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Church, What Time is it Really?

by Honey Stone
03/11/18
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This is purposely written on daylight saving time. Selah

There are several Christians influencing my thoughts lately. One is dead (but alive in Christ) and the other two are alive (and alive in Christ). The influencers are A.W. Tozer, Stephen Jone’s blog of God’s Kingdom Ministries, and an old apology by Dutch Sheets.

The scripture I will focus on from Tozer’s inspiration from the Beatitude portion: Blessed are the poor for theirs is the kingdom of God. 

De-possess What Possesses You

Everybody talks about the blessings of Abraham but they don’t do the de-possessing of their Isaacs as Tozer writes about. Let me show you a bit of my de-possessing process.

In third grade I won first place in the wild life drawing contest. In fact, I didn’t hang my color crayon drawing of ‘a koala and baby’ on the wall because I knew someone else would win. I had never won any coloring contests in first of second grade even though I was known as a good drawer. But Mrs. Joseph hung my drawing on the hallway wall and I heard my named called. From that point on, that became my identity; I was an artist.

So when I went to art school I was devastated to find out that I was the worst of the best. It was a shaky time for me in college. The criticism and competition was overwhelming. I had personal dreams of being a greeting card designer or a children’s book illustrator. I tried and tried but it never transpired. I had trouble drawing multiple characters and I did not make much money on some of the attempts I’ve made with my greeting cards. I finally realized that I couldn’t draw whatever I wanted because I was a prophetic artist.

Yet writing came easy to me and that opened the doors everywhere. It opened doors for me to write out my spiritual dreams and poems and give them to the leaders of my church. It opened doors in marketing. But it wasn’t my personal dream and perhaps the reason I had no true success with visual art was because I couldn’t lay down my Isaac.

God’s dream was for me do have an arts ministry of many colors…I mean many kinds. He personally took me on a journey of learning the various arts such as visual art, writing, dance, music, and drama. I did not know that was His intention until about three or four years ago. I can easily say that I have no ego invested in the other arts.

Joseph Anointing / Tabernacles Time

Joseph was the first character in a series of men and women in the Bible that I identified with. I went to the play and realized that other people had spiritual dreams. I sang and danced the songs before everyone in my life including my family and co-workers.

According to Stephen Jones, Jesus had a Judah and Levi mantle in his first coming, and has a Joseph mantle in His second coming. The Judah mantle was concerning his kingly (lion) rights. The Levi mantle was concerning his priestly duties. These are represented in the feasts of Passover and Pentecost.

BUT the Joseph mantel represents the fruitful bough or favored son or manifested son’s mantle of the feast of Tabernacles. This is the inheritor’s anointing.

Now, let’s look at Joseph and his process. He was betrayed by his brothers, put in a pit, sold as a slave, rose to power, put in jail, defamed, redeemed, rose to power again and forgave to enter the purpose of saving his family. Does that sound a lot of Jesus?

How do we enter into the inheritor’s anointing?

1) We remove all other loves in our life and make God first. Are you at ground zero? Good.

2) We go through the process of suffering in various ways so we can be a Son or Daughter and not a child.

What Time is it? 

The hour we are on according to the statue in the book of Daniel as calculated by Stephen Jones is the crushing rock of the Kingdom Age.

Before the Lakeland Revival I got a dream where a clock said Daniel Time and was set at 11:00 o’clock and the words Joel’s End Time Army. I saw buses with people in them. I realize that Todd Bentley had that name in his ministry at the time but he does not any longer. I realize that there is controversy in what the end time army actually is. Some say it is God’s army and others say it comes against God’s army. You do your research. 

A Strong Word From Dutch…Grow Up!

The leaders in my church were debating about what was going on in Lakeland. Things were getting weird (to say it kindly) and finally the revival stopped and then Dutch Sheets wrote this statement which I hope leaders pay attention to:

We, the leaders of the charismatic community, have operated in an extremely low level of discernment. Frankly, we often don’t even try to discern. We assume a person’s credibility based on gifts, charisma, the size of their ministry or church, whether they can prophesy or work a miracle, etc. (Miracles and signs are intended to validate God and His message, not the messenger; Sometimes they validate the assignment of an individual, but never the person’s character, lifestyle or spiritual maturity.)

We leaders in the Church have become no different than the world around us in our standards for measuring success and greatness. This has contributed to the body of Christ giving millions of dollars to undeserving individuals; it has allowed people living in sin to become influential leaders—even to lead movements, allowing them influence all the way to the White House. Through our lack of discernment we built their stages and gave them their platforms. We have been gullible beyond words—gullible leaders producing gullible sheep. When a spiritual leader we’re connected with violates trust, is exposed for immorality or falls below otheraccepted standards of behavior, it does not exonerate us simply to say we don’t condone such behavior. Those we lead trust us to let them know whom to trust. We have failed them miserably in this regard. For this lack of discernment, and for employing and passing on inappropriate standards of judgment, I repent to the Lord and ask forgiveness of the body of Christ…

We, the leaders of the charismatic church, have built on hype sensation, innovation, programs, personality and charisma. This has produced: shallowness; false movements; novice leaders—gifted but immature and untested; a deficient understanding of God’s word; the building of man-centered rather than kingdom-centered churches and ministries; competition rather than cooperation; humanistic, self-centered Christians who don’t understand sacrifice and commitment; Christians without discernment; superstar leaders; a perverted and powerless gospel;prayer-less and anemic Christians; a replacement of the fear of the Lord with the fear of man; and a young generation that is cynical of it all. We are responsible, not the devil; he takes what we give him. For this compromise in the way we build, for giving the Church watered down wine, commercial Christianity, a flashy but weak Church and hype disguised as anointing, I repent to God and ask forgiveness of the body of Christ.

Final Thoughts

Here’s my thoughts and these have come at a time of depossesing. I would like to say that some leaders are on the wrong ‘time table’ and need to adjust. I realize that some have a great following and this is embarrassing, but it’s time to face the truth. The time table is not Passover or Pentecost. The time table is Tabernacles. I have a handful of confirmations that I don't feel the need to share.

P.S. Can we focus on quality over quantity.