Consider The Significance Of God's Appointed Times
And
some of those of understanding shall fall, to refine them, purify them, and
make them white, until the time of the end; because it is still for the
appointed time
(Dan 11:35).
Jesus told the first disciples that it was not for them, then, to know the
times and seasons which God has placed under His own authority (Acts 1:7).
He
has a time allocated for Jesus' return (Matt 24:36).
Prior to that climactic event, the worst time in all history will occur, the
Great Tribulation (Matt 24:21). This will be a time of punishment of evil
(Luke 21:22).
Leading up to, and following, these events, there are to be "times
of restoration of all things" (Acts 3:21, NKJV).
We
are in one of those times of restoration now.
Truth is being restored through revelation.
These appointed times – when Jesus returns, when God punishes evil,
and restores all things – are depicted in overview by the Festivals of God [1],
also appropriately called moedim (Hebrew) or "appointed times". They
are times of God's visitation to mankind.
Besides these awesome events prophesied in the Bible are "lesser events" in
our history – appointed times nonetheless, when God visits through
further revelation and outpouring, with inevitable judgement.[2]
Here are some aspects which He has revealed to us.
Just prior to the autumn festivals, I wrote this
Letter
to
our happy small 'band' of supporters.
Men of God, moved by His Spirit, wrote many letters to the early churches –
some of which became part of holy writ because they revealed God's will to
the emerging Church. Now the Church is approaching the end of the era, here
is one of a different nature.
2nd
September 2002
As you
know, the time of the autumn festivals is fast approaching. By the time some
of you receive this letter it will be the Feast of Trumpets, a momentous
occasion indeed! I’m sure you can’t wait, like me, to see the meaning of
that Feast fulfilled in history – the dramatic return of Jesus and the end
of this present evil age! It isn’t so far away now! Just a few more years.
Not only
are God’s appointed times in the autumn feasts fast approaching, but so too
are His appointed times with us. By that I mean the fulfilment of His
personal promises to this ministry – the raising of the dead, the
unavoidable publicity that follows in its wake, and the restoration of what
the devil has stolen from us.
With this
letter I am sending three pamphlets:
How Long Revival?
Flowers in Every City (Diana, Princess of Wales),
and
The Last Outpouring of the Spirit.
Some of you
may have had these before. But these will remind you of the essence of what
God has in store, to reach the world via the mass media, before the darkness
of the Great Tribulation closes in on the world.
War in the
Middle East
On last
night’s news, there was confirmation from Tony Blair that he intends to join
George Bush in their assault on Iraq, taking Britain and America right into
the lion’s den. Eight years ago, via a prophetic word, God said that the
fires of final world war would be triggered by a spark from Iraq. (He didn’t
use those words, but that was the gist of what He said.)
In a dream
given to Kassahun Ayele on 3rd June 2001 (Newsletter 15 p 25), God forewarns
that after Yasser Arafat is assassinated, full scale war will break out in
the Middle East. The tinder box will finally ignite! Only God is holding
back these events by His angelic forces.
Judgement On Britain
In February
1989, Paul Slennett received a prophecy that (if the nation refused to take
note of God and His morality) a huge financial earthquake
would strike London, bringing the nation to its knees. (Recounted in
his book,
Earthquake in the City.)
Collapse
of the Stock Market
In various dreams God has given me, (mentioned in previous newsletters and
in
Dreams and Visions From God), the collapse of the stockmarket will
be shattering, both to the economy and viability of this nation, and to many
people’s individual lives. Harold Eatmon was shown by God that this collapse
would occur at the time of year when the leaves fall.
I don’t
know if this collapse will happen this autumn. Perhaps it may be next year
or the year after. Regardless, it is close. It could be this year!
God doesn’t say, because He wants you to be ready. He wants you to look to
Him, not to money or investments (which are merely trust placed in man,
instead of in God).
Why God
Allows Delays
God allows
delays to test people. When He first spoke to us in 1993 and 1994 about
raising the dead, naturally we thought that it was imminent. So did others.
One man kept phoning me every week to see if it had happened. When it didn’t
happen as expected, he fell away. His heart was not right with God, so God
allowed the word to test his loyalty. What was he looking for? Acclaim?
‘Fun’? Excitement? Power? Many people have wrong motives and misplaced
loyalties. They are ‘fleshly’ in their pursuit and desires. God allows
unexpected delays to reveal what really is in their heart. He knows already,
but He wants you to know, too, so that you can change to become more like
Him.
Many
stepped back and no longer walked with us. Why did they come our direction?
What did they expect to get from us? Did they want God? Did they want to
humble themselves (that’s the only way to find Him)? Or were they seeking
something entirely different? Something selfish? When people seek that, they
can only expect one thing: judgement. That’s why God brought them across our
path. He gave them warnings first, then He acted.
The
Workings of Prophetic Ministry
It was very
significant when we first obtained our PO Box, and the number the Post
Office gave us was 29. I didn’t know it then, but I found out later from
reading Bullinger’s Number in Scripture, that 29 denotes two things:
expectation and
judgement. (See
below under 29 and the Expectation of Judgement.) What two words could encapsulate the
essence of prophetic ministry more than those?
We have
seen God’s judgement fall time and time again on individuals who ‘came in
our door’, but who failed to respond properly to His call. They didn’t
expect it. Things didn’t work out the way they expected. Like in the parable
when the friend called at Midnight, it was a most unexpected time,
unexpected occasion and through an unexpected channel. But you know, God has
used an ass at one time to get His message across (Num 22:28). So,
unexpected or insignificant people being mouthpieces for God should not seem
that strange, after all.
Prophetic
ministry offends the mind to reveal the heart.
Expectation of judgement:
that’s what we are all about. God does not punish or ‘judge’ to be
vindictive. He wants people to turn away from their wrong ways or thoughts
which are harming them. After judgement falls, if they repent, He can show
them mercy. But there can be none of the latter without the former.
And that’s
where we are now – close to the time when God pours out His power to
demonstrate to an unbelieving world the reality of Himself, and to a wayward
church the importance of His holiness.
God
Shakes Things
When the
early believers had an experience of God’s power and holiness, they wanted
nothing else. They knew they didn’t need any physical substitute in which to
place their trust. They sold their land and investments and gave the money
to the apostles, so the truths of God could reach the needy (Acts 4:32-36).
This all happened after “the place where they were meeting was shaken. And
they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly”
(Acts 4:31, NIV).
We are fast
approaching another time of great shaking, when the word of God will make an
impact on this nation, spread to Europe and then on around the world. God is
going to do it by raising the dead.
Are You
Ready To Take Part?
This is the
last revival coming up! Are you ready? Get your spiritual shoes on! You’re
going to need them! Keeping up with those who return, and with the response
that it will generate, will be no mean task! You’re going to need a good
‘pair of shoes’. There’s a lot of ‘walking’ to be done, to take the truths
of God to others. This is why I'm writing to you:
Write
down the revelation make it plain on tablets so that whoever reads it may
run with it. For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the
end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will
certainly come, and will not delay (Habakkuk 2:2,3, NIV).
If you have
only just ‘tuned in’ and are not familiar with what God has told us
regarding this end-time witness, I will recap briefly for you here. He will
raise 50 or more people from the dead – those who have not just died, but
who have died weeks, months, or even years ago. He will bring them back to
mortal life, to shake the Church, to create a platform
for the truths of God which we possess, but which the Church at
large does not want to hear.
Getting
Ready For What God Will Do
You have
probably heard the name Marc McKenzie before in this context. That has been
‘on the cards’ since early 1994. More recently, God revealed in dreams that
Miss Barbara Jackson will be coming back too. She was 85 when she died in
1999. She left us the entirety of her possessions in her will, including her
modest home, which we sold, and with the proceeds we were able to finance
work in Africa, elsewhere overseas and some publishing here. But that was by
no means enough to do the mammoth amount of publishing that God has shown us
we need to do to adequately cope with the response that will come from
raising the dead. God showed me two years ago that we had to get ready for
this massive influx. I set to, immediately, and have been working constantly
ever since, without any real break, to get the publications ready in a
presentable format.
They MUST
be ready before the publicity breaks. After that, there won’t be time for
it. So I have been racing against time. Praise God, we are nearly there!
We are on
the gun lap, now. We have another four publications at press right now, with
three more nearly ready to go. I have four more to complete the count
(besides about 5 more volumes of
Articles of Faith). Then, I feel
that the publishing aspect is in place. (Although God showed me recently in
a dream that He is going to get us to do one more in the
Understanding
The Mind of God series, which will make it seven – the number which
someone originally prophesied to me would be written when I began to write
the early ones. I have not received anything about that yet, but I suspect
that it will be a final ‘humdinger’, possibly written some time during the
revival.) [3]
A dream to
Helena last week showed that when the ‘water pours from heaven’, we will not
be ready to handle the vast response. We need bigger premises, storage
facilities and offices than we presently have. God has shown us where these
will be, and how He is going to give them to us. But, unfortunately, people
have held us up in that regard. They have not responded promptly enough to
have made that a reality now. If we had such facilities now, we could be
preparing. Instead, that has to remain on hold, until the people whom He is
prompting respond properly to His prods.
God showed
Helena that when the revival breaks, the water will break through our roof
and come in. (Not a very pleasant prospect!) We will be trying to catch it
with a plastic container! That’s where we are now. A family operated
ministry where I, my wife and Zenya work to keep things running, is not a
large enough set-up to cope with hundreds of requests a day! We need
manpower and the facilities where that manpower can work. And we can’t have
just any old manpower. We need spiritually minded people, truly dedicated to
God, conscientious and diligent.
I have
faith that God will provide, but He has already shown that it’s not going to
be easy by any means. He’s warning us that there will be ups – and downs!
It’s going to be a real struggle, especially to begin with.
What God
Intended For This Ministry
It echoes
what we have been through financially to get where we are now. God has not
opened the heavens and let £50 notes flutter down. Nor has He provided a
solid, reliable financial base via a supportive church. That was not in His
design. If He had taken us that route, we would not have had the time to
write the publications that He was planning. He appointed us as a prophetic
ministry, and that has involved being totally independent of even human
loyalties in a church situation. He separated us so that He could reveal
various things in dreams, and to have us write them down to reach a much
broader audience in publications. The separation and isolation was of His
design too, so that He could take us with a prophetic input and warning to
Reinhard Bonnke, Morris Cerullo, God Digital, and various high profile
evangelists.
You Can
Have Implicit Trust in God
So, while
it has enabled us to follow God’s lead largely unhindered, it has left us
without adequate means of support. Which is why we are £XX,XXX in debt, and
facing more publishing bills that we can’t even find space to put on our
credit cards. Some would be worried about this, but God is wonderful. He
gives you peace of mind. When you walk through the valley of the shadow of
death, you don’t fear any evil when He walks beside you! It’s amazing. He
gives faith for each situation that He takes you through. If I didn’t have
that faith from Him for this situation, I would have ulcers bigger than my
stomach!
Some look
at the credit card debts as failure on our part. And they have stepped back
from assisting us, thinking that God is not with us.
They are
not spiritual enough to see that I didn’t devise those publications. God
did. Moreover, HE made those credit cards available to us. You might say
that they are a miracle. A 'funny' sort of miracle, but a miracle
nonetheless, because they came at just the right time, and with low rates of
interest for a while. When those low rates expire, the card companies hope
to screw us for profits. But God has given me His promise, “Son, you won’t
sink in this thing!” Thank you, Father.
He is
always faithful, even if people are not.
Following God’s Lead Takes Faith
There was a
time some years ago when He told us to copy a set of four tapes for
Worldwiders and send them those four tapes about the impending Tribulation,
and how they needed to make preparation for it. They had to go to just short
of 500 addresses. No one listened!
“What a
waste of money that was!” you might say. Many
would say that. That is
the human appraisal. But it isn’t God’s appraisal. It wasn’t a waste. God
told me to do it. He warns people, long before they face their time of
trial. He gives them all the time they need.
Sending
those tapes cost £1,000. And I didn’t have the money to do it. But I did it
anyway because God told me. And when God tells you to do something, He makes
a way. The only way I had was to put it on a credit card. So I did. That
wasn’t my problem. It was God’s. But it was no problem to Him!
When the
time for payment became due, a man appeared at our doorstep wanting to
fellowship with us. He just turned up ‘out of the blue’. (He wasn’t an
angel. He was a person.) We shared together and a day later he came back
with an envelope in his hand. He said that God told him to give me £1,000.
It paid the bill.
And so,
having more than £XX,XXX to find doesn’t bother me. It’s not my problem. For
some of you reading this, it may be yours. But ultimately it rests with God.
All He wants you to do is to ask Him what He would have you do. He has
already shown me that He will bale us out. I’m not quite sure how, but I
know He will. Meanwhile, we just get on with preparing the publications, so
they are in place for when the ‘bubble’ bursts. We get on with doing His
will. Which is what you must do, too.
Get
Ready
Just make
sure you are in His will. Listen to His voice. When that ‘still small voice’
prompts you, do it immediately. Don’t put it off. It may be to send some
pieces of literature to someone whom God puts in your mind. It may be to
write to that old friend you haven’t seen for 20 years, and share with them
some of what God is doing. Show others you care. Share God’s love and truth,
and the waters of salvation and healing will wash up on their shore,
bringing joy to them and to your heart, too.
Sincerely,
in His love,
Malcolm B
Heap
Dream of
the Queen
PS Last
night Helena had a dream about the Queen. God revealed a little bit about
her, which has formed the basis of a letter to her today from Helena, sent
with a number of our booklets and the enclosed (items listed on page 4),
which includes revelations about Diana’s return.
God said to
Morris Cerullo more than a decade ago: “Everything that can be shaken, will
be shaken," just as He prophesied through Haggai (2:6) and Paul (Heb 12:26).
Therefore "serve God acceptably with reverence and fear. For our God is a
consuming fire" (Heb 12:28,29).
Some
Other Revelations from God
When God births ‘a new thing’, which is meant to supersede the old, He does
not continue to promote the old. Hence the following dreams:
14th Sept 2002. H. We were busy conducting a
funeral of many
Christian leaders who were still alive. This is symbolic of what God is
going to do through miracles, which will shake the leadership to their
roots! The impact of revival will bury them alive!
5th Sept 2002. H. We were hacking our way through the jungle to
create a through road for others to follow, where others have not gone
before. It took a lot of effort.
17th Sept 2002. H. In this dream, some Christians were finding
the
Sabbath hard to accept. One group whispered to each other about the
Sabbath, fearful of what others might think. Another group went underground
to keep it, hiding from others.
On the ground lay a number of long metal sheets several feet wide. These
were going to be used to make a path for others to walk along. Our job is to
lay these down so others may see the validity of the Sabbath, so that it is
easier for people to accept it. The paths will be long-lasting. God’s ways
and God’s Sabbaths are here to stay!
20th Sept 2002. H. We lived in a bungalow with windows and patio doors
facing neighbours. We had little privacy. People could see what we
were doing. Even the back door to the garden had to be locked up.
The dream conveys publicity intruding into our lives.
10th Oct 2002. H. I dreamed of a huge arena, full of people. There were
many discussions going on about life, spirituality, family matters
and other interesting topics. As a bystander, I felt involved in these
discussions. Then someone came to me, got hold of me and held me against my
will. I felt totally helpless and unable to get away.
The dream depicts the results which God’s miracles will instigate. They will
affect the whole nation. Many will be brought to God through the challenges.
The man represents the grip of the media who will pursue us relentlessly.
All this will occur to bring glory to God and make Jesus widely known.
Reuben Oviomor in Nigeria wrote to me on 1st October about what God had
told him
for us – “plan very big, for the work is so big and the time is so short.”
In July 2002, a dream of April 1998 was fulfilled when a peacock
wandered onto our land and made itself at home. It was a sign from God of
the fulfilment of His promises to us – restoring what the devil has stolen.
(See
Dreams and Visions From God, p 15.)
Around that time, a man called at our door about some other related
matters and got talking about something he had experienced in the mid 1990s.
He was given a vision of angels standing either side of him, and in front of
him was the Book of Life. The angels told him that “in these days, many
millions of people will come to know the Lord.” Then he was given a number.
It was 55 million! He felt that this number referred to primarily those in
Britain, and secondarily from Europe. They are among those mentioned in Rev
7:11.
Why
did God bring him here to tell us that? Why did we produce 55 issues of our
journal Awake! Awake!? It will be obvious to the spiritually
discerning. 5 symbolises God’s preparation, and 11 writings He has inspired,
prior to His judgements.
29 and the Expectation of
Judgement
Reuben also
related how God’s judgement has fallen on those who tried to dismiss the
truth about the Sabbath, and not obey it:
“Two
weeks ago God visited a notable pastor who has been debating with me [over
the Sabbath issue]. [God visited him] by showing him the judgement that will
befall those who disobey the fourth commandment. This led him to believe
[and accept] the Sabbath and the festivals. Today he worships on the Sabbath
with his group.”
He has mentioned previously that many
pastors, used to observing Sunday, find the change hard to accept, even when
they see how right it is. Indeed, it is hard! But it’s not as hard as God’s
judgement that falls on those who refuse to keep it.
Many try to ignore it. They compromise.
But, thankfully some realise, without argument, that it is right and proper
to keep it holy. In that same letter of 29th August, Reuben mentioned that
five pastors have turned around and are now making sure they observe this
important command.
The foregoing letter excerpt from
Reuben Oviomor in Nigeria, highlights a very vital point.
In our meeting on the Feast of
Trumpets, which symbolises Jesus’ coming, we were moved to talk about the
most critical facet of Jesus’ return – His invisible coming in our lives.
One could say that this coming is the embodiment of the numeric significance
of 29. (Reuben’s letter was written on the 29th, which is a curious
‘coincidence’.)
Why is 29 significant in this respect?
Because Jesus comes to reveal more of Himself, more of His truth, more of
His workings among men. When any further revelation of Himself is resisted,
when people don’t want to go further on with Him, they compromise their
obedience to His truth. So they must expect judgement to follow.
According to Bullinger:
20 = expectation
9 = judgement.
Southern Nigeria, where Reuben lives,
is smothered with Sunday-keeping churches. It’s very ‘Christianised’. But
few will accept the truth about the Sabbath and turn from their compromise.
Many step back, and many fall away as a result.
The expectation of judgement that will
come to those who deny God over this point is sure.
One pastor, when he considered whether
to obey God on the Sabbath issue, received in the spirit a witness about how
dreadful God’s judgement will be on those who refuse to obey Him. Revelation
16:1 introduces this sentence of seven horrendous plagues:
Then I heard a loud voice from the temple saying to the
seven angels, “Go and pour out the bowls of the wrath of God on the earth.”
Read about the remainder of that
horrific judgement in Revelation 16! And don’t visualise it as an ethereal,
far-off event. It’s for our time! You can count on the fingers of one hand
the number of years to that time of awful punishment.
Some years ago, God spoke to us very
clearly in a dream about not holding back, but declaring boldly and clearly
the truth about His Sabbaths. God does not want division in the Church on
this issue. He wants His people to honour Him by keeping ALL His commands,
and to learn the sanctity of every word of God. Far too many compromise and
defile God’s pure word. They can only expect to fall under judgement in some
way.
Of course, this judgement can take a
number of forms. It can occur right away. God doesn’t wait until the time
spoken of in Revelation 16. Those who step back, out of fear of man, or
laziness, or spiritual carelessness, begin to lose something. They lose a
blessing from God.
They may forfeit spiritual gifts, or
spiritual knowledge and awareness. Problems may arise. Things don’t run
smoothly. Any number of different things can occur to disturb your spiritual
peace, or to destroy what God has begun. Whatever individual form the
judgement takes, one thing is common to all: they forfeit the wonderful
closeness of walking with Him.
Malcolm B
Heap |