We have been thrust into another level, a realm of pure faith. It is not going to be easy to walk in it. We’ve prophesied a sifting, and that everything would change. I believe it has. It has been changing, but now it is set.
Let me explain what is going to happen. We have reached a place in the Walk where there will never again be a day that you feel secure when you look at the circumstances. It has happened many times before that you looked at the circumstances and became fearful, but within a day or two all looked fine again. Intermingled with the Walk has been the illusion of security, of something to lean on that remained from the old order of things. When we were able to put a hundred dollars in the bank, things didn’t look so bad. On days that we felt good, everything seemed more hopeful. But never again, in the Walk, will you know a day in which your sense of security will come through the senses, through what you see or what you feel. From now on, you will either be a believer in the Word or else the Walk will be a torment to you. I’m sorry that those who are just coming in didn’t at least have a chance to have an illusion of security in other things for a little while, because it is now going to change very fast.
Let me explain something about fear. I John 4:18 tells us, “Fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.” The fear that will be upon people will give them great torment. It will sweep the whole world until men’s hearts will fail them for fear, when they look at the things that are coming upon the whole earth (Luke 21:26). The only answer for us is the knowledge that our security is a word from God. If God has spoken a word, it is our only source of support. The circumstances will create an illusion of utter disaster, and if you do not trust the Lord, you will be in constant torment. You might as well back off now, because for you the Walk will be a walk through hell. We will constantly be overextended as far as our resources are concerned. We will continually be depending upon ministries that do not seem adequate or experienced enough. We will always be facing projects for which we don’t have enough money, or enough ability, or enough time. At no time will the circumstances look like anything other than a disaster. And out of this will come the miracle of the Kingdom.
Those who put their trust in the horses of Egypt shall surely fail. They are going to fail. Those who put their trust in the living God and the word that He has spoken will rest in a joy and a peace continually. From now on, a house will be divided. Those who have faith will dwell in the rest of the Lord; those who are filled with unbelief will live in fear and torment. It will be almost impossible to be around them without feeling the utter confusion and the torment to which their spirits have been given, because they do not really trust in God. Their fears will constantly come to haunt them like the delirium tremens that plague the drunkard. Rebellion will constantly come up as they assert themselves against the divine order and what they should do. Desperately they will take things into their own hands when God has given them a word not to.
It will be like the overlapping period between the reign of King Saul and that of David. Three times David was anointed to be king over Israel before he actually became the king over all of Israel. The first time he was a young lad, less than seventeen years old. Samuel came to Bethlehem with a horn of oil and poured it on his head. He didn’t become king immediately, but he did some rather amazing feats. He killed a giant, he could prophesy, and with the music of his harp he could drive away evil spirits. The second time he was anointed to be king, he was thrust out of the kingdom, to live as a fugitive in caves and holes. In reality, he was now closer to being king, but it looked as if he was nothing but an outlaw in hiding. Eventually he began ruling over several of the tribes, and finally the day came when he was anointed to be king over all of Israel. He was anointed to be king over Israel with the first anointing, but it was fulfilled progressively.
Saul was rejected as king the moment he grabbed hold of the garment of Samuel, and found that as Samuel turned away from him, his garment was rent. Samuel turned back and said, “This day the kingdom is rent from you and it has been given to another man.” (It was a man after God’s own heart.) But Saul continued to rule, and to all appearances he was still the king. No one would touch him. God had said, “Touch not Mine anointed, and do My prophets no harm” (I Chronicles 16:22).
A spirit from the Lord came and troubled Saul. Again and again he tried to kill David. He tried to pin him to the wall with his spear, but David always escaped out of the hand of Saul. Although Saul tried to kill him, David wouldn’t touch him; he refused to destroy him. Yet the day finally came when Saul perished. His life became such a burden to him that he took his own life.
I am aware of my desperate situation. It seems as if the spear of Saul has been thrown at me once again. I feel like saying in my heart, “All of this I have seen again and again; there is no change.” But there is a change! The progressive anointings and dealings of God have been so rapid that I know I am now very close to the things that God spoke. He anointed me many years ago, and then I didn’t see anything but giants. He anointed me again and it seemed that I became a fugitive fleeing from the oppressions and the harassments of the enemy. But the anointing is coming again, and each time it comes, we are closer to its fulfillment, as we go through another plane.
From now on, mark it: the man or woman of faith who has been anointed of the Lord will be coming into what God has for them. But those who are fearful and unbelieving, those who have not dared to put their whole reliance on a word from the Lord are going to enter into a personal kind of torment, because God has removed all the things, they can trust in. Whatever the eyes could see, whatever the arms could lean on, what you had in your pocket and what you could buy with it, what you had that could be sold, the reputation and the prestige you had before the world—all will be swept away. When the words come, there will be many who will suddenly say (as they did in John, the first chapter), “We weren’t counting on that. We weren’t expecting that. We thought we were in a walk with God that would go right on and have a superior rating in the Wall Street Journal any day now.” But it won’t happen. The man or woman who survives now is the man or woman who trusts in the word from God.
Be very thankful that you came into the Walk when you did. It will be much more difficult for men or women to enter in now. There will be many coming, but for them the words of the Lord in Luke 13:24 will be fulfilled again, “Strive (as in agony) to enter in, for many shall seek to enter in and not be able.”
I don’t even know why I’m giving you this. It is a fresh reality to me. There is a grieving in my heart because I know the hell that some will walk in. Those who have had a word from God and an anointing from God, but have never done any violence to their unbelief, have never come to grips with the rebellion and the unbelief that reacts to adverse circumstances, have never come to a complete submission to walk with God—they are going to find it very, very difficult. Can you understand why? The believer reaches down, and he has the Word of God to stand on. The man or woman who doubts isn’t leaning on the Word of God.
What can they lean on? They probably thinks, “Oh, the Walk looks pretty good; it’s growing.” There’s nothing to lean on there. It doesn’t look that good. One day a church may look like the greatest thing that ever happened but give it a little time and suddenly it doesn’t look good at all. When everything looks bad, then all of a sudden the man or woman who was leaning on the Walk with God will have the torment of having nothing that they can put their hand on to trust in. Don’t fool yourself—this word has already destroyed your ability to walk in Babylon. You could never go back to that. On that point you’re set. But can you walk in this? If you look around for the supporting evidence to your senses of certain things that look good, you won’t make it. It will be swept away from you.
What if you have a wonderful ministry that everyone thinks highly of? Just about the time that happens, the Lord will give you a word, and when you speak about it, the people will say, “Yuk! We don’t want to hear them anymore.” God doesn’t let you trust in that either. The prophet is not held up and sustained by the response of the people when they prophesy; they prophesy and it is sustained by the word that they speak. They believe that word. They can be like Noah, and speak it for one hundred twenty years, with everyone mocking them. It doesn’t matter, because they have faith in the word. By faith Noah, moved with a godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of eight souls, by which he condemned the world. His faith stood firm (Hebrews 11:7).
The ministers have to do this. You go along and preach and suddenly it seems as if all that beautiful body ministry that was building you up is gone too. I like body ministry and we know this is the Body of Christ—very much so—but you also must face the fact that this is the most lonely, individual walk a person ever faced. If you have been fearful, you had better face it. If you have been governed by fear in your life and if, in this Walk, you are constantly anxious and worrying, you had better be concerned—really concerned. According to Revelation 21:8, the fearful and the unbelieving are first on the list of those who are going to hell. Murderers, adulterers, liars, sorcerers, and all the rest tag along after the fearful and the unbelieving. There just is no way that you can please God if you become a victim of the appearance of things round about you. You can’t do it.
We will be ministering to many from other states and other continents. We see the things that God is doing and we speak them, but we know also that some of these will turn away. Some will be tested more than they are able to bear. However, if they do fail, it will not be because they are weak, or because they haven’t had a true word from God. They won’t fail because they have not had encouragement and prayers and wonderful teaching.
When the Lord says, “Come,” and at that moment they find that they’ve come to the end of their own limitations, they will be like Peter, when he came to the edge of the boat that dark night in the storm. He understood a boat. He knew how to handle it in the heaviest of seas, but the Lord said, “Come.” (Actually, Peter had asked to be invited. He said, “Bid me to come,” and the Lord did.) When he came to the end of his own limitations, he lifted one foot over the boat, and then the other, until he was standing on the water, and he started to walk. You will walk through the storm and through tribulation too, as long as you are obedient to a word that God gives you. But when the winds become boisterous (and they are upon us now), when the illusions and the bitter circumstances rise up round about you, and you turn and look at them, you will be like Peter—you will start to sink. When that happens, do like Peter did—pray that beautiful prayer that he prayed, “Lord, save me!” Every preacher should study that prayer for days on end, whenever they are tempted to feel eloquent and soar on and on and on. It is a perfect prayer.
The Lord will have to help you, because you are going to get your eyes on situations. You will get your eyes on people. You will get your eyes on yourself. You will see the circumstances. You will see that things seem to be so reasonable by another course, and you will forget the word that God gave you, or else you will fail to put your absolute trust in the word. When that day comes, the Walk ceases to become the most blessed sustaining thing in the world to your heart, and it becomes the closest approach to hell.
The people going through the tribulation in the world will never know anything as deadly as what will hit a person in this Walk who does not deal with unbelief. We have a human nature of unbelief and there will be nothing that we can trust in, nothing that we can hang on to. And every day, every circumstance, every problem will come like a tremendous tidal wave to sweep them away, because they have no solid place for their feet to stand. The Walk will become a hell, instead of a walk with God.
God has been giving us words during the last few months about the futility on creation, asking us to get rid of it within ourselves. Now we are faced with the fact that we are ready to move ahead. We really are moving ahead. I believe that we have come into the actual positioning of the first phase of the manifestation of the sons of God. And that is why I believe that there are some who will fail, because they won’t turn away from the illusion of things and just believe a word. The one identifying mark of a son of God is the fact that he is led by the Spirit (Romans 8:14). That will mark us; we are going to be led by the Spirit of the Lord, not by what anyone else says.
I have found recently, that when somebody comes and gives advice, or demands that we follow a certain course that is not of God, a vibration is set up that seems to say, “What a horrible idea. I can’t accept that at all.” It is no longer a matter of saying, “Well, it sounds all right. I’ll weigh it and think about it.” It is either a witness from God or it is a witness out of the pit. And we find that when decisions are motivated by the circumstances and the fears, we can’t tolerate them; we don’t want anything to do with them. There is only one response in our heart, and that is the will of God that has a deep witness of the Spirit of the Lord. We are led by the Spirit of the Lord. God has brought to me a sensitivity that I’ve never known before—a sensitivity to the wrongness of things that are based upon human reason, instead of being led completely by a word from God.
We are approaching another awesome time of sifting. There is no reason why any of you should fail. God has spoken a word and you are in this Walk by revelation. This is the issue now: Will you walk by revelation, or will you walk by the illusion of the circumstances round about you? This issue must be resolved soon because the world situation is not going to improve. Do you realize that? The world is going along, hoping that conditions will be getting better and better as they try to bolster the economy and fight inflation. They can’t do it. There is no way. Things are not going to get any better.
What will happen if inflation cuts your savings in half? What will happen if it all disappears? What will happen if you lose everything? What will you do then? Are you going to be moved by the appearance of things? by the circumstances? or are you really going to believe the Lord? In some way, we must shift gears, and decide, “Yes, this is a word from the Lord.”
From now on, this is a miracle walk. From now on, we trust God and we believe His word. We step out by faith, and without fear we approach everything that faces us as we walk with God. In my heart is a very humble attitude. I’m saying, “O God, deal with my unbelief. Help me if there is any reservation in my trust in the Word that You have spoken over me. Help me, Lord. Help me.”
I don’t think that we have weeks and months to work on this. It’s right here. Which way will it turn now? The Lord could allow many things to happen, even during the next few days, until you would wonder at the way the world had changed. Everything could be turned completely upside down, but that wouldn’t make null and void the fact that we have had some of the most marvelous words that God has ever spoken to us. Regardless of what seems to happen, let’s believe. Let’s be determined, “I’m a believer, Lord. I’m not going to be filled with fear; I’m going to be a believer.”
As our numbers begin to grow, I give you a warning: the dealings of God will hit us if we start to number Israel in order to find out how many men, we have who can bear arms. God brought judgment against David for that—remember (I Chronicles 21)? God forbid that the Walk should ever take a census, that we should ever begin to lean on any resources. This is a walk with God. Let it be a walk with God. Let it not be a walk where we are encouraged because we have a hundred brothers on one side and two hundred on the other. God deliver us from a panic level, that we reach a certain point where we blow up. Let’s have one determination: though He slay me, yet will I serve Him.
The people wanted to make Jesus their King so He could continue to supply them with the loaves and fishes. Jesus told them, “Unless you drink of My blood and eat of My flesh, you have no life in you.” Imagine saying that to a Jew who wouldn’t even touch blood! After that, many of His followers left. Then Jesus asked the twelve, “Will you also go away?” “To whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and we are sure.” It was in their heart. The disciples had to face it. They couldn’t say, “We are on the band wagon. We finally made it. Look at that—the whole world is starting to follow after the Lord.”
The issue came to them, as it is coming to us now: the Walk will be a reproach in the sight of the whole world for a while. It is going to be persecuted from one end to the other. They will laugh at it like Tobiah laughed at the efforts of the Jews to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem under Nehemiah. He said, “If a fox should jump on it, he would knock the wall down” (Nehemiah 4:3). There will be those who rise up to criticize, but remember one thing: if it is a word from God, it is a word from God!
Often when people leave the Walk, they find that the pressure is taken off their lives. They find a good job and no longer do they go through the difficulties they experienced before. They don’t realize that all these difficulties happened because they were in the will of God. If you are in a mess, it is because God is working out a walk of faith for you. He has removed the illusion and the refuge of lies. He has brought you to the place where there isn’t anything to lean on but a walk with God.
Perhaps you could make some connection with an old-order pastor who is desperate enough that he would make you an assistant pastor. Do you want to go back to that? If not, then you’d better get rid of the rest of your unbelief, because on a cold dark night in an alley, the devil is going to hit you with everything he can. And when he does, you had better be sure that you are standing on a word from God.
First of all, repent of your cockiness. Don’t say like Peter, “Lord, even though they all forsake You, I will never forsake You.” Repent of any confidence in the flesh. Repent of any arrogance. Come right down to the place where you acknowledge, “I don’t know of anything in the world that will bring me through, except hanging on to the word that God has given me. With all my heart I’m going to believe what is revealed to me; I will not let it go. If I let it go, I will perish in the midst of tribulation. If I hold on to the word of God and I believe it with all of my heart, I will make it.”
Let’s first start on the repentance route. Talk to the Lord about your unbelief. Don’t just mouth it with a few superficial prayers. Bring it completely out of your heart. God is leading us all to repentance. Even though you ask the Lord for forgiveness, there is something that holds some of you back, because you can’t forgive yourself for the way you have walked in unbelief. You can’t forgive yourself for the weakness that you see. You still want to be strong; you don’t really want to trust in the Lord with all of your heart. There are reservations in your prayers.
We are not putting our faith in numbers. We don’t lean on the arm of flesh. We want to believe that, but how difficult it is. We’ve always kept back a reserve, and that is deadly to the Kingdom. It is the thing that God abhors, and in the early Church He dealt with it very drastically.
Remember Ananias and Sapphira? “Yes Lord, we’ll give it all to You. Everything that we have, we’ll lay it at the apostles’ feet.”
“But Sapphira, don’t you think we’d better stash some in a little sack and bury it? Then if things don’t work out right in the Way, we’ll have something that we can lean on. Let’s not lay all the money at Peter’s feet. Let’s save a little back. Now we’ll have to agree on how much we will give and then we’ll hide the rest. All right?”
“Yes Paw, that’s what we will do.” And they both dropped dead!
You may say, “How cruel!” But remember—the Kingdom dies anyway the day you don’t lean on Him with all your heart. Everything dies the day that you hold back and lean on the arm of flesh. Then it’s all gone. We have to do violence to our fears. We have to do violence to the instincts that make us feel we need some support. We have to lose our lives for His sake or we don’t find them. The door of the Kingdom opens by absolute dedication and discipleship and trust in that word from the Lord.
Lord, we are coming to grapple with the deep roots of fear and unbelief. We want to be loosed from it now—right now. As we confess our sins, You are faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We look unto Thee now, in the name of the Lord. O Master, whether it is walking on water or through fiery furnaces or through lions’ dens or through tribulation, we must be sustained by Your word, and by our absolute faith in it.
Can you say in your heart, “Lord, I will follow Thee, whithersoever Thou goest”? Then He will say to you, “The birds of the air have their nests and the foxes have their holes, but the Son of Man hath nowhere to lay His head.” Do you see what it meant when He said that? There’s nothing that you can depend on. But what about those boys with that fishing business in Capernaum? They left their nets to follow Him. What about that beautiful civil service job Matthew had, collecting taxes? It was very profitable, but he left it with no hesitation.
Can we say it and really mean it? “Yes Lord, wherever You lead us.” Face it: You’re going to believe His Word, and you are not going to lean on anything else. We’ve never said it as truly as we say it now, “We love Thee, Lord Jesus. We follow Thee. Thou hast sent forth Thy Word, and it hath been the light within our heart. It hath been the rock under our feet, the daystar before us.”
We don’t intend to deny the Lord, but we have an advantage that Peter didn’t have; he wasn’t filled with the Holy Spirit. In another sense, however, Peter at the hour of crucifixion did not face as great an hour of testing as we are facing—an hour of testing that will come upon the whole world. You’re going to draw more of the Lord because you have to have more of the Lord. You’re going to believe for the work of the cross because it is necessary. What we have need of, He will give us, because we believe for it.
This word is apostolic. It is a word of warning that the Lord is bringing. Are you dedicated to the exposure of everything that is within you? If you are, God will show it to you. As honestly as you know, are you willing to face anything? Would you also be willing for God to voice it by a trumpet sound, so that everyone everywhere might know the things that are in your heart? Would you take any humbling that He brought? Let your heart trust in the Lord. Let it believe.
The stories of the Old Testament have been very real to me lately. In a time of declension before judgment was to sweep over the land (Israel in the north and Judah in the southern part), the Word tells that God would speak to them and chasten them. Then they would repent and God would give them “some help.” But they didn’t repent completely. They only succeeded in slowing down the judgment for a little while. Then along came another evil king to lead them down on the toboggan of apostasy and rebellion. God would move on them again, and it appeared as if there was total destruction. After they repented, God again gave them “some help.” They refused to remove all the areas of disobedience and rebellion. There was still a mixture: they feared the Lord and they served their own gods.
That is what I am afraid of. I fear anything that leaves any idolatry, anything of Babylon in our heart. If there is anything in my own heart that still wants to please the old order, I’m not aware of it; but if there is, God get it out fast! If there is still any fear of man in me, God remove it. Persecution will be vicious. They will move in on you like an army ready to annihilate you. You’ve got to believe. There can be no reserve.
The Lord said, “I will take one of a thousand of God’s people and bring them into My promises.”
Of thirty-two thousand of Gideon’s assembled army, twenty-two thousand went home. Of the ten thousand remaining, only a remnant of three hundred was chosen—three hundred whose hearts were set on the Lord. We can’t arrogantly say, “I’m going to be one of those three hundred. I’m worthy.” This depends upon the depth of your heart. But you can be one if you can believe. We claim it. Please Lord, include us.
“In that day,” the prophet said, “Zion shall be plowed like a field” (Jeremiah 26:18). This is what He is doing. First He plows our hearts deep, and the rest of God’s people are also going to know the deep dealing of the Lord. I would rather that the mercy of God would dig down now, and bring our voluntary consent to the judgment that releases us from the presence and the very tendency to evil, than to wait and have God deal with it in a punitive fashion.
O God, You are about to chasten the whole world, but chasten us as sons, that we might be partakers of Thy holiness. As You deal with us, please don’t pay any attention to what we are saying; look at our heart. If we holler, if we cry, if we scream—don’t pay any attention to us, Lord. Love us enough to chasten us. Love us enough to discipline us. Let us be partakers of Your holiness. Let us love you with all of our heart. Don’t hold back on us, Lord. We choose to be chosen.