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Urgent National Prayer Alert Posted on www.dutchsheets.org
as a MS Word document
Posted on THEODICY: June 9, 2006 I have been waiting
several weeks to write this prayer alert, making every effort to hear from
the Lord as clearly as possible. I try
not to write national prayer alerts frequently – only when I feel they are
urgent. This is probably one of the
most important assignments I’ve ever had.
Although it is unusually long, please read it prayerfully and pass it
on. In our
partnering with God to turn America back to its Christian heritage and
God-given destiny – indeed, to experience another great awakening that will
impact every aspect of our culture and bring millions of people to Christ –
we are at a great crossroads. I
believe we are at the deciding point in the war. While writing this letter I was handed a
newsletter of Cindy Jacobs, a prophet and international leader in the prayer
movement; she believes this also, stating:
“As I pray for the United States, I see that we are at a crossroads
where we will either keep the ground we have taken and advance to see our
nation transformed, or we will deteriorate at an alarming rate.” The Battle of the Bulge A friend of
mine likens where we are to the Battle of the Bulge. This battle was an intense counter
offensive launched by Hitler in WW II – after D Day, when it looked like the
Allies had won the war, Hitler tried one final, desperate onslaught to turn
the tide. This caught the Allies by
surprise and, though we eventually defeated Hitler’s armies, was for a season
demoralizing and very costly to us.
Likewise today, an intense counter offensive has been orchestrated from
Hell to pull down President Bush and derail the destiny of America. This whirlwind of darkness over America is
bringing great national confusion and is causing paralysis even in the
praying church. I have sensed
this strong confusion in both the civil and spiritual realms, from leaders on down. It is strong in Washington D.C. – godly
governmental leaders know things are in disarray and that something is
desperately wrong, but also say that nothing seems to work when it comes to
reversing it. Spiritual leaders also
know things are not right – that we have lost momentum and that anti-Christ
forces seem to be prevailing – but no one seems to know what to do about
it. My friend Lou Engle, in a recent
prayer alert said, “Wherever I go, I can feel the attitude of resignation,
criticism and despair…” Lou’s entire
alert can be found at www.justicehouseofprayer.com The Spirit of Babylon Chuck Pierce,
another friend and internationally trusted prophet connected our desperate
condition to the war in Iraq: “the spirit of Babylon is slapping us
around.” Iraq is modern day
Babylon. Babylon means “confusion,”
which is obviously one of the results of this spiritual war. America’s armies had no problem taking out
Saddam’s physical army, but we are now dealing with an ancient principality,
the spirit of Babylon, which cannot be defeated with natural weapons and
strategies. This spirit is currently,
though I believe it not be permanently, prevailing against us. As previously stated, the symptoms of
confusion and disarray can be seen in the church, on our president and in the
nation in general. A further
result of all this on our president is political disfavor. He has one of the most unfavorable
performance ratings of any president in history, ranking down with Nixon
during Watergate. The cover of one
major magazine reads: “How Low Can He Go?”
Usually when the economy thrives – and ours is – a president’s ratings
are high, (even if he is sexually involved with an intern and lies about
it!). But not this president. He has lost his favor and consequently his
voice, neither of which will return until certain things occur. A Dream About the President Regarding this
loss of voice, a pastor related to me a dream he had recently about President
Bush. The president was in a jail cell
in a desert region. He was very
agitated and his bottom lip was torn in half.
I believe this desert region represents Iraq and the tearing of the
president’s lip pictures my assertion that his voice has been torn from him. As the dream
continued a man grabbed the president from behind, and said, “Let go. Give in.”
Snakes then came out of the man’s cloak, wrapped around the president
and one of them bit his torn lip. The
president fell to the ground and disappeared.
The snake then took the form of a woman, looked at the man having the
dream (who had run in to try and help the president) and said, “There is
nothing you can do to stop this.” The man in the
dream changing into a serpent confirms to me that we are no longer dealing
with flesh and blood in Iraq, but with “principalities and powers” (see
Ephesians 6:12). They have entrapped
our president, stolen his voice and intend to completely destroy his
effectiveness. Their ultimate goal is
to steal his destiny, which is warring against terrorism and shifting the
courts, especially the Supreme Court of America. Though the president has been disabled and
seemingly taken out by this spirit, it is not true that there is nothing we
can do to stop it. I will address this
momentarily. The Reality of Where We Are It is vital
for us to grasp the magnitude of this spiritual war against America and our
president, and also to realize that the forces of evil are currently
prevailing, though it need not remain so.
If the November, 2006 elections were held today, it is almost certain
that pro-life and morally conservative voices would lose some, if not complete,
control of Congress. It is also quite
likely that if the third vacancy occurred on the Supreme Court now (and I
believe it is coming soon), one of two things would happen. Either Bush would bow to the temptation to
appoint a moderate because of his weak position; or if he appointed a true
conservative constitutionalist like Roberts or Alito, the liberals would be
empowered enough to stop the nomination through filibustering or character
assassination. Worse yet, if
the vacancy doesn’t occur until after the November elections and conservatives
do lose control of Congress, we can very likely kiss goodbye our current opportunity to shift the Supreme Court of
America. This would be the most
devastating setback of our day. The
consequences are unthinkable. The
killing of babies and pro-death culture would continue, God would continue to
be unwelcome in schools, government and public life and another generation
would spiral further downward into Godless, humanistic relativism. Our God-given destiny in America could be
lost indefinitely, perhaps forever. We
simply cannot allow this. Regarding the
war on terrorism, if we don’t turn the tide spiritually and do so fairly
soon, it will turn into a quagmire that our generation doesn’t have the
strength, courage, boldness or selflessness to endure. This is the reality of where we are. What God Is Saying to the Church What must
happen in the praying church and with our president at this critical
time? There are biblical pictures that
can help us identify our current position and point us toward the right
strategy. First, where is the church
and what must we do? If the praying
church does not re-engage in informed, consistent and fervent intercession
for our nation and president NOW, we will lose our Battle of the Bulge. Our past victories and the ground we have
gained are all on the line. So is our
future. We have grown complacent and
overconfident, as did the Israelites at Ai.
In their attempt to conquer the promised land, Israel had won a great
and impressive victory at Jericho (see Joshua 6). However, they grew overconfident and when
they confronted the next town – small and insignificant Ai – did not pray for
God’s help and strategy. Consequently,
God wasn’t with them. The result was a
devastating defeat. We, too, have
grown spiritually overconfident and complacent due to our recent
victories. Now, like Joshua after the
defeat at Ai, we are confused and disoriented (see Joshua 7:6-9). We must re-engage in prayer
immediately. Lou Engle, in the above
mentioned prayer alert also said, “Maybe President Bush’s legacy and the
future of our nation hinge more on our prayers than on the whole political
debate that rages now.” Right on, Lou,
except I believe we can scratch the word “maybe.” Our future absolutely hinges on our
prayers. What God Is Saying to Our President What of our
president? In biblical context where
is he, and what must he do? In Genesis
32, Jacob, Abraham’s grandson and the man who produced the nation of Israel through
his twelve sons, came to his own personal crossroads. He, like our president, had come to a great
crisis. Years earlier Jacob had
connived to attain his brother Esau’s birthright and stolen the blessing
reserved for him as the firstborn son.
Now, twenty years later, Jacob is returning to face Esau, who has
sworn to kill him. On the way, he has
a life-changing encounter with God (see Genesis 32:24-32). Several parts of this story parallel where
our president currently is and what he must do: 1) Jacob was left alone. Consistent with his conniving nature, which
is what his name meant, Jacob’s possessions, servants and family had all been
sent ahead to “appease” Esau. Then, in his wrestling with the angel,
Jacob’s thigh – a symbol of strength – was dislocated, causing him to walk
with a permanent limp. Everything
Jacob owned, all of his family and now, all of his strength, was gone. God was allowing him to lose all, at least
Jacob thought so, and also removing from him what he had relied on all of his
life – his ability to connive (which,
again, is the meaning of his name) his way out of trouble and into blessing
through his own strength and manipulation. For our
president, I believe this conniving nature of Jacob pictures what occurs so
often in the political realm. Not that
the political world and those who are a part of it are necessarily evil, but
a political spirit is. It is the
equivalent of a “Jacob” nature – which we’re all born with – that believes
there is always a way to reverse our fortunes through manipulation and
control, conniving and self-effort.
Some actually prevail through this spirit, but God will not allow Bush
to succeed by operating in it. He has,
therefore, allowed our president to lose favor for a season and nothing Bush
has done can or will reverse this.
Politics cannot help him, Rove can’t, his party can’t, and his troops
in Iraq and Afghanistan cannot. God
wants our president to know that the only one who can help him now is the One
who put him where he is: Himself. This does not
necessarily mean our president has sinned or failed. Of course, he is human and therefore
imperfect. And like all of us he has a
Jacob nature to contend with. But this
doesn’t make him a failure in God’s eyes.
There is nothing to indicate that God was angry with Jacob but rather
that He wanted to move him further toward his destiny, which was to birth the
nation of Israel. His Jacob nature
stood in the way and God needed to change it.
This is what must occur in our president, which brings me to the
second parallel to Jacob and our president. 2) Jacob’s name was changed to Israel. (See
Genesis 32:28) Names represented
nature, identity and purpose in those days.
That Jacob was after one thing – restored favor and blessing, and God
was after another – a nature change, is obvious in the story. Jacob finally realized this when he
responded to the angel’s question of what his name was: “The Man asked him,
‘What is your name?’ And in shock of realization, whispering he said, ‘Jacob’
[supplanter, schemer, trickster, swindler]!”
(Genesis 32:27, Amplified) Jacob’s
acknowledgment of his condition, equivalent to repentance and confession,
allowed God to break off of him the Jacob nature. God then re-named him Israel, moving him
into his destiny. Likewise, God has a
destiny on our president that cannot be accomplished through politics or
human ability. Only the power, wisdom
and enablement of the Holy Spirit can equip President Bush to accomplish his
destiny concerning terrorism and the courts of America. I want to be very bold and make a statement
that may seem unusual regarding a government leader: God has removed favor
from our president and is wrestling with him, in order to remove from him all
confidence that he can prevail through human strength and methods, including
politics. He wants him to walk with a
limp. God wants to anoint him for his
assignment, giving him a supernatural ability to prevail. To accomplish this, He desires to visit our
president in a holy and awesome way, just as He did Jacob. President Bush has an appointment with God!
3) Jacob named the place Peniel, which means
“the face of God.” He stated, "I
have seen God face to face, yet my life has been preserved." Jacob’s life was transformed, favor with
Esau was given and all possessions were returned. In an interesting irony, the word “appease”
(verse 20) – what Jacob was attempting with Esau – and the word Peniel come
from the same Hebrew root which means “face.”
To appease is to put something in another person’s “face” in order to
buy or procure favor. God was in
essence saying to Jacob, “You can’t appease your enemy, but you can appease
Me. Facing your enemy through the
Jacob (political) spirit won’t help you anymore, but facing Me will.” Likewise, God
is saying to our president that He alone holds the key to favor and blessing
in this hour. President Bush cannot
prevail through appeasement, politics or any other human effort alone. But if he will face God and rely solely on
Him, God will visit him face to face, favor will return and the president can
fulfill his destiny. We must pray this
understanding/revelation to our president and we must birth this holy
visitation. For him to live and
operate in a political world without being caught up in it will indeed
require great revelation and humility.
This could come either through God speaking to him personally or by
getting the right individual to him with this message. Our responsibility is to pray until it
happens. If it does not, our president
will not recover and America is in big trouble. [For a
complete explanation, you can order the message I recently shared on this
subject, entitled “Jacob at Peniel.”
Order it by going to www.dutchsheets.org
and clicking on the link on the home page.]
Nuts! In closing, a
final story related to the Battle of the Bulge is pertinent. The Allies chose to stop Hitler’s advance
at a place called Bostogne. The 101st
Airborne Division, nicknamed “The Screaming Eagles” were assigned, against
all odds, to hold Bostogne. The Germans
surrounded the 101st at Bostogne and demanded their surrender. Brigadier General Anthony McAuliffe’s now
famous response was “Nuts.” When the
Germans asked for an interpretation of this, the American officer delivering
the message said, “It means you can go to hell.” The Allies
then needed the weather to clear up in order to use their air
superiority. General Patton ordered
his chaplain to compose a prayer asking God to clear up the weather. The next day the skies were clear and our
aircraft began to control the air war and destroy the enemy. Before the battle, the 101st’s first
commander, Major General William C. Lee, made the following statement to his
soldiers: The 101st
Airborne Division, activated at Camp Claiborne, Louisiana, has no history, but it has a rendezvous with destiny. Like the early American pioneers whose
invincible courage was the foundation stone of this nation, we have broken
with the past and its traditions in order to establish our claim to the
future. Due to the nature of our
armament, and the tactics in which we shall perfect ourselves, we shall be
called upon to carry out operations of far-reaching military importance and
we shall habitually go into action when the need is immediate and extreme. Let
me call your attention to the fact that our badge is the great American
eagle. This is a fitting emblem for a
division that will crush its enemies by falling upon them like a thunderbolt
from the skies. The history we
shall make, the record of high achievement we hope to write in the annals of
the American Army and the American people, depends wholly and completely on
the men of this division. Each
individual, each officer and each enlisted man, must therefore regard himself
as a necessary part of a complex and powerful instrument for the overcoming
of the enemies of the nation. Each, in
his own job, must realize that he is not only a means, but an indispensable
means for obtaining the goal of victory.
It is, therefore, not too much to say that the future itself, in whose
molding we expect to have our share, is in the hands of the soldiers of the
101st Airborne Division. (Emphasis mine.)
The Screaming Eagles Must Arise Hitler personally
orchestrated the Battle of the Bulge.
I believe Satan is personally orchestrating his forces in the battle
against Bush and the church of America.
God is calling the “Screaming Eagles” of intercession to take our
stand and win the air war in the heavenlies, stopping the enemy’s
advance. Like the Screaming Eagles of
yesterday, we can write a history of commitment, bravery, self-sacrifice and
victory. “The future itself, in whose
molding we expect to have our share, is in the hands of” the church. Satan says we can’t win, I say “Nuts!” We can win this war against terrorism and
for the soul of America, but only in the spirit.. If we don’t do so, the greater sin won’t be
our president’s but ours – the church of America. If this word
rings true in your heart, pass it on – and PRAY! Pray in church services; hold special
prayer meetings; fast and pray; send a prayer team to Washington, D.C. to
pray; pause at family gatherings to pray; pray at home groups. Pray, pray, pray. Let’s do our
part and win this war. Dutch Sheets http://www.dutchsheets.org/index.cfm/pageid/263 |
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