When changes come in our lives, our reaction can be insecurity and fear. Within the local church we may go through testings which cannot be defined as normal church situations. Actually, God may be moving to bring us all into a different state, a different spiritual climate or condition. If we look to the Scriptures that are closely related to the Feast of Trumpets, we will see how they can precipitate a real visitation from the Lord. With the blowing of trumpets at that feast, the nation of Israel was launched into a whole new year.
Counting back to the time when Israel first celebrated the Feast of Trumpets, we see that we are now past Israel’s seventieth Jubilee (3500 years). A study of the Scriptures indicates that at the time of Jubilee, Christ read this Scripture from the book of Isaiah: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me … Luke 4:18. Of course, the Jews in the synagogue were furious when He said, This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears. Verse 21b. It is important to realize that this Scripture has more significance for us now than at the hour when Jesus read it in the synagogue at Nazareth.
Isaiah 61:1–2a reads: The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives, and freedom to prisoners; to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord. This is speaking about the year of Jubilee when the prisoners were allowed to go free. Jews who had been bankrupt were able to go back home and repossess their heritage and the old estates of their families. It was a way of land reform and restoration, so that they would not be permanently impoverished. Those who had been imprisoned for various reasons would not suffer an interminable period of punishment. Everyone went free. Everyone returned to a fresh restoration of things.
It is significant that this verse is split in two: To proclaim the favorable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn. Isaiah 61:2. At that time Jesus preached the “favorable year of the Lord,” but He did not preach “the vengeance of God.” He did “comfort all that mourn.”
Verse 3 says that they would have … the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead of a spirit of fainting. So they will be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified. (This restoration psalm is very important.) Then they will rebuild the ancient ruins, they will raise up the former devastations, and they will repair the ruined cities, the desolations of many generations. Verse 4. Spiritually, all of this will come forth in this day, in the year of Jubilee in which God has proclaimed He will liberate His people. They will be set free. They will enter into His fullness, which had been stolen from them; and they will see the Kingdom fully established.
To celebrate the Feast of Trumpets, the priests would study in the synagogues and temples for years to learn how to make the most beautiful long sounds from a ram’s horn. In this day we may not be making the most beautiful sounds; but as we prophesy, we are spiritually blowing the trumpet. Today, the trumpet is giving a very certain sound. I Corinthians 14:8 says, For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle? In this verse Paul was writing about prophesying. When we speak in our worship services, we should speak as the oracles of God, so that we blow the trumpet in Zion and we sound an alarm upon His holy mountain (Joel 2:1): that the weak arise and say they are strong (Joel 3:10), and that it is a day of liberation and blessing for everyone
Situations that are pending are loaded. Changes over the whole earth could happen within a split second. We must look to the Lord to help us. We can try too hard in a fleshly effort that leads nowhere. That portion of God’s faith is very necessary for our deliverance and liberation.
In the contest between Elijah and the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, Elijah took all the handicaps deliberately. He dug a trench and told the people to pour twelve barrels of water on the sacrifices. When the fire of the Lord came, it consumed everything, and even licked up the water. This was holy fire. When the prophets of Baal called to their god, nothing happened, even though they cut themselves. When no one answered, Elijah mocked them. But when he prayed, God moved; and the fire came. That prayer was simple, but fervent (I Kings 18:19–38).
In James 5:16b–17a we read, The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain. When God gives a promise in His Word, we must learn that it will not usually happen automatically. He looks for an earnest heart to cooperate with Him in bringing His miracles to pass. When we get into a flow of worship to the Lord, then with faith we must prophesy and with faith we must speak the Word of the Lord into its fulfillment.
Effective prophecy is not sound and fury alone, but it is also an intensity and focus of faith. Jesus said, And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive. Matthew 21:22. We do not want to merely budge a mountain; we want to toss one into the sea and watch a whole new age spring forth. We are not after little events or a turn in circumstances for our prosperity. We believe for the whole Kingdom to burst forth!
Christ did not make a mistake when He said, “Pray, then, in this way … ‘Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.’ ” Matthew 6:9–10. Every generation has had their turn at this prayer; but there will be someone who will stomp up and down, crying out to God with a faith and a focus so great that all the powers of darkness can no longer resist the overwhelming tide of His Kingdom as it comes on the earth. No one will prevent it! No powers of darkness of the underworld will be able to withstand their prayers. No principalities or powers will be able to stand against the remnant that comes forth with the fervency of Elijah and prophesies for the Kingdom of God to come forth upon this world.
In the book of Hebrews, we read this about faith: Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it the men of old gained approval. By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible. Hebrews 11:1–3. What is seen was not made out of things which are visible. The key of faith brings it out of the nebulous realm of the invisible and into what we can see and walk in. In this sense, faith makes it happen. A man of God comes forth and blows a trumpet in Zion, and this is the beginning of a deliverance for the people of the Lord (Joel 2:1, 15).
Ehud was the one lone man who stood on the mountain and blew a trumpet and brought the deliverance of a whole nation. He was one of the judges of Israel, one lonely man with a vision. When he blew that trumpet, not many days passed until there was a great liberation of God’s people from the bondage of the Moabites (Judges 3:15–30).
Like the blowing of a trumpet, we can voice proclamations in the Holy Spirit of things that are not yet seen, but which live in our hearts and are real to us. These are the hopes and visions that were born by a Word from God. We know they exist somewhere, though we cannot see them yet. But blowing the trumpet can make them visible, practical realities that we will walk in. We can bring to pass everything we have ever envisioned as we worship with deep faith. Let us really believe to make it happen, but we must do more than just voice our enthusiasm. Let us grab hold of His promises and demand, “We have waited long enough! Let there be no more delay!” Prophesy it into view! Proclaim the Word of the Lord!
The Lord is leading us into deeper worship. We should never require pressure or need to be pushed into worship. God wants us to be caught away in a deep, spontaneous worship unto Himself. The days are upon us in which exhortation to worship will be unnecessary. The need to exhort people to worship is disappearing. People are beginning to come to the house of God with a deep love for Him, ready to prostrate themselves before Him.
Let us be very careful how we receive this Word, because it should not be considered as another sermon. It is a Word from the Lord.
In the last days, the mountain of the house of the Lord will be established as the chief of the mountains, and will be raised above the hills; and all the nations will stream to it. And many peoples will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that He may teach us concerning His ways, and that we may walk in His paths.” Isaiah 2:2–3a.
All that has been called the “walk” is actually a walk into the Kingdom. While it seems distinct, I am through making apologies for terminology which has been born out of people’s need to find a word to establish what God was doing in their lives, so that they may walk in His ways. In my heart, I resist every effort to make us denominational or sectarian or identify us with cliche phrases. This was the “walk” and this is now the Kingdom—a walk ordained of God into the Kingdom. This means, of course, that we will refer to the walk rarely, but to the Kingdom frequently. We walked into the Kingdom.
Much of what the Lord speaks about the Feast of Tabernacles and the days to come is found in the book of Isaiah, and in the Psalms which are related to it. We have emphasized the days of restoration for some time. Isaiah 61:4 speaks about restoring the “desolations of many generations.” The Feast of Trumpets is proclaiming something for us, too. The Word of the Lord is coming relative to His establishment of His house. This is something even greater than the restoration. It is the establishment of that which the world has been waiting for many generations to see.
The emphasis is slowly turning from restoration to judgment. Does this register in your heart? We want to see the Church restored, but we also would like to see a bit more than the little judgments we see in the book of Acts. In the New Testament we find a few incidents of real judgment being ministered. But Isaiah 66:16 is a prophecy that “the slain of the Lord shall be many” in the days that He comes in His Kingdom. People will come and say, “… teach us concerning His ways, and that we may walk in His paths.” For the law (instruction) will go forth from Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And He will judge between the nations, and will render decisions for many peoples; and they will hammer their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, and never again will they learn war. Isaiah 2:3–4.
God’s Word must have its fulfillment in the realm of spirit before it can have its fulfillment in the natural realm. We have to so prevail over the enemy that spiritual warfare is no longer the main occupation of our walk into the Kingdom. Rather, the focus is the bringing forth of “the precious fruit of the earth unto the husbandman” (James 5:7), and for the Lord Jesus Christ to receive the rewards of His suffering from every kindred tribe and nation. God hasten the day that this satanic warfare should cease and the harvest of the Kingdom begin. Let us get this phase of war over with! Then let us get into the great harvest. Let us get beyond the problems of survival in the midst of warfare, where we are always helping the wounded and the fallen so that they do not lose out. When we look back and see those who have been lost in the battle, we say, “Oh God, curse the oppressions that have come against Your people, and give them a heart to press on until they have broken through.”
Isaiah chapter 2 talks about the things that are happening in our day. Verses 6 and 7a: For Thou hast abandoned Thy people, the house of Jacob, because they are filled with influences from the east (God hates this whole Eastern philosophy and meditation route), and they are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they strike bargains with the children of foreigners. Their land has also been filled with silver and gold. False prosperity has come from profiteering movements who even buy up bankrupt universities with millions of dollars at their disposal. God says, “I hate that thing.” And we should hate it too!
Verses 9 through 11: So the common man has been humbled, and the man of importance has been abased, but do not forgive them. Enter the rock and hide in the dust from the terror of the Lord and from the splendor of His majesty. The proud look of man will be abased, and the loftiness of man will be humbled, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day.
We should consider it a careful warning when someone comes along and says that we have an adulation of man. Sometimes we can hear a perverted lie from the mouth of Satan, and yet it can start us to thinking and wondering if there is something in it that we should consider. I do not think that we are worshiping man, but it is good to be nudged once in a while to be sure that we are not. This one truth has been taught to us from the very beginning: The Lord alone will be exalted in that day.
The Lord alone will be exalted in that day is a verse of Scripture that I began to preach in 1951 when the Lord met me. Over and over again, I would stand before a handful of people after they had been sifted. Three congregations were sifted in the first two years. It was difficult to get the toehold for the Kingdom that God was bringing forth in the earth through a Living Word. I kept saying, “God alone is going to be exalted.”
Ministers that I had won to the Lord and trained would come to me and say, “What do you want to do this for? You have lost a nationwide ministry. You could really be effective with big congregations, but you are sitting here.” All I could say was this: The Lord alone will be exalted in that day. We did not have many people in those days, but the Word has not changed. The Lord alone will be exalted!
The Kingdom is ready to break. Only the Lord will be glorified. This Word is happening again: For the Lord of hosts will have a day of reckoning against everyone who is proud and lofty, and against everyone who is lifted up, that he may be abased. Against all the hills that are lifted up, against every high tower, against every fortified wall, against all the ships of Tarshish, and against all the beautiful craft. And the pride of man will be humbled, and the loftiness of men will be abased, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. Isaiah 2:12, 14b–17.
Russia will be judged in its arrogance. Judgment has already started in the United States. There is hardly a nation in the world in which the American, who was once respected, is not criticized now. Our finances and our national debt reflect the salvation of country after country to a certain point; then corruption entered in. The money of our citizens has been poured out to establish tyrants of other countries. We wonder about the futility of it all.
Why does all this come? Why does verse 11 say, “The Lord alone will be exalted in that day”? We see a phrase of judgment at the end of verse 19: … when He arises to make the earth tremble. A similar phrase is at the end of verse 21: … before the terror of the Lord and the splendor of His majesty, when He arises to make the earth tremble. Do you know what is happening? The Feast of Trumpets is not for our benefit only, but by the Spirit we are sounding it to the Lord. Our cry should be, “Lord, come and be exalted alone. Do not let anything else glory in Your presence. Arise and make the earth tremble.”
God is putting this deeply in our hearts for one reason. Our focus could go wrong if God had not given this Word, and this is why: The great economic forces of the world are trying to govern exactly what will happen and to control us like puppets on strings. We must become so incensed that we pray against this. The prayer of judgment is the will of God, but remember one important ingredient: We are not praying for evil forces to come down; we are praying for the Lord to be exalted. Ours is not a negative objective. We are not against anything; we are for the Lord to be everything. And in the process of His being everything, no one else will be anything. This is the Word which the Lord wants to seal to our hearts.
Our relationships and our oneness with the Lord are all involved with this truth. We must not regard mortal man whose breath of life is in his nostrils. Why should he be esteemed? (Isaiah 2:22.) We prophesy that propaganda will not be able to establish anyone. The antispiritual emphasis will be brought down. “Woe unto the land, when they call evil good, and good evil” (Isaiah 5:20), when money alone can put a man in as a president or keep a good man despised and hated.
Where do we establish that which is good and say what is evil? The spiritual significance of the Feast of Trumpets can and will create something positive in America. We should stop allowing the arrogant, rich powers to manipulate and dictate the image that we are to have. God is saying, “This one is My man, and that one is not My man.” False prophets will arise, if possible, to deceive the very elect (Matthew 24:24). This will be true also in the realm of politics, finances, institutions, and every government that comes on the scene. Satan will try to present a false image, but it will not work. The image of that false beast in the book of Revelation has two horns like a lamb (Revelation 13:11). God is revealing what will happen according to the Feast of Trumpets. When we blow the trumpet, that false image will begin to come down. However, our emphasis will be Christ’s exaltation. He alone will be glorified in this day.
Isaiah chapter 3 tells how this is going to happen: For behold, the Lord God of hosts is going to remove from Jerusalem and Judah both supply and support, the whole supply of bread, and the whole supply of water; the mighty man and the warrior, the judge and the prophet, the diviner and the elder, the captain of fifty and the honorable man, the counselor and the expert artisan, and the skillful enchanter. Isaiah 3:1–3. What will happen? The rebellious will find some unworthy person and say to him, “These ruins will be under your charge.” Verse 6b. Everyone who is supposed to know something, and be able to do something, has made a mess of it. All they want is to put someone in charge of the ruins. Verse 8: For Jerusalem has stumbled, and Judah has fallen, because their speech and their actions are against the Lord, to rebel against His glorious presence.
This is the day of the Parousia. This is the day of His glorious presence when all the tribulations of the world will happen just as they did at the first coming of the Lord. When they were leading Him to be crucified, Christ said, “If they do this in the green tree, what will they do in the dry?” (Luke 23:31.) If they did that to Him when He came to suffer for us, do you think they will recognize Him when He comes to be exalted in His glorious presence to rule over us, and for Him alone to be exalted?
As the Parousia, the presence of the Lord, comes, it is our Father’s will that “every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that He is Lord” (Philippians 2:10–11). Every principality and power will be brought down. The demon world will be scattered into the abyss. It will all be changed. He will remove everything that is not in complete conformity to His rule and reign. Woe to those who rebel against His glorious presence. The expression of their faces bears witness against them. And they display their sin like Sodom; they do not even conceal it. Woe to them! Isaiah 3:9a.
The closer we can get to the presence of the Lord, the more revelation we will have of one another and of the world around us. In His presence there is no phoniness. The day that the religious exterior deceives people is almost at an end. The pious look, that lying, haughty spirit that parades itself as some pseudo-humility, is being judged from the Body of Christ. Woe to them! For they have brought evil on themselves. Say to the righteous that it will go well with them, for they will eat the fruit of their actions. Woe to the wicked! It will go badly with him, for what he deserves will be done to him. O My people! Their oppressors are children, and women rule over them. O My people! Those who guide you lead you astray, and confuse the direction of your paths. Isaiah 3:9b–12.
This is not a male chauvinist message. We have been struggling with divine order and submission for some time. Not many men are able to move into the authority and the graciousness that should rest upon them. Not many are able to enter into the submission from the heart that God wants. And it is true that children try to rule over their parents. There is irreverence among children whose parents are not restraining them. You can almost count on it—where a passive spirit is on the parents, something is wrong with the children too. Everything today is all mixed up. If a father wants to really please the Lord, he must be concerned about the spiritual welfare of his children. He will guide them in the ways of the Lord. If he loves the Lord enough, he will direct them in the ways of the Lord with love and concern. His children will understand his godly motivation. Discipline should not be with harsh religiosity. It should both correct and bless a child.
The more you walk with the Lord, the more you will face problems of being kind but having a strength and determination to do the will of God. His will must be uppermost in your life. He must be the one who is glorified.
When will all of this world order change and Jesus Christ become the exalted one? When you proclaim the Word of the Lord from your heart. This will herald the exaltation of Christ and the putting down of everything that has come against Him. He alone will be exalted in this day! Break through into this Word! The door is open for you to walk in His every Word. Let it be that you are walking in the Word. Move into it, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Everything we walk in is only for His glory. It is not for our vindication or justification; it is for His glory, for His being exalted alone in that day. He can have no rivals. If we want to be vindicated and praised, the Lord will have another rival to bring down. If we strive for our own vindication and exoneration, we will be lifting ourselves up; and the Lord will have one more enemy to bring down. But if we strive for Him alone to be exalted, then we will be doing exactly what He wants.