Firm Faith

“Unless your faith is firm, I cannot make you stand firm.” – Isaiah 7:9 (NLT)

Been a while since my last article, which is due to business of life and navigating some things with the Lord. But as we are approaching the new year, I have continually been feeling the urgency from the Lord upon this coming year. And with that, there are things that the Lord has placed on my heart that I feel to share and release for those who will read and weigh what is said. I know that there are many who already do such things, and it is not my goal or desire to take away from anything that they share and release. But I believe that the Lord reveals different parts of the whole to individual people, and when the unity of the Spirit is present in these words, each piece fits together perfectly to make up the whole.

As I have been seeking the Lord regarding this coming year, I have been feeling this increased intensity in my spirit. I have been feeling the increased intensity for a while now, since about mid-November, and it has only increased every day leading up to the crossing over into 2023. As I have been seeking the Lord for clarity on the why and reasoning for this, the passage above from Isaiah was highlighted to me and has not left my mind or heart since. 2023 is going to be unlike anything we have seen in this world for a long time. It is going to be both a time of glorious encounter for those who are true to the Lord, while at the same time being a year of deep intensity and unraveling of major events. 2020 is the year that changed everything at a small level, and since then things have continued to change in different ways and they have continued to intensify. 2023 is going to be an acceleration of these things.

What do I mean by that? Think about the last 3 years, beginning with when COVID flipped the world upside down. That was merely the catalyst, the spark. It set things in motion that have only continued to increase. As if someone set up a line of dominoes, knocked over the first one, and they have slowly been gaining momentum. A series of events that will not stop until the End, and that will only continue to be heightened with each passing day.

The passage from Isaiah is a reminder and a warning all in one. To those who claim to be believers and followers of Jesus Christ, you must examine your heart and be sure that your faith is firmly planted in the Lord. Eliminate all other things. Remove all distractions. Get still before the Lord and examine your heart to see where your foundation truly is. Because if it is in anything other than the Rock of Jesus Christ, you will not stand in the days ahead. And God cannot force your faith to be firm because that goes against the freewill that He created us with. He will not force you to be faithful, though that is His deepest desire. He wants you to be firm, but we must each make that choice individually.

Why do I say these things?

The events of the last few years have merely been the rumblings of something bigger coming. They are the wake up call for those who are paying attention and who have ears to hear. They are a call to shift our paradigm back to the standard of the Lord, not the standard of the world. Now we have come to the doorstep of the events that those shakings and rumblings have been unto. Events that eliminate any room for lukewarm faith. There is no more allowance for riding the fence. You are either all in, or you are all out. The Lord has allowed the lukewarm faith up until this point out of His patience and desire to see the lukewarm become firey and passionate. But the time has come when, for the sake of His faithful, the Lord no longer is allowing this to continue. As the Lord spoke to me in my car years ago to get my attention, “Either get serious or get off. I don’t have time for your games anymore.”

As we go into this new year, there will be a very brief window of easing into this, but once that window closes everything changes. Very quickly into this new year. Life as we know it will never be the same again. A bomb is about to drop as we cross into the year of 2023. Whether that is just a symbolic bomb or a physical one as well, I do not know at this moment. But this is the phrase that the Lord keeps reiterating these last few days.

“A bomb is about to drop, one that completely shifts life and culture, changing everything in an instant. Suddenly this will happen, and it will set in motion a course of events that will leave this world shattered and in ruins. These things must take place for what is coming, for only then can the pieces be fully put in place for what follows. Only then can My plan, the things shown long ago to My prophets of old, only then can these things unfold. But My people will not be abandoned. No, for I am with them always. Just as My people Israel were distinguished and set apart by Me when they were enslaved in Israel, so it will be again in this hour. My people will be made known, those who are true and faithful, standing firm in the midst of the coming storm. Though Egypt was shrouded in darkness, My light continued to shine and illuminate over My people. So it will be for My children today. ‘Egypt’ around them will be taken deep into a darkness where no light will shine, but My children, those called by My name, will be wrapped in the Light of Heaven. They will each walk in a bubble of light that illuminates them in the midst of the darkness.”

There are many things that I hear the Lord saying regarding this coming year, but not much that I am allowed to release at this time. The main focus from the Lord going into this new year, this new era, is firmness of faith. This is the foundation of everything with the Lord.