(Prophetic Teaching for the Fivefold)

So he brought the people down to the water. Then the LORD said to Gideon, “You shall put everyone who laps the water with his tongue as a dog laps in one group, and everyone who kneels down to drink in another.”

Judges 7:5

The Lord shared with me that He is putting His people through a series of tests. This is in keeping with the sifting taking place in the body of Christ where people are forced to make a choice for Him or not.  Though this is happening and has been happening for some time now, the Lord brought this illustration to mind in Judges 7, because He wanted to show that many living for the Lord, but are unaware of the current test they must pass in order to be selected for the next level.  He goes on to share that those who are watchful and alert, such as the 300 that lapped like dogs, He will use for His glory, and those who need to go back, will still be in His kingdom living for Him yet used in a different capacity. Those who lapped like dogs were ready. God is not concerned with reducing His number.  He will get the glory and share it with no one.

Because of choices, the Lord is walking throughout the camp, selecting and electing those called according to His purpose for this assignment vs that assignment, none “better” than the other, simply different. However, once a man purges himself from the things of this world, he will be a vessel unto honor, fit for the master’s use. The wheat and the tares grow together until the angel of the Lord divides them.  Some wheat are becoming tares and many tares are becoming wheat.

Besides the sin of prayerlessness and the no-holds-barred against our prayer life, the 

Greatest Attack against a man or woman of God in this season are:

• Compromisers next to them (The mixed multitude/leaven)
• Spirit of Offense
• Spiritual Blindness or Slumber
• The test of Vanity (Vain Things)
• Spirit of Covetousness

Strategic Goals of the enemy are:

1. SET A COMPROMISER RIGHT NEXT TO THEM

To put a person who compromises the Word of God or is deceiving Himself by walking in lasciviousness, next to a person who seeks to walk holy before the Lord without compromise.

To corrupt your steps/good works and turn them to be substandard

To be void of the Holy Spirit (non-God-breathed)

***Notice the men who lapped like dogs chose not to kneel!  They were right next to people who chose to kneel but they did not.

The enemy wants to put you next to someone who will tell you its okay to indulge in “a little sin” or “your vice is not that bad…esp not as bad as someone elses’”

Word Study

Lasciviousness-

Looseness; irregular indulgence of animal desires; wantonness; lustfulness.

Who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lasciviousness Ephesians 4:19.  Tendency to excite lust, and promote irregular indulgences.

Ref:

https://www.compellingtruth.org/lasciviousness.html

        2.  THE SPIRIT OF OFFENSE

Matt: 18:7 Jesus said Woe to him through whom they come!

When a man or woman of God cannot be ensnared by immorality, lying, or the basic sins, and a man/woman of God has purposed in his heart to *go on with God, the enemy will try to ensnare you by the spirit of offense.

This is where one person has ought against another because of one reason or another. It generally stems from a difference in belief systems or a response from someone or non-response where a person misinterpreted or didn’t “like how they reacted/responded” to them. 

Offense can also come without provocation! When one notices there is something they believe is “due them” and they have not received it, or they see another has received it without any (seeming/apparent) effort.

But refuse foolish and ignorant speculations, knowing that they produce quarrels. (NASB)

Again I say, don’t get involved in foolish, ignorant arguments that only start fights. (NLT)

2 Timothy 2:23

Run away from childish indulgence. Run after mature righteousness—faith, love, peace—joining those who are in honest and serious prayer before God. Refuse to get involved in inane discussions; they always end up in fights. God’s servant must not be argumentative, but a gentle listener and a teacher who keeps cool, working firmly but patiently with those who refuse to obey. You never know how or when God might sober them up with a change of heart and a turning to the truth, enabling them to escape the Devil’s trap, where they are caught and held captive, forced to run his errands. 

2 Timothy 2:23(MSG)

10 To whom ye forgive any thing, I forgive also: for if I forgave any thing, to whom I forgave it, 

for your sakes forgave I it in the person of Christ;

11 Lest Satan should get an advantage of us: for we are not ignorant of his devices.

2 Corinthians 2:10-11 KJV

         3. SPIRITUAL BLINDNESS OR SLUMBER

A person unwilling to see the light, either by neglecting to search it out or being locked in an old belief where they are staunchly against seeing things any other way.

8 Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. 9 Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world.

1 Peter 5:8-9 ESV

7 But the end of all things is at hand: be ye therefore sober, and watch unto prayer.

1 Peter 4:7 KJV

13 Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ;

1 Peter 1:13 KJV

But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.

2 Corinthians 4:3-6

         4. THE TEST OF VANITY

Or the test of vain things!  If the enemy can’t reach the man/woman of God with any of these other things, he will seek to compel the heart of man to place his affection on vain things.  Things that have no bearing on eternal living, rewards or pleasing God with all of our heart.  This is not necessarily covetousness, but seeking things out, small “obsessions”, which could nearly be an idol, but are not! 

These can be innocent pursuits, which steal your time and ultimately your heart away from the Father and/or living for Christ.  It is such that we end up inadvertently burying our talent in the ground and having nothing to show forth in this life for the Father and standing at the judgment seat of Christ.  Though we weren’t living in overt sin, we will stand there wondering what we did with our time that brought Him glory.  We may have been able to keep our heart pure, but ultimately become a victim of being immobilized in the kingdom. Frozen from moving forward to press toward the prize of the high calling in Christ Jesus. Failing to walk worthy of our calling. 

Philippians 3:14

I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. (ESV)

I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. (KJV)

          5.  THE SPIRIT OF COVETOUSNESS

The scriptures say guard your heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.  

In this day and age, covetousness is not just houses and cars, but has converted to: 

whether or not you are married, number of followers on social media, and size of church building, weekly attendance, “blessings” and blessings from God

God wants us to lay up treasures in heaven, not on earth.  He wants us to concern ourselves with the lost, and giving to those who can not “return the favor”.

An interesting occurrence there was with Rachel when leaving Uncle Laban’s.  She took her idol with her and hid it, but that small hidden idol became a curse. (Genesis 31:32)  This also happened with Joshua and battle at Ai. (Joshua 7)

In Deuteronomy 8 it says 

1 All the commandments which I command thee this day shall ye observe to do, that ye may live, and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the Lord sware unto your fathers.

2 And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no.

3 And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live.

Deuteronomy 8:1-3 (KJV)

…..putting you to the test, to know what was in your heart, (NASB)

In conclusion, Election at the River, is a message sharing a reminder that God is watching us, even small things, and choosing His army, knowing those who are His through the fellowship of His suffering.  That through humbling in the wilderness, our heart will be proven to be all His and no one else's. It says narrow is the way and path to righteousness, few there be that find it.

Matthew 7:14

For the gate is narrow and the way is constricted that leads to life, and there are few who find it. (NASB)

But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. (NIV)

Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. (KJV)

Jesus said, when the devil comes to him, he will find “nothing in me”. Nothing that would give him an advantage to accuse him, no sin, no guile in his mouth.

John 14:30

I will not speak with you much longer, for the ruler of the world (Satan) is coming. And he has no claim on Me [no power over Me nor anything that he can use against Me]; (AMP)

Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me. (KJV)

We must make sure we don’t stumble over offenses, covetousness, vanity, blindness/slumber, or lasciviousness or compromise. We must strive to present clean hands and pure heart to the Father. 

*go on with God- press toward the mark, pursue God beyond the norm

(Tiffany’s definition)