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Coming Out of Bondage - Part 6

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January 2009 - Coming Out of Bondage - Part 6

Issue #246
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Issue #246January 2009

Coming Out of Bondage - Part 6

The three rounds of the Tyson-Holyfield fight in 1997 were prophetic of three rounds of warfare in the Dragon Wars: 1997, 1998, and 1999. In seeing this, we knew that we should watch for the dragon's lawlessness and disqualification in the year 1999. In Hebrew time, the year 1999 began Sept. 21, 1998 and extended to the next New Year (Rosh Hoshana) on Sept. 11, 1999.

Sept. 11, 1999 was also Jesus' 2000th birthday, and we held a birthday celebration at Port Austin, Michigan. The Dragon Wars had to be concluded by that time. Meanwhile, during that year we were to watch for two bites on the earlobes, the place where many wear pearl earrings. Keep in mind that Tyson's bites equated prophetically to the dragon eating pearls, as pictured in China's eating Hong Kong, the Pearl of the Orient.

The first bite from the dragon came on Dec. 7, 1998, when my friend and colleague, Martin Paulat, died on Pearl Harbor Day. The second came a few months later on March 14 when Carl Petty died. Both were close friends who lived here in Minneapolis. Both were well known for their spiritual walk. Both had seen and done virtually every miracle in the Book. Both had the discernment to see the truth of the Restoration of All Things late in life. Both were, in many ways, my ears here, for I often relied upon their discernment and ability to hear the voice of God.

These dragon bites were the way that the overall battle manifested in our area of the battlefield. In the wisdom of God, as seen so often in Church history, God allows some of His children to be martyred in various ways. For this reason, many missionaries over the years have laid down their lives so that others may come later and reap a great harvest of souls. It is a point of law that even God must seek occasion in order to have a lawful claim on the enemy's property. This is seen in the story of Samson (Judg. 14:4).

It appears that Martin and Carl completed their calling on earth by laying down their lives in order that we might have occasion against the dragon. We were then led to call for a final prayer campaign of this war from August 19 to September 2, 1999. We were to call it Dragon's End. These dates were important in 1997, since we went on the trip to the Gulf Coast to set boundaries during that time (Aug. 19 to Sept. 1).

Heidi’s Vision of “Dragon’s End”

In July 1999 world events in Iran and China told me that Apollyon, the Prince of Persia, was going to help the dragon (China). In the days ahead, we received confirming evidence that this was so.

On August 19 (the first day of Dragon's End prayer campaign), Pastor Dan in Washington State called my friend John and asked him what the Lord was showing him these days. They decided to get together the next day to share discernments. So they met on August 20, and John explained to him that he was involved in a prayer campaign called Dragon's End. He said we were up against the dragon and Apollyon, the Prince of Persia. John asked Dan if he had ever met me, since I used to live in the area. No, he said, we had never met.

Later that same day, some members of Pastor Dan's church went out to eat at their favorite restaurant not far from John's house. It happened to be located in Lynnwood, WA, the city where we had lived from 1993-1996. While at the restaurant, Heidi (the wife) began to sense danger, death, and destruction. In the spirit she could hear screams and cries for help, along with a strange scratching sound. They finally had to leave the restaurant before completing their meal.

While in the car, the high-pitched screams became louder and more intense. In the spirit she then saw a large creature screeching, clawing, and pounding the ground. Heidi was soon in full-scale intercession. They called Pastor Dan and asked if they could come to his house to discuss what was happening.

When they arrived, they tried to figure out for whom they were interceding. When she asked God if it was for her children, she sensed only peace. When it was suggested that she was interceding for the Church, the Lord said it was much bigger than that. Finally, she asked Pastor Dan, “Do you know someone from out of state named Steve, who is fighting against Apollyon?”

Bingo! Pastor Dan had just been discussing this with John earlier that same day. They got back in touch with John, and John called to tell me about it. I was then able to talk with Heidi directly to get the story first-hand. The bottom line is that Apollyon was screeching and was very upset, because he knew that he was being overthrown and cast down. His reaction was to pound the earth.

There was another part to this vision which involved China. She sketched the vision and sent it to me. I cannot say much about it here, because it involves sensitive information, but she described a friend of mine perfectly and confirmed his mission to China.

Victory by Disqualification

The Dragon Wars ended on September 2, 1999 with the disqualification of both the dragon and Apollyon for not fighting lawfully. These enemies were not fully overcome, however. We won by disqualification, not by a knock-out. The full victory would come in 2001.

The overcomers won the prize of the high calling of God in these Dragon Wars. The overcomers will thus become the Sons of God, while the children of the dragon and Apollyon lost by disqualification.

The Apostle Paul himself believed (correctly) that he was an overcomer, and just before he died, he wrote to Timothy saying in 2 Tim. 4:6-8,

6 For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. 7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith; 8 in the future there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day; and not only to me, but also to all who have loved His appearing.

Yet earlier, Paul did not presume to have attained the crown of the overcomer. He wrote in Phil. 3:12, “Not that I have already obtained it, or have already become perfect, but I press on . . .” He was speaking of the prize of the high calling of God, which is the first resurrection, whereby one inherits immortality in the first resurrection, rather than in the second.

Paul was not concerned about his salvation. He was concerned about being an overcomer. And so he had written earlier in 1 Cor. 9:27,

27 I buffet my body and make it my slave, lest possibly, after I have preached to others, I myself should be disqualified.

The people of Apollyon and the dragon were disqualified. When the Dragon's End prayer campaign ended on Sept. 2, 1999, we were able to celebrate Jesus' 2000th birthday on Sept. 11, 1999.

Also, 414 days after the prayer campaign ended, we met for the feast of Tabernacles conference in Champaign, IL (Oct. 20, 2000). There we poured out the first bowl of wine to begin the final phase of the overall Jericho Battle.

From Trumpets to Bowls

When we first launched the Jubilee Prayer Campaign in November of 1993, we understood that this was to be a seven-year warfare, corresponding to the Jericho Battle in Joshua 6. We assumed then that the seventh year would simply be the most intense time of warfare, correlating to the seven times that Israel marched around Jericho on that seventh day.

When we reached the seventh year, God revealed to us that the seventh “day” of the Jericho Battle would actually be extended into another seven years. In other words, each march around “Jericho” represented another year in our time. In other words, the seventh year (1999-2000) was really extended to 1999-2006.

Another way of looking at it is from the perspective of the book of Revelation, where we have 7 seals, 7 trumpets, and 7 bowls of wine. The time of the 7 seals is the time of the 7 Churches of Revelation—the 40 Jubilees from 33 to 1993 A.D.

The 7 trumpets, then, is the 7-year Battle of Jericho, in which we were to “blow the trumpet” of the Jubilee (Day of Atonement) while marching around the city.

It follows that the 7 bowls of wine are the 7 days of Tabernacles, wherein a drink offering of wine was poured out each day for 7 days, along with water. This is what we did at Tabernacles for the 7 years from 2000-2006.

Even so, it was a bit disappointing to come to the year 2000, only to find that there is more to do before seeing the fall of Babylon. However, we also knew that God reveals His will progressively. In 1993 we knew enough to begin the work, and we really did not need to know about pouring out the bowls of water and wine until the year 2000 when the appointed time came to do that work.

Correlating the Eight Signs in John

I had been teaching about the eight signs in the book of John for many years already by the year 2000. I understood that these signs correlated with the eight days of the feast of Tabernacles. The first seven signs occur before Jesus’ crucifixion, and the final one occurs afterward. Thus, Tabernacles runs for seven days, but there is also an eighth day—“the last great day of the feast,” mentioned in John 7:37 and Lev. 23:39.

It was not difficult, then, to see that the feast of Tabernacles from 2000-2006 would manifest the first seven signs in John, beginning in 2000 with the wedding feast of Cana (John 2). So when we began seeing wedding signs as early as February 2000, we knew that this was going to be the Tabernacles theme in October.

In February 2000 Ron and I made a trip to two cities in the state of Illinois, where everything seemed to be about roses and the name “Sharon” and “Rose of Sharon.” We were taken to the Rosebud Café, where Ron sat between two women named Sharon. The next day we had lunch with Jerry Rose on Jericho Road.

The next month I was invited to the West Coast where I attended a gymnastics event at Portland, Oregon—the “City of Roses.” The event itself was called “The Rose City Challenge.”

On May 20, I performed a wedding in Wisconsin, and then flew to Spokane for another meeting organized by Sunny Day Roberts on May 23. She called it “Wedding Symposium,” and it was about the marriage of soul and spirit.

In August, I was asked to perform two more weddings. Normally, I might perform one wedding every two years.

By this time, it was quite clear that the feast of Tabernacles in October 2000 was to have a wedding theme. God had shown us “roses” for the wedding all year, along with the name “Sharon,” and He had connected it with the “Rose of Sharon” (Song of Songs 2:1). Sharon is a Hebrew word that means “a plain.”

We scheduled our Tabernacles conference to be held at a newly-remodeled hotel in Quincy, Illinois. However, a group of ministers came from Chicago to threaten the hotel owner for allowing us to meet there. They believed that we were some kind of “hate group,” because we dare to call homosexual behavior a sin and because we do not believe that the Israeli state is the fulfillment of the biblical prophecies of the House of Israel.

When these Christian ministers brought up the fact that we did not believe that the Israeli state was true Israel, a rabbi informed them that we were correct. He said that the Jews were Judah, not Israel. We were told that the rabbi was then ignored and treated as a pariah for the rest of the meeting. How ironic that we would be condemned by Christians and defended by a rabbi.

The Christian ministers even threatened to pressure the city fathers to withdraw his hotel license to operate in Quincy. So he had no choice but to cancel our meeting. So thanks to those ministers, we went to right place, because, as we quipped, “We have to have Champaign for the wedding.” We thus met in Champaign, Illinois.

Champaign is a Late Latin word which means “a plain.” It has the same meaning as the Hebrew word Sharon., the “plain” in Canaan.

About ten minutes after changing the location for the meeting, I had a phone call from a woman in Idaho named Sharon, asking if perhaps I might find time at the conference to perform a wedding for her and her fiancé. Suddenly all the revelation about roses and Sharons fell into place, and we knew that God had used those Christian ministers to bring us to the right location for the feast of Tabernacles and to pour out the first bowl of wine.

And so I performed the wedding between Richard and Sharon on October 20, 2000 at the start of the Tabernacles conference. This wedding signified the time when David was crowned king over all Israel. A monarch is said to be “married” to the nation, and so in this case, we knew that the Davidic company had been “crowned” with full authority over “all Israel.” This authority had begun on May 30, 1993 when “Saul” died and “David” was made king over “Judah.”

For 7½ years the overcomers had functioned under a partial authority, but on October 20, 2000 they received the full authority to rule the earth. This increase of authority would be necessary in order to do the work of pouring out the seven bowls of wine upon Babylon and to conduct the warfare that still lay ahead.

The Transfer of Authority

Three very important time cycles came to an end toward the end of the year 2000. The first was the seven-year agreement between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO Chairman Yassir Arafat on Sept. 13, 1993. They had agreed to establish a Palestinian State in seven years—that is, by September of 2000. This failed.

The second major time cycle to end in the year 2000 was the seven-year Jubilee Prayer Campaign. It began November 29, 1993 and ended on the same date in the year 2000.

The third major time cycle was the 7½ year transition from Saul to David, beginning May 30, 1993 and ending November 30, 2000 just a day after the seven-year Jubilee Prayer Campaign. The coincidence of these two end points was seen back in 1993, but we had no idea what would happen seven years later.

In observing the 7½ year transition from Saul to David, we came to see from 2 Sam. 5:4 and 5 that this time period referred to David’s reign in Hebron before moving his capital to the newly-captured city of Jerusalem.

4 David was thirty years old when he became king, and he reigned forty years. 5 At Hebron he reigned over Judah seven years and six months, and in Jerusalem he reigned thirty-three years over all Israel and Judah.

Shortly after David was crowned king over all Israel, he captured Jerusalem from the Jebusites (2 Sam. 5:6-9). It was David’s first recorded act after receiving the full authority over all Israel and Judah.

And so, as this prophetic pattern manifested in the year 2000, we saw the “crowning” of David occur at the feast of Tabernacles on October 20, 2000, followed by the “capture of Jerusalem” on November 29. We read in 2 Sam. 5:7,

7 Nevertheless, David captured the stronghold [castle, tower, or bulwark] of Zion, that is the city of David.

The following day, November 30, 2000 we established the New Jerusalem by prophetic decree as the capital city of the overcomers. We read in 2 Sam. 5:9,

9 So David lived in the stronghold [castle, tower, or bulwark] and called it the city of David.

So the year 2000 was indeed a pivotal year. First, in September, Ariel Sharon forever buried the possibility of peace between the Israelis and Palestinians, making war a certainty at some point. Secondly, a month later at the feast of Tabernacles, the overcomers were given full authority over the earth. This “crowning” was seen by the wedding between Richard and Sharon.

The Seven Bowls of Wine

At the same time, we poured out the first of the seven bowls of wine upon Babylon-Sodom-Egypt-Jerusalem, the city of seven hills. Incidentally, while it is true that Rome sat on seven hills, Jerusalem also sat on seven hills: Scopus, Nob, Mount of Corruption, Mount Zion, Mount Ophel, “The Rock” (site of Fort Antonia), and the later Mount Zion (southwest hill).

Along with the seven bowls of wine (judgment on Babylon and old Jerusalem) we were led to pour out seven bowls of water, signifying the outpouring of the Spirit upon New Jerusalem. Thus, the judgment is not to come without a corresponding level of mercy. The destruction of Babylon is matched by the construction of the Kingdom of God. It is not all bad news. There is as much good news as bad. The bad news is only “bad” to the Babylonian supporters of old Jerusalem. The news is all good to those of the New Jerusalem. It depends upon one’s perspective and situation.

The seven bowls of water and wine signified the seven days of the feast of Tabernacles, wherein the priests used to pour out drink offerings of water and wine for seven days in ancient times. We merely followed their prophetic pattern each year during the feast of Tabernacles.

Many people contributed revelation. In the year 2000 Sunny Day Roberts was led to organize seven prophetic gatherings, culminating on Nov. 28-30, 2000.

In that gathering, the Word of the Lord revealed that Nov. 29 was the date of the conquest of the Jebusites—that is, the old Jerusalem. Then Nov. 30 was the time for the establishment of the New Jerusalem as the Capital of the Kingdom of God, with the Davidic Company being given the reins of government for the earth.

This simply means that the overcomers (as led by the Spirit) now have the authority to determine the course of world history. Their decrees carry legal force in accord with their new level of authority.

Such an event has occurred only twice before. The first was when God chose Israel to rule by a Passover anointing. The second was when God chose the Church on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2, shifting the divine right to rule to the shoulders of “Saul,” or the Church under Pentecost.

The third shift took place on Nov. 30, 2000, when the overcomers were given this divine authority for the Age of Tabernacles yet to come. This newly-acquired authority was necessary in order to complete the work of pouring out the seven bowls of wine from 2000-2006. This work was designed to undermine and finally overthrow Babylon’s Kingdom that has ruled the earth for over 2,500 years.

The Stone is now grinding the Image to powder.