God is doing something really exciting in the earth today: He is giving us revelation of how to step into the heavenly realms. He is showing us how we can choose to turn into the Kingdom of Light rather than into the kingdom which is in darkness. He is encouraging us to engage with what we find in that Kingdom – His presence, His power, all the resources of heaven – and to manifest those things here on the earth. That was always His intention:
Your kingdom come
Your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
There are a number of keys to doing this effectively:
• Know God intimately
• Know our identity as kings & priests
• Live according to kingdom principles
• Rule over own sphere of authority (our house)
• Take charge over the courts for our own life
• Be transformed into a son from glory to glory
• Be manifested as sons on the earth (fulfil our destiny).
We saw last time how familiar spirits can seek to rob us of our destiny. If you read CS Lewis’ Screwtape Letters you will quickly grasp how demons scheme and operate to wreck our lives. But we are going to war against familiar spirits. We will rise up and deal with them, so that all of us can come into our destiny.
Destiny
Destiny is something which really stirs me, because God has given me a mandate to call forth other people’s destinies. Each of us has a scroll of destiny which mandates us to rule in our own lives. Each of our destinies is unique. For each of us, there are certain words – or sights or sounds, or even smells or sensations or experiences – which will stir us, and resonate in our spirit, because they are tied up with our destiny.
When I first got baptised in the Holy Spirit, God dropped a word in my heart. That word was ‘revival’. At that point, I didn’t even really know what it meant, but it resonated with me. It just stayed in my heart. And since then, words like ‘restoration’, ‘renewal’ or ‘reformation’ have had the same kind of effect: they vibrate somewhere deep down within me and cause me to start to stir. And there will be things which will start to stir you too. That is because they line up with what God has written about you in your scroll.
For each of us there will be at least seven spheres of dominion, or thrones, to rule in our own lives, but beyond that, we may be called to further degrees of authority. All of us need to see where our thrones are, what we are called to do, and deal with whatever is stopping us fulfilling our calling.
Prophetic acts
Over recent years, there have been a number of prophetic acts which I have felt to carry out with individuals or groups of people when ministering to them, acts which call forth their destiny and their place of authority.
I have placed crowns of destiny on people’s heads; I have used our rainbow banner as a cloak for people, symbolising a mantle, placing anointing of authority on them. I have given people sceptres of authority – that is how God identified those who would become part of our leadership team, though I did not know that at the time. In my office, on the wall, I have a big sword that God told me to get. Often I have used that sword to call people into what God intends them to do, and when Lindy Strong was here in 2014 she again did something similar, inviting people to take up the sword and speaking prophetically over them. I have given people other specific weapons and objects that God is giving them too, such as axes, maces, orbs and so on.
These are more than just symbolic of what is going on in the spiritual realm. We do things not symbolically, but prophetically. We have held or waved flags of particular colours or combinations or in particular ways. We have marched around our building and around our footprint as God has directed. These prophetic acts actually achieve something in the spiritual realm, they open up things in the heavenly realms for us. When we are obedient in carrying out a prophetic act, that act joins with something in heaven and causes something to open up here on earth.
We have to be obedient, because we often have no idea what doors they are going to open up. These are not things I would be naturally inclined to do, if you know my past, but I know they are effective when God leads me to do them, so I need to be obedient. The same is true for all of us.
‘Who am I?’
Some of the questions people ask when we start to talk about destiny are: ‘Who am I?’, ‘Where do I come from?’. They are good questions. I need to understand where I come from so that I can understand why I am here today. That will lead on to where I am going tomorrow. This is how our destiny gets outworked, one day at a time: yesterday, today, tomorrow.
We need to understand the nature of our creator, and our creation. ‘Who created me?’, ‘Why and how did He create me?’. All these questions will help us understand our destiny.
God is eternal. It may seem really obvious to say it, but it is important to grasp this. He has always been, He is, and He will always be (Rev 1:8). He is almighty, that is ‘all-mighty’. He is light (1 John 1:5). He is love (1 John 4:16). He is spirit (John 4:24).
If we meditate on these scriptures, and others like them, we will begin to understand who God is. And if we know Him, if we have that intimate relationship with Him, it will help us understand who we are.
‘I knew you’
Here is a key verse about who we are.
“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, And before you were born I consecrated you; I have appointed you a prophet to the nations.” (Jer 1:5).
God is speaking here to Jeremiah, but He is also speaking to each of us. He knew me, and He knew you, before He formed you in the womb. Knowing, again, is a really intimate encounter. This was not some vague thought that God had. Therefore you existed even before you were in the womb, since God knew you then. And since intimacy is two-way, actually, you knew Him too.
He consecrated you. He set you apart. He had a purpose for your life that He knew, and that you knew, before you were actually formed. It is part of your very being. He has appointed each of us to a particular role, task, or position. For Jeremiah that was as a prophet to the nations. What has He appointed you for? What has He called you to do? Who has He called you to be?
The good news is, you can know. God knew, before you were even a physical being, and He wants you to know.
You can ask Him, and He will reveal it to you.