Tag: heavenly realms

92. Step into the Realm of Heaven

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott – 

We have been seeing over several posts now how God intends us to enter into the realms of heaven, here and now while living on the earth.

If you are ready, it is time today to actually do that.

Step in, step out

If you are able, please stand up and pray in tongues for a minute – out loud if possible, just to activate your spirit. Please don’t skip over this. If right now you are not in a position to pray aloud, you are welcome to continue reading, but do come back to this post later and actually work through it, because it is very practical.

When you have been praying for a minute or so (don’t stop, carry on praying in tongues),

See that there is a door open.
God is standing in the door,
And He’s welcoming you to step into the realm of heaven

There is a ladder, with angels going up and down.
But you don’t have to climb the ladder to get up to the door,
Because God is asking you in, welcoming you, inviting you to come.

So as you continue to pray in tongues,
Take a step forward, a physical step,
And go into that realm, where your throne is, in the heavens.

You are now standing in the presence of God.
The glory of God is surrounding you,
The presence of God’s kingdom is surrounding you.

You step in and receive your lordship.
You step in as a lord,
And you are going to receive the authority to rule
On the mountain that is operating within your spirit.

You are in the heavenly realms.
You have stepped in to the presence of God
And He is investing in you
The right and the power to rule in your life

So step out of the heavenly realms
(Take a step backwards).

And now you have authority,
And you can exercise that rule and authority on your mountain
To see things change in this realm, on the earth.

I want to encourage you, you can step in and out of the realms of heaven as many times in the day as you choose to. Step into the realm of heaven; step back out of the realm of heaven: bring heavenly authority back with you and apply it to your life.

If there is something negative or difficult going on during the day, just step into the realms of heaven. Receive the robes of righteousness and then step out of the realm of heaven and exercise authority in the righteousness of God, here on earth.

Practise stepping in and stepping out.
Pray in tongues vigorously.
That will build your spirit so that you are able to step in and step out.

Engaging with God in our garden

We have a garden in our soul. Our garden is part of our heart (there are four chambers of the heart). Let’s begin to learn to fellowship with God there, as we open the door, that ‘everlasting door’ that is in each of us, to let God in.

So we pray in tongues for a minute or two, continue to pray …

[2 minutes]

And now we are going to open that door.

We open the door in our heart.
We welcome the King of Glory to come in
and be enthroned on the throne of our life.

We receive His lordship, His authority in our spirit,
For our spirit to rule our body, rule our soul, and have authority.

We operate in the authority of the kingdom: in heaven, in our lives, in our spirit.
So we develop that spiritual connection with God where the River of Life is flowing,
Where the garden of God becomes the garden in our heart.
As it is in heaven, so it is outworked on earth, in and through us.

You can learn to step in every day, open up your door, let the King of glory come in. And He will rule on the throne of your life as you surrender the rule of your life to Him.

When we first start exercising in this way, He rules. We surrender our life to Him. Then as we go on, He starts to give us back more authority. He trusts us to do the things on earth as in heaven. Once we have learnt to surrender our spirit, soul and body, He will give us the throne in our own life to rule with Him.

Step in every day. Open up the doors. Let the King of glory come in. Enthrone Him over your life. Then start to exercise that lordship on your spirit-gates, your body-gates, your soul-gates. Work on getting your gates open and flowing freely (you can use the diagram below to help you with this). The Spirit of God will start manifesting through you in everyday life.

You can continually step into and out of the realms of the heavens, as God intends.

Gates

gates-with-no-hole
Diagram of the gates of our spirit, soul and body. The origins of the diagram go back to at least the year 1919. Ian Clayton saw something similar to this on a scroll he received from heaven and offers extensive teaching on it.

In this diagram of the gates of our spirit, soul and body, you will see that the Glory of God is in the centre of our being, and the gates are the means of seeing Him manifest in our lives. They are not for ‘letting Him in’, but for ‘letting Him out’. Starting with the gate of First Love, we can work through them, asking God to show us if anything is blocking them, and then exercising heavenly authority to see them opened and freely flowing. The more of our gates are wide open, the more of God can be manifested in our daily lives.

Garden (song)

Here is a Misty Edwards song we often use to help us engage with God in our garden.

Or click here to play: Garden (Misty Edwards – via YouTube – opens in new tab/window)
[If the above version does not appear, please search for ‘Misty Edwards Garden’ on YouTube]

Related articles from Freedom ARC
Related articles from others


1048

91. The Way, The Truth, and The Life

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott –

In this ‘Kingdom Realms’ series we have begun to understand that God intends us to have access to heaven, right now. But to do so there are certain steps we must follow. He said to Joshua, the High Priest:

If you will walk in My ways and if you will perform My laws, then you will also govern My house and also have charge of My courts, and I will grant you free access among these who are standing here’ (Zech 3:7).

The earth is filled with his glory

Isaiah saw the Lord on His throne.

In the year of King Uzziah’s death I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple. Seraphim stood above Him, each having six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called out to another and said,
“Holy, Holy, Holy, is the LORD of hosts,
The whole earth is full of His glory.” (Isa 6:1-3).

So the Lord sits on His throne, on top of His mountain. And the structure of it is like the temple. There are seraphim who stand above Him (we will look at the angelic realms in more detail in a later post). They are prophesying the revelation they are receiving: that the earth is to be full of God’s glory. And God has chosen the church, He has chosen us, to display the fullness of His glory on the earth.

The Temple

The temple consists of the Outer and Inner Courts, the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies. The veils (or matrices) between the different heavenly dimensions are the way, the truth, and the life.

In the Outer Courts there is darkness. If we don’t want to spend eternity there, we must seek to fulfil our purpose and our call. This is where we will find those who are not faithful to fulfil what is written on their scroll and the destiny they have been given in God.

We have looked at that before: those such as the five foolish virgins, and those who say ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ to whom Jesus says ‘Depart from Me, I never knew you’; they will be thrown out into the outer darkness. It is not the place some think of as ‘hell‘ – how could a place of fire be dark?

The Way, the Truth and the Life

When Jesus described Himself as ‘the Way, the Truth and the Life’, He was referring to the pattern of the heavenly and earthly tabernacle, and specifically to the doors or veils between the various areas or dimensions. To those who were listening to Him it was perfectly clear what He was talking about, because they were familiar with those areas of the temple. He was saying that if we follow Him, we can enter in to the holiest place, and find abundance of life. Of course, if we approach this saying with a Greek mindset rather than a Hebrew one, the meaning will be completely lost on us.

There is a process to this, a progression, a series of protocols that God has prepared for us to enable us to enter in.

Everlasting Doors

Let’s look at this diagram again.

Most of the enemy activity that we are experiencing and trying to deal with right now is going on in the atmosphere of the earth. That is where the spiritual hosts of wickedness, the rulers in darkness, and powers are functioning in principalities (or spheres of geographical areas).

The pattern that is in heaven is expressed in us. We are made in the image of God. We are body, soul and spirit. And in us we also have a door into the realms of the heavens, which we can open and experience the kingdom of God in us.

In the same way, there are also Everlasting Doors on the boundary between the atmosphere of the earth and the heavens. We read about them in verses 7 and 9 of Psalm 24. Those doors are ruled by things we need to dispossess. I have seen God open some of these doors, often as a result of prayer and of intercession. When they are opened, revival starts to take place. God’s Presence and His glory become accessible in this earthly realm.

Mountains and thrones

Click the image for a larger, easier to read version (opens in new tab or window).

In the realm of the Kingdom of Earth is where we ‘walk in His ways’ (Zech 3:6-7). In the Kingdom of  God is where we ‘keep His laws’, and where we are to rule as lords. In the realm of the Kingdom of Heaven is where we ‘rule His house’.

There are mountains and thrones in each of those realms, on which God intends us to rule. For example, in the Kingdom of God, we at Freedom have seven mountains as a church, and seven scrolls attached to those mountains. Other churches will have their mountains and scrolls too.

Each of us as individuals also have our own mountains, our own places of rule. These are according to our destiny, our call and our gift, and we are to occupy them as lords. Jesus is King of kings and Lord of lords: we are the lords and kings that He is Lord and King of. As lords and kings, we raise people up in discipleship to themselves become lords and kings.

The seven spirits of God stand before the throne in the realm of Heaven. They are not God, they are creatures, and they are there as tutors to bring us to revelation of who God is and of His ways. We need to engage them and learn from them if we are to be revealed as the sons of God.

This is another view of the realms of heaven, based on Ian Clayton‘s ‘menorah’ diagrams.

You can see how these realms of authority in the heavens are arranged in the same way as the structure of the temple: Outer Courts, Inner Courts, Holy Place, Holy of Holies. There are protocols we can follow which will help us to access each of these, as we will need to in order to fulfil our destiny. We each need to be able to rule as a lord, and a king, and to stand as a son.

For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God (Rom 8:19).

And we will be manifested as sons on the earth, just as God always intended.

Related articles from Freedom ARC

SoundTrack: The Way (New Horizon) – Housefires (feat. Pat Barrett) via YouTube

90. A Doorway to Experience

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott – 

We are looking at how God invites us to ‘come up here‘, how He invites us to experience for ourselves the realms of heaven. Now I am only telling you about the places I have actually been myself, so that I can give you testimony from first-hand experience, and tell you that it is possible to go there. There are plenty of other places where I haven’t been. And I find that when God gives me experiences, sometimes it is only later on that He brings revelation of where those places are. So there are also places which, although I have been there, I couldn’t tell you where they are as yet.

The scriptures as a doorway

But you don’t just have to take my word for all this.

I’m going to give you a lot of scriptures in this post. I know that some of you will have been asking, ‘where in the Bible does it say we can do this?’ I don’t subscribe to sola scriptura myself, but if you do need to see it in the Bible, then I can show you from the Bible. Then, once you know that this is all based in scripture, you can have the confidence to enter in. So use these scriptures as a doorway. Go through, and find for yourself the reality of what you read. Your experiences can then become an anchor for more.

The kings of the earth

And from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To Him who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood (Rev 1:5).

Who are the ‘kings of the earth’? We are. At least, we are supposed to be. We are supposed to be manifesting the kingdom of heaven on the earth.

And when they heard this, they lifted their voices to God with one accord and said,
“O Lord, it is You who made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and all that is in them,
who by the Holy Spirit, through the mouth of our father David Your servant, said
‘Why did the Gentiles rage,
And the peoples devise futile things?
The kings of the earth took their stand,
And the rulers were gathered together
Against the Lord and against His Christ'”
(Acts 4:24-26).

Here we have the kings of the earth again, this time opposing Christ. So here the kings and the rulers are not us. In this passage the disciples are quoting from the Old Testament, and it refers to a time before the cross. These are the rulers in the heavenly realms, principalities and powers, who gathered to oppose Jesus. They were trying to destroy the seed, and they did all they could to achieve that, but He overcame them.

In heaven, on the earth, under the earth

And no-one in heaven or on the earth or under the earth was able to open the book or to look into it (Rev 5:3).

Right there you see at least three realms: in heaven, on the earth, under the earth. Stated quite clearly, for those of you who are asking, ‘How do you know that some things are under the earth? This is how we can know. Again,

And every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all things in them, I heard saying, “To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honour and glory and dominion forever and ever.” (Rev 5:13).

God’s throne is above all these other realms.

Heavenly places

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love (Eph 1:3-4).

It is ‘in the heavenly places’ that God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing. Plural, ‘places’, speaking about more than one place in the heavens. And, ‘just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world’: it was always God’s intention that we should rule the realms of heaven, and bring that rule onto earth – that we would access both realms. So when Jesus came, He accessed both realms.

If you read Genesis 28, where Jacob had a dream of a ladder, and a door open in heaven, you’ll see that God was standing in the doorway welcoming people in. That ladder did not go through those other realms, by the way. It is not linear, as though you have to go through one to get to two to three to four to five and so on. It goes straight in. We can have access straight in to the realm of Heaven, because that is where our thrones are.

Our inheritance

He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth. In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will (Eph 1:9-11).

We now live in a time when that administration is being outworked through us, the kings. That administration is our inheritance. God has already purposed this: we have to work it out. And we can’t do it from our position here on earth. We have to go into the realms of the heavens to outwork it, because that is where the authority structure is which will enable us to bring it here on earth.

Up to now, the church has been trying to change things in the atmosphere of the earth from our position here in this earthly realm. We have talked about ‘praying into those realms’, whereas in fact we need to go into higher realms, realms above the atmosphere of the earth, and exercise authority from those higher realms to bring about the changes we desire.

Look back at the first diagram I shared at the beginning of this series.

We have authority from those three realms going into heaven, and the realm of Heaven. That authority is what enables us to go into the atmosphere of the earth, to break the enemy’s power, and to reclaim it and purify it. It is our inheritance. He has stolen it, or rather, Adam handed it over to him; but because of the cross, we can get it back.

Seated with Him

And we know that we can go into those heavenly places: we are seated there with Him:

And raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Eph 2:6).

Again, if we read carefully we can see that this tells us there are lots of heavenly places, and lots of thrones where we are seated. We have to get hold of where they are, and be sure we are seated on them.

He descended, He ascended

Now this expression, “He ascended,” what does it mean except that He also had descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is Himself also He who ascended far above all the heavens, so that He might fill all things (Eph 4:9-10).

If He descended to the lower parts of the earth, and we are supposed to do the works that He does, and did, then what are we supposed to do? The lower parts of the earth are also realms where we should be ruling. I am not talking about Jules Verne, Journey To The Centre Of The Earth. I am not talking about physically going down into the earth, although it is described in those terms. These are really spiritual realms of government and authority. The centre of the earth contains a throne on which Adam would have ruled in glory.

It also says that Jesus ascended. So everything in all of those realms is supposed to be filled with the glory of God.

God’s eternal purpose

That will only happen through us, through the church, because that is the way God has planned it:

And to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things; so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places. This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord (Eph 3:9-11).

God’s manifold, multi-faceted wisdom is to be made known through the church, through us, to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. That is His eternal purpose. He has always intended that it should be this way.

God is in all

One God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all (Eph 4:6).

We need to get hold of this truth, because it will explain why we can go to any of these realms, to all these heavenly places. It is because God is in it all, and we are in Him.

I want to encourage you to take these scriptures, meditate on them, ask God to take you to these places and show you the reality of all this.

This is your inheritance. You can have access to it all.

Related articles from Freedom ARC

1018

89. Seed Wars

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott – 

When Satan fell, he was seeking to overturn God’s eternal plan that Man should inherit the heavens. He wanted that place of rulership for himself.

Here is a diagram I used when I taught about spiritual warfare in Freedom Church:
I realise that some of the writing is quite small to read, so you can click on the image above to view or download it as a PDF file, if that helps.

Time and Eternity

On the left you see eternity, the setting for Genesis 1:1. Before time, if you like. God created the earth to be inhabited, but then Lucifer rebelled, as we saw last time, and was cast down to the earth, where he brought down God’s judgment upon it in the first flood.

Moving to the right, you find Genesis 1:2. Inside the bracket of time, now. The earth is without form, and void (that’s really just another word for ’empty’). God begins again, He recreates the earth. How long is the time between verse 1 and verse 2? We have no idea. Nor do we know how long a time elapsed between verses 2 and 3. It could have been microseconds; it could have been 14 billion years. We don’t know.

The Fall of Man

Then comes the week of (re-)creation followed by the story of Adam’s fall, as Satan now engages with Adam and Eve. And what he is offering them is the only thing he has to trade with: information. He offers them the opportunity to become like God, but without God. The opportunity to know, without God. To rule, without God (he would later try the same thing on Jesus in the wilderness). This is the root of humanism.

Trading for Seed

He offers to give them information in return for something. They did not trade by eating a piece of fruit from a tree – that is very symbolic language when you go back into the original language. Satan overshadowed them, and took their DNA. He knew that DNA was the only thing that could inherit the heavens.

Now that he has DNA, he produces a seed. That may be an unfamiliar idea, but it is right there in scripture. In Genesis 3:14-15 we find the first prophecy of the coming of a Messiah, a Redeemer, and in verse 15 we read about Satan’s seed: “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel”. God is talking to Satan, and says, “Your seed and her seed”. It is made really clear that Satan has seed.

Seed Wars

This is how he came to get that seed. Cain and Abel, who were twins, had different fathers. Abel’s father was Adam, and his DNA was to produce what is called ‘the seed of woman’. Except that Cain killed him, and God had to reinstitute that line through Seth. Cain’s father was Satan. Cain was the seed of Satan. So you can view this whole period as one of seed wars, during which Cain’s seed seek to rule.

Polluting the Seed

Then, in Noah’s time, we have fallen watcher angels – Ben Elohim (sons of God) – falling to earth, leaving their proper place (Jude 1:6). They do a similar thing with human women, overshadowing them (this is not sex as we know it, but overshadowing of their DNA) to produce the race of giants called the Nephilim. Spiritual warfare becomes intense, fighting for the purity of the seed. Judgment comes again in the flood, but God preserves the seed of woman.

Jesus the Seed

We know that Jesus was the prophesied seed who was coming, who was to crush Satan’s head (though he would bruise His heel). Satan did not know that, but every scheme and intention of his was to prevent the fulfilment of that prophecy by eliminating or corrupting the seed line before it could happen.

Abraham and his Seed

Remember the covenant God made with Abraham. It was a covenant with Abraham ‘and his seed’ (Gal 3:16). And throughout the Old Testament period, Satan threw everything he had at frustrating God’s plan. From genocide under Pharoah to the massacre of the innocents under Herod, he tried everything to prevent the fulfilment of God’s words in Genesis 3:15. Even when Jesus was ready to enter His ministry, as I mentioned earlier, he attempted to derail His destiny in the wilderness.

The Prophecy Fulfilled

The cross, he thought, was his moment of crowning triumph. Only to find that, despite his best efforts, all he had done was fall in with the eternal purpose of God, and co-operated in bringing down that promised crushing blow upon his own head.

Related articles

JOIN US IN ENGAGING GOD!

Engaging God on the Heavenly Pathways of Relationship and Responsibility is our online school for equipping a Joshua Generation of supernatural sons of God to live according to the order of Melchizedek.

Your first two weeks free!
Click here to get started today*

To find out more about the Engaging God programme, click here…

*Technology permitting: automated process on setup of payment arrangement and completion of online registration form. Terms and conditions apply.

88. The Fall of Lucifer, the Light-Bearer

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott

We have seen that something catastrophic happened between the first two verses of Genesis. Satan fell.

When God made the earth, as it is now, He removed it from the sphere it was in and placed it into time and space. God said, ‘Let there be light’ before He made the sun, and the moon, and the stars. Because He is light, and that light is creative light. And there are two speeds of light: there is the speed of light that operates in the heavenly realms, and the speed of light which operates here, which is slowing down (as some scientists have now suggested), although at the beginning they were the same speed. Because of Adam’s fall, the speed of light started to slow down and so time used to be quicker (if you understand what I mean). That is why the earth appears to be 10,000 years old in the biblical account, and yet it is 14 billion years old as measured by science. Time was different, time was stretched out, the heavens were stretched out.

There is a passage in 2 Peter which speaks of this period: For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water (2 Peter 3:5-6).

This is not Noah’s flood. This is talking about the original destruction of the earth, and the fall of Satan. Earth was flooded with water at that time, the first flood. That is why we then find that the Spirit of God was brooding upon the waters in Genesis 1:2.

The anointed cherub who covers

We need to see what happened when Satan fell. He was originally a covering cherub, one of those angels who covered the throne, one who cried ‘Holy, holy, holy’. When he cried ‘holy’, he was exclaiming with wonder as he received from God the revelation of His purposes.

At some point, God revealed His plan to use Man, a person with DNA, to carry the DNA of God on the earth. And God revealed that it was to be His sons in DNA who were going to inherit the earth and the heavens (rather than the sons of glory, the angels).

Instead of crying ‘holy’ this time, all of a sudden, something else started to form in Satan’s heart.  He rebelled, and in his heart he was saying, ‘I want to ascend to the place where I will be like that!’

Now Satan had a reptilian form, and he was covered in stones. He was called Lucifer, the light bearer, and he was also the leader of the worship in heaven. So those stones were supposed to reflect the light of God’s glory, and he was supposed to be responsible for training Man to come into the fullness of God.

In Ezekiel 28 we can read about Satan’s fall.

Thus says the Lord GOD, “You had the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering: the ruby, the topaz and the diamond; the beryl, the onyx and the jasper; the lapis lazuli, the turquoise and the emerald; and the gold, the workmanship of your settings and sockets, was in you. On the day that you were created they were prepared (Ezek 28:12-13).

The garden of God (Eden) was connected to the earth. In Genesis it says God had a garden in Eden, and then He planted a garden east of Eden. So there were two gardens, and at that point heaven and earth overlapped. The garden of God was where God walked, Adam had access to that; it was where the Tree of Life was.

And then we read about all the stones that covered Satan’s body. You will notice that Satan had nine stones, but Man has 12 stones: the breastplate of the High Priest had 12 stones, there were 12 tribes, there are 12 foundations to the New Jerusalem, 12 fruits on the Tree of Life. The number 12 speaks of government, and Man was supposed to exercise godly government.

[Biblical numerology is really interesting: threes and sevens and tens and twelves and forties are everywhere once you start to see them, but we can’t go fully into that here.]

Then it goes on,

You were the anointed cherub who covers, and I placed you there. You were on the holy mountain of God; You walked in the midst of the stones of fire. You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created until unrighteousness was found in you. By the abundance of your trade you were internally filled with violence, and you sinned; therefore I have cast you as profane from the mountain of God. And I have destroyed you, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire (Ezek 28:14-16).

Heaven is on a mountain, ‘the holy mountain of God’ (v14). The whole structure of heaven is a mountain and there is a plateau on top. On the mountain there is a throne and from the throne runs a river of fire – imagine how lava flows from a volcano. There are stones that operate on that fire which are stones of revelation. I have been on that mountain and I have walked on those stones, and another time I will maybe explain what those stones are. They represent what Satan would have done to bring Man into the fullness of God.

But then unrighteousness was found in him. It was exposed because of his role as covering cherub and the revelation that God gave him. The scripture goes on to speak about Satan’s trading and about his being filled with violence.

Again, I am going to have to teach on trade and trading floors another time, because it is to do with covenant and to do with exchange. For now, let’s understand that it worked like this: Satan had information, revelation of what God was going to do, and he traded it with the other angels. Man was going to inherit the heavens, rather than the angels doing so, because the angels were all about being ministering spirits for those who would inherit salvation (Heb 1:14). All the angels were created for us, and that now became clear. When Satan discovered this revelation, he went to some of the other angels and a third of them decided they were going to receive and act on it, and they were going to seek to rule the heavens instead of Man.

Like lightning from heaven

So Satan fell, like lightning from heaven, Jesus said. As a result of his fall, Satan no longer has access to Heaven (but has not lost access to all of the heavenly realms). He has no access to the River of Life or the stones of fire, or anything else which is found in that heavenly realm.

And when he fell, ‘there was war in heaven, Michael and his angels waging war with the dragon. The dragon and his angels waged war, and they were not strong enough, and there was no longer a place found for them in heaven. And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him (Rev 12:7-9).

Here Satan is referred to as the dragon (I was writing about dragons and giants a few weeks ago in a previous post). This is where the word ‘dragon’ comes from: it is a description of Satan. A third of the angels – and that is a great number – took the trade Satan offered them, and fell with him.

As I say, that was in the original creation. Satan’s activity on the earth brought down God’s judgment upon it in the first flood, which resulted in a planet that was ‘formless and void’, covered in waters over which the Spirit would hover, brood or vibrate (Gen 1:2). And in the second creation, Adam’s rebellion would give Satan access to heaven again and open some of those realms back up to him.

Related articles from Freedom ARC

87. The Heavens and the Earth

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott –

Joshua the High Priest

And the angel of the LORD admonished Joshua, saying, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘If you will walk in My ways and if you will perform My laws, then you will also govern My house and also have charge of My courts, and I will grant you free access among these who are standing here” (Zechariah 3:6-7).

We saw last time how there is a progression here in the things that Joshua is required to do if he is to enjoy free access to the heavenly realms. It begins with walking in God’s ways and continues with performing His laws. We will go on to look at those heavenly realms to which he would have access, but first let’s touch on those laws.

12 Laws out of Jerusalem

The laws are not the Ten Commandments. They are ‘laws’ in the sense of ‘principles’, and they describe how God works within His kingdom.

• Law of the Spirit of Life
• Law of Sin and Death
• Law of Love
• Law of Faith
• Law of Sowing and Reaping
• Law of First Mention*
• Law of First Born
• Law of Abundance
• Law of Justice
• Law of Judgment
• Law of Grace
• Law of Righteousness

These are principles of how God operates and how we should operate in the kingdom. Like Joshua, when we start to do so, we gain free access to the realms of heaven.

Heavenly realms

I want to share with you a representation of those realms of heaven, so that you have some idea of how these realms relate to each other. It is only a representation though, and our understanding of this is developing all the time.

You will see that there are realms under the earth. In fact, there are three realms into the earth, three realms into the kingdom of heaven (into God’s kingdom, a kingdom that was given to Adam), and there is the atmosphere in between them, making seven. You will always find sevens in the things of God, because seven speaks of completion and is the perfect number.

Each heavenly realm has seven dimensions or levels of authority within it. I don’t know what they all are yet, but I do know that they are linked to the court structure (covered in the last session of the Transformation series, available on our website).

Within the atmosphere of the earth there are three realms (Greek thinking would see them as layers, but they are not), realms of God’s kingdom rule, and you will see the kingdom of earth where we experience the presence of God. Within this atmosphere is the area where we are supposed to rule: it is in darkness.

Under the earth, there are various places: Sheol, and Satan’s trophy room, and Tartarus, where certain angels are wrapped up. There are other places there too, but I am not going to deal with them here.

It is important to grasp that you do not have to go ‘through’ one realm to get to another. That again is Greek thinking. God has shown me places in many of these realms, and it is only over time that I have come to understand where they are located.

Let’s look at some scriptures, because we need to look at beginnings to see how some of this took place.

Satan fell

In the beginning (Gen 1:1) God created the heavens and the earth. He created the heavens first. The heavens were not just physical, they were all those realms we have just been looking at: realms of His kingdom, realms of His authority. The kingdom is all about authority, government and rule. Adam was supposed to bring what was in those realms onto earth. Earth was supposed to reflect heaven. Earth was not in the same place as we know it now. This was before time: in fact time didn’t exist at this point. And he created sons of God, which were the angels, particularly the ben elohim, who were preparing Earth for Man.

Now we have verse 2: The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. But God did not create it that way. Something happened between God creating the heavens and the earth and the earth becoming formless and void.

What happened was this: Satan fell.

This was before Adam was created. The Spirit was hovering, resonating, over the surface of the waters. The fact that the whole planet was covered with waters indicates that there had been judgment. God did not create it like that.

For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him (Col 1:16).

Everything was created for Jesus. Thrones, dominions, principalities and powers are not the names of demons. They are not the names of fallen angels (although fallen angels do presently operate in those realms of authority and power). So all these things – thrones, dominions, principalities, powers – were created for Jesus. ‘All things visible and invisible’ were created for Him: but things which are invisible to us now, to the natural eye, were not invisible to the spiritual eye for Adam.

The kingdom government is the heavens come on earth. It is all about bringing about on earth a reflection of what is in heaven. Whatever you see in heaven, those are the things God wants to see worked out in us. The principles of heaven need to be reflected in our own lives, and then in the world around us (starting with our spheres of influence). Everything that is in heaven, God wants to bring on earth.

What was the earth like when God created it? How can we know it was not created ‘formless and void’ (as a different reading of Gen 1:2 would have it)? Look at this verse in Isaiah:

For thus says the LORD, who created the heavens (He is the God who formed the earth and made it, He established it and did not create it a waste place, but formed it to be inhabited), “I am the LORD, and there is none else” (Isa 45:18). He did not create it a waste place.

Connected to the realm of heaven

This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made earth and heaven (Gen 2:4). Do you see how the two halves of this verse are referring to different things? There is ‘created the heavens and the earth’ and then there is ‘made earth and heaven’. He originally created it, then something happened to spoil it (and we have seen what that was); and out of the formlessness and void, He made earth and heaven. In the original creation, there were no stars, planets and galaxies as we know them now. They didn’t exist in that creation because earth was in the centre of that circle, with a direct, seamless connection to heaven. Earth always was (and still is) intended to be connected to heaven.

Now, as we know, Adam had access to walk with God. The earth, in the centre of everything, was connected to the realm of heaven. There was an overlap between Eden (the garden of God), and the garden God planted for Adam. That meant that Adam had access to every realm in our diagram from under the earth upwards, up to and including the realm of Heaven. After the fall everything was moved out into time and space, and the earth was no longer connected to heaven in the same way. The earth’s axis moved and everything became elliptical rather than circular, right down to the orbit of electrons around the nucleus of the atom.

If Adam had not fallen, and if he had taken the Tree of Life (which was the pathway to life), he would have had access to the higher realms: Heaven of heavens, Perfection, and Eternity.

But as we know, he chose a different pathway.

Related articles from Freedom ARC

* The Law of First Mention sets the precedent for how we should interpret a particular word or phrase throughout the scriptures. Since everything is always a circle with God, in many cases we have to go back to Genesis if we are to properly understand what comes about in Revelation.


976

85. Characteristics of the Joshua Generation (#36-40)

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott –

36. The Joshua Generation will bring revelation that wherever the next generation place their feet they will possess.

That possession includes not only this world but also the heavenlies. Both are their inheritance and destiny.

So Moses swore on that day, saying, “Surely the land on which your foot has trodden will be an inheritance to you and to your children forever, because you have followed the LORD my God fully”(Joshua 14:9).

Now as we know, God did not intend that inheritance just to be a piece of land, but the whole world. ‘For the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would be heir of the world…’ (Romans 4:13). And Jesus said that all authority had been given to Him both in the heavens in the earth (Matt 28:18-20).

The whole of creation groans as it waits for the sons of God to be revealed. When you take your place as sons in the heavenly realms, you are beginning to step up into your inheritance, which is the whole creation. And you will find that you can go anywhere in creation, you will see the galaxies – and actually we are supposed to create too. We are supposed to do the works that Jesus did. Who created the stars, the galaxies? Jesus did. You can go and do the same, and you will. Yes, in eternity, but you can actually go and do it now, if you access some of these realms and especially the courts.

The courts of heaven issue papers which confer upon you the authority to act, here on earth. That is sometimes the reason we have been unable to do things we know we ought to have been able to do: we have neglected to go to the courts of heaven to get the necessary authority.

Yes, that was because we didn’t know we were supposed to. We do now.

37. The Joshua Generation will encourage a passion to love God, and walk in His ways, and serve Him will all our hearts and souls.

Only be very careful to observe the commandment and the law which Moses the servant of the LORD commanded you, to love the LORD your God and walk in all His ways and keep His commandments and hold fast to Him and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul (Joshua 22: 5).

So take diligent heed to yourselves to love the LORD your God (Josh 23:11)

God hates mixture and lukewarmness – and so will we. It will take diligence, and self-discipline, and perseverance, but the Joshua generation will become so focused on walking in His ways and serving Him wholeheartedly that it will set us apart and cause others to take notice. The love of God will become a passion for us: it will burn in our hearts; and it will be unthinkable for us to offer Him anything less than complete obedience and dedication. Joshua the High Priest was promised access to heavenly realms if he would walk in God’s ways and perform Gods laws: we know the same offer is open to us. Once we have tasted of that, how could we turn away?

38. The Joshua Generation will warn the next generation about the dangers of compromise and going backwards.

There is a real danger if you see all this and choose to walk away from it. Ian Clayton has talked about how the spirit of antichrist is those who walked with the church and then turned away to start sowing false teaching. Once we get here, there is no going back.

For if you ever go back and cling to the rest of these nations, these which remain among you, and intermarry with them, so that you associate with them and they with you, know with certainty that the LORD your God will not continue to drive these nations out from before you; but they will be a snare and a trap to you, and a whip on your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this good land which the LORD your God has given you (Joshua 23:12-13).

39. The Joshua Generation will charge the next generation to never stop waging war.

The fight goes on until the Kingdom of God fills the earth, until the glory of God fills the earth, and Jesus returns. Meanwhile, we cannot let up, we cannot compromise, we cannot stop fighting, we cannot let down our guard; and neither can the generation that follows us.

Now it came about after the death of Joshua that the sons of Israel inquired of the LORD, saying, “Who shall go up first for us against the Canaanites, to fight against them?” (Judges 1:1).

They continued to enquire of the Lord. They did not say, ‘Now that Joshua has gone, we can do our own thing’. The war was still ongoing, even though we have read that Joshua gave them the whole land (Joshua 11:23). The Canaanites were still out there in the rest of the world, and they were still enemies of Israel, and of God. Israel were heirs of the world, intended to be a blessing to it. They were supposed to take that blessing out into the whole world. Obviously, they didn’t do that. They stopped short, even though God had said “but indeed, as I live, all the earth will be filled with the glory of the LORD” (Num 14:21).

Yet that is still God’s plan – as Isaiah says:

Now it will come about that In the last days the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the chief of the mountains, and will be raised above the hills; and all the nations will stream to it (Isa 2:2).

The mountain, the place of authority; the house of the Lord – these are all in the heavenly realms. Then it is worked out in this realm, as all the hills – all the other earthly authorities – start streaming to the church. Because we are living in the fullness of our sonship, because we start to radiate the goodness of God, because we start to manifest light, and live in creative light, not just created light. There is some awesome stuff coming, but we need to be prepared.

There will be no end to the increase of His government and peace, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this (Isa 9:7).

Justice and righteousness are the foundations of the throne of heaven, foundations of the throne of the kingdom. God is going to accomplish this: He will have His way.

40. The Joshua Generation will set a clear choice before the next generation.

They can choose the past, or they can choose to walk in their future destiny.

There is so much that we already have, that we already know and enjoy, and it is good. People can choose to stick with that – but if they do, they will miss God’s best. We don’t want to take possession of what God has given us, and then settle. Our influence has to increase and grow, because it is the nature of God that He wants to fill the earth with His glory.

Now, therefore, fear the LORD and serve Him in sincerity and truth; and put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. If it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD (Joshua 24:14-15).

We are coming to a close now, not just of these posts about the Joshua Generation, but of the whole 15-month series on the Prophetic Timetable. Next time we will begin something new, but for now I want to leave you with this: Joshua was 110 years old before he died, having fulfilled his destiny. There is time for all of us who are called to this purpose to raise up and release the next harvesting generation. Joshua did it: God wants us to do it.

Whether it is to be that Joshua generation who take our inheritance and bring others in, or whether it is to be part of the next generation, the Jesus generation, who will see Him return: God wants to reveal to us our destiny, and to see us fulfil it.

Related articles from Freedom ARC
Related articles from others

JOIN US IN ENGAGING GOD!

Engaging God on the Heavenly Pathways of Relationship and Responsibility is our online school for equipping a Joshua Generation of supernatural sons of God to live according to the order of Melchizedek.

Your first two weeks free!
Click here to get started today*

To find out more about the Engaging God programme, click here…

*Technology permitting: automated process on setup of payment arrangement and completion of online registration form. Terms and conditions apply.

83. Characteristics of the Joshua Generation (#26-30)

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott – 

Joshua led the children of Israel into their inheritance. If we want to do the same, what kind of people should we be?

26. The Joshua generation will start to be known and get public attention.

Before the revival we experienced here in 2011, virtually no-one outside of North Devon knew we even existed. Suddenly, because of what God began to do here, all kinds of people noticed us, from all over the country, and began to look to build relationship with us.

And some of the other things which have happened since – not least Ian Clayton coming here, and then mentioning us wherever he went – have made us known in countries all over the world. This blog gets hits from the UK and Europe, but also from Africa, America, Australia, Russia and the Far East. Hundreds worldwide have joined our Engaging God programme, and thousands subscribe to the YouTube channel.

Who would have expected that? It certainly was not of our own devising. God has a reason for it. He wants us to help other people come into the revelation we have received, and He wants us to equip and enable them to enter into their own inheritance.

So the LORD was with Joshua, and his fame was in all the land (Joshua 6:27).

Now, ultimately none of this is really about our fame – it is about God’s fame. We are here to make God known in all the earth. But we will have public recognition along the way, and that will bring public battles. Those battles will happen because what we are bringing will cause a reaction both in the spiritual realm and in this one.

All sorts of criticism and all sorts of accusations will be made because of what we are doing. A lot of people do not understand, yet. They will say we are doing things by New Age or occult power. They said that about Jesus, too, and we need to be ready for it. We need to be confident in our identity and in the revelation God has given us. We will be in the public eye, one way or another. So we have to make sure there is absolutely no pride in what we do. We need to be humble. It is about what God is doing, not about what we are doing. It is all about Him, but he uses us. Therefore we must rule our house, and deal with anything of sin or iniquity in us, deal with any stumbling blocks in our own lives.

If we have a need for affirmation or recognition from men, we are going to have to deal with that, because it is affirmation from God that we really need. And if we do receive affirmation and recognition from people, let us receive it with thanks, but then go and trade with it on the trading floors of heaven. Go and cast your crowns before Him.

27. The Joshua generation will take a radical stand against sin.

Sin is going to get exposed. It is already happening, always has. But the whole angelic realm are going to become active in exposing sin.

“Rise up! Consecrate the people and say, ‘Consecrate yourselves for tomorrow, for thus the LORD, the God of Israel, has said, “There are things under the ban in your midst, O Israel. You cannot stand before your enemies until you have removed the things under the ban from your midst.”’ … It shall be that the one who is taken with the things under the ban shall be burned with fire, he and all that belongs to him, because he has transgressed the covenant of the LORD, and because he has committed a disgraceful thing in Israel” (Joshua 7:13, 15).

We cannot have things in our midst which stop us standing in victory against the enemy. We need to see those things removed. That is part of the function of those gathering angels, who are removing stumbling blocks from among us. Purification, refining: the heat of God’s furnace is being turned up, in order to bring all the impurities in the gold to the surface. Then, when they are skimmed off, the surface of gold is an absolute mirror which is reflecting the glory of God. That is what our lives are there to do: to reflect the glory of God – to reflect what is in heaven – on earth.

We are coming into a time when the story of Ananias and Sapphira is going to become very important to understand. They lied to the Holy Spirit and dropped down dead. When we start to enter into these things which God is revealing, suddenly the levels of responsibility go up. And with more responsibility, certainly there is more authority and power – but the level of purity and holiness required to operate in that dimension also is greatly increased.

I am responsible to enter into the fire of God myself. And I am putting it out there for you too, but it is up to you what you do with it. I have discharged my responsibility, you must decide how you will respond. Are you going to enter the fire? Either way, the consequences are yours.

28 The Joshua generation will be careful to always seek counsel from God before making decisions.

It is dangerous for us to do things here on earth (going to and fro) without first having been in heaven. We must not do it.

So the men of Israel took some of their provisions, and did not ask for the counsel of the LORD. Joshua made peace with them and made a covenant with them, to let them live; and the leaders of the congregation swore an oath to them (Joshua 9:14-15).

They made a covenant with a people who tricked them, who pretended not to be inhabitants of the land, but to have come from a long way off. And Joshua did not lift up his eyes into the heavens to see. This covenant with the Gibeonites was a problem for Israel for generations to come. They made a covenant with the enemy, because they did not seek God first.

We must not make decisions based on what looks right. Looks can be deceiving. We cannot trust our natural eyes: we need to see in the realms of the spirit if we are to make right decisions. Getting our strategy direct from heaven is the only course that will keep us safe.

29. The Joshua generation will put the enemy under their feet.

The enemy here is not people. We do not put people under our feet. We do not tread all over people. We do not tread people down. We honour and respect people. We bring people from captivity into freedom. That means we do cast out demons, we do demolish strongholds, we deal with a spiritual reality which is beyond what we see in the natural. We need to see the giants defeated, and the dragons, and all the other principalities and powers and rulers in those dark realms. So we have to put the enemy under our feet.

In this passage, the kings represent those rulers in the heavenly realms:

When they brought these kings out to Joshua, Joshua called for all the men of Israel, and said to the chiefs of the men of war who had gone with him, “Come near, put your feet on the necks of these kings.” So they came near and put their feet on their necks. Joshua then said to them, “Do not fear or be dismayed! Be strong and courageous, for thus the LORD will do to all your enemies with whom you fight” (Joshua 10:24-25).

Through the power and victory of the cross, Jesus made a public spectacle of all the demonic realms, and they are no longer in authority. We have authority over them. We may not yet have taken proper hold of that authority, but we are beginning to do so.

We have to rule over them, and put the rulers in those realms under our feet.

30. The Joshua generation will operate in great signs and wonders.

Then Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel,  “O sun, stand still at Gibeon, And O moon in the valley of Aijalon.” So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, Until the nation avenged themselves of their enemies. Is it not written in the book of Jashar?  (Joshua 10:12-13a).

A supernatural event: time stood still. It gave them opportunity to defeat their enemy.

(The book of Jashar mentioned here, by the way, was excluded from the canon of scripture by the Nicene Council, operating under the authority of the Emperor Constantine. He did not want any of this stuff to be known, because he did not want ordinary believers to know they could rule. He wanted to rule, through the pastors in the church whom he paid; and that gave rise to the institutional structure that we still have to see dismantled today. Get the CD, as Ian Clayton says – he did a whole session on that. They tried and failed to get 1 and 2 Peter thrown out too, and the book of Jude (which says some very interesting things you don’t find elsewhere in scripture). Those books talk about entering these realms, about operating in authority and power in the heavenlies. But there are a whole lot of books that used to be regarded as scripture which did not make it into our canon because the enemy did not want them there).

And the sun stopped in the middle of the sky and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day. There was no day like that before it or after it, when the LORD listened to the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel (Joshua 10:13b-14).

Este artículo también se encuentra disponible en Español
Este artigo também está disponível em Português (do Brasil)

Related article from Freedom ARC

 

Are you part of the Joshua Generation?

We developed this just for you:

Engaging God on the Heavenly Pathways of Relationship and Responsibility
Equipping a Joshua Generation of supernatural sons of God to live according to the order of Melchizedek

Find out more and get started today!*

*Technology permitting: automated process on receipt of payment and completion of online registration form. Terms and conditions apply.

81. Come Up Here – Bringing Heaven To Earth

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott –

Over the past few posts we have looked at the first 20 characteristics of the Joshua generation. Before embarking on the other 20, this time I just want to explore something I have hinted at before but not really opened up fully with you.

The Moses generation

Remember how the Moses generation failed to enter in? They came out of Egypt but turned back instead of entering the Promised Land. The reason their mistakes are recorded in scripture is so that we can learn from them.

For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea; and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea; and all ate the same spiritual food; and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well-pleased; for they were laid low in the wilderness. Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they also craved.

Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written, “THE PEOPLE SAT DOWN TO EAT AND DRINK, AND STOOD UP TO PLAY.” Nor let us act immorally, as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in one day. Nor let us try the Lord, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the serpents. Nor grumble, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come (1 Cor 10:1-11).

A billion labourers

The Moses generation did not cross over into their Promised Land because they saw they would have to face giants. Will we cross over into ours? The Joshua generation are going to equip a harvest of a billion labourers, equip them in the supernatural, to bring heaven to earth. Those billion are just the harvesters, who will eventually bring in the full and final harvest at the end of the age. There will need to be that many of them because the battle is going to become more and more intense, as light comes into the darkness, challenges it, and overcomes it. Those harvesters are the Jesus generation, the ones who will see Him return.

Some of those reading this will be of the Joshua generation and some of the Jesus generation; I hope none of you are of the Moses generation – I do not want you to stay in the wilderness.

On earth as it is in heaven

So here we are. God is outworking His purposes, and the ends of the ages have come: we need revelation from Him if we are to engage with how things are in the heavenly realms and bring them into the earthly realms. That is what it means when we pray ‘on earth as it is in heaven’: it is up to us to bring heaven to the earth.

The Joshua generation will be forerunners who have spied out the land. What we may not have realised fully until now is that our Promised Land is not only about earthly things. To operate in the fullness of the kingdom, we need to operate in heavenly as well as earthly realms. Some of our spying out will be done in the realms of earth, but some of it will be in the realms of heaven.

God offered Moses’ generation the land of promise, but the vast majority of them said, ‘We can’t go in’. And earlier in their journeying, He had been willing for the whole nation to meet with Him on the mountaintop, but they were afraid of the thunder and lightning, the fire and the smoke, so they said to Moses, ‘You go, and tell us what God says. We can’t go in’.

In the same way God offers us all access to the heavenly realms now, because Jesus has opened them up for us – that is what was signified by the veil of the temple being torn in two at the moment of His death. His purpose is that we can experience everything He intends for us. Like the children of Israel, though, many are saying ‘We can’t go in’.

Responsibility

The kingdom of God is about government, about authority, about rulership. God wants us to learn how to rule in our own lives, and how to rule in the realms of the spirit to bring heaven to earth. We need to learn how to lead and equip the Jesus generation to possess  the land of promise. The Hebrew word for ‘possess’ means ‘to inherit by seizing, dispossessing and become heirs’. We were made as spirit beings, to have access to the spiritual realms. When Adam was first created, he had access to the heavenly realms. There was nothing to stop him. Only sin [essentially a loss of identity] caused him to lose that access. The glory that he was clothed with was removed. Let me put it like this: it is as if a bandwidth of revelation was removed from him, so he could no longer see into the things which were of a higher bandwidth – the realms of heaven.

Now, everything about God’s kingdom has a beginning and an end, but the beginning and the end are always the same. That is why Hebrew thinking is always circular, not linear like Greek thinking. Linear thinking speaks about layers of heavens – first heaven, second heaven, third heaven – but the heavenly realms are not really that way at all. They are dimensions of authority. It may have seemed simpler to our western minds to express it as first/second/third, but it has been misleading. We read ‘third heaven’ in Paul’s writings and leap to the conclusion that there must at least be layers below that of a first and second heaven through which we have to travel to get to the third. Hebrew thinking implies no such thing.

For God’s kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven, it will involve us fulfilling Adam’s mandate: to rule in the spirit realm and by so doing to reconfigure the natural realm. When we fulfil that mandate, we will see God’s glory fill the earth (Num 14:21).

We have to have experience of operating in the heavenly realms ourselves if we are to bring other people into it, and that is what God is doing amongst His people right now. He is opening things up so that we can gain that access, and begin to operate in two realms, earthly and heavenly. We learn to rule in heavenly realms, and then we bring that rule to bear in the realm of the natural.

Operate in authority

Before we can rule in the earthly realm, we need to operate in authority in heavenly places.

We have to go up and down before we can go to and fro. The trouble is, we have tried to bring heaven down while standing in the earthly realms. That is why we have been beaten up so much by the enemy: we have been trying to come against the spiritual forces of wickedness and darkness with the earthly dimension of authority we have here. We need to bring heavenly authority in order to defeat them. It is a different dimension of authority. To exercise heavenly authority we need to go up, and bring heaven down with us.

On the island of Patmos, in the spirit, John heard a voice saying ‘Come up here’ (Rev 4:1). That voice is still speaking to us today. Do you hear it?

Soundtrack: Open Door – Janine John Band (via YouTube)

Available in other languages
Related articles from FreedomARC

Are you part of the Joshua Generation?

We developed this just for you:

Engaging God on the Heavenly Pathways of Relationship and Responsibility
Equipping a Joshua Generation of supernatural sons of God to live according to the order of Melchizedek

Get started today!*

*Technology permitting: automated process on receipt of payment and completion of online registration form. Terms and conditions apply.

79. Characteristics of the Joshua Generation (#11-15)

Mike Parsons
with Jeremy Westcott –

The Joshua Generation are those who will enter the land of promise, and enable others to do the same. We have looked at 10 characteristics of that generation so far, and there are plenty still to come (so if you are new to this blog, it would probably be best to go back a  few posts if you want to get the most out of what we are in the middle of here).

11. The Joshua Generation will be equipped to enable the next generation to possess the land.

Joshua the son of Nun, who stands before you, he shall enter there; encourage him, for he will cause Israel to inherit it (Deut 1:38).

We have to cause others to inherit. This generation who are going to be saved, who are going to be the labourers for the future: we have to enable them, to disciple them in the supernatural, to encourage them to inherit everything in the Promised Land. We must not sell them short in the fullness of what their inheritance is.

12. The Joshua Generation will witness the awesome overcoming power of God.

We have seen the power of God at work in increasing measure over the past few years, seen quite a lot of signs and wonders, different miracles and so on. Those have just been a taster of the things that are coming.

Do not fear them, for the LORD your God is the one fighting for you…O Lord GOD, You have begun to show Your servant Your greatness and Your strong hand; for what god is there in heaven or on earth who can do such works and mighty acts as Yours? (Deut 3:22, 24).

No counterfeit can begin to match the true power and authority of Almighty God. Just as Elijah did with the prophets of Baal, there will be some among you who will challenge the forces of the enemy and call down fire from heaven, you will challenge some of those who do supernatural signs in the occult realm, and in the New Age realm; you will challenge them to a test of authority and power. And our God wins; therefore you win, you overcome, and you demonstrate true spiritual authority and power. It is going to be awesome!

You are going to win if you will step out in the confidence of the things you have already done, having your faith built up by the things you have already seen. That is what it means not to despise the day of small things but to see it as a time of preparation for the things that are coming.

13. The Joshua Generation will be strong and courageous.

If we are going to need to be strong and courageous, it is because there is something to fear or to overcome. And we will find that we too have giants to overcome, who are exercising authority in heavenly places. There are dragons to slay, who are robbing the people of God. True identity and inheritance are being held back from God’s people and it is for us to see them released.

Then Moses called to Joshua and said to him in the sight of all Israel, “Be strong and courageous, for you shall go with this people into the land which the LORD has sworn to their fathers to give them, and you shall give it to them as an inheritance. The LORD is the one who goes ahead of you; He will be with you. He will not fail you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed” (Deut 31:7-8).

God is with us. He is going before us. He is preparing the way. He is going to be with each of us and with all of us in this fight and in this battle. But there are going to be things we really do have to face. Some of the spiritual dimensions of things we have to contend with – even in this realm – are going to spook a lot of people.

As I have mentioned before, having been into developing nations where spiritual opposition is much more open, and seen what goes on there when evil is challenged, I expect those things to happen here too. Witch doctors who shape-shift, who change form in front of you? We haven’t seen that here – yet. The big ministry teams in some of those places have what they call the ‘snake-pit’, where they carry out deliverance, because some of the people they are praying for will change into serpents and werewolves and so on.

There is a lot of stuff in the media, films and TV which is beginning to make this seem more acceptable to the Western mind, almost like it is quite good really to have werewolves and vampires; and that is all part of the enemy’s schemes. Some of the spiritual power that the enemy has will operate in that dimension; and we need to know that we have authority over them. We are going to need to be equipped to handle spiritual opposition on a scale we haven’t yet seen.

14. The Joshua Generation will be filled with the spirit of wisdom.

We will definitely need the wisdom of God to know what to do in the face of some of the situations we are going to find ourselves in. Wisdom will be our equipping, connecting us to the God who knows all things. He is before all things. Therefore we can have a heads-up on the future, and on everything the enemy is planning, so that we can take a stand and be ready to overcome it.

Now Joshua the son of Nun was filled with the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him; and the sons of Israel listened to him and did as the LORD had commanded Moses (Deut 34:9).

There will be an authority that comes with that wisdom, which is going to inspire people to press in and receive their inheritance.

15. The Joshua Generation will meditate on God’s word day and night.

This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it; for then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have success (Joshua 1:8).

Meditating on what God has said to us is a key to entering into the spiritual realm; a key to understanding how to access the realms of heaven, seeing the word of God as a doorway into the realms of the spirit. Again, meditation has become a taboo in the church because of Transcendental Meditation and other forms of eastern meditation, which empty people’s minds. Biblical meditation, by contrast, fills people’s minds, fills them with the truth, and teaches them to engage with the eyes of their heart.

As we learn to meditate and to open up our spirit to that realm of God’s purposes, the eyes of our heart will be enlightened. As we engage our spiritual imagination, we can start seeing the Holy Spirit moving on people, start actually seeing angels and other heavenly beings. We can start seeing – and entering into – the realms of heaven.

Available in other languages
Related articles from Freedom ARC

Are you part of the Joshua Generation?

We developed this just for you:

Engaging God on the Heavenly Pathways of Relationship and Responsibility
Equipping a Joshua Generation of supernatural sons of God to live according to the order of Melchizedek.