Taking the Land

The Lord said to me:

“Take the land; wrest it out of the hands of the wicked; make it a good land, clean and pure - make it My land. Smear it with the pitch of claim. Where you set your foot, it is yours. As My foot steps in your foot, and as your foot steps in Mine, so the land is yours and Mine.”

The enemy comes along and says, “This is mine, I have defiled it, therefore I get to keep it.” Was that not why Satan disputed with Michael over the body of Moses? Was not Moses dead, his body defiled by death? But Michael was not about to give it up, and we know that Michael would have gotten his way, seeing he represented God’s will.

I recall when, as a seven-year old, I sat at supper with Uncle and we would compete for the “chilyushka,” the heel of the freshly home-baked loaf of bread. One day, he grabbed it and pretended to spit on it. “There! It’s mine now!” he laughed. And surely it was, because I thought he really had spit on it.

In those days, I did not have the physical or mental strength to compete with my uncle. Today, however, I have not only physical or mental strength, but I have the spiritual strength, the greatest of the three, to withstand the most powerful person in this world, the prince of darkness.

The power I have now is the resurrection power. If I have the power not only to cleanse something but to resurrect it from total decadence, why shouldn’t I, especially when God has commanded me to do so?

Just what does the Lord mean, “Take the land”? Do not the trees and rocks come with it? Did not the buildings and vineyards and wells come with the land when Israel took it from the Canaanites? Did not the walled cities, horses, chariots, weaponry, clothing, gold, women, children, flocks, herds, and other spoils come with the land they wrested from the enemies’ grip?

Why do people haul the decaying remnants of an old car out of the bushes? Is it not because they see value in it and have the knowledge and power to restore it? Why would someone renovate an old house? Why not build a new one? Because there is value in the old one.

Men, made in the image of God, exhibit an innate predisposition to restore things. Everywhere in God’s creation we see that He recycles and renews the elements. The task of the saints at hand is to take a vile garbage dump filled with rotting trash and turn it into a beautiful, luscious, wholesome, fruitful garden.

That which is good does not need reconciling, but that which is defiled does. As Jesus said, “It is the sick that need a physician, not the healthy.” That which is sound and in safe keeping does not need redemption, but that which is stolen, enslaved, defiled, and destroyed does. It is written that the whole world lies in wickedness. We are here to reconcile that which needs redemption, reconciliation, restoration, and resurrection.

There are those who say, “This was used in the worship of other gods, so have nothing to do with it; it has nothing to do with God.” A primary object or symbol people have spoken to us about is the Star of David, allegedly the one referred to as the star of Remphan:

“Yea, you took up the tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of your god Remphan, images which you made in order to worship them; and I will remove you beyond Babylon” (Acts 7:43 MKJV).

First, we made no star to worship another god. Second, we do not use this star to worship the True God. Third, we do not care what some things were used for. We are flying the flag of Israel, a nation God has called out of all other nations and brought back to its ancient land for redemption. Yes, He did destroy their nation, their capital Jerusalem, and their Temple because they used all three for other gods. If He wishes to destroy their language as well because they have used it to worship other gods, that is fine with me. It seems to me, however, that He has moved men to restore it instead. If He also wishes to destroy the people, that is His business. However, that is not His will, not for the Jews, and ultimately not for any people.

Satan took man and defiled him, using him for every vile purpose imaginable. Shall we damn man because he has been in Satan’s possession? While man has been damned, God is in the business of redeeming, not condemning. “You know not what spirit you are of,” said Jesus to James and John who were ready to destroy men in Satan’s grip. “The Son of man has come to save life and not to destroy.” It is the destroyer who condemns and destroys. The Savior saves and has stopped at nothing to do so. Indeed, He has done it; the reconciliation of all things is a done deal. It has only to be fulfilled.

Satan is known as the prince of this world, identified so in Holy Scripture. Should Jesus Christ not have laid down His life for mankind because it has been enslaved by Satan and sin? Is anything unredeemable because it has been used for evil? Shall we scrap the earth because it has been defiled?

The Bible has been used by false religion ever since It came into existence. The Muslims refer to It, Jehovah’s Witnesses take and pervert It, the Mormons ignore It and count It as secondary to the Book of Mormon, the Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists, and so many others use and abuse It to promote their doctrines, which are not of God. Shall we then throw away the Bible? Shall we let the Devil have It? “Don’t quote from It anymore, since he has used It for every vile work there is.” Isn’t that what atheists are saying? Are they serving God’s interests or Satan’s?

When God had adulterers stoned to death, was He stoning adulterers or adultery? When Jehu destroyed Baal worshippers, was he destroying Baal worshippers or Baal worship? When people are ill, are we to take the Hitlerian approach and destroy them, or shall we become physicians to them instead?

God has commanded me to take back the land which the enemy has taken and defiled. I intend to do just that and not leave so much as a blade of grass to the usurper and destroyer, no, not one blade. Why should I let the devil have anything, when I am commanded to take it back? We are the ministers of restoration, not surrender, and of the reconciliation of all things, not just of some or even most.

What is resurrection, but to bring back from the dead and restore to newness of life, never to be destroyed again? If the star was used for evil, we will take it back for good, and we have. If today’s Israel uses it for evil, it will not deter or discourage us from using it for good. Our purpose is to serve God, not Israel, not Jews, not a flag or a star, not a religion, or yet ourselves. We are here to serve Him that He may be all in all:

“And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son also Himself be subject unto Him that put all things under Him, that God may be all in all” (1 Corinthians 15:28 KJV).

There are those who will touch and handle only that which is clean, supposing themselves to be clean and holy before God. The religious would not touch the wounded man by the side of the road, but Jesus commended a Samaritan, one considered unclean by the Jews, for ministering to the unclean. The Pharisees considered the Gentiles unclean, but Jesus also died for the Gentiles and sent Saul to bring the good news that God was prepared to receive them.

Those who will only touch the clean wish to make it known to all that they are clean. They misinterpret the words of God, “Touch not the unclean thing.” God was not talking about the Samaritan but of what the Samaritans were guilty of doing. God was not talking about the leper but about the sin that condemned the leper to his sorry state and the unclean attitude of despising him. That was what was and is unclean to God.

Truth be told, nothing is clean to those who think themselves to be clean. Of them is it written:

“But to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure, but even their mind and conscience is defiled. They profess that they know God, but in their works they deny Him, being abominable and disobedient and reprobate to every good work” (Titus 1:15-16 MKJV).

Here is why they are the way they are:

“For they who are such do not serve our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches they deceive the hearts of the simple” (Romans 16:18 MKJV).

But will I reject these people? Who am I that I could do so? If rejection, however, is the will of God, it will only be temporary. It will be until God prepares them for repentance, even as He rejected His own people for a time and not forever:

“For the Lord has made you come back to Him, like a wife who has been sent away in grief of spirit; for one may not give up the wife of one’s early days. For a short time I gave you up; but with great mercies I will take you back again. In overflowing wrath My face was veiled from you for a minute, but I will have pity on you for ever, says the Lord Who takes up your cause” (Isaiah 54:6-8 BBE).

Those to whom nothing is pure are also on the slate for redemption. I don’t suppose they would wish to be cast off forever and treated as unclean, as they do with other people and things. God’s thoughts and ways are not men’s thoughts and ways:

“Even so these now were disobedient, that through the mercy shown you they also might be shown mercy. For God has shut up all to disobedience, that He might show mercy to all” (Romans 11:31-32 EMTV).

Escapism and Capitulation to the Enemy

We are here to take the land. “Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven” is taking the land, bringing Heaven to earth. The New Jerusalem is brought down to men. Taking the land is serving the Lord. It is about His glory, and not our privilege. The Lord desires commitment to that end, which is in His power to perform. It is about His will, not ours.

The rapture doctrine is about surrender to the enemy and retreating. Satan has powerful hordes of armed warriors on his side, plus the men of this world he has captured, but there are more for us than against us. The Lord has powerful angels without number at His disposal to serve us at a moment’s notice.

Just as the Lord’s death had to be fulfilled, now the taking of the land He has paid for must be fulfilled. What should we do? Let thieves keep stolen property? They took it, and therefore we need to let them have it? Is there no care for justice? How dare anyone propose the devil keep whatever he has stolen - the Star of David or Israel or the Temple Mount or the Bible or any other thing!

We are here to set at liberty all of God’s creation:

“And we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now” (Romans 8:22 MKJV).

“Truly He Who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” (Romans 8:32 MKJV)

Bringing deliverance to a dead, sin-cursed world is possible because God is the Resurrection. Wherever our feet touch, the land is ours. “Expect the impossible,” we are instructed by the Lord. What is impossible for man is possible with God. With God all things are possible. It is a glorious work.

Victor Hafichuk