One of my friends recently shared with me how the Lord spoke to her about entering into the Promise Gathering this summer “swept in on a river of thankfulness”. This phrase really resonated with my heart because it captured what the Lord has been speaking to me about the Gathering. As I shared in my last email, The Summoning , I really believe that the Promise Gathering will be as significant a milestone in our journey in the church in Canada as the Winnipeg Gathering was 10 years ago. July 1999 in Winnipeg represented a “crossing over” – a time when God summoned a critical mass of believers from throughout Canada to stand in the gap for our nation, humbling ourselves, praying, seeking the face of the Lord and turning from our wicked ways (repenting for the sin of anti-Semitism in the nation and the state of the church). And as we did, God heard from heaven and He turned His face towards us, ushering Canada into a season of the favour of the Lord where we have remained relatively safe and secure from the many calamities, natural and manmade, that have been befallen our world in the last decade. July 2009 in Ottawa I believe there will be another significant “crossing over”. Once again, the Lord is summoning a critical mass of His body to stand in the gap on behalf of the whole. Only this time we will not be weeping and lamenting in order to avert judgment, but celebrating the Lord’s goodness to us over the last 10 years and presenting ourselves before the Lord to be commissioned into the next phase of our journey as a nation. I believe as we please His heart by our obedience to come into alignment with His purposes, we will see the release of a measure of God’s supernatural authority to the church that His Kingdom and spiritual government might be established in the body of Christ in Canada as it is in Heaven. As we come to this watershed in our journey and I reflect back on the past decade, I find my heart echoing that of King David in Psalm 107 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the LORD say this-- those he redeemed from the hand of the foe… Some became fools through their rebellious ways and suffered affliction because of their iniquities. They loathed all food and drew near the gates of death. Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress. He sent forth his word and healed them; he rescued them from the grave. Let them give thanks to the LORD for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for men. Let them sacrifice thank offerings and tell of his works with songs of joy. Psalm 107:1-2; 17-22 So as we stand on the threshold of this new phase of our journey, I feel it is right that we seal the passing season with thankfulness to the Lord for His unfailing love and His wonderful deeds for us. As we were praying about how to best do this, the Lord reminded us of the story of Joshua and the children of Israel building a memorial altar at Gilgal after they crossed through the Jordan and into the Promised Land. When the whole nation had finished crossing the Jordan, the LORD said to Joshua, "Choose twelve men from among the people, one from each tribe, and tell them to take up twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan from right where the priests stood and to carry them over with you and put them down at the place where you stay tonight." On the tenth day of the first month the people went up from the Jordan and camped at Gilgal on the eastern border of Jericho. And Joshua set up at Gilgal the twelve stones they had taken out of the Jordan. He said to the Israelites, "In the future when your descendants ask their fathers, 'What do these stones mean?' tell them, 'Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground.' For the LORD your God dried up the Jordan before you until you had crossed over. The LORD your God did to the Jordan just what he had done to the Red Sea when he dried it up before us until we had crossed over. He did this so that all the peoples of the earth might know that the hand of the LORD is powerful and so that you might always fear the LORD your God." Joshua 4:1-3; 19-24 As we read this story, we felt that we too should build a memorial altar to the Lord at this important time of crossing over into the Promise. But rather than build a physical altar, we will build a “virtual” one, composed of the “stones of remembrance”, our stories and testimonies of the many times the Lord met us at pivotal moments in the journey. So for the next 12 weeks, each week we will release another story, another “stone of remembrance” for this altar. And as together we rehearse the stories of God’s great faithfulness to us, I believe many of you will be stirred to remember your own stories of how the Lord led you to be part of this journey and how He met you along the way. I want to encourage you to capture these testimonies in writing, in song, in paintings/drawings, in video, and share them with us, so that we can add them to this national memorial altar of thanksgiving to the Lord. To find out more about how you can share your story, click here.
