This article is a short follow up to my earlier article, The Precious. That article forms a foundation for what I am saying here. [Also see the article "The How and the Therefore".]
The Lord gives us instruction, 'line upon line, precept upon precept; here a little and there a little.' Each new insight becomes the foundation for something more yet to come.
So everything I've said so far is a preliminary. All this is the foundation for a word the Lord gave me in June and July of 92. A startling, exciting word, which he clearly spoke to me on two separate occasions. (The second time, he made sure I wrote it down.)
That the martyrdom of the church
would allow him to break the powers that keep Israel in blindness!
Correspondingly, the martyrdom
of a remnant of saints would allow him to break the powers that keep the
church in blindness!
So what is this supposed to mean? Lets look at some scriptures relating to blindness of Israel and of the Church.
For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in Romans. 11:25.
And not as Moses, [which] put a vail over his face, that the children of Israel could not stedfastly look to the end of that which is abolished:
But their minds were blinded: for until this day remaineth the same vail untaken away in the reading of the old testament; which [vail] is done away in Christ.
But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the vail is upon their heart.
Nevertheless when it shall turn to the Lord, the vail shall be taken away. 2nd Corinthians 3: 12-16..
I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and [that] the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see Revelations. 3:17-18.
A. As Israel is a type of the Church, many verses that speak to or of Israel also make sense when applied to the Church.
B. The passage clearly speaks of a blindness in terms of a vail over the mind or over the heart.
C. The blindness is related to understanding of the scriptures, especially the old testament but also the new.
D. The mention of not being able 'to look to the end' speaks of not understanding end time prophecy.
E. The references to the vail say that it is 'done away in Christ' and 'when it shall turn to the Lord, the vail shall be taken away'. The vail is removed, done away in Christ, in the spiritual but in the natural it awaits the turning or returning to the Lord before it can be finally removed.
The vail of the Temple was removed at the death of Jesus. As Mathew. 27:51 says: "And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent;".
The removal of these other vails will also require a death. What the Lord is saying is that the blindness, the veil, over Israel will be removed by a death, the death of the Church. The removal of the vail in Matt. 27:51 is a type. Just as Jesus death removed the vail in the natural temple, the death of the body of Christ, the Church, will remove the vail in the spiritual temple.
But first the vail blinding the Church must be removed. And then, when the fulness of the Gentiles [the Church] is come in, Israel's blindness will be removed..
When the Church "shall turn to the Lord, the vail shall be done away." This will happen when revival comes. But it will require martyrdom, perhaps extensive martyrdom on the part of the remnant of the Church. [See the Rick Joyner article, "Onslaught Against the Church"] That is the remnant that is praying for revival and discerning the times.
When the nation of Israel "shall turn to the Lord, the vail shall be done away." And they will look upon Him whom they pierced and cry "Hosanna to the Son of David: Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord; Hosanna in the highest." Mathew 21:9
And so this concept is a key to the two major events of end time prophecy. The coming of the Lord and the coming of revival. The one event open and manifest, the other somewhat hidden in scripture.
To phrase it another way, the coming of the Lord, the Day of the Lord is the coming of the Lord for and with his church. [ See "Marvin Ford's vision of Heaven"] The coming of revival, an invisible coming, is the coming of the Lord 'to' his church.
After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.
Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the LORD: his going forth is prepared as the morning; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth. Hosea 6:1-3