4/4: THE GATE OF GLORY & THE PRIESTHOOD RESTORED

I woke up from a dream on 4/1 about "American Idol." In the dream, one of the judges disqualified me from participating in the competition because the "opinions of the people" had a negative effect on the sound of my voice. I knew I needed to find the sound I was born for, but it didn’t fit within the framework of competition, and the only way to discover this sound was coming out from under my nation's idol of desiring to be first and praised in the eyes of men. There was a death to the opinions of man required in order to be filled with the pure sound of Heaven’s Glory. I could not offer a pure sacrifice of worship in the presence of idols.

The Lord has been highlighting the number 4 to speak to me for the past year (go back and revisit the prophetic timeline for March-April 2024). The number 4 in Hebrew is tied to the fourth letter in the alphabet, "dalet" which is a pictograph of a gate or door. Ezekiel 44 opens with the prophet being brought before the temple of the Lord and led around its perimeter by the Spirit. He was led to the East Gate, which remains closed to all except for the "Prince" who enters through a vestibule to commune in the presence of God. Ezekiel is then led to the entrance of the north facing gate, and the fear of the Lord overcomes Him as the glory of the Lord fills the temple. He falls down on His face in reverence. 

"Then the man brought me by way of the north gate to the front of the temple. I looked and saw the glory of the Lord filling the temple of the Lord, and I fell facedown." Ezekiel 44:4

The chapter continues as the messenger of the Lord gives the prophet an instruction to divide and  restore the priesthood and cleanse the temple of idols that were brought in by those who previously guarded the gates of the Lord’s sanctuary. Those priests who profaned the name of the Lord by bringing their idols into His Temple and causing the people to stumble would bear the consequences of their sin and, while God would allow them to remain in the temple, they would no longer have access to the most holy place to minister in His Presence. They would be relegated to service in the outer courts and instead of being granted deliverance, they would bear the weight of their iniquity. 

Ezekiel was to raise up a new priesthood, musicians, craftsmen, judges, guardians and gatekeepers who minister to the Lord in purity. The standard had to be raised and restored.

"They are to teach my people the difference between the holy and the common and show them how to distinguish between the unclean and the clean." Ezekiel 44:23

Alongside of this theme of 4s, I have seen a battle raging between two fires. One fire is orange and one is blue. The Lord has been revealing that wherever this orange flame is at work, falsehood is present. Wherever the blue fire is present, it sweeps down like a wave and consumes whatever it covers. This is the pure fire of God. It comes to judge, and to heal, to purge and to protect.

The Lord will wash away the filth of the women of Zion; he will cleanse the bloodstains from Jerusalem by the spirit of judgment and the spirit of fire. Then the Lord will create over all of Mount Zion and over those who assemble there a cloud of smoke by day and a glow of flaming fire by night; over everything the glory will be a canopy. Isaiah 4:4-5

We are in a convergence of time, a supernatural moment of fulfillment. I recently went back and looked at several significant dreams I've held onto for years in intercession, and I know this is also true of many in my community, that we are in real time watching marking dreams unfold before our eyes. These dreams are not only being brought to fulfillment, they are bringing alignment and acceleration. Is this happening for you too? What dreams are playing out in your life right now? Be attentive to what, and who, is at work. We must find ourselves postured in humility for what comes next.

I see three battles at play right now— those of sounds, fires, and gates. These battles have been ongoing for ages, but we’ve reached a tipping point.

We are in a Mount Carmel moment. There is a face off between falsehood and truth, where the masks come off and we see what’s really real expose the powerlessness of the counterfeit. There will begin to be a public witness where the shouts of man’s ambition and fleshly passions meet the fire of God’s all consuming Glory. And the drought is about to break, a breaking in of glory so overwhelming that no man can contain it, name it or claim it.

Then they called on the name of Baal from morning till noon. "Baal, answer us!" they shouted. But there was no response; no one answered. And they danced around the altar they had made.

At noon Elijah began to taunt them. "Shout louder!" he said. "Surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened." So they shouted louder and slashed themselves with swords and spears, as was their custom, until their blood flowed. Midday passed, and they continued their frantic prophesying until the time for the evening sacrifice. But there was no response, no one answered, no one paid attention. 1 Kings 18:26-29

There is a war for worship. 
There is a war of fires.
There is a war at the gates.
And the struggle for territory and possession is over this one thing.
The heart.

Tremble and do not sin; when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent. Psalm 4:4

If the enemy can infiltrate and pollute your worship, he has your heart.

If he can tempt you with his fire, he has your heart.

If he finds no Prince in your gates, he has your heart.

But there is a sound that nullifies the noise of his taunts, and it is the sound of travailing intercession that births life.

There is a fire that drives out falsehood and deceit, it is the blue flame of Holy Spirit possessed prayer.

There is a Prince who stands at your gates, and He ever lives to make intercession.

The time has never been greater, the stakes never more high than they are now to repair the altar of our hearts and restore the priesthood that is made up of living stones. Dig into the trenches of your soul as deep as you can and be baptized with the Water of the Living Word. Be delivered from the assignment of death that has been chasing and tormenting you for years. Offer all of yourself as a living sacrifice to be fully possessed. Leave no place in your heart untouched or unavailable. The battle is turning at the gates, His Glory is coming and it requires a pure offering. He will have His people. He will have our hearts. His fire is about to fall.

Then Elijah said to all the people, "Come here to me." They came to him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord, which had been torn down. Elijah took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying, "Your name shall be Israel." With the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord, and he dug a trench around it large enough to hold two seahs of seed. He arranged the wood, cut the bull into pieces and laid it on the wood. Then he said to them, "Fill four large jars with water and pour it on the offering and on the wood. Do it again," he said, and they did it again. "Do it a third time," he ordered, and they did it the third time. The water ran down around the altar and even filled the trench. At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed: 

"Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command.  Answer me, Lord, answer me, so these people will know that you, Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again."

Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench. When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, "The Lord—he is God! The Lord—he is God!"

Then Elijah commanded them, "Seize the prophets of Baal. Don’t let anyone get away!" They seized them, and Elijah had them brought down to the Kishon Valley and slaughtered there. And Elijah said to Ahab, "Go, eat and drink, for there is the sound of a heavy rain." So Ahab went off to eat and drink, but Elijah climbed to the top of Carmel, bent down to the ground and put his face between his knees. "Go and look toward the sea," he told his servant. And he went up and looked.

"There is nothing there," he said. Seven times Elijah said, "Go back."

The seventh time the servant reported, "A cloud as small as a man’s hand is rising from the sea."

1 Kings 18:30-44