There is a deep in every elect of God, and that deep is your identity. That means the preaching of the gospel cannot make you an elect; the preaching of the gospel comes as a deep to awaken the deep in all of God’s elect, and when that deep cry out, your deep will respond if you’re an elect. Equally, the evening message was not sent to awaken the world, but rather the elects who have long waited for the bridegroom, but their consciousness went foggy in the process of time. The midnight cry has come to awaken them out of their slumber, to come out and meet the bridegroom.
Warning does not necessarily stop you from averting a pending danger, but your urgent response to that warning. Our attitude towards this message that we have received and believed in is what determines our identity. It is not enough to claim to be a message believer; if you don’t respond to the voice of the time and give it the urgency it requires, you don’t understand the message. When you understand the message, your ambition will change; you will drop your ambition and take up God’s. The message of the hour is given for us to understand two things: -the age where we are and the time we are in. In this life, there is no continuing city; in fact, this is Satan’s Eden; there is no place for God on earth here. When you understand the message, you will create room for God in your heart, thereby escaping the judgment to come, which is the second thing the message of the hour has come to make us understand. The purpose of the message is not to prevent the oncoming judgment from coming on the world, but to awaken the elect who’s deep would respond to God’s deep—to change our hearts for transformation so that we can escape the judgment to come.
There is a picture in the Bible we can look up to see how to respond with the attitude required for us to heed the call of warning.
And Joshua the son of Nun sent out of Shittim two men to spy secretly, saying, Go view the land, even Jericho. And they went, and came into an harlot’s house, named Rahab, and lodged there.
2 And it was told the king of Jericho, saying, Behold, there came men in hither to night of the children of Israel to search out the country.
3 And the king of Jericho sent unto Rahab, saying, Bring forth the men that are come to thee, which are entered into thine house: for they be come to search out all the country.
4 And the woman took the two men, and hid them, and said thus, There came men unto me, but I wist not whence they were:
9 And she said unto the men, I know that the Lord hath given you the land, and that your terror is fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you.
10 For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red sea for you, when ye came out of Egypt; and what ye did unto the two kings of the Amorites, that were on the other side Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom ye utterly destroyed.
11 And as soon as we had heard these things, our hearts did melt, neither did there remain any more courage in any man, because of you: for the Lord your God, he is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath.
12 Now therefore, I pray you, swear unto me by the Lord, since I have shewed you kindness, that ye will also shew kindness unto my father’s house, and give me a true token:
13 And that ye will save alive my father, and my mother, and my brethren, and my sisters, and all that they have, and deliver our lives from death. Joshua 2
Rahab risked her life by hiding the spies from Israel, committing what can be termed treason if caught. Rahab was in the system of Jericho, but she had no confidence in the system of Jericho. Jericho was a place surrounded by mighty walls that could not be penetrated, sophisticated men of war who could withstand all sorts of battles, and a great comfort of pleasure, yet she saw beyond all that that she began to confess faith to the men that came to Jericho. She simply believed the promises of God for these feeble men rather than in the system of Jericho. Thus, she took a stand and asked the men to swear that she would be given a true token. What was in her that transcended the understanding of all of Jericho and what it could offer her? If only in this world you have hope, you are of all men most miserable.
If you must have the true token, you must be desperate, and you must understand the signs of the time, where your confidence cannot be in anything but the LORD. Rahab understood this, and she became desperate, requesting a true token. She understood two things: it’s time for Jericho to be destroyed, and if she must escape the wrath to come, she needs a true token. Do you understand the message you have believed? Check your desperation to answer. There is a life that should follow when you understand the message. The message is not for you to read and go. There is something you must know that will propel urgency in you to respond with imminent response to God’s voice calling “The Bridegroom Cometh.”
Daniel understood the message of his time; he could read the handwriting on the wall; this was his difference between him and the magicians. Because he understood the signs of the time and the message of his day, he had a different attitude.
In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, of the seed of the Medes, which was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans;
2 In the first year of his reign I Daniel understood by books the number of the years, whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.
3 And I set my face unto the Lord God, to seek by prayer and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes:
4 And I prayed unto the Lord my God, and made my confession, and said, O Lord, the great and dreadful God, keeping the covenant and mercy to them that love him, and to them that keep his commandments;
Daniel became desperate about seeking God’s face, the left behind the things that use to distract him and set a focus. And because he acted the way he ought to, God sent an angel to him.
If you have heard the message, you would know that there is an expectation on your life that God has towards us: God expects you to be desperate, God expects you to keep walking far away from the world, not into it. Paul saw the stand of some brethren for the truth and commented that indeed, their name must be in the book of life.
3 And I intreat thee also, true yokefellow, help those women which laboured with me in the gospel, with Clement also, and with other my fellowlabourers, whose names are in the book of life. Philippians 4
The day you become conscious of your identity, your attitude will change, your lifestyle will change.
11 And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.
12 The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.
13 Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying.
14 But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof. Romans 13.
It is time to awake out of slumber, the Bridegroom cometh, let us heed the Cry made, to come out to meet Him.