Dear Joyous Ones:
The Feast of Tabernacles begins tonight at sundown. Tabernacles is a time to enjoy the Lord and celebrate His goodness. Leviticus 23:40 says, “Rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days.” Deuteronomy 16:14-15 says, “Be joyful at your feast for the Lord your God will bless you and your joy will be complete.” When this Feast was outlined in Leviticus 23:39-43, it not only remembered the Exodus from Egypt when the Israelites wandered in the wilderness, living in tents, enroute to the Promised Land, but also celebrated the abundance of God’s blessings in connection with the ingathering of the fall harvest. This is a wonderful time to gather with friends and family and rejoice over the Lord’s goodness and provision.
The Feast of Tabernacles is a celebration of God’s glory. This is a time to remember past experiences of His glory, to seek His face and experience His glory now, and a time to call out to God for a fresh outpouring of His glory in the new year. One week a year, God asks His people to tabernacle with Him. God promised a special blessing for those who would do this. Part of celebrating Tabernacles is to bring an offering as an expression of thanks to God. Deut. 16:16-17 says, “No man should appear before the LORD empty-handed: Each of you must bring a gift in proportion to the way the LORD your God has blessed you.” When we express our thankfulness in giving, it opens our heart to receive even more.
Tabernacles is a time to celebrate the fact that God tabernacles with His people. He wants His glory to be a normal part of our experience. He tabernacled with Israel in the wilderness. He tabernacled on earth in Jesus and He continues to tabernacle with us today through His Spirit! As you celebrate Tabernacles, call out to God for His glory to come and dwell with you. Beginning tonight at 6 PM CDT and continuing each night throughout this week of feasting, we will post a video to help you enter into joy worship and receive new strength for the year ahead!
Contending for Joy!
The Lord has a purpose to move any desolation into a new level of abundance. From the beginning, when God saw the Earth in confusion and chaos, He planned for a people who would move from chaos into multiplication. He spoke! Chaos subsided and abundance began. This is the essence of spiritual life. When Yeshua, Jesus of Nazareth, defined why He came or was sent to Earth, He said in John 10:10, “… I came that they might enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, until it overflows).” Many Christians, even those that are seeking to understand their earthly purpose, never realize that the One who was sent to redeem them purposed them to “enjoy life.” Prior to this portion of the verse, we find Jesus declaring, “I AM the Door! Anyone who enters in through Me will be saved (will live). He will come in and he will go out [freely], and will find pasture. The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy.” (AMP) This is meant to help you enter the Door (called Christ) into a new dimension of abundance.
We have approximately 75 people that work for this ministry. Several years ago I was sitting in my office in a quandary because I knew I needed to give a Christmas bonus for those who had served so faithfully all year long. I know that the holidays can be a tremendous blessing, but very stressful as well. I heard the Lord remind me of one of the key verses that have directed my life – the one I quoted above from John 10. However, His voice illuminated deep within my spirit with the portion of that scripture that says I came that you might ENJOY LIFE.
I knew I had to move by faith. Faith comes from hearing … hearing when the Spirit of God speaks to us. Faith’s counterpart is presumption. Therefore, one must be sure they have heard the voice of God. The Spirit of God spoke to me and said, “Enjoy those who have served, and bless them.” I knew I was to take what we did not have and bless each one who had served. Joy began to overwhelm me. By the next morning, all that I had given (which was a substantial amount) was already on the way through the mail. The real miracle was that something changed in me. Anxiety from trauma that I had carried for years and years and years had lifted. That old, bad friend was gone and the joy of the Lord had replaced that portion within my soul and spirit.
We have been in great warfare. Warfare is conflict, and in the midst of the conflict we can lose our joy. Joy produces strength. When we don’t sense the life of Christ flowing through us, we need to ask the Lord, “What has happened to my passion? In the midst of my circumstance, Lord, did I just get tired and quit withstanding?” In truth, we can pray until we are green. We can do all sorts of religious activities. But if we don’t resist the enemy in the midst of that trial (the temptation toward passivity and all other temptations), and if we don’t allow the trial to bring the working of the Cross into us, then we won’t really enter into the passion and fullness of life that the Lord intends. Having God’s passion as we walk in wisdom and revelation is the key to protecting ourselves from becoming outwitted by the enemy.
Yeshua, Himself, prophesied that a triumphant people, filled with Father’s revelation, would arise and prevail against Hell’s gates. This people will do exploits! They will take resources and multiply or change them into a new form to be used today. These people are an apostolic people. They are a modern people, yet look very much like those who crossed over the Jordan River 476 years after God spoke them into existence when He communicated to their Father, Abraham. The Gates of Hell will not be able to withstand this people. We are a people that will build a new prototype for today and unlock a Kingdom mentality that hell cannot withstand. We send this from this Apostolic Center. May you be filled with the fire of His Glory and overwhelming joy.
Sow Into Your Joy!
I keep hearing the Holy Spirit saying, ‘The sound of joy is in you!’ As the people of God, we must release the sound of joy! No matter what our natural circumstances or situations dictate, and no matter what we feel physically, we have a sound of joy to release. We must employ the law of sowing and reaping, and sow from the joy in us which is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. As we release the sound of joy from the earth, He releases His joy from Heaven based on Psalm 16:11, ‘In His Presence, there is fullness of joy and at His right hand there are pleasures for evermore’. That joy becomes our strength to produce supernatural victory! Find the sound in Heaven that will produce joy in the earth today!
Blessings,
Chuck D. Pierce