The People of God in Transit

In the previous two messages we dealt with God's End-time People and God's End-time Church endued with Power from on High. When Joel's prophecy (Joel 2:23) is fulfilled God's people will receive both the Former Rain and the Latter Rain. But before this comes to pass and before God allows His people to possess His full inheritance He has to bring His people through many transit points in their pilgrimage journey in order to mature them.

There is a parallel truth concerning the pilgrimage journey of the children of Israel delivered from the bondage of Egypt and the pilgrimage journey of Christian believers delivered from the bondage of sins and the bondage of the spirit of the world. The children of Israel in their wandering in the wilderness came to 3 transit points. At each of the transit points significant things happened to them. Very ofter as a result of what they did and did not do in God's dealing with them the consequences of it could be quite predictable. There are certain principles we can develop which will help us to learn with regards to what happen to the Church and individual believers in transit.

Prophetically, the Church is in transit. The lessen learned can also be applied to ourselves personally in our own personal pilgrimage. We call it pilgrimage because whether we like it or not, God only allocated to each one of us threescore years and ten (Ps. 90:10). If you live to the age of 80 there is nothing for you to boast about because God has granted you 10 years grace period.

Picture of the children of Israel in Egypt

"Now it happened in the process of time that the king of Egypt died. Then the children of Israel groaned because of the bondage and they cried out; and their cry came up to God because of the bondage. So God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God acknowledged them" (Exodus 2:23 - 25, NKJV, emphasis added).

"So I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians ..." (Ex. 3:8, emphasis added).

According to the above passages of Scripture four things happened when the children of Israel cried out to God:

1. God heard their groaning.

2. God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. His covenant was He would multiply their descendants as the stars of the heaven and as the sand which is on the seashore (Gen. 22:17).

3. God saw their conditions.

4. God came down.

The manifestation of the power of the Holy Spirit that you are seeing in many Asian countries today is due to the fact that many years ago, the people of God, though small in number, began to cry out to God for revival. Missionaries were sent and many leaders of Evangelical Churches taught us how to pray - to cry out to God. I believe just as God heard the children of Israel, God hears His people now. Just as God came down and delivered the children of Israel from the hand of the Egyptians, God has come down, by His Spirit, and will continue to come down in revival power upon our land. God will continue to deliver us from the spirit of the world.

Learning to live by faith

God performed two miraculous acts of deliverance for the children of Israel. First, the sending of the 10 plagues and then, the crossing of the Red Sea. From Egypt they moved on to the wilderness where they learned to live by faith - by trusting God in two ways.

1. Trusting God in their daily provision of food and water. When they got tired of the manna God sent them quail.

2. Trusting God in His unfailing guidance.

Believers are to trust God in their daily needs (Matt. 6:33) and trust God's daily guidance by His Spirit. We must learn to live by faith and learn to hear God's voice.

However the constant temptation of the Jews was to go back to Egypt where the provision of food was predictable. It was difficult for them to live by faith with the constant fear that the manna might not come daily. But the Bible says, "He who keeps Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep" (Ps. 121:4).

If you want to be free in Jesus you have got to live by faith. But we want things to be predictable. Those of us with a degree in theology, or any other degree from Bible College, find it extremely difficult to accept the manifestation of tongues - it bypasses the mind. A meeting that is led by the Holy Spirit will never be acceptable because they fear anything can happen. But if everything is predictable people will feel comfortable and most will buy it. At such and such a time we sing hymn No. 1; then comes the opening prayer and every one stands up; then another hymn and followed by Scripture reading; then comes the sermon and completes with another hymn and then the Holy Communion followed by the collection and so on! The meeting ends after the closing hymn and the doxology - everything is predictable every Sunday. You don't need the Holy Spirit in a meeting like this.

But if you have to move in the realm of Spirit, some people, especially the highly educated ones don't like it and you are likely to hear comments like:

"I have a PHD you know, and my qualification don't go very far with the Holy Spirit! I am not a fanatic like some of them".

Having said that, I am not suggesting we throw out the mind like a fanatic. What the Church needs are sane Charismatic and Pentecostal Christians. Praise God, the main purpose of the transit points initiated by Him is to make us sane Christians! He wants His people to have charisma with character!

God's transit points for His people

God allowed His people to go through three transit points after they were delivered miraculoulsy from the bondage and slavery of Egypt.

1. Kadesh Barnea

The first transit place was called Kadesh Barnea which was 11-day journey from Horeb (Mt. Sinai) where Moses received the Law (the Ten Commandments) from God on two tablets of stone (Num. 10:11, 12).

Moses sent out 12 spies into the land of Canaan to scout out the land. Those (10 of them) who brought evil report (Num. 13:33) and brought fear into the hearts of the people of God died by a plague. Only Joshua and Caleb survived (Num. 14:37, 38). The reason why they survived was because they had a different Spirit - the Spirit of God and not the spirit of the world which brings fear and insecurity.

The Church of Jesus Christ is facing the same problem today. It depends on who you are going to listen to. Are you going to listen to the spies who created fear among God's people or are you going to listen to the living God - with the Spirit of Joshua and Caleb? Even if there are "giants" facing the Church our God is a much bigger Giant.

The Jews were not prepared to move in faith into the Promised Land (Deut. 9:23) and so God exiled them and forced them to wander in the wilderness of Paran for 40 years - until the first generation of Jews who came out of Egypt perished except Joshua and Caleb!

The first act of deliverance performed by God was to deliver His people out of Egypt. His second act was to deliver Egypt out of them! For 40 years God was rooting Egypt out of them one by one - the smell of onions and garlic still fresh in their nostrils. And they still remembered their fleshly and worldly way of life.

Is the Church going into exile in the wilderness because we failed to move on in faith with God? Does God need to deliver "Egypt" out of us?

Paul said, "Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh" (Gal. 3:3, NKJV)?

The truth is we will not make anything perfect by the flesh. We will not succeed if we keep on following "big ministries" and worldly methods in winning souls. And God will not give us more power because the power He has given us we have already abused. The work of the cross is vital in our lives in order that we might produce the Fruit of the Spirit. God is maturing His end-time Church by bringing in Christ-like character in every one of us. How long we remain in transit in the wilderness depend on how much we are willing to obey and let the cross to deal with our fleshly or carnal desires - so that Christ is formed in us (Gal. 4:19).

2. Shittim

Shittim was the second transit point but it was still in the wilderness. But to move on the Promised Land the children of Israel had to cross the second stretch of water. The first stretch was the Red Sea and the second was the Jordan (Joshua 3:1). They came to the Jordan and lodged there and they used Shittim as their second transit point. The River Jordan was the gateway to the Promised Land.

The Jordan speaks of water baptism which signifies death, burial and resurrection. My opinion is that the contemporary Church needs to go through another "baptism" in the Jordan River. Certain things, like methodology and worldly methods that we used to practice in the past do not work any more and need to die and be buried - before we begin to see the resurrection of Spiritual power in a fresh way. God causes certain things to die in our lives so that we are forced to spend time with Him in prayer and intercession.

In Shittim four things happened:

I. A period of waiting (Joshua 3:2). At the end of 3 days the children of Israel set out to follow the priests who carried the Ark. You and I need to go through a period of waiting and learn to hear God's voice.

II. A period of cleansing. Joshua said, "Sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you" (Joshua 3:5). The old leaven in us needs to be purged out. Leaven in the New Testament Scripture signifies putrefaction, decay and corruption. The carnal desires in us need to be purged out.

III. A return to the Scripture. Joshua said, "Come here, and hear the words of the Lord your God" (Joshua 3:9). The contemporary Church needs the correct expositon of the Word. Nowadays you seldom hear an anointed message from God in the Church. Instead you hear a lot of sermons prepared by preachers using references from the books they read or from the internet Christian websites. The trouble is the accuracy of such preaching depends solely on the Biblical understanding of the book writer! If the book writer gave incorrect exposition of the Word then the preacher who uses the book as reference, his preaching will be incorrect! A true Bible teacher must be ready to give a message from God (without preparation) "in season or out of season" (2 Tim. 4:2). A timely message from God is always refreshing.

IV. A reminder of God's promises (Joshua 3:10). We are reminded that you and I have entered a new covenant, not a covenant carved out of two tablets of stone, but a covenant in the Holy Spirit. We are no longer guided by the Law but at all times moved by the Spirit of God.

3. Gilgal

Finally the children of Israel crossed the Jordan River and encamped in Gilgal on the east border of Jericho (Joshua 4:19). God reminded His people to erect 12 stones which they took out of the Jordan (Verse 20). The purpose was to remind their future generations that He did it all to deliver them from the bondage and slavery of Egypt and without Him they could do nothing and all glory should go to Him alone!

Notice that Kadesh Barnea and Shittim were on the wilderness side. But Gilgal was on the side of the Promised Land in the land of Canaan. At Gilgal the childred of Israel were reminded that their promised inheritance was yet to come. Gilgal also became a sanctuary for the children of Israel when they prepared for battle in the Promised Land. God promised them that they would win battles if they would do it God's way.

We are reminded that right from the beginning, right now and right to the end God will be with us and will go before us. All we need to do is to cooperate with Him and do things His way. God is saying to us that we may still be in transit, we may still have to fight battles but His promise is that victory is sure - in His time and by His way.

Paul said, "... what He had promised He was also able to perform" (Romans 4:21).

Unfortunately many Christians are tempted to remain in their transit points because they are enjoying it.

The Lord said to Joshua in Gilgal, "This day I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you" (Joshua 5:9).

God has got to roll away the reproach of "Egypt" from each one of us for otherwise we are not ready to do any battles. We must be totally set free from the demands of the world and move on!