In Judges 2, the Scriptures discuss how God's chosen people began to worship Baal and the Ashtoreths. This fulfilled a prophecy in verse 3 because of the disobedience of the Israelites "...I will not drive your enemies out before you. They will be thorns in your sides and their gods will be a snare to you". The defeat got so bad that God raised up the judges (verse 16) to save them from their enemies because God had compassion on his chosen people and also to protect the lineage that was to bring forth Jesus. But the Israelites still prostituted themselves to Baal and found further ways to prostitute themselves after the judges died until another judge came along and the cycle constantly repeated. The judges were the deliverers of Gods people. They were warriors. They led the armies that defeated the enemies of God, but nowhere in the scriptures does it say that they were the governing body of the people. In fact, the very last verse in Judges (21:25) states that there was no king and "everyone did as he saw fit". In fact, this is a common concept popularized in postmodern society today where postmodern people think that "all roads lead to heaven" fueled and propogated by the same root that influenced their parents "Pre-postmodern" mentality of "if it feels good, do it".

God's children went from annointed leader by God, to no leadership at all. Eli's sons and Samuel's sons did evil in the eyes of the Lord to the point that the Israelites wanted deliverance, but through a world systematic way via a king. Samuel finally obeyed the voice of the Lord about the people's rejection of God and annointed a king. The people said in I Samuel 8:20 that "..We want a king over us, then we will be like other nations; with a king to lead us and go out before us and fight our battles". This is very contrary to God's purpose of (1): God appointing a leader to lead his people. (2): God wanted his people to be like God, not like other nations. (3): God wanting to fight their battles. i.e. "The battle belongs to the Lord". Throughout the Old Testament, the people were in a constant cycle of kings and constantly in and out of the will of God. They died, to be rescued, only to die, be rescued and repeat the pattern over again. This is so much like the church today. We are acting like Old Covenant Christians in a New Covenant. The church almost dies, get's rescued only to almost die again and repeat the cycle over and over again. This went on for world history forever in the physical sense, but one man came down from Heaven to re-establish the order of God's people to the point of being a continuous church until the second coming of the Lord. His name is Jesus. Jesus died and rose from the grave. Jesus ascended back to Heaven and told his people that he is coming back. Later on, God sent the Holy Spirit back on earth to be the comforter that Jesus foretold in John 14-16.

Before I proceed to the New Testament / New Covenant way of life, let me explain how "VIVAL" came about.

One night I was laying down in my bed to try to get to sleep. The weeks before were rough, busy, and I accomplished many tasks while at the same time feeling like I did nothing. I laid down and started to pray for my needs, the needs of my friends, praising his name, praying about the webpage, etc. I felt drained and depleted and I asked God to "fill me up since I am empty". I then heard the Lord tell me as clear as day:

"Bob, You are not empty!!!"

"WHOAAAAAAAAAAAAAA" I said, shocked. Everything around me, everything within me said otherwise. It was at this point where God showed me the automobile fuel tank analogy I explained on the previous page. Then the Lord filled me up and told me as plain as day:

In these last days, there can not be no more "revivals" and "renewals". The New Testament church will grow by one-on-one relationship evangelism and getting into the same trenches that the church has deemed "unacceptable" in order to snatch out those people who never knew me and those prodigal sons and daughters who once knew me. The difference between religion and Christianity is that within religion, man had to come up to God and attempt to play "holier than thou" when I knew all the time the spiritual climates, conditions and pressures existent. In Christianity, My Son Jesus came down from heaven to earth to provide atonement for sin. Jesus went to the sinner. Ordinary religion expects sinners to come to us. In order to be able to go out into the highways and byways to reach the sinners whether the sinner is outside the local bar, homeless, online, your next door neighbor, or whatever. My people must be in a constant state of relationship with me.

"Revival" MUST!!! become "VIVAL"!
"Renewal" MUST!!! become "NEWAL"!

Look at the New Testament and see the church I want my people to be.

This says The Lord of Hosts

I went and studied the New Testament lifestyle of the Christian by reading Acts and by reading the letters Paul wrote to the churches. What was revealed to me opened doors and enlightened me to last days living.

In the New Testament / New Covenant, we see the early church in the book of Acts and the letters Paul wrote to the various churches throughout Eurasia. We see in Acts 2, where the Holy Spirit came down and baptized the believers with tongues of fire. It was at this time, also known as the harvest festival, where many Jews and converts to Judiasm came together to celebrate the festival of Harvest. The Jews were amazed at how the baptized people were able to speak in their language. In one sense, the move of God that occurred at the Tower of Babel was reversed. At Babel, man forsook God, built a tower to heaven to exalt themselves as God and God scattered the people to the ends of the earth to create new nations and created many different languages to confuse the ones who built a tower. At Pentecost, men of different nations and different languages came together to worship God and the baptism occured causing people to speak languages that could be understood by all for God to get the glory. Therefore the "one church" was born, and men of many nations took the blessings of God and the "one church" mentality back to their respective nations. In Babel, unified men built a vertical tower upwards in an attempt to reach heaven and touch God (like dry ordinary religion) and were scattered and made to speak different languages. At Pentecost, scattered men came together in unity at The Upper Room where the Holy Spirit came down and touched men in order to build a church not of brick and mortar, but a church that would horizontally spread out to the ends of the earth to preach the Gospel and fulfill the Great Commission (Bible Based Christianity)!

If we look at the letters that Paul wrote, the letters are addressed to the church at Corinth, the church at Galatia, etc. The letters are NOT! addressed to the denomination at Corinth, the denomination at Galatia, etc. The letters to the different churches does not translate to being different denominations today. These churches were started by the same people who were at Pentecost and took the Holy Spirit back with them to their respective homelands. It was still the same Christian faith in different cities that had specific issues to deal with. Corinth had sexual immorality to deal with. Galatia had legalism to deal with. Ephesus was constantly under persecution and attack from Satan. It was and still is one body with many parts. This is not like the Old Testament where the church was dead, and born again, then died and was born again. In the Old Testament, when the people started worshipping idols, the church died and was taken into captivity by their enemies until God raised up a man who would lead the Israelites to repentence and re-establish God as the ruling head of the governmnet. In the New Testament, the church never died nor was it ever intended to die. When one person tried to start legalism, or distort the scriptures, Paul directed the church leaders through his letters to disassociate with the heretic and correct all deceptions within the church. The church became a constant 24/7 house of prayer, praise, and fasting not through the 'Harp and Bowl' method propogated by International House of Praise in Kansas City, but by living an everyday normal life of being 'spuernaturally natural'. It was by this constant church along with fulfilling the Great Commission that the Church kept on growing no matter what trials and tribulations appeared. Some were beaten, some were flogged, some were killed for the Faith, but the church never died and the Great Commission was still carried on. Instead of only allowing the High Priest to go into the Holy of Holies once a year for the atonement of sin in the Old Covenant, Jesus established the New Covenant by becoming the ultimate sacrifice to all all to enter into the Holy of Holies at any time. The priests in the Old Covenant had to prepare the people for the festivals laid forth to Moses by God. In the New Covenant, the people must be in constant relationship with God and observe his laws and commandments at all times and through prayer and fasting. The people prepared the leaders (spiritual and governmental) by prayer and fasting to obtain leadership skills to lead them by the wisdom of God.

How then, do we maintain a constant state of VIVAL in these last days? The scriptures tell us many ways on how to be in constant maintenance of our Christian walk. One must know how to properly know when to or when not to perform proper Spiritual warfare. One must know properly how to perform Spiritual warfare. One must know what constitutes the need for and what does not constitutes the need forspiritual warfare. For more information on the extremeties of Spiritual warfare, please e-mail me and request the article "Warfare Gone Wacko". One must know the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through the pulling down of strongholds. In order to properly fight this spiritual battle, we need spiritual armor as described in Ephesians 6. If you look at the armor, we see protection for the loins, a brestplate, feet protection, a shield, a helmet, a sword, and prayer. Do you notice something missing here? I do. Protection for the back. Why is there no protection for the backside of us listed in the spiritual armor? Simple, we could not swing our swords effectively in the heat of battle. We would not be able to flex our shoulders and upper backs properly to swing the sword. How many times in your life has the devil attacked you from the front? In my life, seeing the obvious attacks from the devil in front of me is very rare. He has always came from behind me where there is no armor to protect me. Also, since the church is as one body and if my spiritually armored brother or sister in Christ is being attached from behind. It is my responsibility to watch my spiritual brother's or sister's back and thwart the devices of the enemy that comes from the backside to attack my brother or sister in Christ. This also works inversely. It is my brother or sister in Christ's responsibility to watch my back and thwart the enemy when he attempts to attack me from behind. We are not to be renegades and do our battles alone. We are in this battle together. If God wanted us to fight this battle alone, then God would have provided some protection for our back. Some Christians are good at swinging swords while some Christians are good at slinging stones.

Have you ever noticed in Gladiator movies where if two friends are attacked by an enemy that surrounds them on all sides, what is the first thing the two friends do to prepare for battle? The two friends have their armor on, get to the center of the attack, and press their backs to each other. In other words, they place their weakest parts together to where they become one fighting unit. In the enemies eyes, he has to now see the two as one and since the uncovered parts are now together and protected by the armor covering the two warriors, there is now no part that does not have armor covering within the fighting unit. Secondly, by placing their backs together. One warrior can see one half of the attackers while the other warrior can see the other half of the attackers while at the same time watching each other's back to keep the enemy from attacking them from behind. Now, the chances of the enemy attacking the warriors and defeating the warriors are now decreased because the enemy's mode of attack has to now come from a front view only instead of having the option to choose a frontal or a rear assult.

What if the warriors increased their numbers? Their strength as a unit increases!! How? If you place the numerous warriors back to back and shoulder to shoulder to form a bigger circle, the enemies still have to see the warriors as one unit but now, there is more armor present to protect the group. You will also see that the warriors can decrease their total peripheral vision to a smaller angular range in order to place more focus on a smaller range of attack. By having three warriors, the peripheral vision is now reduced from a 180 degree radius view to a 120 degree radius. The more Christian warriors that band together, the lesser the angular radius of peripheral vision has to be to watch your fellow brother or sister's back and the more focus that can be placed on your peripheral vision zone in order to more clearly and to faster see the forthcoming attack of the enemy. It is imperative that the Christian warrior learns how to fight corporately within a group of likeminded believers and also learn how to fight only with a best friend. Why? If we look at the example of the group of three warriors mentioned previously and now impose a real spiritual warfare situation here. The cross training of warfare skills in huge numbers and with a best friend becomes more evident. Suppose that one of the three warriors (in this example, I will use the warrior to my left) in your fighting unit is stricken to the point of partial blindness or stricken to the point of not being able of quickly reacting to the attack at hand, By earlier learning spiritual warfare techniques involving only two people. I can help the brother or sister on my left by increasing my peripheral vision to the left side in order to help see attacks better and alert my partially disabled brother or sister in Christ when to swing or swing for him if necessary to strike the enemy. The other brother can increase his peripheral vision to his right side in order to help see attacks better and alert my partially disable brother or sister in Christ when to swing or swing for him if necessary to strike the enemy. All of the other warriors must increase their peripheral vision slightly to help cover the other warriors beside them because the warrior beside him or her had to increase his peripheral vision to help keep the wounded solder (i.e. wounded brother or sister in Christ) from being killed. By increasing in numbers and pleading the blood of Jesus, the warfare becomes easier to perform and the warriors become less weary in order to go forward for Christ.

Click here for part three of Vival.