We The People
It is really happening… As I sit here in Frankfurt airport watching the sunrise dawning over Germany, my thoughts are also rising with enlightenment as I reflect upon the changing Spiritual climate of our globe. The Great Awakening is not just a figment of a preacher’s incessant exhortation-filled mind, it is also not some distant, ethereal vision, and it is definitely not some intangible mist that can never be grasped. It is upon us, Beloved… and it is beautiful.
Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says:
Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts, as you did in the rebellion, in the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers tested and tried Me, and for forty years saw My works. Therefore I was angry with that generation, and I said, “Their hearts are always going astray, and they have not known My ways.’ So I swore on oath in My anger, ‘They shall never enter My rest.’”
Hebrews 3:7-11 BSB
I have been meditating on the context of Hebrews chapters three through sixfor many months now and something struck me uniquely here in these verses above. The Father said, of His previous chosen generation ordained to possess the promised land, “Their hearts are always going astray…” Notice “astray” was the perspective of Heaven as to what precipitated the rebellion and unbelief. I have preached these powerful truths many times before because of the debilitating handicap of unbelief (the Greek word for ‘anti-trust’), which will eventually lead to the raw and unhindered destruction of rebellion. But, I recognize now that the genesis of this total depravity of outcome actually started with ‘astray’, not anti-trust, and not rebellion.
The author of Hebrews here was quoting from (likely the Septuagint version of) Psalms 95. The words of this Psalm were written many, many generations after Israel FINALLY did the hard thing and took the inheritance that belonged to them. The heroic challenge was that they needed to face hoards of enemy armies that were more numerous and better equipped than they were. The cities they were called to overthrow and defeat were walled strongholds of ungodly people who were in no mood to simply surrender their nations and families to these religious vagabonds. Most of these territories were ruled by Nephilim (giants produced as the offspring of spirit-beings with human women) that were drawing on spiritual power from their rebel, fallen gods. It was no small call.
Neither is our call today.
The Psalmist was writing to encourage and exhort his present audience by recounting the glorious character of our Most High God. Just before the quoted verses above, there was this revelatory statement about a specific virtue of our loving God, “For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.” (verse 7, Brenton’s Septuagint).
Americans in the present need this illumination. We are HIS people, He is our God. E Pluribus Unum is Latin for, “out of many, one.” It is not our national heritage that binds us, it is a divine heritage that defines us. This is why our motto, “In God we trust,” has such importance today. The pasture our Good Shepherd has given us is purple mountain majesty and amber waves of grain. The Deutsche people are submitted to, “Gott mit uns,” which means “God with us.” The beauty of their land is unique and breathtaking… the beauty of ours is no less. The beauty of the German people is priceless compared to the land, and no less in America, or any other nation. Any national demise in any place today is directly indicative of a people astray from their Shepherd. It is not economics, it is not politics, it is not philosophy… it is Jesus that makes a nation not stray.
Astray (planáō in Greek) is defined this way: properly, go astray, get off-course; to deviate from the correct path (circuit, course), roaming into error, wandering; (passive) be misled. Planáō is the root of the English term, planet (“wandering body”). This term nearly always conveys the sin of roaming just as ancient people believed the planets meandered around the night sky, just doing their own thing. Roaming takes one into a foreign territory, ruled by foreign gods, always leading lives into chaos and slavery. The failure of the people of God called Israelites was wandering from the hand of God by selfishness (whining about provisions), temptation (Baalam led them astray through sexual deviance and lustful living), greed (stealing spoils that did not belong to them), disloyalty (serving gods and idols of other cultures), and laziness (they just didn’t FEEL like going to battle).
Same for Americans… same for Germans… same for Kenyans… and on and on.
Kay and I were honored to be surrounded by remnant believers in the two conferences we ministered in. The second one was 1,200+ Jesus-loving radicals that humbled themselves to my hard message in such a powerful way that it brought conviction to me… the one who preached it. There were over 500 people at the altar after one challenging message of repentance, many of whom were literally weeping and crying out unto God. This is far from normal for a typical German demeanor. Kay and I spent two-and-a-half hours praying and ministering to these sincere respondents and seeing many miraculous occurrences mingled with strong tears. There are hundreds of testimonies that I know about and I do not know the majority of what happened because I am hindered by the language barrier and information dissemination.
It is happening.
The above verses in Hebrews three are followed up with this challenge in verse thirteen:
But exhort one another daily, as long as it is called today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
Today is called today, and I am exhorting you. Do not be led astray by the deceitfulness of this wicked world. Do not allow your heart of love and grace to become calloused at the evils around you. Do not allow the devastating effects of sin cause you to, “miss the mark,” of your Divine Destiny.
My message to you, dear SCM reader, is that this is the time and we are the people who have been called for such a time as this. I recognize that I have some of the most unique partners of any ministry today. You are those crazies who believe in radical repentance, nation-changing movements, the Christian heritage of our nation and people, and the ability of our individual and combined efforts to be the propellants of the Kingdom in our generation. I am humbled to serve with your support. Thank You!
For the Holy Cause of Liberty!
Steve and the SCM team
