Scripture reference: Matthew 25; Matthew 12; 1 Corinthians 3; Ephesians 4; Ephesians 3:10; John 6; Isaiah 3:1 to 12; Matthew 13; Matthew 13:47-50
Pastor John: Hey. How y’all doing? Good. Ah, thank you, Brynn. I’m good. So, did you have a good afternoon? Yes. I don’t wanna ask you what you were doing, but I’m sure what you were doing was good. If it wasn’t, may the Lord send His angels to interfere with you anyway. If He doesn’t, that’s the better option because if He doesn’t, Dennis is likely to slap you upside the head, tonight. Yes. So, you’re trying to quit doing that. Praise the Lord. You know, in moments like this, I only have one complaint and that is that it’s too short and it’s just not enough. Yeah. But I’m thankful and I’m grateful that we have what we have and we have gotten what we’ve gotten. Amen. Hallelujah.
Well, I wanna encourage you if you weren’t here this morning, you need to get the messages either by audio or by video, I don’t know what’s available. But whatever it is, they will make it available on the website, get it, it’s really good. So, I don’t, you hear me all the time and it’s wonderful that you guys all showed up tonight. You people from Johannesburg, thank you for coming, thank you for making the time to get out here. You people from Witbank, ag dis mos normaal. No, thank you for coming. We appreciate you coming out in the middle of the week.
So, it’s my joy, well first, let me say it was wonderful to have Katherine here today. And if you ever want to have some very good information on sex, you gotta listen to this morning’s message. We’ll get her back just for more talks like that. Praise the Lord. Thank you, Katherine. Thank you for coming to South Africa, thank you for being here, thank you for making it all happen. And it’s been wonderful to have you here. But, tonight, the main event is to have the professor in the house and, so, Brother Dennis, please come and share the word as the Lord gives it to your honor. Why don’t you give him a hand, please people.
Dennis Peacocke: Thanks. How many of you believe that what goes around comes around? Is that real? Yes, okay good there you go, there you go. And I am in the dangerous position of having fathered and disciplined and disciple and loved and all the rest of it, but my poor daughter has been under the pressure of my involvement in her life, and now it’s all reversed. She waited until my old age, where I’m feeble, and now as the CEO of the corporation, I’m praying that I didn’t do anything to injure her too seriously because of the fact that she’s now my boss. So let this be a warning. Let this be a warning. You too, with your children, may touch this. So, Katherine come and share a little bit?
Kathrine Gallagher: Hello? Oh, there it is. My father just asked I briefly greet you, especially for those that maybe weren’t here this morning. I am Katherine Gallagher, nay Peacocke and I am in fact, now his boss, but let’s all be realistic. I mean, how much can I really be his boss? It’s Dennis. Come on. But, it’s been wonderful to work with my father for so many years. I just wanted to briefly let you know what the organization of Go Strategic is all about. What we do is work on practical Kingdom training, pre-subsitional thinking, world view applied, worldview. What does it look like to apply Biblical principles to every area of life? How can we problem solve for not just ourselves, but our communities and the world around us? We do that through our products and resources and we also have three different schools, which I know I will be talking to Pastor John about again, and we talked about it a little bit. We’ve got a school of Christian worldview and strategic living. A school of business and economics and a school around public policy and Kingdom citizenship. We work globally with different amazing churches such as yours and other ministries to help bring in training and equipping for them and also connect them with other like model believers. We just have a heart to see Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done. Christians who are really practically trained and equipped and positioned to hear the Holy Spirit and really make a difference and engage where they live and whatever jurisdiction they are called to.
So, we do have a, I think a slide they are gonna put up at some point, that’s got a little QR code that will take you to our website if you wanna find out more about the ministry. We’ve got a few resources that we will have available. I can just name drop a couple things that we have. There it is. So, that will take you to our website. There is a spot on there if you go to where it says the latest you can kind of see the latest things that we have. My father and I are more regularly going podcast together. We just did one around Doing Business God’s Way, that’s on there. We have a handful of devotional plans in the YouVersion Bible app. YouVersion Bible app, if you are familiar with that, there is one in there about Doing Business God’s Way, one around worldview, one around strategic thinking and more coming. So, there is a handful of free resources. Use them for yourself, give them to your friends, and, you know, check out there. Some of the resources we have. Thank you again so much for having us. It’s my first time on the continent of Africa. I’ve done many other continents, but I’ve not been here. So really blessed to be here.
So blessed to get time with Pastor John and Pastor Sharon and just their heart for you and their heart for the Kingdom and their humility which is huge. I was sharing this with them the other day. You know, I grew up as a Pastor’s kid. I’ve been to more meetings than I can think of, I’ve met hundreds and hundreds, probably of pastors and it makes such a difference. You, you want a leader who is still humble and teachable. They know who they are in the Lord, but they also have humility and unfortunately there is a lot of people in leadership that don’t have that. And it is a gift that your leaders here are having a humble heart. They know who they are in the Lord and they are confident in the best way. Right? They know who they are in the Lord, and at the same time they still have that Christ-like humility. And that is so important to leaders. So, you guys have precious gifts here in your pastors and I know there’s others on the leadership team that are the same.
So, we are so delighted to be connected with you, reconnecting with you, and excited to see what the Lord’s gonna do, you know, for such a time as this. There is so much going on, I know here in South Africa, just like in my country, we’ve got some crazy elections coming up, I know you guys have elections coming up. There is a lot going on. So, for such a time as this, we gotta be ready, equipped, engaged and I always say I teach small children sometimes. I was a dance teacher for many years and I always say we need to have our listening ears and our watching eyes. So, we need those. So, thank you so much. Thank you.
Dennis Peacocke: So, how many of you were here this morning? A lot of you were here. Yeah good for us. So, I did not, you can tell in my levity right now. I did not know what to do. How do I follow my daughter teaching on sex? Not an easy task, I’ll say. So, but it didn’t take too long before we began to drop down. We began to drop down. I don’t know if we’ll drop down in quite the same way, here, where what we’re gonna do now. But I’m believing that what we are gonna be sharing will be extremely relevant and useful. So, John, get the mic and pray for us, will you, please?
Pastor John: Hallelujah. Let’s pray together, people. Thank you, Lord, that Your Word comes out with power, that there is no resistance here this evening. We have opened our hearts. We have ears to hear. Our minds are clear. The atmosphere is clear of any interference in Jesus’ name. We receive the Word with authority. We receive the Word with power, and we know that this word will penetrate our hearts, and it will bear forth a great harvest of your Word, wisdom, understanding and purpose of the Kingdom of God that we need to walk in Jesus’ name. And we pray for Dennis that he will speak without limitation. He will speak with the Holy Spirit guiding, leading him, and everything that needs to be said will be said tonight. In Jesus’ name. Amen. Amen.
Dennis Peacocke: Amen. Amen. So, I was last here with you in 2009. I wasn’t sure about what the date, but 2009. And when John and I, when he picked me up in the car, I just couldn’t I’m fondling him. I’m touching. You’re really here. I mean, we haven’t seen each other. And how many of you wanna touch somebody if you haven’t seen them and you miss them? The question was, well, how are we going to catch up on what’s gone on fifteen years ago? Because fifteen years is a long time in the speed of what God is doing right now. And one of the things, big things that happened to me the next year, 2010, was the last part of it in August. I’d been in Central America. I’ve spent a lot of time in Central South America. And I’d come home with a bug that became a serious problem with my intestines. And it got serious enough that I came to Jan, and I said, “Jan, I think if I don’t go to the hospital, I could die. Whatever is going on is not getting better.” Which I’ve lived like Superman, and I’m not Superman. There’s probably some of you that have lived like Superman or Superwoman. I mean, I just in all the miles, three and a half million miles of flying over the around the planet. When I figured out that I’d been around the earth more than fifty times, I got tired just thinking about that.
But as I began to get sick, I got sicker and sicker. And, you know, if you’ve never been sick, as in you got worse, not better, you know, you get sick and go to bed and you’re okay in a week. But it wasn’t doing that, and that made me very nervous. I’d never experienced something where I began to get weaker, not stronger. And I actually as that thing progressed, I lost a lifetime of strength, which was a very humbling, I’m a very physical guy and probably even relied too much on my body strength and all that kind of stuff. I was going into the unknown. How many of you have been into the unknown? “Where is this going? What is going on? Sir, would you mind telling me what this is about?”
As I got worse and went into the hospital for a week or so, and they took x-rays of me. And when I woke up, from they did a, you know, full search of my body cavity. And the nurses, we were joking and having fun before I took the anesthetic. And when I came out of the anesthetic, the nurses were uptight, which I said, “This is not good.” And, they quarantined me, and it took a while to figure out what was going on. But it got to the point where, the Lord allowed me to be getting worse and worse and I had to start informing Him. Can I get a witness?
How many of you like listening to people pray, especially the ones who begin to inform God about what’s going on in the prayer? “Lord, we know this and we know You know, or we hope You know, and You remember and all that stuff.” So I began and those that were here this morning, in context, this will be easy for you. I began to challenge the Lord, not impolitely, but, “I’m sick. I’m really sick. You can’t possibly, can You be preparing me leave? I cannot be done. I’ve waited my whole life to deal with.” Now think in 2009, what happened in 2007 and 2008.
We had the first of a major heart attack in global economics and began a reshuffling of the deck, which I’ve had a background and all that stuff. And reshuffling what was there did not make it all that much better. In fact, you could argue that where we are now in some ways is more dangerous than where we were in 2007 and 8. And I work with people that work on the senior global levels that were, “Don’t quit your day job.” Seriously. Just tell me where the debt levels that we’ve gone too are unserviceable, and it’s just a question when we finally get to the point where we can’t service the interest on the debt and still maintain social spending. That, we’re headed down that course.
The Lord still didn’t say anything. It wasn’t like normal. Normal for me was pretty much to spend the day with the Lord and very ongoing conversation during the day. And I began to press, and went into a limited fast, but a lot of prayer. “Are You taking me home? Are You actually seriously thinking about taking me home?” And on the third day of that day, I said, “Father, please, what do You want me to get ready for? Are You are You gonna take me home?” And then in His voice, which is only His voice, He said, “Don’t ask Me again.” And it was harsh. It was a stern Father who was saying, “Trust Me, and I don’t want to talk about this again.” Which was not reassuring. Can I get a witness? It was not reassuring.
So without going through the detail, it actually got – I went into congestive heart failure. I’ve never, my heart is perfect. What is the next domino? Has anybody here ever been in a domino situation, where one thing keeps, you know, and you’re wondering where does that thing end? And I made it to what may have been the whole point of this, to the point where lying alone in the hospital having just had a phone call come in from Kansas City that had looked at my blood work and said, “You have a very, very serious problem. Go immediately to the hospital.” I in a very private way, I made it to, which was probably what the whole thing was about. “Okay, Father. I’m not gonna fight it. If You wanna take me You can take me.” Which is a life changing place when you get that, when you can get there, especially if you’re aggressive like me. You know, I’d fight to the last breath. But He said, “No, I don’t – I don’t want you fighting to the last breath. I want you surrendering on a new level.”
You ask what’s happened since I’ve seen you fifteen years ago? I, you know, took that journey and that – what that did to me as a person, is it made me able to fellowship with people who are sick and in pain and in their whole life have lived through pain. And I knew nothing about, I mean, I was given strength and energy and all of a sudden I began to weep a lot for all the people that don’t get better, all the people that are not still, you know, as I am or as I have been and it just opened a world to me and it broke stuff in me. It broke stuff in me. And I’m very grateful that the Lord took me through that. I’m sure it was part of what He’s wanted me to be and become and to relate to people that I could not relate to in a real – “I’ve been there, and I know what you mean.” Are you with me? As we talked this morning and I’m getting into some direction here real soon.
How do we talk like the Lamb when we’re surrounded by the lions? How do we do that? How do we challenge the world and challenge well intentioned people who are so far lost, intellectually you’re not even sure what pathway is there for me to try and reach you or touch you in some real way? How do I do that? And it isn’t gonna be by shame as Katherine talked about shaming and how that people you know, people are so insecure. How many of you know that there’s a part of you that is insecure? Hello. And, Father, let the other ones come to that reality, quick. Okay.
The Lord knows exactly how to weaken you when He wants to weaken you, and where the breaking of us in a positive way occurs. My nature is aggressive, but I don’t wanna be aggressive. I don’t wanna be the lion when the lamb is what God is after in this given situation with people. All of you, whether you have put this in this context that I’m gonna open up here, God helping me, but, you were saved for these times. You were designed by your Creator to be alive and be in your sphere of influence. All of you have a sphere of influence, and you’re in different levels of awareness. You’re all really tending the garden of your life. We talk about that in-depth sometimes, but all of you, if you’re spiritually awake, you’ve already got a mini circle of influence where it really matters how you touch the people in your life.
And the United States, which has been arrogant in many different ways, I mean, the history of the US has been like a fairy tale in many ways. Americans, you know, we do anything, we go anywhere, we win fights, all that kind of nonsense. But we aren’t that country anymore. And it has been very interesting to watch the culture in the United States go into a mode of fear. And we’re in a fear, we’re in a mode right now because, for example, between the levels of… The United States is so divided right now that it’d be a great time for China to try and take Taiwan. It’d be a great time for the war in Europe to really go further. It’s a real danger that Iran is very close to nuclear weapons when they’ve already said to everybody, when they get it, they’re gonna blow Israel in the smoke, and they’re capable of doing that.
As the chaos and there’s business people in here, finance people in here, you understand. Again, I said I’m around some of the senior economists of the world, and I’ve heard with my own ears from the Federal Reserve people, in their language, the system is broken, and we don’t know what to do. Now what was interesting in that comment was it was made in the context of about 130 or 150 senior leaders from all over the world. New York Times, Wall Street Journal, all the major newspapers were in that meeting, and there wasn’t a single word that ever got out of that meeting to people to know what was being said, let alone, saying none of us, and we’re running the game, we’re not really sure what to do.
We had another follow-up meeting in Zurich a year or so after that. The same senior economists and the ones that couldn’t be there, were on, you know, on film live, you know, big screens. So, there’s a lot going on, a lot going on. And what do we do in the US when no matter who wins, the other half of the country is not going to accept the results? This is looney tunes. This is not possible that the United States of America could go to being what it has been, in the point where it is a broken system. And we don’t, we don’t have leaders that know what to do to close the gap.
So, what I’m saying here is, as the situation goes,wherever it’s going to go, and I don’t know
where it’s gonna go in that sense. People are going to be freaking out and flipping out by the
zillion. I cannot, I mean, Holy Spirit, help us right now. We it looks like we’re going deep again here. How what level of stability, at what level of faith, and what level of hope are you going to bring in to contact with the people that know you, live with you, trust you? Everybody in here has got a few people that really trust you. Some of you have lots of people who trust you. I have been everywhere globally because I’m running around the globe is, I’m trying to remind the audience you’re going to be viewed by somebody as somebody that is truthful and help me understand how bad is this, and where is it going? And are you in fear? Where are you at as we go into challenges that are for real?
How many of you are pretty sure most people are not living on that level of reality that I’m trying to communicate? Because nobody wants to deal with that. I mean, what do we do if the food chain breaks down? We got one week worth of food in the United States, ten days. Blockchains, all the stuff that can be shifted quickly and gone through quickly, is there. And I’m not trying to scare you. I’m just trying to tell you that is where we are right now. And then the question is, how much real faith is in you, and what is your faith in? What is your faith in?
Now, I’m not challenging you, are you going to Heaven? I’m talking about a whole other reality than are you going to Heaven. And that is what’s your family? What’s your situation before you go to Heaven? And if you’re a theologian, if you are deep in the Word of God, you may have noticed that the Bible is sharing two opposite directions at the same time.
I don’t know how many of you see that, but God is in absolute control. But He’s waiting to see what the response is of the people and nations. Some nations are going to be sheep nations and some are going to be goat nations when you read Matthew 25. And the nations and the cities. How many of you know cities are going to be judged in eternity? You go to Matthew 12. I mean, Jesus said, “The cities that I’ve been in, in the day of judgment that they didn’t respond, they’re gonna really have trouble, because I did miracles in them and they didn’t respond etcetera, etcetera.”
So what I’m trying to say to you is, you were and are alive at a time when it may be scarier than World War 2. Okay, World War 2 could have gone another direction. There are many major events in history that could have gone different ways depending upon how God wanted to make it play out. And what is your trust level in what God is after? And God is not after it… let’s put it what He is after mostly, is to pull out His kids and the ones that are wanting and are living a life that they wanna be in eternity together. He wants to make sure that he doesn’t lose any of those, and He will do whatever is required to maximize the number of those people as a loving Father. That’s just He, you know, He’s not after us being healthy, wealthy and wise. He’s not after us, never getting as sick as I was. He’s not after that. What He’s after is getting you at a level as mature as you can get, here in the gymnasium that we call current life, because this is the warm-up for the real game. I wonder if you heard what I just said?
This life is preparation for the one that’s gonna last forever. Lord, help us right here. I remember my, you know, in all of us, I trust you do inventory in your walk with God frequently. And at night, assess the day, what, you know, how was your day? Where did you miss God? Where did you find Him? What did you see? I mean, I hope you’re living in the presence of God in that way. And I was complaining to Him one day politely, but nevertheless. I said, “I’m working too hard to not have this stuff go on into eternity.” Oh, I don’t know if I can go here. The skill sets that you’re developing will go with you through death.
First Corinthians 3, we could get into that, how many of you have paid enough price already that whatever you got out of what God served you up, you need that to go with you. That’s so valuable, the last thing you want to do is leave that here. And all the trials that you may be in now or going to go in or whatever is God is trying to get what He wants to get ready for you, to prepare for you on a trajectory that is similar to the trajectory you’re on right now.
God doesn’t send people to hell, they go because that’s the journey they have chosen. The leaders of eternity are being trained here. When you see that, Paul talked there in 1st Corinthians 3 about, “Some of what we’ve done will be burned up and some of it will pass through death.” It’s the stuff that God has played hardball with you in. That’s the good stuff that passes through death. When you can find your way into the reality of what I’m saying, it’ll begin to change you very rapidly.
So, what I wanna do in a I’m not gonna preach forever, but how many of you would like to think we can see where some of this is going and what you can do? In the last thirty years, I’m watching, I love watching people when we did get into this. It’s called show and tell. Show and tell. In the nineties, early nineties, very significant thing began to happen. The baptism in the Holy Spirit went global. I mean, that has happened in numbers of places and over the decades, but it went viral. And millions of people experienced the baptism of the Holy Spirit, in the eighties, charismatic renewal, Pentecostal stuff. The mass evangelism that went on and is still going on in the third world.
I mean, the Hispanic world is on fire right now spiritually, and you’ve got some situations here in Africa that are too and in other parts of the world. But, millions were empowered with that and in the same time, the theologically cessationism, which taught that the baptism and the miracles are not no longer operable, that same, deception was lifted off the Ephesians 4 ministries, there of evangelists, pastors, teachers, apostles and prophets. That shroud, shrouded, unbelief began to be lifted and the ministry of the apostles began to be recognised. Until you believe that God has taken, you know, deception away, you can’t go where you need to go while there’s deception. As it lifts, you got the pioneers, the explorers, who are willing to accept reality that the masses don’t. And gradually, you’ve got different layers of people. But the apostolic ministry and the power of the apostolic, which is different than the prophets, the evangelists, the teachers and most of the church is not led by apostolic authority. It’s led by the pastors and on one level, that is a disaster, not because the pastors are bad people, but pastors will never take us into the kingdom conflict with the world system and equip us because they don’t have that ministry. The pastors are the ones that care for people, you know.
If you’re really sick, there’s teachers and evangelists you don’t want there. You want somebody else there, who has got another level of authority and strategy. How many of you think God might be strategic a little bit? The strategist and you don’t need a strategy for the people of God until you see the revelation that God is preparing His people to change the world in ways that without an apostolic ministry, the world isn’t gonna change. Are you breathing? Now what, because I’m giving you an equation, a sequence, the way God rolls it out very carefully.
So when apostles, real true apostles begin to show up with strategy because that’s what God gives. The sign of the apostolic ministry is a focus on the Kingdom of God, because the Kingdom of God theologically is Grand Central Station. All roads lead into the Kingdom of God and that’s why Jesus did not come preaching the baptism in the Holy Spirit. He did not come preaching a lot of stuff that we thought. He came preaching what? The Kingdom of God is at hand.
Now I know you’re wrestling and a lot of great things that you are in gonna be going into deeper on Ecclesia. The Kingdom, how is it possible other than confusion? How is it possible that Jesus says, “Seek first the what? The Kingdom of God.” How is it possible that the main event in prayer when they said, “Teach us to pray is, our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name.” Thy, what? Thy Kingdom come. The Body of Christ is not seeking the Kingdom of God first, and we are paying the price of irrelevancy. Because the pastors who do, who are doing exactly what they’re supposed to do as the teachers are doing what they’re supposed to do and the evangelists what they’re supposed to do, none of them are called to be strategic and moving God’s people in strategic directions. If until the apostles show up and we begin to see that, and what they do is they start focusing on the Kingdom of God, and that’s beginning to happen.
How many of you know that if your IQ drops fifty points, there might be something going on. We’re way too smart and way too interested in the Bible to have accidentally not focused on what we were told to focus on. That was not an accident. That is a spiritual device of the enemy that has kept us imprisoned to this moment. You’re weird, you’re weird. You’ve, you’re following some weird people here. They actually believe apostolically that we and us are to be trained to be useful by God to do stuff that only the church can do. And if the Holy Spirit chooses to give us a good butt whipping, if that is going to be required to wake us up, then that’s required. That’s required. We’ll go there gladly because He’s our Father, and He’s our Leader. I’m not just talking about them. I’m talking about God, our Father. And there will become more and more sermons about the Kingdom of God. I’ve got something going in me. I mean, because Kingdom, I saw the Kingdom from the beginning. And I saw that what we are called to be is God wants to co-manage the created order with us.
Now having been in Berkeley, I can say, “Smoke that and call me in the morning.” Some of you all know what I just said. We’re not going there for robes and golden slippers. We’re going there to take the assignment the Holy Spirit has for you, perfectly fitting you and the gifts and the destiny that He gave you, which you are to begin to live out here, Ephesians 3:10, that the work that you were ordained to do before you were even born. How many of you are connecting in or aware that God wants to connect you to the destiny? “I just want to get to Heaven.” No. No. No. No. You got God waiting for you to do what only you can do with people that only you can do.
Now the next piece too, so the apostolic ministry begins to emerge. Then the theology begins to be Kingdom of God. And there is a day coming, and I I see it, I just don’t know what it’s going to look. In the same way that we had a baptism in the Holy Spirit, there is something coming towards the church of imbibing the Kingdom of God which is within you at a whole new level. Whole new level. I remember this morning, we talked about how fragile we are and how hard it is to live at the level that we’re touching in here. It’s scary. There’s risk involved. Deception. There’s warfare. If what I’m saying is true, how come everybody isn’t doing that? There’s millions of Christians. Why, why would millions of Christians not be trying to figure out what their destiny was and becoming an army? Which is what the world is afraid we will become. His obedient army.
Surprise, surprise, the next thing from the Kingdom of God is the Ecclesia. I studied Ecclesia as a political theorist major at Berkeley. I mean, I knew, you know, Ecclesia, when Jesus said, “I’m going to build an Ecclesia.” He didn’t say He was going to build a Jewish, building. How many of you know Jesus thinned the crowd on purpose with His dracula speech?
You all know Jesus had a dracula speech in John 6? “Unless you eat My Flesh and drink My Blood and they were some, ‘Say, what? Say, what?’” You know what the penalty for eating human flesh was in the law? What do you mean? Ah I, I got a lot of questions for the twelve guys who was watching Him do this stuff. “The Lord, He’s on another trip. Drink His Blood. Say what?” And a lot of them said, “You know, Lord, I’ll be with you till the end, and this is the end.” And I love the verse, the Bible wasn’t not hiding many things. It says, and many of his disciples said, “I had enough of this.”
Ecclasia is a governmental body that the Greek city states in the 700bc began, as they began to write constitutions to rule the city states. Israel was the only other group on the planet who was doing anything similar to the Greeks. And the Ecclasia you were a kaleo, you were called to officiate in the government the management of the nation that the Ecclesia was operating in. They made decisions about taxation. They made decisions about penal codes. They made decisions about life. They were a government, a functioning government. And now I say again to Jesus, “You’re after a what? What about my golden slippers and my white sheet?” Looked like the ku klux klan in eternity. What about all of that? (Everybodies laughing) Sorry. I’m with, I’m so with you. Oh, them golden slippers. “You wanna reward me with what?” Guess what the prize is? “I’m giving you ten cities.” Can we negotiate? When I began to see all over in the scripture that He wants His children to build what He’s created and the creativity of it forever and eternity going to levels that Paul said, “I’m not allowed to speak to what I saw. You guys can hardly handle what I’ve already revealed.”
The Ecclesia and then phase 4. But here’s the trip. All of this is going on right now. This is not theory about what’s going to happen. It’s already happening. I’m here on the ground of what’s happening in South Africa and there’s a piece of that, that’s in my heart. I know that. Phase 4, apostles, Kingdom, Ecclesia. Here’s the one that the world is uptight about, make disciples of the nations. Do you know why they crucified the Christians? They could care nothing about another god, but when they hear that the church, the group, these Christians were sending apostles because the Greek word, apóstolos, is a general or an admiral in the military service. This is no ordinary cult that is a moving and arising here in Caesar’s day. They were sending apostles, that meant strategic military-thinking people. And they said, “No, no, no, no, no. This cult, we can’t let this cult do its trip” and they don’t wanna do it now.
It ain’t no different now except technology is changing the game. The tech world is changing the game. This is a flat planet where within seconds, the whole world can be in a conversation. History has never been where it is now, and for the strategies of both those demonic princes who oppose are clear that whatever is going on now, they’ve got a better shot right now at strategically shutting down and controlling what’s going on in the spiritual realm. Now is the time that they are really going to move to control it.
If you think the stuff that is going on in Israel is just against them, you don’t understand the real target is the church. Come on baby, let’s see what you’ve got. That’s the real target. And you’re beginning to hear it squeak out now, people. Listen carefully, you’ll hear it coming. And part of the thing that is so painful and I don’t know how God is going to get around this, is people like us, people like me are seen as cult, because Christianity isn’t interested in managing the planet. We just want to stay our time here and get the heck out of here. But there is a problem my brother. There are some of us that understand what the game is and “I don’t want to get out of here, thank you very much.” And when I say, “Thy Kingdom come and Thy will be done on earth.” I can’t honestly say that and pray that unless I am one that would love to be here on earth to represent Jesus Christ and what His game and His plan for the nations is. That’s why I am here.
I can’t tell you everything, but there’s a meeting that we are here for, a lot of leaders, a lot of nations here and know the general’s plans remain in the general’s tent. But this thing that is going on, the apostolic prophetic, those two things function together. The Kingdom of God that is at war with the kingdom of this world. The Ecclesia which is going to be spiritually governing territory. We’re not talking guns here. We’re talking spiritual authority that is more powerful than guns. Run along children with your guns, we’ll take alignment with the Holy Spirit and see what alignment with this Ecclesia that will not be defeated Jesus said, it ain’t gonna lose. It’s not gonna lose.
Ooh, do not, I’ll see what I see from eternity and I am sure looking forward to being here and see all I can before it all goes. This makes Christianity feel a little different because Jesus has this thing He wants for you and me and all of us that is so crazy that He wants us, He wants us to become governing responsibly people. Brother Dennis imitates someone crying “But, I don’t want to govern, I don’t want to govern, it’s hard work and people won’t’ like me.” Oh Jesus.
So, last thing here, if we had more time and I don’t want to overload you. How many of us said, “We should’ve shut up twenty, thirty minutes ago?” [Congregation: No. No] If you go to Isaiah 3, just take a note here. I wanted you to go to Isaiah 3 verses 1 to 12. Isaiah 3:1 to 12 is an exact biblical description of the destruction of a nation or a city or something or a nation, primarily Israel. And it lists, I’m going to take the surprise. It lists in order where the skill sets are going to get sucked out so that the whole thing collapses. And you’ll never guess, unless you’ve cheated and read that verse. I got a lot to teach on this one. Who do you think is the plug in the sink of a culture and a nation surviving? Is it the priest? Is it the prophet? Is it the ruler? Is it the judges? No, no, no, no, no, no. The plug in the sink is the warrior.
Now I did not write the Bible. I’m not Isaiah. I take no responsibility for the carnality of whoever said, “The warrior was more important to the nation’s survival than the priest.” But God said he was. Prove me a liar. Read the verse. Now, it isn’t because God is a Warrior, although our Lord is a Warrior. He is a Warrior. He comes back on a white horse, kicking butt, and taking names. Okay?
He is bringing to an end some stuff, but the point of it is the warrior is the one who is committed enough to the cause to die. And when you no longer have the warrior spirit in an organisation, that organisation is on its way to death. I think God was trying to tell us something when He put His Son to death. The greatest move of war ever committed. His commitment to die so that we can have His power is His flipping off the devil for what he said to Adam and Eve is that God’s insecure, and He doesn’t want you to have power. The crucifixion of Jesus Christ was God’s statement about how committed He was to share His power. Woah. That spirit of the warrior. What are you ready to die for? I mean, God did it once. He’s allowed, actually, in churches, many people to die for the faith. I’m just saying that when you no longer have a people where the leaders are willing to pay the sacrifice, it is going to be challenged by those who are willing to pay the sacrifice themselves to destroy what you got going. I don’t know what that’s going to look like, but when I saw that. [Dennis starts praying in tongues] You got to be kidding me. The warrior is the plug in the sink. Remove it and the water drains out. Yeah. The warriors are the ones that are saying, “Take me. I’m not going to back off or back down.”
Now last thing. Where are we now? I believe where we are with all this fermentation with the apostolic ministry that is going to be leading the church, and by the way, it doesn’t mean they will be leading the church pastorally. That’s not what they’re going to be doing. They’re going to be leading the church strategically because God has a purpose for the Body of Christ in this moment of history, and has always had moments of history where He’s trying to steer His people into a certain kind of activity. That’s who He is.
Now Matthew 13. Matthew 13 is the Kingdom of God chapter in the Bible. You’ve got Daniel’s stuff and you’ve got pieces of it scattered. But Matthew 13 is a foot long injection needle of what God has to say about the Kingdom, and it’s very upward. Kingdom is not losing. We’re not losing. Okay. And it talks about, right near the very end, the great net and this is where I believe strongly where we’re moving. The net of the Kingdom pulls in the saved and the unsaved together in the same movement. I know enough about politics in the world of political reality and movements and that stuff, because that’s what I do. In order for unsaved people to journey, it means that there’s going to be common commitments that are Kingdom based, not necessarily church based, because the Kingdom is bigger than the Church. Let’s think about this. We’re talking about reality. The Kingdom has got non-humans in it, like angels and whatever else, whoever else God’s created. We’re not the only ones, but we are the ones that He’s chosen to build through.
I’m sorry to interrupt your joy with Jesus with responsibility, but I’m going to do it anyway. He’s got a word for the Church, “Grow up, grow up.” Become a change agent. Specialize in something that you’re interested in already, and become an expert. So that in that realm of the Kingdom of God, you can contribute to your city, to your community, to the school systems. Okay, well I don’t want to do that here. Your own truth. There’s a world of difference between knowing truth and owning truth. I know truth and if I’m following God, I’m going through enough change that I’m digesting what I conceptually know and it gets in my gut and now I am that truth. That truth is alive in me. Not just my opinion. It’s alive in my being. My being is being transformed.
I want to ask you, what truth do you own? What Bible verses have the Holy Spirit made an issue with you round and round and round and round and you still don’t get He’s trying to get you to see something that will become who you are, a part of your essence. That’s called transformation. It’s called incarnation. The game is not being smart on Bible verses. The game is how much of that has been incarnated into you. I can quote every verse in the Bible. I can’t do that, but, well, goodie for you. I wonder how many of them you own? How many of them work for you? I believe in truth that works ten out of ten. Ten out of ten. And the ones that work ten out of ten in my life, I’ve paid for. What have you paid for? What truth have you paid for? And then you cry, “Lord, I thought You deserted me.” Or whatever you thought when you were beginning to pay the price of digestion. Get out of the other side of the trip that’s on you, and you’ll worship Him and say, “Thank You, that hurt like hell. That really hurt, or that was really tough. But now, now I own that truth.”
This fusion of Matthew 13:47-50, please read it tonight before you go to bed. It’s a short little thing. But in order for the unsaved and the saved to be walking and working together for the sake of the Kingdom, they weren’t building the Church, they were building the Kingdom together. At the end, He says, the angels come and pull the non-Christians out of the alliance. They, the ones in the alliance, could agree with a lot, but they couldn’t agree with whatever it was that was the final step for their salvation. But I want to tell you something, that net is going out to the nations right now. It’s going out. And we’re going to see more and more non-Christians saying, “You know what? You guys aren’t crazy. We may not believe Jesus is who we think, but you’re making sense.” We’re depoliticising what the enemy is trying to politicise.
The problem with the left is it makes every human activity political. Some of you know what I just said. It just can’t stop. It’s consuming until everything is being managed and regulated by authoritarian leaders. It just can’t quit. But Nicodemus is showing up at night. Men and women all over the world right now, are beginning a conversation, trying to find each other – right now in a finding mode, which is going to end up being that net. We don’t want to politicise the church. We’re not calling people to political parties. We’re calling people to spiritual truth and spiritual principles.
I’m working especially with the black community a lot because I have civil rights and all that back when. And the black Church, in the US, is in major shift right now. They’ve been Democratic Party for years and finally figured out that the democrats weren’t doing them any favour because they weren’t being empowered. If you want to know who to follow, follow the one that can help empower you. Don’t be a slave without another name. That process and we we’re not trying to get them out of the left into the right, trying to get them into the Bible Because the management of the planet, eventually, the Church of Christ is going to be injecting into the political process the policies of God that are in that Bible, which I told you this morning, and I will quit here. When I didn’t know any more than what I had as marxist and trained, the level I was and the history of political theory and all that stuff, how it all works, that’s the way I read the Bible. I was immediately looking for what is the energy of creating capital? What is the nature of the separation of powers because all that political stuff was my destiny to bring to the world and others in here what the Bible says about what should and shouldn’t be done in terms of taxation policy. And we can begin to tell you point after point after point after point, worldview of what the Bible says to create a sociology of empowerment. How many of you think the world might like to see that? Well, what shall we say? What shall we say?
What is that? [Dennis refers to the sound the rain makes on the roof] Is that rain? Let it rain. Let the Kingdom rain down on this place. The Lord bless you. Thank you for listening. Thank you for listening. And I hope that, God willing, when I come back next, I’ll see a whole other jump like the one you made when I last left you alone. I hope it goes the same way again. God bless you. Are you gathering the debris?
Pastor JohnBendixen: Well, praise the Lord. Hallelujah. If I’m grateful about one thing and I’m grateful about many things. But if I’m thankful and I’m grateful, I have to say I’m thankful that we, by being obedient to God and the steps that God has been taking us all these years, we find ourselves on point with God. On the cutting edge of where the church is, on the cutting edge of where God’s army is, on the cutting edge. We are frontline people. Is there something about this echo we can do? So, you know, thank God. Thank you. Thank you, Dennis, for being willing to share the truth with us.
I like the way Dennis put it tonight, what level of truth do you own? I guess if we had to phrase it in the language that we’ve been using over the last while, we would say, is the circumcision working? Is that painful process of circumcision creating a covenant between you and God and between the truth that God is placing in your heart? Is it working? Are you owning it? Is it doing the job that it needs to do? Because on the other side of the pain is a whole new level of covenant with God. It’s a whole new walk with God. It’s a whole new commitment that God has towards us. Even though, actually, if you think about what God asked Abraham to do and what He asked the children of Israel to do, that came out of the wilderness and got into the promised land, and every time He asked all the male to be circumcised, the pain of that was over in a couple days. If you’re an older person and you had to go through that, an older male, maybe a week or two, for the recovery to happen but the value and the benefit of the covenant established is eternal. From something so temporary. The covenant is eternal.
So, in the way that the Lord has been dealing with us about our holy days, the way that the Lord has been dealing with us about, “What is your more for?” The way that the Lord’s been dealing with us at different levels of commitment to how far will we go with committing to God? All of this is the Kingdom of God that we are busy with. How many of you recognise, the language that Dennis was using, is the language we use in our church? It’s not about congregational meeting, it’s about we have to become a different kind of people, that God can use us as a people that are committed to His cause, not to our cause, that are committed to His ways, not to what we think is comfortable for us. We’ve got to and the only way we can get there is we’ve got to go through, which truth are we going to own?
And if we are prepared to confront that truth, and we have been, and that’s why I commend you. Every week, when I get up here, pastor Sharon gets up here, we commend you that you are allowing us to minister to you this way because, actually, we stopped playing church a long time ago. We are serious about God’s order. We are serious about God’s ways and we are seriously going to have God show up for us, and He is showing up for us because this is the way it’s going to happen. Hallelujah. And it is happening. Praise the Lord.
I am so grateful that God has called us and we have understanding of the apostolic order, of the prophetic order. We understand Ecclesia, although we have some understanding, we’ve got a long way to go still and I’m looking forward to the next level. Amen. Hallelujah. And we’ve all been through this together, haven’t we? We’ve all been through this together where we’ve had to figure out the risk. And many of us, if not all of us, have had to understand there is a risk. The risk is if I go here, I could lose friendships, I could lose things. Importantly, most importantly, there’s stuff that you’ve been carrying baggage that we’ve all carried from our past that doesn’t belong in the Kingdom of God, it doesn’t belong in the way ekklesia is supposed to rule. You can’t bring that stuff in. You’ve got to leave it behind, and that’s where the circumcision happens. And so, I say thank you to all of you.
If Dennis has brought an affirmation to us tonight and an encouraging word to us this time, it’s that we’re on the right track. We are on the right track. We’re making great strides. And, you know, arriving here, Dennis was encouraging me that we truly are becoming and he’s a witness to the transformation that has happened in our ministry, our people. He’s a witness of the transformation that we are not just people playing ‘church’ anymore. Why would we want to do that? What for? What’s the reward of playing ‘church’? [Brynn: Slippers and cloaks] Thank you, Brynn. Sheets and slippers. And so, we don’t want to play ‘church’. We don’t want to play ‘church’. Hallelujah.
We want to be useful in the Potter’s hands. We want to be the clay that He’s molding, that we become what He wants us to become. Hallelujah. I am rejoicing. To use the word I used recently, my spirit is vibrating. It’s in tune. It’s in tune with God. How about you? Don’t you feel it? Don’t you feel the flow of the Spirit, the move of the Spirit, the vibration, that tune of the Holy Spirit?
You know, if you’ve got a tuning fork, you’ve got to smack it before it vibrates. If you’re not vibrating yet, don’t worry – we’ll smack you. [Pastor John and congregation laughs] And then you will get the vibration and the sound will be heard. Hallelujah. Glory to God.
So, this has been a different series of meetings. And I’m glad that we’ve had them. Hasn’t it been amazing? Amazing. So, we’re not going to take up a cash offering tonight. But I do want to say that if you want to contribute an honour seed for Dennis and Katherine’s visit here, please do an EFT deposit into the ministry account. This is something that we all do nicely, properly, correctly. We understand how that works. Please do an EFT and just mark it for Dennis or for GoStrategic or whatever you want to do, how you want to mark it. Just make sure that we understand the difference between a tithe and offering or the seed that is supposed to go to them. Hallelujah. Because don’t we want to have God give us more revelation like this? This is a way that we can partner and contribute towards revelation that can increase in our lives. We know how this works. I leave it in your hands. I leave it between you and God to decide what’s got to happen here. Amen? [Congregation: Amen] Hallelujah.
I just want to know, Dennis, are you available just to greet a couple of people or do you want to go back into the room, there? You’re okay? [Dennis: I’m not afraid of people] You’re not afraid of people? I figured that. Just treat him nicely. Don’t crowd him, don’t do all that. But, amen.
May you go blessed, protected, peace upon you. The glory of God is going to rest upon you. His presence is going to draw you into all the things that you need to have, all the things you need to know. He’s going to rest upon you and make sure that you have all of those things, in Jesus’ name. Amen. Do you all agree with that? Amen. Thank you for coming. Bless you all. All of you, bless you, bless you, bless you.
Hey! Hey! The next time I see you… Hey! Hey! Hey! [Pastor John laughs] I’ll have done it the next time I see you! Hallelujah. Me and Kit together. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. It will be epic. Amen. I’ll see you all.
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