One of the prophetic promises for the end times is found in Acts 2:17-18a (ESV)
“‘And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; 18 even on my male servants and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.”
Peter was quoting from the book of Joel. As I am now in my late 60’s, I particularly like the end of verse 17; “and your old men shall dream dreams”. Often, I must get away from the routine and daily hectic pace of living in Frederick to begin to unwind for my imagination to fire up and receive revelation from the Lord. Well, Jesus didn’t wait long. In the early morning hours of our first night in Lakeland, Fla. (we’re taking care of my wife’s mother for 13 days), the Lord blew mind with a dream about what is to take place soon. It coincides precisely with what Bruce Allen shared when he and Reshma were with us a few weeks ago. He spoke about our place being jammed with people and others lined up at the door waiting to get in. Well, here is my dream…
“I saw 1000's and 1000's of people coming being drawn by the presence of Jesus!! All were just worshiping Him. Different people would take the mic and just speak of their love for Him! Little children were prophesying. Cindy Smith, who has been with Jesus the last couple of years came up to me holding her drum saying, "remember the children". Then this little child came up to me and said, "open portal" and the next thing I was to be able to see in all the realms at once. Jesus told me the key to this awakening is learning to love him and others totally and not hold anything back! The fear of the Lord comes out of our love for Him! The more we loved and poured out our worship on Him, the greater the crowd grew until all you could see were masses of people. It was happening perpetually and could not be stopped. The last thing I remember was the media wanting to interview me. They asked me to tell our location. I was going to say "Frederick Md”, but the Lord stopped me and told me to say "it's wherever you want it to be" meaning that "Jesus is in me (us), the hope of glory"!
There is so much more instruction that he gave me that is too long to blog about. I’ll speak about it once I’m home. But he showed me a couple “markers” to show me that this final awakening has already started in Cornerstone.
However, there is one thing that Jesus emphasized. What is coming cannot be stopped. But it can be delayed or stopped unless we deal with “self”. He showed me that we don’t actually love Him, we love self and the version of Jesus we have created through our own social engineering and denominational conditioning. It is called mind control. All self-worship and self-focus must be gone, and we must show our love for Him by how we love each other. The Apostle Paul puts it this way in Ephesians 4:25-31 (ESV)
“Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. 26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, 27 and give no opportunity to the devil. 28 Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. 29 Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. 32 Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”
These are not just good suggestions. These are absolutes if we desire to see the “word of the Lord’ fulfilled in this season. It’s accomplished by dying to self and loving Jesus with all our might, heart, mind and strength and loving others the same way. Let’s begin to consecrate ourselves like we have never done before. Deal with all the “little foxes” that spoil the vine. It’s not the “big” sins, it’s the “tiny” ones that destroy the opportunity to have and to hold His presence.
The Lord has brought us His fire to make sure our motives are pure, and our desire is only for Him. You can’t stop what’s coming but you can miss it. It all depends on your response to the Holy Spirit. Jesus then showed me a picture of those who refuse to repent and walk in forgiveness. He will not allow them to come and be involved even though they desire. It will be the same as the young man at the wedding feast being cast into “outer darkness” (Matt.22:1-14). The invitations to the wedding feast have already been sent out. Did you receive one? How will you respond? Are you too busy with the cares of life? Will you come? Help us Jesus!