We are approaching the end of this series looking at the generation who will possess all that God has promised, and be forerunners who inspire others to do the same.
31. The Joshua generation will be ruthless in the pursuit and eradication of the enemy.
Again, we are not talking about fighting against flesh and blood, but that we must not compromise in dealing with the spiritual forces of wickedness. We have to be ruthless. No compromise. We can’t live alongside them; we can’t share thrones with them; we have to destroy them.
Joshua captured all the cities of these kings, and all their kings, and he struck them with the edge of the sword, and utterly destroyed them; just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded… For it was of the LORD to harden their hearts, to meet Israel in battle in order that he might utterly destroy them, that they might receive no mercy, but that he might destroy them, just as the LORD had commanded Moses (Joshua 11:12, 20).
This is a picture of something they did in the natural realm and we must do in the spiritual realm. When we do, it gives us authority in this realm: authority to rule.
32. The Joshua generation will ensure that nothing God commands will be unfinished.
We need to be faithful in carrying out God’s commands, and carrying them out fully. We need to persevere.
Just as the LORD had commanded Moses his servant, so Moses commanded Joshua, and so Joshua did; he left nothing undone of all that the LORD had commanded Moses (Joshua 11:15).
We need to fulfil the word of God. If we are to take the commands of God, the counsels of God, and fulfil them, then we must know them. And knowing them involves much more than head knowledge. We need to hear the word God speaks to us, go into heaven with it, get revelation on it, and bring it back down here.
33. The Joshua generation will bring the next generation into their full inheritance and rest.
So Joshua took the whole land, according to all that the LORD had spoken to Moses, and Joshua gave it for an inheritance to Israel according to their divisions by their tribes. Thus the land had rest from war (Joshua 11:23).
He took everything that was promised: the whole of the land. Now that should have been the starting point for them to go into the rest of the world, and bless the whole world. Remember, Abraham was given the whole world as his inheritance, not just a tiny piece of land in the Middle East. They were supposed to go from that place to fill the earth: they never did it. So the kingdom was taken away from them and given to a people who will. Jesus said He had been given all authority in heaven and on earth, and that his followers were to go and disciple the nations. That is the same authority in heaven and on earth: it is authority granted in heaven to be outworked on earth.
This scripture says they had rest. In one of my face-to-face encounters with Jesus, he took me and showed me the seat of rest: what it is to come from a position of rest. He taught me from Matthew 11 and from Hebrews 4. Everything we do must come from rest. From peace, from wholeness, not striving or struggling; not being weary and heavy-laden in our own strength. Everything needs to come out of rest; then we are doing things in the strength of God.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls (Matt 11:29).
The word translated ‘gentle’ here is the word for a stallion under complete control, a wild stallion which has been broken and has a bit in its mouth, so that whoever rides it is able to control it. That is like us, knowing that we are a wild stallion, empowered with authority, but totally submitted like Jesus was to the Father: ‘I only do the will of Him who sent Me’ (see John 4:34 and 6:38).
False humility is pride in disguise, saying that I’m no good, that I have nothing to offer. True humility lies in saying, ‘I am a son of God, seated in heavenly places. I have authority and power. And I choose to surrender that authority and power only to do what I see the Father doing.’
In complete surrender you can come from a place of rest.
34. The Joshua generation will have supernatural strength for war.
They will be like Caleb, who at 85 years of age was still going in and out to fight.
So, let’s understand, none of all this is about age: it is about who we are and what we are in the spirit. No matter what our physical age is, in the spirit we can have rulership and strength to overcome.
I am still as strong today as I was in the day Moses sent me; as my strength was then, so my strength is now, for war and for going out and coming in. Now then, give me this hill country about which the LORD spoke on that day, for you heard on that day that Anakim were there, with great fortified cities; perhaps the LORD will be with me, and I will drive them out as the LORD has spoken (Joshua 14:11-12).
Caleb and Joshua, as we saw in characteristic #7, had a different spirit on them. They had an attitude. They were going to rule. They came with authority and power.
Let me ask you this: when Caleb talked about going out and coming in, where do you think he was going out and coming in from? It was the heavenly realms, because that is where his strength for war came from. If you go up and down, you will be able to go to and fro, as we have seen before.
One of the things I really like about Caleb is where he went when he did go out to war: to the mountains! ‘Give me this hill country’. Because in the hills, in the mountains, (in the place of authority, as we now understand) was where the giants were. He wasn’t going to settle for the easy places, where there was no-one much to conquer.
35. The Joshua generation will be giant killers, forerunners for the next generation.
I have a sword, which enables me to destroy and cut the heads off giants. All of us need to be giant-slayers. You all have giants who are occupying your thrones in the heavenly realms – that is, unless you have already been there and dispossessed them. You have to dispossess the enemy in order to possess your inheritance. In the heavenly realms is where you do it, and then you outwork your inheritance here.
We have to do that in our role as forerunners. We have to take our place of authority. We can’t pass this on as theory: it has to come out of our experience if we are to lead others into it.
I can only talk about giant-killing like this now because I have been and killed one. I couldn’t talk about it before. I am not going to talk to you about theory, I am only going to talk to you about things I have done, and about places I have been, so that you can go there too. And if you go to places I haven’t been, and do things I haven’t done, then you can testify to those so that I can get to go there and do them too. That is how testimony works: it opens up my experiences for you, and yours for me; ours for others, and theirs for us. And so we overcome by the word of our testimony.
Caleb drove out from there the three sons of Anak: Sheshai and Ahiman and Talmai, the children of Anak (Joshua 15:14).
There are 9 races of giants, which arose from the activity of fallen angels who did not keep their proper place, as we read in Jude. Nephilim did not have human spirits, so when they died they went into the heavenly realms, where they occupied mountains and thrones.
If we are to take our place of authority, we need to kill the giants. And if we are to fully receive our inheritance we will need to kill dragons as well, because if you go into the heavenly realms you are going to come across them too. I know maybe all this is a bit ‘out there’ for you, but I have seen it, and so I can tell you about it. It really is up to you what you do with it – I would suggest you go to God yourself and ask Him to show you.
Dragons are another result of Satan’s attempts to manipulate DNA.
In the garden, Satan overshadowed Eve. That was what the fruit was all about: it wasn’t like eating an apple off a tree; it was an overshadowing where he mixed DNA. Cain and Abel were twins, but one of them had Satan as his father. That is why Cain killed Abel, to stop the line of Adam going forward, so that the reptilian line could fill the earth.
DNA is important, because only DNA could occupy the realms of heaven. Only DNA could inherit. So Satan needed DNA – he had tried to manipulate it in the first creation, where his pollution of reptilian seed outworked in the dinosaurs. When those dinosaurs died, their spirits became dragons, in the heavenly realms.
Dragons occupy our inheritance. When we cut off their head, let’s make sure we cut off their tail, split them open and get out everything that is in their belly: our scrolls, and all that God intended for us to have. That is what they do: they stop the provision and the inheritance of God coming through to us.
We need to kill the giants to take our place of authority; and we need to kill the dragons to receive our inheritance.