be shut up, and no one will be coming or going. The city of confusion is broken down, and every house is shut up that no man may come in.” Isaiah 24:10 says that.”
The prophet Isaiah describes in Isaiah 24:12, all entrances and exits to the city are gone. In other words, there will be no place to escape. Wilkerson continued …
“God has shown me that a calamity is coming beyond humankind’s capacity to respond. This judgment (correction) will devastate the world’s economies. Every restaurant and bar will be shut down, and all the drinking and merrymaking will end. All entertainment and churches will be shut down.”
As the COVID-19 pandemic has gripped the world, many Christians have been driven to pray like never before and meditate on God’s Word like never before. God will often work in a crisis or national disaster – or times of great distress and hardship - to call His people back to Himself and prepare them for a fresh move of His Spirit. I am one of those who believes that God is preparing to do a new thing in this time of great shaking that has created so much uncertainty. I have said so from the beginning of this crisis. Much of that in which many have put their confidence and so much faith has been shaken hard, some of it has been destroyed – our security has been taken away … Many houses that have been built on the sand … are falling down. Idols have come crashing down. There is a great disillusionment and fear that has taken hold of our nation and, indeed, the world. And in the church, too.
But I am convinced of the love of God for His church. I am convinced that when He allows calamity or suffering, He repurposes all of it to sometimes discipline (not punish) His people so that they get very, very real about what is extremely important. So that they conduct a reality check, so that they repent and get ready for what God is going to do. That doesn’t mean that the process of getting real (repenting) is not easy. It’s not. It can be painful. But remember this: God disciplines (corrects) those He loves.
“They (our human parents) disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in His holiness. 11 No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.” - Hebrews 12:10-11
We are being prepared to share in His holiness. In the shaking … in the pressing and crushing … God is making new wine.
New Wine – Hillsong Worship (lyrics)
In the crushing
In the pressing
You are making
New wine
In the soil, I
Now surrender
You are breaking
New ground
So I yield to You and to Your careful hand
When I trust You I don't need to understand
Make me Your vessel
Make me an offering
Make me whatever You want me to be
I came here with nothing
But all You have given me
Jesus, bring new wine out of me …
Be encouraged! This is not a time for fear but for a reality check about our faith – we do want to be real about it, don’t we? Embrace repentance as the Spirit brings truth to you in grace … and get ready for what is next in God, because I think it’s going to be big. Very big!
You are so, so loved!
Ps Milton