I am always amazed at
how God leads me to certain books for a certain time period in my life. William and I have been fasting/praying for
our neighborhood, the city in general, the ministry God has given us, and we
feel the Spirit rising up for a great work here. We are warriors for Christ (Is.9 , II
Cor.10:3, I Titus 1:18, Eph. 6) and this is battle time! I just read a book by Mark Andrew Olsen
called The Warriors – funny how I read this first before reading the first book
in the series called “The Watchers” – God knew I needed to hear the “The Call
to War” (p. 309) and be reminded that I am not just the ‘armor barer’ to
William, but I too am a warrior. We are
running out of time – the final phase of this battle is upon us. Jesus is returning very soon and the enemy
seems to have the upper hand, but we win in the end!
Tuesday, May 13, 2014
Call to War!
From Mark Andrew Olsen’s book “The
Warriors”, from Bethany House, published in 2008
A Call to War, 1350 the last
Templar burned alive
Long-rumored and prophesied
Summons to War
The stillness and solitude of this
place have sharpened my sight and allowed me a wondrous revelation. I have been shown things of which most
mortals know but a glimpse. I have beheld
the battlefronts of a vast and ancient war.
I may be called a soldier, yet in the face of this war I know nothing, I
am less than a spectator. This is a war
beyond all things, beyond all conflicts, beyond time itself.
Do not be deceived, for although
my words may bear the ring of legend, they describe truth of a supreme
order. Truth so monumental that by
comparison the reality of our present travails, the urgency of our earthly
Crusades, are as trifling as the grains of salt upon these nearby shores. Truth of such magnitude that it could alter
the course of a conflict which has engulfed heaven and earth since the dawn of
history. Here is what I witnessed.
I saw, long ago, so far in the
past that it happened before the first human being, the birth of the blackest
betrayal in the annals of divine history.
A breach so grievous that the Word itself speaks of it only in the most
fleeting of sidelong glances; brief, almost abashed references seemingly
reluctant to stray too near their subject.
A treachery so monumental that I could somehow sense its aftermath
continuing to echo across the millennia, resounding like a frightful echo into
eternity.
I saw a greatly different age
altogether. A time when the veils
between dimensions seemed more transparent and porous than today. An era whose citizens moved freely between
the realms of flesh and spirit.
The inhabitants of this distant
past lived in a state of joy unknown by any created being before or since, for
they served Yahweh, the great I Am, the divine Creator of all that is. I saw them, surrounded His throne in
gatherings wider than the broadest ocean, a sea of spirits quivering before His
love like banners in a coastal gale. I
heard Him laugh with pleasure. I heard His
thunderous voice call them angels, even then.
And I beheld their leader: a being
so luminous and beautiful that even in my vision I found it difficult to gaze
upon his face. I spied the day the
Archangel gazed upon his own beauty and something foul birthed deep within
him. A tiny warp formed in the fabric of
emotion. He swooned at his flawless form
and a spark of pride ignited. I watched
it flame into ambition, then jealousy.
The angel forgot the source of his beauty and light, and began to covet
the very throne of Yahweh.
In one instant, evil was born and
given form in this being, the angel Lucifer.
Yahweh’s favorite remade himself into His scheming enemy. I saw a shadow creep into a kingdom of pure
light and begin to spread. A rebellion
grew where once only bliss and harmony had reigned. Whole legions of angels joined Lucifer’s
revolt; that much I saw. I almost turned
away from the wretched sight of angels twisting into demons as they
relinquished their angelic bodies and embraced the foulness of Lucifer’s
hate. Why they sided with a created
being, one of their own, over the supreme power of the Almighty may never be
known. But they took up spiritual
combat against their brethren with the intention of overthrowing the Most
High.
We humans were not told enough to
describe the ensuing war in any detail.
I myself was shown battlefields stretching from one edge of the sky to
the other, filled with whole legions grappling in the most desperate and
vicious combat I have ever witnessed.
But like any man, I know little of its true history, only that it was a
war more terrible than any afflicting this earth. I know that it raged through the heavens for
vast swaths of time and consumed countless numbers in its wake.
And I do know its ending, or at
least that of its first phase. Lucifer
and his fellow conspirators were defeated.
I watched them plummet through space with their growls of rage echoing
across the heavens, ejected from the sight of Yahweh and banished from His
presence forever to an exile here on earth.
All this took place before human
history ever began. It is vital to
remember this, for from our own finite perspectives we humans tend to cast
ourselves as the central players on the stage of history. The truth is that our race’s current travails
comprise at best Act III of this sweeping, celestial drama. A saga which is less about us than about God
and a war which has not yet ended, although its outcome has been won at a
great price. And the period I just described was merely
Act. I.
Act II we know well from the Word,
for it concerns the great sacrifice Yahweh made to cleanse our race of the enemy’s
stain. He made himself one of us, then
in that Person paid the supreme penalty to reconcile us to himself. But here is the wondrous fact I learned about
Act III. Even though victory is assured,
humanity rises to play a breathtaking part in its winning.
I saw a black day dawn, many long
years after this one, a day of immense threat and shadow when the deepest of
evils forces God’s people to rise above their ignorance and shallow faith. A day when they unite to hone the gifts and
powers with which God has endowed them.
A day of warfare and victory. I
saw human Warriors becoming a fighting force for Yahweh the likes of which the
world has never witnessed. On that day I
saw men and women alike wage war with not merely the carnal weapons of steel and
wood, but those of the Spirit, wielding armaments of prayer and supplication,
of submission and love. I saw these
fighters soar beyond any notion of valor and glory ever known in my benighted
age. I saw God pour out upon them a
power unknown since those very first acts of the early apostles.
Mark my words. This was not prophecy. It was vision. I saw it as bright as daylight, as clear as
the walls that surround me now. I only
pray that God will preserve these words for the day when eyes worthy of their
import are led to find them. So to the
finder of this stone, and the next beholder of these words, I commend thee into
the service of the Almighty. I pray for
you even these many years hence, and I charge you to keep watch for that day of
unbearable evil. For if you are reading
these words, that horrid day must be either night or already upon you, and you
must be one of those anointed to gather these Warriors together.
So hurry from this place and beg
the Lord to form you and His people into Warriors worthy of the fight!
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