Under Cover of Darkness – God is at Work!

Several months have passed since I wrote the last entry in my blog.  During those months I have watched in stunned amazement at both the unfolding of history and the continued disintegration of respect for the Word of God and the laws of God.

Holy fear of a holy God is no longer a motivator for leaders outside the church and, sadly it seems, for many leaders inside the church. The lessons we can learn from the lives of the Kings of Israel and Judah in Scripture are going unheeded and this cannot be without consequence for individuals, nations and, indeed, the church.  Unseen spiritual laws, as powerful in the spiritual realm as the law of gravity is in the physical realm, operate on the affairs and circumstances of men and nations.

When we live in accordance with God’s covenantal promises we are laying the foundations for God’s blessing. But when we consistently and flagrantly fly in the face of the wind of God’s Spirit then the consequences can be serious. In Isaiah 45:7 there is a challenging verse in which God says through the prophet, “I bring prosperity and I create disaster. I, the Lord, do all these things.”

We don’t like to think in terms of a loving God creating disaster, but in the stories of the Kings we read time and time again how through their rebellion against God, they lost their covering and protection with serious consequences – personal and national disaster was often the result. These stories are in God’s Word for a purpose.

As believers we cannot control the free will choices and amoral behaviour of non-believers. But both believers and non-believers are subject to the laws of the land in which they live. The god of this world rejoices when governments pass legislation which violates the will and laws of God. Over the past fifty years the relationship between governmental law and the moral laws, implicit and explicit within Scripture, has disappeared from the statute books of nations, culminating in a tsunami of changes in respect of marriage, where one nation after another has fallen, like a line of dominoes, into the trap of passing legislation to authorise and legalise so called ‘gay marriage.’ The fact that there is no such thing in God’s eyes has been overlooked by the majority of nations. Marriage can only be between male and female – not male and male or female and female.

No nation on earth has the authority to redefine what God ordained through His covenantal promises and laws. In creating ‘gay marriage’ the nations of the world have deliberately stamped on one of the primary covenantal purposes of marriage – to have and to bring up the next generation of children. Gay marriages are, by definition, sterile. Surrogate motherhood, on behalf of a gay couple, further violates God’s laws of sexual relationship, introducing a third sexual partner into the equation. And in the latest Supreme Court decision in the USA, which has forcibly made ‘gay marriage’ legal across the Union, the judges who made the decision have deliberately over-ruled the principles enshrined in their own constitution!

There are now circumstances prevailing that make it difficult for believers to remain faithful to the Word of God in respect of marriage without, at the same time, breaking the law! The days Jesus warned about in Matthew 24:9, when He said ‘nations would hate you because of me’ are definitely here.

And while increasing spiritual darkness in the moral arena is covering the nations from the top down, in the Middle East the drums of war are rolling as the so-called ISIL caliphate flexes its terrifying muscles through the proliferation of human atrocities in the name of fundamentalist Islam. Its ultimate stated target is Israel. At the same time Sunni and Shia Muslims are at war with each other across the whole region. Even as I write these words six of the most powerful nations of the world have signed a nuclear agreement with Iran, without the involvement of the one nation who is most threatened by Iran – Israel!

As all the above things are happening, God is at work raising up an army of believers in Yeshua (Jesus) in Israel. In 1980 there were perhaps 200 believers in the land – today there are over 15000 meeting in well over 100 congregations. Something serious and totally unprecedented is happening beneath the world’s spiritual radar! God is preparing the ground for the return of the Lord.

In Ephesians 2:14-18 Paul talks about the “one new man” that God is raising up from Jewish and Gentile believers. For almost the first time in history since those very earliest days of the Church age, we are seeing that very thing happening. God is truly stirring His people as Jewish and Gentile believers in Jesus are recognising each other and working together in unity of heart and purpose. Scripture advises us to read the signs of the times. As we have witnessed the gathering of Jews from all over the world into the nation of Israel, following the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948, we are now witnessing the rise of Jewish believers in Messiah and the rise of the “one new man”!

Rather than recoil in fear from all that is happening in the world that causes grief to our spirits, and seems to be spreading darkness across the planet, let us focus our attention on what God is doing under cover of darkness – for the day is fast coming when the Light of the World will once again penetrate the darkness. God’s prophetic agenda is unfolding. Our security must be in Him for it is only in Him that we can rise above every circumstance, knowing that He has already overcome the world.