"REGISTERED TO PRAY"

January 13, 2012

It's a wintry day in the state of New Hampshire today, and a good one to sit down to write to my favorite Readers Circle (smile). It has actually been a very instructive few weeks spiritually, with more from the spirit of wisdom and revelation than I am able to put on paper. Between our own continuing testings as a family and also the just concluded New Hampshire presidential primary election, the Lord has offered us some very rich experiential insight. Here, I will give just a digest of some of what He has been teaching us.

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On the primary election--this once again is something we partook in mainly for the sake of our girls as a combined learning experience in civics and spiritual discipleship. If you remember, four years ago we had opportunity to watch the Lord work spiritually through our engagement of both Governor Mike Huckabee's campaign and (now president) Barack Obama. This time around, the Lord had us to spiritually engage the campaigns of Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senator Rick Santorum. (And we may not be done yet)

Beside interceding for these two in particular, we were especially called to face down the spirit of lawlessness and militant homosexuality dogging Rick Santorum under the guise of what is called the Occupy Wall Street protest. Please be clear about this: the Occupy Wall Street movement is not about economic justice. It is about the right to practice and enforce lawlessness. It is of the same spirit that generated the hippy movement 50 years ago and that birthed before that the socialist revolutionary movements leading to soviet communism.

In interceding for the candidates, the Lord gave us the phrase Registered to Pray. In this He spoke to us about the superiority of authoritative prayer over voting and political action when it comes to engaging human political processes. The rationale for that superiority is simple. It is the Lord, not man, who raises and deposes political leaders (Daniel 2). Presidents and prime ministers do not come to power because of elections, but because of divine purpose. No campaign however well financed nor election however marred by voter fraud can alter the vote already made in heaven. Prayer offers the only direct line to the One with the actual authority to decide an election.

God's people need to retool their attitude toward prayer as a mere adjunct to political action. This includes our understanding of how to pray about elections and for candidates. Praying over elections is not about praying for or against a certain man to win in line with who we have ourselves decided upon because of their right policies. Rather it is about praying for perception of God's purposes regarding candidates and elections--purposes that far transcend ours. And it is about aligning our prayers with that spiritual insight. (If the church really understood its heavenly transpolitical calling, there would be no division in the church over political candidates.)

Similar to the way that news networks have reporters follow every campaign and not just the ones they are biased to, so the church should have prayer ambassadors following every candidate, perceiving the Lord's purposes regarding that campaign, and interceding accordingly in the sole interest of the kingdom of God and His righteousness. And just as campaigns are followed by the protesters of lawlessness and the lobbyists of self-interest, God's people ought to be out bringing the spirit of praise, worship and intercession at campaign events to oppose these contrary spiritual forces. (Our family has seen first hand how the voice of intercession is able to drown out and quench the voice of radical protest.)

Spiritual Righteousness vs. Political Rightness

Incidentally, it is here we see why no political party or human government can ever manifest the kingdom of God. Politics and human government is based on human political polarities of right and left based in natural knowledge of what men think to be good and right. But the kingdom of heaven is not about human rightness based on political or economic theory, but divine righteousness. Righteousness is only found in eternal life that comes by faith through the gospel. Again, it's about the two trees in the garden.

The purpose of the church is to demonstrate the superiority of Gods kingdom righteousness through spiritual faith over the politics of human rightness. This does not mean that policies, especially morally-impacting policies like abortion, are unimportant. It means that the issue of eternal life and the final state of the souls of men, not governmental policies, are what should dominate our interest in human political affairs.  (Issues pass away; hell is forever.) But this first means the church must come to its own clear holy understanding of the difference between true righteousness and mere political rightness (or political correctness.)  

While it is true that political legal rightness theory better reflects the values of the kingdom of righteousness than the libertine policies of leftism (note: Jesus was closer politically to the rightist Pharisees than to the leftist Sadducees and Samaritans) political rightness of itself nevertheless leads only to death. Only the righteousness of the cross that kills sin beyond and outside of right political principle leads to life. And only devotion to spiritual righteousness at the expense of political devotion can lead to good reflections of righteousness in politics.  

It is such spiritual righteousness, not political rightness, that the church is commissioned to champion before the world. When interceding regarding and even participating in the machinery of human government, the primary concern should be for the eternal destiny of candidates and elected leaders, and for the power of the conviction of sin, righteousness and judgment to be brought to them and upon all the people by the Spirit of Truth. This is how the kingdom of God comes to earth and eventually replaces the kingdoms of this world.

Standing before Pilate Jesus said, For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth--not political truth, but spiritual truth that changes politics by changing lives at the core And this is likewise Gods design in every interface between the chosen of God and those in human rulership, even as seen from Daniel to Paul. It remains His design for us today.

Return to Sodom

As our family called on the Lord for angelic reinforcements to quell the voices of the lawless groups following Senator Santorum, the Lord impressed on us the relationship between God's final confrontation with Sodom in Gen. 19 and the final confrontation of the saints with the world in Rev. 11. The two are quite related.

However Sodom was founded, its end is all we know of it. (Did they too start perhaps with noble forefathers and an insightful constitution?) However it did start, Sodom came to be marked for two things: idle gluttony and moral perversity. Less attention is given to the idle gluttony. Yet when we see that these two track together, we can see also how the era of the worldwide Laodicean church and that of end time moral perversity go together.

According to Romans 1, the blossoming of moral perversity, especially homosexuality, is the final result of a divine proving process in which a civilization has chosen to repeatedly reject the knowledge of God. As the end result, homosexuality's prominence signals the end of a civilization.

Meanwhile, Laodicea is the last of the seven churches. Lot dwelling in Sodom is the consummate picture of the end time Laodicean church:

     How many complacent satisfied Christians do you know that are consumed with computer games and the banality of social networking? (Are you one of them?)

     How many do you know that are obese, addicted to food (especially junk food) and to eating establishments? (How many of these people are dying of cancer and praying for a miracle healing? Are you one of them?)

     As well, how much of Christian thinking is inherently shaped by the world's atheistic philosophies rather than God's word? (How many believers now say that love is more important than truth and that no one should judge anything about whatever anyone else is doing? Are you one of them?)

The final product of godless end time society and the last church go together. As homosexuality flourished in Sodom, so does it flourish today in the complacent self-satisfied Laodicean era. It would not be incorrect to identify the church of Laodicea also as the church of Sodom.

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But how does real ministry function in context of a rudderless church ensconced amidst an atheistic society? For once the knowledge of God is gone out of society, no basis of reasoning with or of persuading men remains that can cure it. (Today we see the futility of Christian political action and tepid evangelism in the face of militant homosexuality.) Answer: all that remains to us is the display of spiritual power. It's either Elijah shows up or game over.

Absent the knowledge of God as a basis on which to appeal to godless men, the only remaining answer is Elijah-class angelic and prophetic intervention. These two are also of one. (The angel showing John around heaven was one of his fellow servants the prophets.) Lets see how this works.

The Release of End Time Prophetic-Angelic Power

In Genesis 19, the Lord sends angels to Sodom. Their mission is to get Lot out of Sodom before destroying it. Intercession fails to save the city. It saves only Abrahams relatives. (What are you praying for today? For more on the true objective of Abrahamic intercession, please review this article. ) When the angels arrive, they are accosted by homosexuals. (Ever been accosted yourself?) At the point of their arrival, the only power the angels are allowed to display is to strike the gang surrounding Lot's house with blindness. And this they do.

Today, prior to the destruction of idolatrous civilization protecting world sodomy, while God yet appeals to His people and prepares deliverance toward the mountains as He did for Lot, the prophets of the Lord have the power to invoke spiritual blindness upon godless mobs of protesters. (I encourage you to go out to an Occupy encampment in a city near you and start applying this power.) No one is allowed to be destroyed. The amnesty canopy of God's grace remains in force over the Laodicean church. There are still lost sheep to be found.

But a turning point is coming--a tipping point. Once that point is reached in the heart and mind of God, the prophetic angelic ministry of testimony converts from one of striking blindness to one of calling forth fire, just as the angels called down upon Sodom. This is seen in Revelation 11,

4 These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. 5 And if anyone wants to harm them, fire flows out of their mouth and devours their enemies; so if anyone wants to harm them, he must be killed in this way.

What this will look like is not known. What matters is that we become wise to our times in the Spirit, realize what time it is in the world and in the church, and begin to assume our true kingdom role as witnesses to the truth of God's righteousness by faith. Unless you have cast in your lot with the Laodicean church, this is your calling. It's different from most all else you are hearing out there about love. The true love of God is love based on the truth of our witness to All that He Is against all that is opposed to Him in this world.

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This is just the beginning of what I wanted to share with you today. The Lord also had more to share with our family about stewardship salvation through the knowing of God versus the knowing of money, the overcoming of dire lack by creative multiplication in the knowledge of God, the power of the sword of God's word to act as a surgeon's knife for divine healing, and also on the differing tiers of divine purpose among mankind ranging from eternal salvation to national placement.

How much of this I will get to remains to be seen. Writing is an extremely time intensive ministry. And it always becomes more than I first set out to write. I welcome your intercessions regarding this ministry. Special thanks to those of you who regularly write to communicate with us spiritually and naturally.

Everyone be blessed as you begin this new year of 2012.

In the love of the truth,