Hello everyone!
As I write this I’m listening to Chris Tomlin’s song, “God of this City” (from his Hello Love album). Here are some of the lyrics …
“You're the God of this city
You're the King of these people
You're the Lord of this nation
You are
You're the light in this darkness
You're the hope to the hopeless
You're the peace to the restless
You are
There is no one like our God
There is no one like our God
For greater things have yet to come
And greater things are still to be done in this city
Greater things have yet to come
And greater things are still to be done in this city …”
These last phrases in bold above really grabbed my heart, “For greater things have yet to come, and greater things are still to be done in this city” – and I felt the strong prompting of the Lord to pay attention and be alert because He is moving in our city. He has not been delayed or frustrated by COVID-19 restriction, He was not surprised by this pandemic as we were. I felt as if God was roused to action as the fullness of time had reached critical point beyond human understanding … and it is about to happen.
As I contemplated this, I began to understand something I shared with yesterday’s Zoom prayer meeting. I have been experiencing some very big shifts going on in the spiritual realm, of the proportion I have not experienced in many years – and these are changing things on the earth. If you can imagine the earth’s tectonic plates for a moment. These are huge. There are only a handful of major plates and dozens of smaller ones according to National Geographic magazine. Six of the major ones are named after the continents embedded within them, such as the North American, African, and Antarctic plates, and so on. Though smaller in size, the minor ones are just as important when it comes to shaping the Earth. The tiny Juan de Fuca plate, for example, is largely responsible for the volcanoes that dot the Pacific Northwest of the United States.
These plates, as we all learned in school, make up the earth's outer “shell”, called the lithosphere. (This includes the crust and uppermost part of the mantle.) Churning currents in the molten rocks deep below move these plates along like a random network of gigantic conveyor belts all doing their own thing – the human eye cannot see this movement, because it is slow, but it is happening. And, every now and then, in the places where these plates meet or divide where the pressure of their butting up against each other becomes too much, geologic activity results like an earth tremor in minor events, an earthquake perhaps or even a volcano in large events – then we see something quite big. What has been going on manifests.
Well, in these last few weeks, I have felt the “tectonic plates of the spiritual realm” (to use the metaphor) being forced together and pressure that has been slowly building for decades, is about to cause more than just a tremor – and people on the earth are sensing it too, and reacting, although most don’t know what is going on … they’re just reacting. But the stresses and strains can be sensed by the prophetics. There are significant seismic shifts beginning to occur over whole cities and even whole nations as what is happening in the spiritual realm has influence on the earth.
These are significant days.
And we’re seeing, I think, the beginnings of “birth pangs”, as Jesus put it in Matthew 24 …
“Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of birth pains.”
Now, none of this is to cause alarm. But we do need to be attentive to what is happening and become a people very seriously invested in intercession for our world so that we work with God in all of this. In all of this I sense that the Spirit of God is very active in the spiritual realm right now positioning strategically and making ready for who knows what kind of warfare that is coming. God is also calling his church to attention and spiritual high alert …
I believe that if ever there was a time for the church to seriously and ruthlessly ramp up its prayer life, it is right now – and this needs to be sustained over the next months so that we may learn what God is doing and how we are to be involved. As we pray, we ask for understanding and wisdom about what to pray about and for how long … and God will give that to us so that our prayers become highly effective.
Many during this time will see their intercessory gift, or prophetic gift, dramatically increase as God gets His church ready. But that will not happen if God’s people fall asleep … or will not get rid of sin …
James 1:21 “Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.”
My friends, I believe this is big. There are many things converging in this moment in history … and we need to be righteous, ready and alert. I’ll have more to say on this soon.
In the meantime, listen to the words of Jesus …
Luke 22:46 "Why are you sleeping?" He asked them. "Get up and pray so that you will not fall into temptation."
FINAL WORD
2 Kings 6:15-17 When the servant of the man of God got up and went out early the next morning, an army with horses and chariots had surrounded the city. "Oh no, my lord! What shall we do?" the servant asked. 16 "Don't be afraid," the prophet [Elisha] answered. "Those who are with us are more than those who are with them." 17 And Elisha prayed, "Open his eyes, LORD, so that he may see." Then the LORD opened the servant's eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.
1 John 4:4 “You are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world.
He is the God of this city
He is the King of these people
He is the Lord of this nation
He is …
You are loved so very much.
Ps Milton