A few weeks ago I was in Israel speaking in a conference.  While I was there, it was the Jewish festival of Purim which celebrates the story, as told in the book of Esther, of God’s miraculous deliverance of the Jewish people from extermination.  Immediately I was reminded of our journey in Canada in 1998-1999.  At that time the Lord had spoken to us that He was giving us one more year to repent (this was the Jewish year from Rosh Hashanah 1998 to Rosh Hashanah 1999) otherwise judgment was coming to the nation.  With only a few months notice, in November 1998, over 600 leaders and intercessors from throughout Canada, gathered in Harrison Hot Springs.  The purpose of this gathering was to posture ourselves to hear God for His strategy to bring the nation into repentance. 
 
In one of the first sessions, we lined up the flags of the provinces and territories across the front of the room and asked the representatives from each province to come to their flag to pray.  No sooner had they done so than a wave of travail hit the whole meeting room.  To my utter amazement I saw people drop to the floor, weeping, so overcome by a spirit of mourning and lamentation that they literally could not find the strength to pull a Kleenex to wipe their running eyes and dripping noses.  Months earlier, the Lord had said to me that He was not looking for Canada to come with signed statements of repentance for our anti-Semitic hearts but true weeping, lament and travail.  At that time, I felt this was impossible; Canadians were too reserved, I thought, to ever subject themselves to such a public display of emotion.  But the Lord challenged me to simply share the vision, saying “You don’t know what I have prepared this nation for, David, for such a time as this”. 
 
Now as I stood watching the scene before me, the Lord spoke to me again.  “Because the Church in Canada has risen up like Esther, saying “If I die, I die, but I will present myself before the King”, David watch and see what I am about to do in this nation.”
 
A few months later, the newspaper headlines across our nation were filled with an amazing story. Our then Prime Minister, Jean Chretien, had been invited by the head of the Jewish Congress to visit the concentration camp of Auschwitz and at the last minute he decided to go.  This was historic because he was the first Prime Minister to ever visit a concentration camp.  But even more fascinating was what happened to him while he was there. 
 
Also invited on this trip was the father of the head of the Jewish Congress, who was a survivor of Auschwitz, and whose name happened to be Mordecai.  Mordecai’s entire family had perished at Auschwitz and he had never been back in more than 50 years.  So as he came to the camp he was naturally overwhelmed with sorrow and memories, and he began wailing and lamenting for his family.  Our Prime Minister was moved to tears and he put his arm around Mordecai and said to him, “I promise you, this will never happen again”.  This prophetic photo was shown on the front pages of all the newspapers in Canada: the Canadian Prime Minister, whose name means “John the Christian”, comforting Mordecai the Jewish survivor and promising that an extermination like the Holocaust will never happen again.. 
 
I feel that the story of Esther is actually an amazing analogy for our whole journey in Canada these last 10 years.  In Winnipeg in 1999 a remnant standing on behalf of the whole nation rose up again like in Harrison and presented ourselves to the King. And by His grace He received our sacrifice of tears and mourning and lament and He extended the sceptre of His favour to us, a favour that has grown over the last ten years.  That’s not to say that everything is perfect in our nation, but in a world rocked by global terrorism, natural disasters and now a devastating economic crisis, Canada appears as a safe haven, remaining relatively protected and blessed as compared to the other nations of the world. 
 
But there is more to Esther’s story.  After she boldly stood before the King, and He extended his sceptre of favour, he asked Esther what she wanted, up to half his kingdom.  But even though the salvation of her people was paramount in her heart and mind, she did not immediately speak to the King about the plot of Haman.  Instead, she harnessed herself to follow what must have been a divine strategy from the Lord, inviting the King and Haman to a banquet she had prepared.  The King’s heart was so pleased by Esther that he again asked what he could give her.  Still she knew it was not the time for her to speak, so she asked the King to attend another banquet.  And before this second banquet took place, the Lord intervened to begin to turn the situation, reminding the King about Mordecai’s faithfulness and having him honoured in the kingdom.  Then, at just the right time, when the King’s heart was open at the end of the second banquet, Esther asked him to spare her life and the lives of her people – and because of her wisdom to wait for the timing and alignment of God, the whole Jewish race was preserved.
 
I believe that like Esther, we too in the church of Canada have experienced the Lord’s favour.  And while we have longed to see the healing of our nation and the release of our destiny, we also have faced many tests over the past ten years: would we be driven by our deep heart longings to initiate according to our own human wisdom or could we harness ourselves to seek the Lord and hear His voice alone, waiting for Him to release His divine strategies in His timings to bring all things into alignment with the purposes of His will? 
 
And by God’s grace I believe He gave us the ability to be “a people willing in the day of His power” and walk this journey of seeking, waiting and simple obedience with Him.  And I believe if we will continue to walk in humility and brokenness before the King, God will release to the Church an authority to see His dreams fully realized.  And the church of Canada will be another step closer in the fulfillment of her destiny as a ‘healer to the nations’ in a time when, more than ever, the nations are crying out for hope, for peace, for safety, for security.

We believe that the next step of our journey is that the King is summoning a remnant of His body to the Promise Gathering in Ottawa this summer.  What He will do with us and how He will do it, we do not know.  All we know is that our responsibility is the same as it has been for the last fourteen years of our journey: to ‘hear what the Spirit is saying to the Church” and, by simple obedience, to heed His call to gather.  The rest, as always, is up to the Lord. 
 
I look forward to being with all of you who are appointed to be in Ottawa this summer.
 
All my love
 
David