May 4, 2013

Back in the mid-1990's, we were gathered together at Trails' End in Post Falls, Idaho for a series of spontaneous worship gatherings. Trails' End was the ranch belonging to Earle and Marcia Treend, and it served as a principal gathering place for these spontaneous worship gatherings for roughly five years. For this particular gathering, we probably had somewhere in the neighborhood of a couple of dozen worshipers, most of whom were musicians.

 

A little word, first of all, about the nature of these gatherings. Folks would gather from various places around the northwest and Canada. These were not large gatherings -- generally ranging from two dozen people to perhaps four dozen at most, and frequently consisted of somewhere between 12 - 18. What made them differ from most was the fact that everyone assembled for one purpose: to minister to the Lord.

 

We weren't getting together for fellowship, even though there was plenty of that to go around. We weren't gathering for the teaching of the Word, although Holy Spirit absolutely imparted His Word into us. Our primary objective was that when we were finished, the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ would have been thoroughly satisfied -- that He would have received from us the ministry of our love to and for Him, and that He would have a responsive and obedient people who would go forth from these gatherings to accomplish His heart's desire wherever He sent us.

 

Our gathering together would begin early in the morning immediately following breakfast when we would pick up our instruments and begin (as I have earlier described in last week's article) to play whatever new music was flowing in our spirits. We would continue in this prophetic vein until sometime around noon and break for lunch. Following lunch, we would head back to our instruments and resume the worship and prophetic declarations both by voice and by the sound that came forth from our instruments functioning in unity. This would continue until 5:00 PM or thereabouts when we would break for a light supper, fellowship around the dinner table and -- perhaps -- prayer over any issues Holy Spirit was bringing before us. By 7:00 PM we would be back at it and continue until anywhere from 11:00 PM to as late as 1:00 AM before quitting and heading for bed.

 

We repeated this same basic format over and over for the next two or three days until there was a sense that we had accomplished the purpose for what Holy Spirit had called us together. It became a fairly regular occurrence for us to hear angelic voices adding their chorus to the music, and on a number of occasions we heard (and recorded) the sounds of instruments being played in our midst that weren't there (in the natural realm, of course)!

 

That's a general picture of what took place with each of our gatherings. Each gathering had its own distinct character and flavor. Sometimes the prophetic flow took on the ministry of healing for people hundreds of miles (or more) distant from us, and we watched some pretty extraordinary healings take place while we were worshiping.

 

Other times the focus was on deliverance for people from demonic attack or oppression of a very severe nature. Then there were the adventurous times when we were picked up as a body corporately into the heavenlies and allowed to see the hosts of Heaven going forth to do battle on behalf of the Beloved.

 

The event I'm preparing to describe to you was quite extraordinary and differed significantly from every other gathering we'd ever had. We were not long underway when we began to hear the sounds of angelic instruments signaling that something unique was about to unfold prophetically.

 

The music took on the character of intense warfare as prophetic pictures of the people of God at war with the enemy graphically unfolded before us in the realm of the spirit. It culminated in battle music that was so intense -- both from a musical perspective, and from a spiritual perspective -- that the ground under the ranch house where we were gathered began to shake and vibrate.

 

It was so loud and so intense that we put down our instruments and ran outside expecting to see a great earthquake taking place. What we heard instead was the sounds of hundreds, if not thousands, of horses galloping in cadence as warriors on horseback going forth to battle. What you don't realize is that we were nestled among hundreds and thousands of trees. There was no place for anything like what we were hearing to possibly take place in the natural.

 

From this point forward in our gathering the music began to take on the call to the people of God to come out of Babylon. Babylon had not been part of any discussion with any of us, and the prophetic utterances and singing that followed unfolded a panorama of God's deliverance for His people from the crushing spirit of Babylon that has been at work in the earth for generations.

 

That one single four-day gathering unlocked an understanding of what Babylon is all about, what it means Scripturally and prophetically to be trapped by the system we call Babylon, and the process by which Holy Spirit is setting people free. The 18th chapter of Revelation unfolded before us in a portrayal I've sought to share ever since. This series of Coffee Breaks is an effort to take you there and to methodically uncover and reveal every deceptive trick Satan has used to ensnare well-meaning but truly ignorant believers with Babylon's vices.

 

Now that I've shared this preface with you, pause for a minute to pour yourself a good cup of some very dark double-roasted French coffee, pull up a seat and let's get started.

 

There has been a very great emphasis in the Spirit towards a drawing into the Holy of Holies. This is that place of intimacy -- the place of joining and merging with the Lord Jesus Christ as His counterpart -- His other Self.

 

Once that joining occurs -- that merging in the realm of the Spirit -- there is a new dimension in the Lord that sets the stage for a timeless future. Still, this is not the end of all that He desires and has purposed. There is a domain to which He is taking us which transcends all that we can possibly imagine in the natural realm. This is a place where mortality puts on immortality, a place where time ceases to have relevance, a place of absolute unity with the Lord such that we possess complete power and authority.

 

And, Folks! I'm not talking about "in the sweet bye and bye" or "when we all get to Heaven!" I'm referring to a current-day reality and practical dimension of life in the Lord Jesus Christ!

 

More and more in recent days, weeks and months, the Lord has been releasing through such prophetic and apostolic teachers as Chuck Pierce, Paul Keith Davis and others some pretty amazing views of the fall of Babylon. At the same time, a cry is actively going forth from Holy Spirit, "Come out of her, My People!"

 

In the gathering to which I have just referred, there was birthed in all of our hearts a cry for those people who are still caught up in the structure and system of Babylon. These are those who, while they have not responded to the call of the Bridegroom to come into the place of intimacy, still have a love for the Lord Jesus Christ. Because they have been too sidetracked with issues, doctrines, and a focus on end-time events, their spirits have been desensitized to hear the call to intimacy.

 

That does not take away from the fact that they have a genuine love for the Lord. It simply means that they have limited their responses to the Lord predicated on the realm of spiritual understanding in which they walk. Thus, there is a call going forth by the Holy Spirit for them to hear and respond to the Lord, and come out of Babylon -- and all that it represents -- for their safety's sake.

 

Consider the view in Revelation 18 of that which is currently happening, even as this Coffee Break is being written:

 

"After these things I saw another angel coming down from Heaven, having great authority, and the earth was illumined with his glory. And he cried out with a loud voice, saying, 'Fallen, fallen, is Babylon the great! And she has become a dwelling place of demons and a prison of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean and hateful bird. For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the passion of her immorality, and the kings of the earth have committed acts of immorality with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich by the wealth of her sensuality’."

 

"And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, "Come out of her, my people, that you may not receive of her plagues; for her sins have piled up as high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. Pay her back even as she has paid, and give back to her double, according to her deeds; in the cup which she has mixed, mix twice as much for her. “To the degree that she glorified herself and lived sensuously, to the same degree give her torment and mourning; for she says in her heart, 'I sit a Queen, and I am not a widow, and will never see mourning" (see also, Isaiah 47).

 

"For this reason in one day her plagues will come, pestilence and mourning and famine, and she will be burned up with fire; for the Lord God who judges her is strong........And every shipmaster and every passenger and sailor, and as many as make their living by the sea, stood at a distance, and were crying out as they saw the smoke of her burning, saying, "What city is like the great city?' And they threw dust on their heads, and were crying out, weeping and mourning, saying, 'Woe, Woe, the great city, in which all who had ships at sea became rich by her wealth, for in one hour she has been laid waste!' Rejoice over her, Oh Heaven, and you saints and apostles and prophets, because God has pronounced judgment for you against her." (NASB)

 

In the midst of that 1990's gathering, and again today with a renewed emphasis among the prophetic voices, the Spirit of the Lord has been trumpeting, "Rejoice over her, my people, for your day of vindication has come."

 

In order to understand the significance of this, we need to understand exactly what Babylon is, and what Babylon represents in this modern day.

 

With the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq and the Bush administration's efforts to bring democracy into a region that has known little of it historically, the discovery that Saddam was seriously moving forward to restore the ancient city of Babylon has brought renewed attention to its existence. More than a few folks have immediately calculated that the references to Babylon in Revelation (among other prophecies such as Isaiah's) were referring to the physical, geographical, ancient city itself.

 

Many "end time" preachers have sought to compare Babylon to the Roman Catholic Church. Writers of numerous religious books have simply identified Babylon with the city, Rome, and the political power of the Vatican. This is an analogy which really misses the point. It mis-directs the wrath of the Lord against Roman Catholics, and causes people to completely sidestep a critical issue which the Lord has been addressing for thousands of years.

 

The issue is not Rome, and it is not the Roman Catholics. Babylon represents a whole system -- a way of life -- a modus operandi. It is a thought process which has become the core of the entire church structure -- no matter by what name, title, denomination, or organization it gets called.

 

Babylon is a principle. Babylon is a throne -- a ruling spirit or principality which has long prevailed over many of God's people, deceiving them into false allegiances and idolatry. The Lord views this as adultery and fornication. We will identify the presiding spirit of Babylon as we progress in sharing this series.

 

So how do we know this? Simple! Back up for just a moment from the previous scriptures and take a look at Revelation 17.

 

Verse 3 begins, "And he carried me away in the Spirit into a wilderness; and I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast, full of blasphemous names, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was clothed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a gold cup full of abominations, and of the unclean things of her immorality; and upon her forehead a name was written (an onoma), a mystery (the word, "mystery," in Greek is musterion, which -- as used in the N.T. Greek text – denotes: a previously hidden thing which is clearly explained and revealed, in and by the Spirit), BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH." And I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus……….." (NASB)

 

Now...let's go through this again. The truth of this revelation can only be understood "in the Spirit," as John states, since this was the manner in which it was revealed to him. To attempt to understand this truth in the natural realm without the revelation that comes in the presence of the Lord is to simply eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

 

To attempt to explain this in a political, governmental, or religious sense, is to be likewise sidetracked by the thirst or quest for human knowledge. This is a "knowledge" which takes us away from the place of intimacy with the Lord Jesus Christ -- a knowledge which only salves our ego and permits the fulfillment of fleshly desires and needs.

 

The revelation, therefore, which unfolded before us as an Ekklesia in the midst of worship, is a revelation in, and by the Spirit. I realize that this revelation flows counter to some generally accepted "truths," so if that which is shared troubles you, please bear with me. Put it on the shelf until the Holy Spirit can reveal it. Ask the Lord to open your understanding in and by His Spirit.

 

Let me stop here, and we will pick this up next week and begin laying out a pattern in history within the Word to help you see and understand this from the realm of Holy Spirit.

 

Blessings on you!