Five-Fold Today - Quagmire - The Full Birthing - Light In the Dark - Trust, Authority and Leadership - Broken Vessels and Prophets - No Bandaids - Happiness Is Not the Goal
Quagmire
Bill Burns
The lord has been speaking the word "quagmire" to me. Quagmire is a soft miry land that shakes or yields under your feet. It is a marshland or can be called sinking sand or quicksand. It is something you want to step in or get stuck in or caught in. It also means a difficult, precarious or entrapping position, which produces a predicament or dilemma. Then, the Lord gave me Nahum 2:1, "He who scatters has come up before your face. Man the fort! Watch the road! Strengthen your flanks! Fortify your power mightily." The devil has come up before your face in this season. Watch out for those things that can become holiday entrapments. Satan loves to use this season to get you into a wrong place spiritually, wrong attitudes. There will be opportunities to overcome, so fortify your place of safety.
The Lord says that in this coming year I will release abundantly, above and beyond anything that you can even imagine at this point in time, the power of My presence which will produce My glory. When My glory comes into this place and over this place (My church) it shall be completely surrounded, above and below. You will be astonished. All that you must do to position yourselves is to believe that My calling is upon you and My purposes are before you, and the work that I have begun I will bring to completion, says the Lord.
A new day I set before you, says the Lord, the day of the end of the age when the birthing of the Child, the Christ, the Holy One, shall come to fullness within you. However, not all will understand the season. Not all will recognize this birthing. Not all will know that I am among My people. If you will look at the pattern you shall see that which is required. You will see that there were both father and mother who understood that a child was coming, and I say to you that it represents the birthing of the apostolic, for I am about to bring forth spiritual fathers and mothers that will know the fullness of My intentions and purposes in this dispensation.
Then, there comes the time, for was it not the wise men who understood the times and the seasons of the coming forth of My purposes, of the birthing of My heart into the earth. These are the sons of Issachar (1 Chronicles 12:32), I say, that understand the times and the seasons in which you, My people, live. Listen to them, for they shall point the way unto you, and they shall identify the moving of My Spirit, its coming and going, so that you may be in the right place at the right time, prepared for all things. Then, I say, was it not the shepherds who knew? For, there are those who have hearts of shepherds who desire to care for the flock. Yet the fullness of that calling has not manifested; it is simply a desire at this time, but I say that the harvest is coming, and I will call forth My shepherds and those that are able to nurture the young and care for the lambs. I say, that when I come into My temple the prophets will know.
Was it not Simeon who knew he must remain until I come. Are you not like him, remaining until the last trumpet sounds? The trumpet itself is the sound of My voice calling you to prepare ye the way of My coming. There was also Anna, the prophetess. I do not leave the women out, but call them to manifest My prophetic word and bring it forth in this land that others may know what I am doing in this season. You are My witnesses. You are the candlesticks, man and woman together for My purposes in this age to announce My coming and My return. You can only remember at this point the day of small beginnings, but I say that the small beginnings will bring glory. For as I speak to you, My voice shall come forth like a trumpet sound, and it will lead you up to the top of the mountain, and from the top of the mountain, I shall meet with you. You shall be gathered together into the glorious house of the end of the age. This is My purpose, says the Lord.
Faith Tabernacle
The Full Birthing
Ras Robinson
Now comes the full birthing. I have been birthing a greater work and a greater move in you for some time now. It would be difficult for you to personally conceive of all that I have in store concerning you. You know in your heart that this is true. I desire to birth Jesus and his ministry in you in full measure together with all the destiny I have intended. All your dreams and visions have pointed to this hour. Staggering, isn’t it? Just to think and recall all that I have said to you.
Yet you have had a difficult time believing my miracle concerning you. You cannot seem to imagine that such a thing could happen to you. Your humility has at times been rank unbelief and you know it. And yet, your faith has been ever increasing. You have opened your heart more and more to me. You at least have pondered my word in your heart without dismissing it. My word to you is true and it will come to pass. Nothing can stop it. It will definitely come to pass. Timing is of ultimate importance in prophetic words. This is your time, this is your season and this is your hour. All this is only because I have chosen you as my vessel. You are my choice and this is my timing. All I need from you is that you be willing. I can see that you are! Now comes the full birthing.
-----
Light In the Dark
Thomas Bramhall
Some of you I have called to be My light in the dark. Some of think you are now like Joseph, seemingly languishing in a prison and not yet been given pharaoh's ring. In God's time, child. Some of you are now like Daniel. I will make you valued by even the darkest for your integrity. You will outlive many kingdoms. Please don't whine about the darkness around you. I put you there to all the more shine, thereby to manifest My glory as My trusted light.
tommyb@arttech1.com
Trust, Authority and Leadership
M.Adrienne Hawthorne
Greetings Brothers and Sisters,
First, may God bless you during this holiday season and we all transition into a new year. Through my experiences of late, I discovered a need that exists in the Body, especially in relationship to those of us who participate in mentoring and equipping the Body of Christ. I post this to those in this forum who may currently function in those roles, or have in the past. I also desire to hear from those of us who receive instruction and mentoring from others.
Reasonable boundaries appears need establishing. In my approach to interpersonal relationships, I believe that one needs to know the boundaries established within and among those relationships. Talking about mentoring and shepherding relationships, I find that many do not realize that boundaries exist, or they make a choice to ignore them. Familiarity happens as a result. Jesus experienced familiarity in His ministry.
For me, if I come into a company, whether it be a church, a prophetic company, or an apostolic team, then I, by virtue of my desire to be included among that body, come under the authority of the one that God set in leadership. My desire and willingness to join reflects the trust that I have in the one in leadership.
Trust means that I trust that s/he moves under the direction of God and the blueprint used for building and establishing the vision and the work. As God shares His prophetic picture with them, I join them to co-labor with God. Looking at authority using those lenses, I may question for more understanding; however, I do not challenge. I may ask for clarification, rather than seeking to correct. As I walk in trust I understand, respect, and honor the authority that I willing submit to, which enables me to follow them as they follow Christ.
Trust enables me to see the whole, even from the vantage point of my role. Trust enables me to give honor to whom honor is due. Trust empowers me to walk a transparent lifestyle, allowing leaders to speak into my life, even into the place that I may not see.
As we move to build His Kingdom, let us all, lay down our hurts, and our previous negative experiences to willingly allow the Lord to heal us through healthy relationship with the leaders He has placed in our lives.
Ap. M. Adrienne Hawthorne
revmah@usa.net
Broken Vessels and Prophets
Deborah Voetberg
We are standing in a time of the revealing of the Lord in ways not yet seen upon the earth. In His word He says He does nothing unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets. But to the prophets of the Lord.....whose words are you revealing? He is searching the very foundations of His prophets. What foundation have you built upon? The foundation of Jesus Christ or the foundation of past hurts, betrayals and insecurities? The revealing of the Lord in these days will be through broken vessels, emptied of their own agendas and filled with the heart of their Father.
There is now a stripping away from the lives of God's people for the revealing of how far we have fallen from His truth. An exposing of the very motives of our actions and ways that we have called the Lord's and yet they have been a covering for own insecurities, doubts and unbelief. Our understanding is far from Him and stands in the way of His revelation and the excellence of His plans.
Prophets should have the evidence of fire in their lives. The very fire of God that has burnt away the dross of their past life. The evidence of the fear of their Lord, mightily impressed upon the core of their heart. The intimate knowledge that by His Spirit and His breath alone they take their next breath. They should be able to point to at least one incident, if not more, of the death or deaths where they were transformed and delivered from themselves and the ways of man.
The covenant of our Lord is not with us but with Himself for us! He established covenant with Himself, because He knew He and He alone would keep that covenant. We are the benefactors of an unbreakable covenant that is ours as long as we lay hold of it. The covenant stands whether we believe it or not. The covenant stands whether we apply it to our lives or not. The covenant stands whether we say it is true or not. The covenant stands...because God does not lie and will not deny who He is. He will never change.
God Himself will perform every word He has ever declared and will have a people to fulfill His word, because He will always have a remnant. Our choice is will we submit ourselves to the working of His hands in our hearts and lives? We complain and become weary when God does not perform the way we think He should. We quickly loose faith and are overcome with grief over the cutting away of the very building materials the enemy has used in our lives to build a temple that can not hold the glory of our Lord. IE.... the walls of fear and the stairwells of doubt and unbelief; rooms decorated with our desires filtered through an unrenewed mind. We cry out to the Lord, "How long will the wicked prosper? Those that say their ways are hidden from you?" The Lord answers, "Will I find faith on the earth when I return?"
We have become weary running with the footmen when the Lord is preparing us to contend with the horses. We have become unsettled, weary and doubtful in the land of peace, because our trust was built on what we called peace and not on His truth. God is preparing us for the floodplains of the Jordan. He will have a people.
The Lord is looking for those broken vessels that not only understand He has risen them from the grave but that the very Spirit that raised Him from the dead gives life to their mortal bodies through His Holy Spirit that dwells in them! Broken vessels that look not at the circumstances of their lives but whose minds are set on things above and not the things on the earth. A remnant who has embraced the promise that their lives are now hidden with Christ in God and they are seated in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
A remnant that has come to understand that only in the shadow of the valley of death do we overcome the spirit of fear. Those who shout..."I have seen death and have found it has no place in me! You are my God and my times are in Your hand!" Those who have found the provision and anointing of their Lord in the presence of their enemies and have experienced daily the promise that His goodness and mercy shall follow them all the days of their lives because they have learned to dwell in His presence.
Broken vessels and especially prophets of the Most High God....embrace the shaking and testing of the very core and foundation of your faith, for it will produce the very revelation of Jesus Christ in your heart. In haste you have cried out, "I am cut off from before the eyes of my Lord." But He has heard your cries and supplications. Love Him. Place your hope in Him. And He will strengthen your heart! Seek out the provision of the Lord every day, and He will be found. Command your soul to bless the Lord, for the great work He has started in your life He alone is able to bring to completion. You are being prepared for your future; the words given in your life are being tested in your heart and will be brought about in His timing and by the power of His Spirit.
The bride will arise glorious and see the coming of darkness covering the earth but will shout, "The ruler of this world is coming but he has nothing in me! For though in the world I will have tribulation, I am of good cheer for the Prince of Peace that dwells within me has overcome the ruler of this world!"
Great Grace!
Deborah Voetberg
Dabar Ministries
No Bandaids
Teresa Seputis
Children, I am a faithful Father, and I have a great love and a great care for each of you. And many of you have issues in your life that seem big to you that seem overwhelming at times. But know that I am in control and that I am well able to work My glory in each situation.
Child, remember the days where you were young and would fall down and skin your knee? And you would go running to your mother and she would kiss it and then put a bandaid on it? Some of you have learned to look for bandaids for your situation to ease the pain or to get you by. But child, I am not a God who puts a bandaid on it. I am a God who cleans it out, who blows My healing wind on it and causes there to be a restoration. Do not look for a quick relief. Rather look for My power and My glory and My anointing to come into your situation.
For I say to you that it is My desire to transform, to empower, to give you the victory and to cause you to walk in the fullness of My plans for you. And My plans for you are good -- they are life and they are delight -- for I am a loving Father.
So don't come to Me for a bandaid. Rather come to me for a complete healing. For it is My desire to heal your hearts, to heal your situations, to transform, to work My glory in you and to cause My anointing and My power to rest upon you. I have created you to be an overcoming one; to be one who walks with Me and does with Me what I am doing. And I am well able to cause you to walk in the fullness of My plans and purposes for you.
Look to Me, for I am with you and I will work My glory in your situation. Trust Me, and I will bring it to pass. For I am a good God and a loving Father who cares greatly for you.
teresa@godspeak.org
Happiness Is Not the Goal
A. W. Tozer
That we are born to be happy is scarcely questioned by anyone. No one bothers to prove that fallen men have any moral right to happiness, or that they are in the long run any better off happy. The only question before the house is how to get the most happiness out of life. Almost all popular books and plays assume that personal happiness is the legitimate end of the dramatic human struggle.
Now I submit that the whole hectic scramble after happiness is an evil as certainly as is the scramble after money or fame or success....
How far wrong all this is will be discovered easily by the simple act of reading the New Testament through once with meditation. There the emphasis is not upon happiness but upon holiness. God is more concerned with the state of people's hearts than with the state of their feelings. Undoubtedly the will of God brings final happiness to those who obey, but the most important matter is not how happy we are but how holy. The soldier does not seek to be happy in the field; he seeks rather to get the fighting over with, to win the war and get back home to his loved ones. There he may enjoy himself to the full; but while the war is on his most pressing job is to be a good soldier, to acquit himself like a man, regardless of how he feels. Of God and Men, 48-49.
"Oh Lord, redirect my focus. Help me today to be a 'good soldier of Jesus Christ.' Amen."
Read "Insight for Leaders" online at:
December 28, 2001
Kremmling, CO 80459
http://ft111.com
ft111@ft111.com
Ras and Bev Robinson, Pastors
Fullness in Christ Church
Fullness in Christ Ministries
www.fullnessonline.org/fcc.htm
rasrobinson@fullnessonline.org
Foundation Builders Church and Ministries, International
The Rochester Apostolic and Prophetic Alliance
To the AP Discussion Panel
apdiscusspanel@yahoogroups.comOh, how great is Your goodness, which You have laid up for those who fear You, which You have prepared for those who trust in You in the presence of the sons of men! You shall hide them in the secret place of Your presence from the plots of man; You shall keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues Psalm 31:19&20
www.judges5.com
judges-5@msn.comYou therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier. --2 Timothy 2:3-4
_______________________________________________________________
http://www.litmin.com/tozer.php3Five-Fold Today Archives
The Lord has given us the grace to reconcile the children to their Fathers
As One Body
Issue Oriented Discussion Newsletter
Index | Search This Site | Aristide.Org | The Latter Rain | Babylon the Great | The Kingdom | The Nicolaitans | Jezebel
The Baptism With the Holy Ghost | The Grand Delusion | World Trade Org | Liberation Theology | Jay Atkinson | Alphabetical Index