Thank you to those of you who were able to join us at the First Kingdom Congress last Friday evening in Everett. What a time we had! More than 150 leaders from government, business, education, ministry, and other spheres gathered to exalt King Jesus over our state and issue a response to the Goliath-sized challenges of our day. Is there not a cause?!

The vision presented at the First Kingdom Congress was one of corporate unity and projected power in the body of Christ. The consensus of those that gathered was, "Why not us, and why not now?" We are on the cusp of a historic new work of cooperation and unity in the Church of Washington State, one that will see the elders return to the gates of our cities, and the watch of the Lord establish a wall of prayer around the state.

For those of you who were not able to come, we invite you to join us on October 3, 2014 for the Second Kingdom Congress, where we will continue to unfold the plan for 1Church1Day (www.1church1day.org), the strategy for linking the body in a continual prayer watch for our state and gathering leaders from each of the seven spheres of society into strategic councils. These two efforts, combined with the communication plan that will link them, will provide valuable spiritual and natural intelligence for how to position the Church for
transformation in our state.

Between now and the Second Kingdom Congress, we also invite you to learn more about the vision at http://www.1church1day.org/and sign up there for the 1Church1Day mailing list to receive updates, articles, and information about upcoming training for the work we'll be doing together.

This Passover will be marked by a very rare heavenly event: a lunar eclipse. Some have coined this a blood moon.  In fact it is the first of four blood moons that will occur on the Feasts of Passover and Sukkot (Tabernacles) in 2014 and 2015. Four lunar eclipses are called a tetrad and there have only been seven recorded since 1 AD.  In the last century the tetrads occurred twice.  The first was associated with Israel becoming a nation in 1948 and the second was in 1967 right after the Six Day War occurred.  That's remarkable don't you think?

Jesus told us about the conditions that would exist before He returns in Matthew 24-25 and  Luke 21.  He says that there will be signs in the sun, the moon and the stars and admonishes us not to allow ourselves to allow our hearts to become weighed down with drunkenness, carousing, or the cares of this life but to rather "watch and pray."  My friends, we are living in amazing times and God still has plans for the nation of Israel.  Israel finds herself in very challenging times once again as peace talks have stalled and are set to expire on April 29th.  Historically tetrads have always marked a time of tragedy followed by triumph for Israel.  

The lunar eclipse (blood moon) is scheduled to begin at 10:58pm PDT as the moon moves into the earth shadow. The full lunar eclipse begins at 12:07am and lasts until 1:25am PDT. 

If there was ever a sign in the heavens that said "watch and pray" these blood moons occurring on Passover and Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles) in 2014 and 2015 sure do. It is a time to pray first for the peace of Jerusalem (Psalm 122) and then for the salvation of Israel (Romans 10:1).  Then we will pray whatever our Lord shows us to pray for His Church, our community, state and our nation.

We would like to invite you to join us in a "Night Prayer Watch on Passover, April 14th." We'll begin our watch at sunset on April 14th. We are going to invite our Church to join us in our local area and we encourage you to invite your church family to gather together in homes or as a local congregation to watch and pray with us.  Actually, we are going to watch not only in prayer but also with a telescope!  

Here are some of the scriptures we'll be meditating upon and praying too. 

The office of prophet is likened unto that of a watchman in Ezekiel.  Scripturally we see there are three ways that God anoints prophets with a spirit of revelation to gather what I like to call "spiritual intelligence."  First, God can speak directly to a prophet audibly, internally, or through a vision or a dream just like the Lord spoke to Elisha sharing with him the Syrian King's war strategies (2 Kings 6:12, 2 Kings 7:1).  Second, God can speak through research and give direction like He did Daniel as he studied the book of Jeremiah (Dan. 9).  Finally, God can give insight through prayer walking just like the Apostle Paul recieved revelation about how to present the gospel to the Athenians in Acts 17 using the statue of the Unknown God he'd seen as he wandered through the city.  

I'm going to use our recent trip to Burma to illustrate how we constantly seek to gather and utilize spiritual intelligence.  

Prayer Walking
During the second part of our journey to Myanmar (Burma) we stayed in Yangon.  As we walked through the city made several observations.  I will only share two.  First, we saw Shwedagon Pagoda. The term "dagon" stood out immediately.  Second, we saw the Lion Throne in the National Museum.  We learned that the Lion throne was only ascended by the king when judicial decrees were to be made.  This is clearly a counterfiet throne.  It is a counterfiet of the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. 

Biblical Research Regarding Dagon