---

A Window of Opportunity

By Duane Stewart

One scripture that brings excitement to the heart of believers is that this promise, spoken of through Haggai, whose name means “festive”, brings to us the assurance of God’s presence, a presence that shall outshine any former presence given to God’s people. This is a promise that applies greatly to those people living today. Haggai 2:9, “The glory of this latter house shall be greater than the former, says the Lord of hosts. And in this place [His house which His people are] I will give peace, says the Lord of hosts”. A promised glory, one that shall outshine the sun as promised to God’s people, especially those who are living in this day and time of entering into the fullness of times. This promise, assured by God as line upon line we see prophesies fulfilled all around us. With the understanding given from God, the conditions that we now see today are revealing that the promised darkness that would come has arrived. This darkness, the results of ignorance concerning God’s word, abounds around us as gross darkness swallows up the minds of a large portion of humanity. This darkness, the lack of knowledge where God’s word is concerned, ushers in, among the populace, a famine of spiritually understanding the revealed word of God, which means true knowledge is absent among the people.

Is this type of famine even now among the people, the fulfilling of those days promised in Amos 8:11-13, “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord God, that I will send a famine on the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord. They shall wonder from sea [heart of carnality] to sea [heart of carnality], and from north to east; they shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the Lord, but shall not find it. In that day the fair virgins and strong young men shall faint from thirst”. Where are the generation called upon to bring forth, into the earth, the life as God has purposed to impart it? Are they absent because of a lack of knowing the revealed word of God? Where are the speakers of this revealed word? Are they still hidden away and waiting for an event to take place that shall, through them, manifest the revealed word of God? While the word of God is being ministered today in greater portions than ever before, God’s word even now circles the globe through television and the internet, but the true famine of hungering and thirsting which exist is an absence of a people who are hearing and understanding the true word of God. With revelation of God’s word now available and with the Holy Spirit bringing forth an understanding of His word, let him who has an ear, hear what God is saying to the church.

Herein, God speaks of a field where tares and wheat grow up together with this declaration to man, consider your ways. There exist certain conditions in which God is not pleased and He is now appearing in the form of judgment concerning these conditions. As declared in Isa. 1:2-9 these same conditions are prevalent today. “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth! For the Lord has spoken: I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me; the ox knows its owner and the donkey its master’s crib; but Israel [Christian Community] does not know, My people do not consider. Alas, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children who are corrupters! They have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel, they have turned away backward. Why should you be stricken again? You will revolt more and more. The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faints. From the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no soundness in it. But wounds and bruises and putrefying sores; they have not been closed or bound up, or soothed with ointment. Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire; strangers devour [carnal doctrines and mind-sets] your land in your presence; and it is desolate [without God’s presence], as overthrown by strangers [carnal doctrines]. So the daughter of Zion is left as a booth in a vineyard, as a hut in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city. Unless the Lord of hosts had left to us a very small remnant, we would have become like Sodom, we would have been made like Gomorrah”. Just what is the condition and mind-set of our world today?

A window of opportunity is that which God has left us; He has preserved for us a small remnant, those of a man-child company borne out from the Christian Community to establish through them God’s kingdom. These bring down the governments of this corrupt religious world as they establish the true government of God. With the Christian Community disallowing the above truth of rebellion from Isaiah, these conditions have brought us to a time of divine judgment. Let us remember the occasion when God rejected the High Priest Eli at Shiloh. In considering Eli, the High Priest of the Levitical order of Priest that represents the systematic churches of today, let us notice that Eli’s eyes had grown dim, speaking of a people who have no vision. Therefore, the light of revelation was going out except for God moving to rise up in the Samuels of today. 1 Sam. 3:2-3, “And it came to pass at that time, while Eli was laying down in his place, and when his eyes had begun to grow so dim that he could not see, and before the lamp of God went out in the tabernacle of the Lord where the ark of God was, …”. Again, a present-tense condition, one that brings the Christian Community to a place where it also needs to recognize its need for change as God’s anointed ministry raises up with a word of revelation. This change includes a setting aside of the existing sins of corruption, as manifested through Eli’s house, and a raising up of the remnant of this last day trumpet, the coming forth of God’s Samuel company being lifted up with the anointed mantel of God’s word.

Let us also note that liken unto Israel, the Christian Community has demanded the right to rule by the system of their own choosing. That is like Israel, a choosing of the house of Saul (represents the carnal mind – the house of flesh) to become their king. This house of Saul represents the carnal fleshly motives that war against the revealed true word of God. 1 Sam. 8:6-7, “But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, give us a king to judge us. So Samuel prayed to the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them [does not the Christian Community choose carnality over God in most occasions?]”. In addition, like King Saul, this carnal church system has run its course and God is now declaring that a new day has come. A new covenant, liken unto the house of David when becoming King over Israel and anointed to manifest, as a type of Jesus Christ and His many member man-child, the establishing of the kingdom of God in the earth. Therefore, the carnal religious systems of today, rejected by God while His eternal house, His temple, is anointed to come forth in manifested victory is appearing.

1 Sam. 15:21-23, “But the people took of the plunder, sheep and oxen, the best of the things which should have been utterly destroyed, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal [means a circle, a wheel – a Christian Community going around in carnal religious circles]. So Samuel said; has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry, because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He also has rejected you from being king [spoken to Saul]”. Note, much like the church of today, a ritual of offerings and sacrificing is the extent of most of the Christian Community’s services. That is, their lives always take a stand at Gilgal as they, like in a circle, a wheel like cycle ever turning, trying to maintain some semblance a life for God. Going constantly around the same mountain of man’s traditional doctrines has taken the place of obedience to God’s progressive revealed word, yielding to the Holy Spirit’s leading. Herein, the enemy snares them into a prison house mentality that keeps them from knowing the true freedom and liberty that comes from an obedient relationship with Christ.

This darkness of ritualistic sacrifices shall be and is defeated in the lives of a people who desire a life of obedience. God’s true seed, the obedient wheat who receive the life of Christ will defeat the enemy. Isa. 59:19b, “When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him”. In relationship with Christ, all that opposes God has no ground in which to stand. Herein, this enemy is defeated through the nature of Christ that is within and manifesting from this new creation man. This standard, this light, now flows from within like a river to manifest the effectual glory of God. This glory, spoken forth by God, shall cause all darkness to flee and those who walked in darkness shall begin to know freedom when and if they observe the light coming forth from within the Christ and His many member man-child. Isa. 60:1-5, “Arise, shine; for your light has come! And the glory of the Lord is raised 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. Lift up your eyes all around, and see: They all gather together, they come to you; your sons shall come from afar, and your daughters shall be nursed at your side. Then you shall see and become radiant, and your heart shall swell with joy; because the abundance of the sea [heart of much of the carnal church] shall be turned to you, the wealth of the Gentiles shall come to you”. This light is a turning of the tide, a window of opportunity given unto those who attach themselves to the glory of God made available to those who walk in the light.

The standard, which flies over this first-fruits people, is the first-born Son called Jesus, raised upon the cross as the picture of salvation resting within man’s spirit, soul and body. This is that remnant of people who shall arise in God’s glory, becoming a radiant people who manifest that glory which becomes the allurement, the strong attraction that brings all things to the redeeming House of God. Herein, the nations shall begin to bow before the king of glory as He appears in and through His people. Is this not also, what Jesus prayed for as He pronounced He had finished the work the Father had given Him to do? John 17:5 & 22, “And now, O Father, glorify me together with yourself, with the glory which I had with you before the world was. … And the glory which You give Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one”.

This window of opportunity, restoration time, is even as spoken to us concerning the restoration of the tabernacle of David. Recall, during Eli’s era, among the children of Israel, the Philistines took the Ark of the Covenant away (Ark was the dwelling place of God’s glory). This lost Ark was the results of corruption that existed among them and caused the glory of God to depart from Israel as God allowed the Philistines to capture the Ark. However, after David was King, his heart’s desire was to see the ark, God’s glory and presence restored to them. This accomplished return of God’s presence to Israel was as David finally, after learning God’s divine order and His pattern for the carrying of the Ark, brought it to Mt. Zion. Here on Mt. Zion, the people could come, as the praises ascended before God 24/7; the people now looked upon His glory. This restored glory is within God’s new covenant temple of today, purposed to manifest, and looked upon by the world through God’s new creation people. Acts 15:16-17 states, “After this I will return and will rebuild the tabernacle of David, which has fallen down; I will rebuild its ruins, and I will set it up; so that the rest of mankind may seek the Lord, even all the Gentiles who are called by My name, says the Lord who does all these things”.

Here a question often asked today is, what is it that the world sees as the church? Even as according to scripture, it is that she has become a form of godliness but is denying the power thereof. Because of the lack of true godliness and glory, it is said, by the world, that the church is neither desirous nor does it hold any attraction concerning life. Also said by the many, there seems to be no difference between how the world of non-Christians and the majority of Christians act and live. Why, could it be that they reject the Holy Spirit, the fire of God, that which purifies people through salvation, deliverance, sanctification and healing? For this cause as they reject the Holy Spirit, weariness becomes the Christians testimony, which results in a people who preach one thing while doing another. What the world needs to see then is for a change to take place in the form of a people manifesting the glory of God, God’s window of opportunity.

Ezekiel 12:22-28 declares, “Son of man, what is this proverb that you people have about the land of Israel, which says, the days are prolonged, and every vision fails? Tell them therefore, thus says the Lord God; I will lay this proverb to rest, and they shall no more use it as a proverb in Israel. But say to them, the days are at hand, and the fulfillment of every vision. For no more, shall there be any false vision or flattering divination within the house of Israel. For I am the Lord, I speak, and the word which I speak will come to pass; it will no more be postponed; for in your days, O rebellious house, I will say the word and perform it, says the Lord God. … Son of man, look, the house of Israel is saying, the vision that he sees is for many days from now, and He prophesies of times far off. Therefore say to them, thus says the Lord God: None of My words will be postponed any more, but the word which I speak will be done, says the Lord God”. A declaration declaring that old things pass away and all things are now new. Has not God likewise taken away the old Levitical covenant of laws by fulfilling them in Jesus and replaced them with a new covenant? This new covenant does away with the old rituals and traditional laws that accomplish nothing. Heb. 8:13, “In that He says, a new covenant, He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away”. (Read Heb. 8:7-13). Note that all, which is not a part of this new nature (covenant written upon the heart – soul), is of the old covenant law and is obsolete and passing away. Therefore, the carnal church needs to come out from underneath the old covenant, all the laws and rituals of carnal understandings by allowing the Holy Spirit His rightful place.

Again, we do have this window of opportunity, a time of restoration that shall fill the earth with the glory of God. A time when the promises of God, made unto the spiritual house of Israel, shall come forth into fulfillment. Note as spoken of in Joel 2:23-24, “Be glad then, you children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God; for He has given you the former rain faithfully, and He will cause the rain to come down for you – the former rain and the latter rain in the first month. The threshing floors shall be full of wheat, and the vats shall overflow with new wine and oil”. While the church, through its first 2000 years, has known a time of the former rain many times, note that the promise of this present day is one that promises the former and latter rain at the same time, a filling up of God’s people with wheat, new wine and oil. Wheat, speaking of the bread of life, which was Jesus who became the seed planted to bring forth a harvest of like-kind sons. New wine is speaking of the Holy Spirit and the fire upon His ministers in manifesting a like-kind glory. The oil is that anointing mantel that brings forth the glory of God in such a way that all shall bow before the Christ (not the man).

Therefore, as we consider this window of opportunity, the time of full restoration, just what is it that this restoration includes? Joel 2:19 is our promise, “The Lord will answer and say to His people, behold, I will send you grain and new wine and oil, and you will be satisfied by them; I will no longer make you a reproach among nations”. First: we can see our restoration includes the joy of our salvation. Psalm 51:10-13, “Create in me a clean heart [living soul], O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me by your generous Spirit. Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners shall be converted to you”. Second: restoration restores unto us the glory that becomes a greater glory than the former glory. Col. 3:4, “When Christ who is our life appears [is revealed in you], then you also will appear [be revealed] with Him in glory”.

Third: this restoration is a changing of the guard, a walk that restores a people to walking with God even as Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before their fall. This is a walking with Him in the cool (spirit) of the day. Is not this our day, a day of restoration? Gen. 3:8, “And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the spirit of the day…” Job 42:5, “I have heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you”. Rev. 12:5, “She bore a man-child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her child was caught up to God and His throne”. Our window of opportunity is God’s field, which is a world with the messengers of God now removing the tares. The wheat even now is maturing into that throne room order of God to begin their ministry as Priest/Kings in establishing the kingdom of God throughout the earth. These shall defeat all that wars against God as they let God be God. A people who have moved into the nature of Christ as they manifest His will, His mind, His emotions and His desires. Therefore, a birthing is taking place, a man-child is coming forth, and a company of people is manifesting that completed nature of God. This window of opportunity is the beginning of our new day and world that is now upon us. Therefore, let us rejoice and be glad for we are not a part of the night but are now the sons of the day.

Duane Stewartwww.avoiceforthegatheringsaints.org