PROPHETIC WATCH
Last week during Bible School, I was sitting in on one of our classes, "Understanding the Anointing" being taught by one of our instructors, Pearlene Tindle. I heard in my spirit the Holy Spirit say, "Liberty to Move." As I began to write that statement down, the Lord started speaking to me. This is what he said:
"There is so much that the Holy Spirit wants to do...things he wants to impart, and things he wants to see stirred up that he has already been imparted. But things have been somewhat confined because of man's thinking." [He reminded me of Paul's exhortation to the church of Ephesus, not the walk as the Gentiles do, in the VANITYof their MINDS (depravity, frailty, wanting in vigor to know the realities of spiritual things) ]. He went on to say, "Man's mind has stood in the way of much of what the Holy Spirit wants to see done." As he was talking to me, he make reference to the phrase, "Liberty to Move," and added, "...but there is a liberty coming...it is part of the divine shift." He said, "There is a new mind that will lift the church out of the mind of man, into the mind of the Spirit. When this is accomplished, a new liberty to move will come.
Right now there are things that are wanting...things being restricted because the mind of man is keeping it from flowing. It is not so much a conscious restriction as it is an entrenched mindset. The church will have to be renewed in the spirit of their mind, which means they will have to draw back from the natural tendency to think as a man, and start thinking like a God-man. Then will come the liberty...then will come the release where things have been wanting."
As I began to ponder on this word, what I kept hearing in my spirit was the church has got to step over into the mind of the Spirit or she will continue to struggle to see the fullness and unconsciously hold back on the flow of heaven. So much has been limited by our reasoning and natural thinking. We must think from a different perspective. We must put on the mind of Christ!
"Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus...."
- Phil 2:5
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Greetings!
Paul said, "Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty" (2 Cor. 3:17). Clearly, he was describing a freedom to walk in all that Christ has wrought for us in redemption. For many who are still subject to bondage, there is a liberty that can bring you into your destiny. It comes through the vision of God, and it is worked out in you through the force of faith. I encourage you to study the Pauline revelation, to know your calling and to know what God has purposed for your life. When you see the vision, of all that belongs to you in Christ, then there will come a drive that will propel your faith to run full steam ahead, until you become possessed by the possessor - the Lord who is that Spirit!
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THE VISION
REFLECTING THE GLORY |
"Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables,
that he may run that readeth it."
Habakkuk 2:2
There is something about vision and what that vision entails that becomes the driving force to our faith. Faith has to have purpose. It has to have something that it can live by. Real faith is never aimless, nor is it lifeless. That's why Habakkuk mentions in this same passage, "The just shall live by his faith" (Hab. 2:4). If it is through faith that we live, then faith itself must be alive! It must be able to provide something that propels us upward and onward. That something comes from what we call vision. Proverbs says, "Where there is no vision, the people perish..." (Pr. 29:18).
When the prophet inquired of the Lord what he would say while on his watch, he heard these words: "Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it" (Hab. 2:2). The word "run" means to move swiftly, to hurry, to rush upon. The word "readeth" means to call, to invite, to appoint, to summon, to be chosen, to be endowed. When you apply the meaning of these words to this statement, there is something very compelling about the need for us to have vision.
Vision is what defines our purpose. When Paul stood before King Agrippa, he recited his experience on the road to Damascus. He told him how he had a vision of the Lord, and that Jesus himself said, "I have appeared unto thee for this purpose..." (Acts 26:16). He told him what that purpose was, and that there would be further occasions where he would appear to him in order to explain more in detail the purpose and plan he had for his life. Paul told him: "O king Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision" (Acts 26:19).
Think of vision as a call to purpose. Each one of us was created for purpose, and finding that purpose is what fuels our faith. If we don't have an understanding of what our purpose is, then we have nothing to run after. A faithless generation is nothing more than an aimless society. It is a people with no purpose - no vision. What made Abraham the father of faith was the fact that God gave him a vision, a call to purpose, and he took hold of it and ran with it! Romans chapter four says, "Against hope he believed in hope that he might be the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, 'so shall thy seed be'" (Rom. 4:18). The very fact that he saw the plan and purpose of God for his life is what fueled his faith, even as he stood against what appeared to be impossible odds. If you are going to be a person of faith, then you will have to see clearly God's divine purpose for your life - you will have to be able to recognize and understand the call, the summons to run with purpose!
The Lord told Habakkuk, "For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry" (Hab. 2:3). We could read this verse this way: "For the vision is an appointment." Although we know that "to everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven" (Eccles. 3:1), the very fact that vision is an appointment means we have a destiny to fulfill. I like the meaning of the phrase, "but at the end it shall speak, and not lie." Literally, it is saying that when the season for vision arrives, it will be breathed out of us as the fruit of something that is ripe and ready for harvest. To "speak" means to breathe out or blow out. Think of it as an aroma, or the scent of a fragrant flower. When the vision speaks it is like the breath of what has been living in you is being breathed out! Your life carries the scent of purpose...and it is lived out by your faith!
For Paul, it was the revelation of the finished work of the cross! He saw with explicit detail, our union with Christ. God enabled him to see the vision of man walking in the image of God, clothed with his fullness and surrounded with his glory! He even made this statement: "Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus: Whereunto I also labor, striving according to his working, which worketh in me mightily" (Col. 1:28, 29).
What is it that drives you...that drives your faith? Have you answered the call, the summons of the Lord, to find and fulfill your purpose and destiny? If you have, then you know perfectly well what your assignment is. The Lord told Habakkuk, "Write the vision." I would encourage you to take a moment and write down what you see as the vision. Create a reference point from where you are to where you want to be. I think it will amaze you to see just how stimulated your faith will become - knowing what you are called to achieve!
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PRAYER
Father, in the name of Jesus, I thank you for the call on my life to find and fulfill my purpose. I see and understand, through the writings of the apostle Paul, there is an ideal identification to walk in - to arrive at! Just as Paul said, "I press toward the mark of the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 3:14), I chose to lay hold on the vision of who I am in Christ and walk in the fullness of the blessing of the gospel. Help me Lord to see clearly the vision of my destiny in you. In Jesus name, I pray. Amen. |
CONFESSION
I choose today to be a person of vision. I will see and know all that Christ has wrought for me. I take hold of it by faith and purpose to walk in the revelation of the finished work of Calvary. I will become all that I have become in Christ. I will walk in the fullness of him that filleth all in all. I will run swiftly to grasp the prize of eternal life. Today is my day for victory! Today is my day to rush upon the call, the summons, and the appointment to my destiny! |
DEFINING MOMENTS...
Second Corinthians four says, "But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them" (2 Cor. 4:3-4). In essence, Paul is saying that the enemy is ardently at work seeking to block the vision of the finished work of Christ from being realized. As long as our minds are blinded to the glorious gospel of Christ (the gospel of glory) and the revelation that we are to be conformed to the image of Christ (which comes as we are changed us from glory to glory), then we will continue to struggle with faith. Once faith lays hold of the vision then, "katie bar the door!" You talk about running swiftly, to hurry, to rush upon it...this is it! I trust today that you have received the summons, your appointment to destiny...and that the vision is speaking through you, and all those around you are catching the scent of the heavenly call!
In His Grace,
Pastor David
Faith Harvest Church
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