Part 1 says "We are entering into a spiritual winter. It's time to stoke the fires."  Click here for the rest of the word.

In part 2 I heard "the theme in 2014 will be a light shined in darkness."  

Situation Report
Dark is getting darker as people call evil good and good evil (Isa. 5:20).  Because of the transgression in the land civil government expands its reach through a multitude of laws (Prov 28:2).  Unrighteous men who create unrighteous laws (ie. that kill innocent children) will not have fellowship with God (Ps. 94:20-23).  The growing confusion and death all point to dark getting darker (Isa. 41:29, Isa. 24:10, Ps. 107:10, Isa. 9:2, Zech 12:4).

We draw near to the "day of the Lord."  It is a time where there are multitudes who have entered into the valley of decision (Joel 3:14).  It is a day of darkness and gloominess (Joel 2:2).

A People Come Great and Strong - the Sons of Light - Out of Zion

Joel 2:2-3A day of darkness and gloominess,  A day of clouds and thick darkness, Like the morning clouds spread over the mountains.  A people come, great and strong, The like of whom has never been;  Nor will there ever be any such after them,
Even for many successive generations.  A fire devours before them, And behind them a flame burns; The land is like the Garden of Eden before them, And behind them a desolate wilderness; Surely nothing shall escape them. NKJV

Joel 2:10-12
The earth quakes before them, The heavens tremble;  The sun and moon grow dark, And the stars diminish their brightness. 
 The Lord gives voice before His army,  For His camp is very great; For strong is the One who executes His word. For the day of the Lord is great and very terrible; Who can endure it?  "Now, therefore," says the Lord,  "Turn to Me with all your heart, With fasting, with weeping, and with mourning." NKJV

Joel 3:16 
The Lord also will roar from Zion,  And utter His voice from Jerusalem;  The heavens and earth will shake; But the Lord will be a shelter for His people, And the strength of the children of Israel. NKJV

John 12:35-36
Then Jesus said to them, "A little while longer the light is with you. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you; he who walks in darkness does not know where he is going.   While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light." NKJV

1 Thessalonians 5:5-11
You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness.  Therefore let us not sleep, as others do, but let us watch and be sober.  For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night.  But let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation.  For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, 10 who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him. 
Therefore comfort each other and edify one another, just as you also are doing. NKJV

Dark will grow darker but light will grow lighter.

Isaiah 60:1-3 
Arise, shine;  For your light has come! And the glory of the Lord is risen upon you.   For behold, the darkness shall cover the earth,  And deep darkness the people; But the Lord will arise over you,  And His glory will be seen upon you.  The Gentiles shall come to your light,
And kings to the brightness of your rising. 

Darkness will continue to grow but so will the light.  When God designed light and dark He set a boundary between the two and He called this boundary good (Gen. 1:4).  

You will see a holy people emerge not out of legalism but rather a holy love for Jesus Christ our Lord.  As they take up their cross, die to themselves as Jesus did, they will become bearers of the light and the anointing.  

Zion was the place of continual prayer, praise and worship in a city.  We will see more and more city churches cooperating together to create the atmosphere of heaven (continual prayer, praise and worship) in their cities.  Houses of prayer will become more like strategic operation centers helping facilitate and coordinate the efforts of local congregations.  Kingdom minded leaders from all spheres of society will form councils which will be like gathering the elders at the gates of a city. These kingdom minded people will gather together corporately, work together corporately as priests, and then as kings take their light into their spheres of influence.  They will be Christ bearers, lights that shine in darkness gone to deliver those who are bound in darkness hating even the garments stained by sin.

Behold a GREAT LIGHT is emerging across our land.  A light shines in darkness!  God is calling forth strong men to carry the light for it is they who will overcome the strongman.

Matthew 12:29-30
Or how can one enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he will plunder his house.  30 He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters abroad. NKJV

In 2014:

• The watch of the Lord will grow in cities to seat the courtroom of heaven
• We will see more decisions for Christ this year as we draw nearer the dawning of a 3rd Great Awakening

Let us pray the Lord of the harvest send laborers to the harvest.  Let us pray for the restoration of David's tabernacle (Amos 9:11-12).  Click here for Part 1 of What is God Saying for 2014?  

See read more to learn about the  two supermoons that will occur in January as signs confirming the word.

Satan launched an all out campaign to undermine the fear of the Lord.  How?  I'm glad you asked.  

The key is to undermine the truth that God is the Creator.  When you get rid of the truth that there is a Creator then you have undermined that fact that there is "divine design."  When you undermine divine design then the truth that everyone is created with a purpose is attacked.  When purpose is destroyed then accountability is torpedoed.  Accountability means the responsibilty to answer for your choices.  When you destroy the concept of everyone giving an account for their life before an eternal God, then you have dismantled the fear of God.  Psalm 111:10 and Proverbs 9:10 teach us that the fear of the Lord is the begining of wisdom. 

There is lots of talk in the body of Christ today saying there is no need for fear because fear drives you away and does not draw you near.  That's not totally true.  There are two kinds of fear.  Matthew 25 and Luke 19 Jesus illustrates the kind of fear that drives a wedge between the servant and his master.  You remember the parable.  Three servants were given some money.  Two invested and recieved a return while one servant hid their talent out of fear.  That kind of fear that provoked inaction and missed the mark actually contributed to the seperation between the master and his servant.  (The introduction was inspired as I listend to Bill Johnson teach on "Dealing with Sexual Sin in the Church.")

There is another kind of fear based on reverence, love, respect and awe. Its the kind of fear that is found in a healthy relationship with a parent or a spouse. It is a recognition of the consequences possible through trust being violated.  This kind of fear actually facilitates intimacy and draws us near.  

Campaigns are a series of battles.  Here are a few battles I'd like to highlight to illustrate the effects of Satan's strategy with the hope that it will inspire you to engage in God's divine plan for your life.  Let's start with Satan's attack on accountability.  I like to think of it as account-ability or as, do you have the ability to count?  

If you are wondering if I was using a word play you are correct.  Do you have the ability to make a difference?  You can if you are honest and can count numerically. This is how you can introduce accountability (a count ability).   

Why does it seem like the world is going crazy?   Matthew 24:12 sheds some light as to why.  

"And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold. " NKJV

The Greek word translated lawlessness here means "illegal violation of the law, wickedness, iniquity, and unrighteousness.  It comes from a word that means lawless."  It is either breaking established boundaries or operating outside of boundaries wether knowingly or in ignorance.

The word abound means multiply and the word translated love refers to the "agape" unconditional love of God.  

The word translated "cold" is fascinating and sheds tremendous light.  The Greek word translated cold is actually "psycho."  In the Greek it means to breathe on something so as to reduce the tempature or make it cool.  This word also serves as the basis for our modern understanding of "psycho" used in words such as a psychopathic or psychotic person.  Dictionary.com says these are crazy or mentally unstable.     

Matthew 24:12 means "and because lawlessness, people acting as if there are no absolutes, boundaries or eternal laws, continue to multply their love for God wains and they act like they've lost their mind doing crazy things."  

The truth is without the love of God people go crazy and do stupid things.  Sin makes people stupid.  Stupid refers to a dulled, foolish or senseless mind.     

Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector who was rich.  Luke 19 describes how this little guy Zacchaeus climbed up a tree to see Jesus.  He was surprised when this led to a divine encounter with Jesus in his home.  Everyone knew Zacchaeus was a sinner.  Some knew it through personal experience that he was dishonest and a thief.  Many were offended that Jesus would spend time with him in his house.  

By God's love and grace this led to transformed heart.  This was illustrated by what Zacchaeus did after the encounter. 

Luke 19:8-10   
Then Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord, "Look, Lord, I give half of my goods to the poor; and if I have taken anything from anyone by false accusation, I restore fourfold."   And Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham;  

What is truly remarkable here is to realize what just happened.  Zacchaeus did DOUBLE what the Law required.  Exodus 22:7 required a thief to restore double.  But in this case he did twice as much as what the Law required?  Instead of just returning double he restored four times as much.  Why?  Here is what I have learned.


Two Lessons

1. A true encounter with Jesus leads to a transformed life evidenced through a change of action.  You can see the effect of an encounter with the living God.  Faith and love go hand in hand.  They work together and faith without works is dead (James 2).
2. Grace is God's enabling power.  Grace goes beyond the requirements of the law because the motive is not "the love of the law" but the "law of love."  

I met Representative Matt Shea in Spokane WA in 2010 while I was mobilizing the Church in that region through Operation Rolling Thunder.  I liked Matt right away.  He is an army officer, a combat veteran, an attorney and a Christian.  I like all that, but what I truly like is that Matt entered the political arena to serve.  He did not check his morals and convictions at the door of political expediency.  From my observation, truth is something that is important to him and he is not afraid to stand up with boldness and courage to fight for the truth. 

I remember the oath I took to defend the constitution of these United States and from watching him over the last three years, I'd say he remembered that oath too.  It also appears like he has actually read it and is defending it rather than undermining it and violating it for political expediency.  I appreciate the moral conviction and courage he has been demonstrating.  Now, I'd like to share with you some sage advice he just offered in his recent blog

Over the years I've marveled how often Hollywood comes out with a movie that has a title and a theme that speaks to the season that we are in.  It's happened again with Star Trek's Into the Darkness. 

Currently our nation is the weakest we've been in this modern era.  We have the most debt we've ever had, we have scandal after scandal being exposed.  We have an administration who is undermining the constitution with practices that seem more fit for a socialist or even communist form of government.  Life, family, marriage, etc. is all under attack and.... the list goes on.  We've entered into one of the darkest chapters of our nations history.  How did we get here?  Proverbs 20:20 provides perfect insight. 

One of the first steps taken towards this present darkness were taken in the 60s during the sexual revolution.  It began with dishonoring the parents.  Rebellion was in the wind and we are now experiencing the maturation of those decisions in this generation. 

We are in deep, deep darkness.  Good is called evil and evil good.  On one hand I hate this situation and on the other hand I am truly excited.  The stage is set for a great awakening.

America is embroiled in many public scandals today!  The expose is growing.  The Washington Post has consolidated some of these in "Mr. Obama and his scandals."  It lists among other things how that the "Justice Department" leaks documents to attack a whistle blower who expose the "Fast and Furious" debacle, the IRS targeting conservative political and religious groups, the Justice Department violating the First Amendment snooping into Associated Press and Fox News reporters seeking to intimidate, the Benghazi atrocity which is worse than Watergate, and.... the list goes on.

I submit that this is the fruit of more than 50 years of a growing rejection of the Lord and His moral commands.  In 1963 prayer was banned by our Supreme Court and one year later the court banned bible reading which was followed as school after school removed the 10 commandments.    

President Harry S Truman popularized the saying "the buck stops here."  This administration acts like the "buck stops there, and there and there..." anywhere but here.  Blame shifting and avoiding responsibility seem to be the protocol of the day.

Here is a dollar for those who need to buy a clue!  The rejection and erosion of our relationship with The Lord has undermined our moral fabric.  No system, I repeat, NO SYSTEM can survive and function without character.  The family unit can not survive.  Capitalism will not work.  A Justice Department run by people with no morals will not uphold laws.  The IRS will not stay within the confines of the law when it is run by people with no internal moral boundaries.  Here is another secret for those who believe socialism or communism is a better system.  They won't work without moral boundaries either.  What do you think led to the downfall of the Soviets?

Judgment began in the household of God as scandal after scandal has been revealed and I have not doubt it will continue as our Lord cleans house.  But now this trend has spilled over into other spheres of society.