Editor’s note: This is not a Pacific Northwest word, but it is a word for the Church, including the Pacific Northwest.
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By Bob Hartley
Going From a Retreating, Misery Christianity to a Hope-Filled, Reforming Christianity
I experienced a series of visitations in the past few weeks that revealed God’s jealous and hope-filled heart of love for His people and plan according to this passage:
“The LORD goes out like a mighty man, like a man of war He stirs up His zeal; He cries out, He shouts aloud, He shows Himself mighty against His foes” (Isaiah 42:13).
God has extensively spoken in past revelations that have laid the foundations for this understanding of God’s zeal to displace what has hurt His children. He has called it “misery Christianity” versus “a hope-filled Christianity.” By this second reformation He will activate and empower 50 million “Hope Reformers” to usher whole cities and nations into great blessings and manifestations of the Kingdom of God in every arena of life.
This is our first report of what the Lord said regarding a 2014 “word in season” with some context and comments added to aid the understanding.
The Lord GOD has given me the tongue of those who are taught, that I may know how to sustain with a word him who is weary… Isaiah 50:4
Not the Spirit of Terror Year But the Psalm 67 Year
On a number of occasions, I have been taken in the Spirit into a “reformation room.” Situated within is a table of communion where the Lord reveals His manifold faces and nourishes us with the bread of His presence.
In this encounter I was seated at the corner of the table on the Lord’s right side. He strongly corrected us concerning speaking from areas where we were weary, wounded, disappointed, or Hear the clock ticking hopeless. The Lord said, “Stop it! Wait and listen again until you get the hope, the love, and see My solution.” He was in pain over this and desired to help us.
He said that 2014 is the year for Psalm 67:
“May God be gracious to us and bless us and make His face to shine upon us, that Your way may be known on earth, Your saving power among all nations. Let the peoples praise You, O God; let all the peoples praise you! Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for You judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth. Let the peoples praise You, O God; let all the peoples praise You! The earth has yielded its increase; God, our God, shall bless us. God shall bless us; let all the ends of the earth fear Him!”
The Lord said that He will progressively reveal facets of His nature to us that will help us progress in His purposes this year and beyond.
• He said, “There is an epic battle presently raging over Who I am.”
As we continue to look up to Him (see Psalm 121), greater building wisdom and favor will allow us to discern His hopeful ways more clearly than ever before. The Lord linked this experience to the account of Moses praying to see His glory and to know His ways and presence in an ongoing fashion in Exodus 33.
“Now therefore, if I have found favor in Your sight, please show me now Your ways, that I may know You in order to find favor in Your sight…” Moses said, “Please show me Your glory.” And He said, “I will make all My goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you My name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy [compassion] on whom I will show mercy [compassion].” Exodus 33:13, 18-19
They will bow their knees God spoke from Psalm 67 that He is going to open up His face and His ways so that He will be seen and known, not only among His people, but also among whole cities, and even nations, that will open their gates to Him. I saw specific nations invite Him, with His gifts and building plan, into their cities. These cities will become radiant with joy and pulsate with the presence of God. They will receive and enjoy many breakthroughs in every area of life. Jesus has also shown me how thrilled He truly is that these people and places are welcoming Him to bless and lead them.
• The Lord spoke, “Psalm 67 is the fifth scene.”
With this, the Spirit took me back, as He has many times, to one of my initial heavenly encounters in January of 1982 in Fort Collins, Colorado, when I was just newly converted. It was so dramatic! After being “taken up,” I saw four visions of earthly situations that were only filled with sorrow, tragedy, despair, and death. I was disrupted and deeply burdened by what God showed me. But, then I saw “The Fifth Scene”!
The first four scenes were real, but the fifth scene was the even greater reality. I saw the Lord high and lifted up like Isaiah did – even though I had never read the passage at that time. The Lord Almighty was higher than the sky and the brilliance of His indescribable presence filled my whole view. He was filled with joy, celebrating and, yes, belly laughing.
I was so perplexed by the contrast of the fifth scene to the first four I had witnessed. I asked Him, “Lord, what about all the terrible evils and human suffering you just showed me?” Then I saw a small dark dot enter the lower left corner of the vision. It floated up a ways and then suddenly disappeared. The Lord authoritatively announced, “That dot represents all the evil of all beings and of all history combined. It’s temporary and fleeting compared to Who I Am. So what are you going to magnify?”
The Lord is going to been seen as “The God of the Fifth Scene” or the “Psalm 67 God.”
• At the communion table He declared, “I Am God All Powerful”:
“Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who keeps covenant and lovingkindness…” (Nehemiah 9:32).
• He said, “I am the celebrating, covenant-keeping, sovereign God, and I will bring forth radiant cities and nations of the earth.” (See our most recent Elijah List article.)
He is first offering to us “the Gift of Himself.” This hope reformation is all about a healed and expanded view of God, and what then happens is we feed and feed others on this deeper knowledge of God. This revelation caused me to weep for joy. Though we do truly know the Lord, and yet surely there are many, many things about Him that we have yet to discover.
He told me that we presently know 1% of the 100% of the knowledge of God that He wants to reveal to us in this life, not to even mention what the future age will reveal about Him. It’s not that the divine attributes revealed in Scripture will be contradicted by what we learn, but it’s that we so easily misunderstand and misjudge His great heart and His manifold wisdom and thoughts regarding the people and situations in our world.
As a result, we often unwittingly misrepresent the Lord to the people and the watching world around us. However, Jesus wants to be more accurately “re-presented” in our day by His sons and daughters to a needy and spiritually hungry world. Psalm 67 speaks of causing His face to shine upon us. And He is promising to help us if we humbly acknowledge our need to learn and grow.
Wrapped up in this Gift is a revelation of “The God of the Fifth Scene,” and also a “pattern” for our worship, and a “building kit” for our service. He will unfold to us a practical, stage-by-stage plan for the extension of His Kingdom like He did for Moses, Solomon, and Nehemiah. Psalm 67 speaks of the revelation of His ways. God will reveal a blueprint about specifically how He is seeking to dwell among us here and now, and how this union with Him will lead to a truly apostolic reformation that will eventually lead to the restoration of all things referred to by Peter in Acts 3:19-21.
Psalm 67 speaks to the nations singing for joy and salvation coming to the earth. As we unpack this Gift, we will also experience how divine hope will “heal and expand” our view of God, and our own hearts, too. (We will say more about these things in our coming reports, because Jesus has spoken important and hopeful details about them to us.)
• The Lord said, “I will progressively reveal 12 of My faces that will cause you to advance in My Hope Reformation. This is a year for the Issacharian Reformers to arise.”
“…Of Issachar, men who had understanding of the times, to know what Israelought to do…” 1 Chronicles 12:32
• He also declared, “They will reflect Zechariah 10:3”:
“My anger is hot against the shepherds, and I will punish the leaders; for the LORD of hosts cares for His flock, the house of Judah, and will make them like His majestic steed in battle.
We will be transformed from “sheep” into “war horses.” The Lord instructed all of us to continue to sit at the table, and to keep watching and listening, so that we could see through the dark clouds. He said, “Wait, wait, wait for My Father’s hopeful view,” because He had more things yet to reveal to us…
A New Lens For a Hopeful Prophetic
At the very beginning of this visitation, the Lord held my face in His hands for two hours and repeatedly affirmed that He was delighted in me. I saw Him also holding the faces of others at the table. He kept saying, “I am delighted in all of you.” He kept imparting the essence of Zephaniah 3:17 to my heart…and to theirs…again and again:
“The LORD your God is in your midst, a mighty One who will save; He will rejoice over you with gladness; He will quiet you by His love; He will exult over you with loud singing.”
It was so good that He did that because I didn’t know at the time how much I would need that deep and warm fatherly affirmation and delight to handle the rebuke over hopeless prophecy and speaking throughout my life.
As this divine encounter took on a more serious tone, He took a fiery coal and put it to my lips to purify my speech. He said this was needed so that I could blow the trumpet He has put to my mouth to faithfully declare His nature.
He then took me, and many others, on a journey through a number of scenarios in our histories where we spoke out of a wrong frame of spirit, heart, or mind. He showed me the damage and discouragement I had caused…even in relation to people I love the most. It was so painful and humbling to rehearse.
• The Lord said, “The words I have given you to speak are a ‘holy sacrament.’ Speaking ‘hopeless words of negation’ only serve to ‘resurrect’ the enemy that I have already ‘obliterated’ for you.”
He took me back to a very dramatic experience I had years ago when He powerfully defeated a terribly intimidating demonic spirit of negation and hopelessness that had tormented me. I witnessed the heat of this battle with my eyes wide open! When had He vanquished this demon by His mighty power, He asked me in an audible voice, “Whom do you fear now?”
Now, in this recent visit, He proclaimed again with strength, “I am your Victorious Warrior.” He said, “You have a choice to ‘resurrect’ this old enemy, but it is not My plan.” Then He showed me times when I had chosen to do this. Ugh!
• The Lord declared, “I intend to bring you into the goodness and blessing of Romans 5:17 so that you may reign in this life:
“‘For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ.’“
God spoke He wants to raise us up as true Hope Reformers who partner with Him to “reign in life”…to prevail over the darkness and misery of this world and bring the hope of the true Gospel to the cities and nations of the earth that He so deeply loves. The Holy Spirit said, “God has ‘lifted you up’ out of the ‘miry clay’ of Psalm 40 so that you can ‘mount up on wings of eagles’ to declare Isaiah 40:31 – ‘the glory of the Lord’ that ‘shall be revealed’ and how ‘all flesh will see it together.’“
• The Lord was shouting, “Soar with Me. I want to take you to a place in Me where the enemy’s voice ceases.” I was aware that this era could become like the time of Solomon in which all of his adversaries were subdued on every side. Then He said, “Destruction is not My answer. I have a redemptive plan.”
The Honorable Prophetic
To help me understand an even fuller context for and properly steward the prophetic, the Spirit took me in a vision to the tent of Noah to observe the correct behavior of Shem.
Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk and lay uncovered in his tent. And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father and told his two brothers outside. Then Shem and Japheth took a garment, laid it on both their shoulders, and walked backward and covered the nakedness of their father. Their faces were turned backward, and they did not see their father’s nakedness. Genesis 9:20-23
Shem covered his father’s nakedness, and the Lord promised us, “I will cover your shame and nakedness with My mercy,” and He instructed me to make sure that I do the same for my prophetic comrades and the Body at large. He made me aware of the “seeds of superiority” that the enemy would try to sow within us. We were being called to be vigilant to speak from His heart and not allow this to happen. I would have to first embrace the Lord’s correction to me in order to be able to declare to others what He wants me to offer others as a spiritual father.
He instructed me to honor those who are speaking for the Lord for being fathers and mothers in the faith. They have accomplished many good and great things in and for His Kingdom through the years. However, the Lord is saying, “Stop it with the negative words that have not been filtered through a lens of a heart that has been healed by the power of hope.”
The Rebuke
Jesus is issuing a word of correction to many of His beloved leaders in the land. This also extends out to segments of the people of God in general, for as the prophets and leaders go, so go the people. It is a word for all, from the greatest to the least. I saw some dark and heavy clouds of trouble, despair and depression roll across the hearts and minds of God’s people and leaders in all the arenas of life…even more intensely over the last quarter of 2013. I had personally encountered this satanic opposition during these past few weeks, but Jesus kept insisting to keep watching for the breakthrough in the clouds.
Then He warned us all with a very firm, but still loving, tone:
• “Do not speak until I lift you up out of the miry clay, and put a new song in your mouths.” He also declared with intensity, “I do not use the enemy to spank My children!” He said, “I intend to turn the enemy’s assaults and attacks into opportunities for you to partner with Me to transform them into portals of hope.”
He spoke this passage:
“…I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt” (Hosea 2:15).
The Lord decreed,
• “You must continue to watch until you can see and speak from the silver lining, the hopeful place with My hopeful solutions, versus speaking from the dark clouds that release the dark humidity of doubt and despair. Indeed, I have already positioned and am empowering both My angel armies and My Hope Reformers to discern and apply these divine answers.”
• “I will raise you up above the clouds to see My heavenly perspective of these negative situations and challenges and turn them into opportunities to advance in amazing ways and bring reformation to cities and nations. Mercy triumphs over judgment.”
• “Can you hear Me? I am giving you My blessing without reproach. Can you hear Me? Nehemiah did! I have a blueprint…a building kit…to birth the Kingdom Church…an apostolic reformation and the restoration of all things. Can you hear Me?”
The Lord said to stop being like Sanballat…a professional accuser…who twisted the truth by magnifying the challenge instead of magnifying the Lord. Like in the time of Nehemiah, the Lord is commanding us to be happy and rejoice with His plans to build and rebuild.
Questions And Answers: Then the Lord spoke to me about 2014 in response to my questions:
• “Civil war?” “No! Not to worry, hope peacemakers are rising up. Be praying for peace on all sides. Go forth and have fun. It is time to build.”
• “U.S. currency failure?” “No! Not to worry. I have some good plans. Therefore go and build.”
• “Protect ourselves to survive tribulations?” “No! I have you protected and covered like the cities in Goshen. Freedom is granted to live more generously than ever and bring reformation. Go, build and have fun!”
• “Need to hoard food?” “No! However, there will be a few various places where there will be need for food assistance, so be wise. Go and build, have fun, so that you can feed people. See your food multiply, and there will be supernatural and providential miracles in these days. I have My Hope Reformers ready to step in to help alleviate the hunger.”
The Lord continued on:
• The Lord said to all of us in a very kind but very firm tone, “Stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it! Stop spreading this misery, this evil humidity that you have been spewing out that settles upon the mountains. If you cannot speak out of life, do not speak out of death. Look again from a better view, from My perspective. You are to get above the clouds. To fear Me is to see what I see.”
• “It is harming, confusing and wounding My people…it puts My cities and nations under a dark cloud. It is speaking out of your own wounds…or your warfare, or your weariness, or your sense of rejection, or your isolation, or your disappointments, or your despair. I am bringing a healing model and restoring My joy to all those who have suffered pain in this life, and it is beautiful.
• “Let Me tell you how to fight with hope and love.” (At this point He laughed and lightened the mood.) “Ask Me this, ‘What would it be like if My servants simply focused on hope and love until the very end? What kinds of amazing solutions would I bring into this world?’“
• The Lord said, “Let’s fight against this enemy together! I do not want both sweet and bitter waters to proceed from the same source. I do want to go with you! But follow Me with joy, love, hope, and adventure in your hearts. Band together and reveal to all ‘The God of the Fifth Scene’ and call them into the Hope Reformation…the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits.” (See James 3:11; Daniel 11:32.)
The Hope Reformation Plan
• God said, “This is a Psalm 67 year.”
God is giving us a divine blueprint and a building plan. He is engineering a “new exodus” for God’s people to come out of “misery Christianity” into a hope-filled reformation. The Lord said,
• “I will release My people to leave the bondage and drudgery of religious agendas and traditions and the merely human expectations that require them all to just make brick after brick. I will commission them to go forth into all of life to worship Me in the beauty and wonder of the diversity I have created. They are to give back all their amazing gifts, talents, and daily works in the neighborhoods, streets, schools, and marketplaces as an acceptable offering to Me and I will then use them to glorify Me in all the earth.”
• The Lord said that we will see ourselves, our journey, and comprehend our story within the ancient story of Moses and the children of Israel.
I saw the Lord open up a hope-filled reformation blueprint where He magnifies Himself in supernatural and providential miracles this coming year. He will continue to trump evil with good and cause hope to be the anchor of our souls as we major on adoring Him well.
Bob Hartley (scribed by Michael Sullivant)
Deeper Waters Ministry
But God is inviting us to receive a NEW word from him (“prophets” speaking of the prophetic community we’re part of), which will take us into a new realm of battle, and into a new realm of victory. You’ll take territory you’ve never had before, territory that you’ll never have to give up.
