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The rise of the house of Elisha, part 4

I mentioned earlier that the Jamestown colony was established on May 13, 1607. While that was true, the colonists actually landed at Cape Henry on April 26, 1607. They then planted their flag and a cross brought from England and claimed the land for Christ on April 29. So there is more than one date that should be considered in this 400-year cycle.

So on April 29, 2007 a Dutchman named Johan Huibers finished building his half-size Noah’s Ark and opened it up for tourists. He later built a full-scale model of Noah’s Ark, completing it in 2012 and opening it up to the public. (When we flew to The Netherlands in April of 2015, our hosts, Henrick and Margriet, took us on a tour of this full-scale Ark. It even had some animals in pens and cages.)

Although the Jamestown colonists came directly from England, the Pilgrims arrived 13 years later via The Netherlands, where they had first sought religious freedom. So it is of interest that a Dutchman built this modern Noah’s Ark.

Recall that we poured out the seventh bowl of wine and water on October 7, 2006 and that 40 plus 150 days later was April 15, 2007. We drove to the headwaters of the Mississippi River at the end of our “Noah’s flood,” and then two weeks later Johan’s half-size Ark was completed on April 29.

The connection was not lost on us. We soon dubbed 2007 as the Year of Noah.

More Signs of the Flood

On August 16, 2007 tropical storm Erin made landfall near Lamar, Texas. Once it came ashore, it continued to increase in strength and flooded Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Missouri. Eighty mph winds were recorded in Norman, OK, which is hurricane strength. We took this as a sign of the flood of the Holy Spirit that was yet to come.

This storm system dissipated, but the system itself continued to move north to Minnesota, where it merged with another rain system coming south from Canada. It came to us in Minnesota just as we were having a conference in a barn just north of Minneapolis. In those days we had been holding yearly conferences at that location, and we had noticed that each year the weather seemed to speak prophetically.

The conference in 2007 was held on August 17-19, just as the two storm systems were merging. Ron had discerned that since we were in the Year of Noah, we ought to see rain at this conference. If we saw rain two days in a row, it would be an indication of a double portion of the Holy Spirit that was to be poured out soon.

Well, it did rain two days in a row. Southeastern Minnesota received 17 inches of rain on August 18. Officially, from midnight to midnight they recorded 15.4 inches of rain, which broke the all-time Minnesota record of 10.8 inches in a single 24-hour period.

The Leslie Conference: September 14-16, 2007

We hosted two Tabernacles conferences in 2007, which we called the “Banner Conferences,” because we were led to plant banners (or standards) at both locations. The first was at Leslie, Arkansas on September 24-27, where Dr. Melissa had seen a standard planted in the midst of a ring of fire.

Keep in mind that 2007 was also the 400^th anniversary of the time when the Jamestown colonists planted their flag (or banner) on April 29, 1607. We planted a banner in Leslie to claim America for Christ and His Kingdom. (Later, we planted the banner in Hawaii in the midst of the geological ring of fire to claim the world as a whole for Christ.)

The banner is 50 x 50 inches to signify the Jubilee. It has a gold background to signify the glory of the Lord covering the earth “as the waters cover the sea” (Isaiah 11:9). Our logo, a shield portraying the two doves, is in the center of the banner, proclaiming the two works of Christ with the motto: Truth in Love.

Around the edge of the banner is a 1½ inch strip of purple to signify divine government surrounding the earth. We support Christ’s right to rule the earth (1 Corinthians 15:27, 28) according to His righteous laws.

Finally, at the bottom of the banner is embroidered the words: “His Banner over us is Love.” It is taken from the Song of Solomon 2:4.

The Hilo Conference September 24-27, 2007

We held our second Tabernacles conference in Hilo, Hawaii from September 24-27, 2007. At the close of the morning meeting on September 26, Dave Dixon sang The Prayer, and it seemed as if the Holy Spirit was released at that moment. As he finished the final notes of the song, Pam could not hold it in any longer and burst out with joyous laughter. She had tried to suppress it, but finally she had to release it for about 10 minutes. We knew then that we had broken through in some way, and that we had entered into whatever the Lord had for us.

That afternoon we planted the banner in the midst of the ring of fire at the Kilauea volcano.

What we did not know until the following week was that as our conference was beginning on September 25, Doug Evers had experienced something similar to this thousands of miles away in Wisconsin. He told us later that it was “like being full of laughing gas.” He could only describe it as being filled with the Spirit of Forgiveness. That sounds like something the Holy Spirit would release on such an occasion. Forgiveness, after all, is at the heart of the law of Jubilee and is the core of the message of reconciliation described by Paul in 2 Corinthians 5:18, 19,

¹⁸ Now all these things are of God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, ¹⁹ namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.

Whereas much of the church’s message to the world has been “turn or burn,” we are ambassadors of Christ with the message that God is “not counting their trespasses against them.” Ours is a New Covenant message, telling the world what God has done for them. It is a message of love, which God has demonstrated by dying for the world while they were yet sinners and while they were yet enemies (Romans 5:8, 10, 11).

The church has usually preached the Old Covenant gospel of man’s promises to serve God, but we have a New Covenant gospel of God’s promises to us. This is the good news that causes us to be filled with laughter through the Spirit of Forgiveness.

The Birth of Elisha

The final evening of the conference (September 26) was the evening of the first day of the feast of Tabernacles. Prophetically speaking, the first day of Tabernacles is the time when the sons of God are to be born. During that evening meeting, Geri, one of the young Hawaiian girls at the meeting, went into spiritual labor.

This caused some confusion at first, since many had not seen this sort of thing before. Many left the room. Geri was obviously not actually pregnant, but nonetheless, she appeared to be in hard labor and had to lie down on the floor in front of God and country.

Geri then began to prophesy to various people by name, giving them a word from the Lord. From her position, she had no way of knowing who remained in the room behind her, but she spoke no prophetic words over any who had left the room. Thus she prophesied for about 1½ hours as she seemed to give birth to ten spiritual children. (Later, the Lord said: “Ten callings have been brought to birth.”)

Toward the beginning of this time, she asked for me to come near, so I sat behind her near her head, where I was able to observe, discern, and “test the spirits to see whether they are from God” (1 John 4:1). The timing of this birthing experience coincided with the evening of the first day of Tabernacles, which was the day we would expect to see God birthing something.

The next morning, as we were concluding our conference, Fred commented that this was the birth of Elijah. The Lord confirmed this, but actually, it was a prophetic type of the double portion of Elijah’s anointing which was given to Elisha.

I had hoped to see the birth of the actual ministry of Christ, now that the seven bowls of wine and water had been poured out a year earlier. But instead, we saw the birth of the preparatory ministry of Elijah/Elisha that was comparable to John, who prepared the way of Christ in His first coming (Luke 3:4). Things always seem to take longer than we want.

After we returned home from Hawaii, Bob called me on the telephone to convey his discernment that we would see this “birth” a year later at Tabernacles of 2008. This was based on the story of Sarah in Genesis 17:21 and 21:2, where it was said that she would give birth to the promised son “at this season in the next year.” The Hebrew word translated “season” is mo’ed, “appointed time,” which is an early reference to a feast day.

John the Baptist was born at Passover, as was Isaac, to prepare the way for Christ’s first coming. But in the present season of Christ’s second coming, the birth sign came at Tabernacles. Genesis 21:6 says,

⁶ Sarah said, “God has made laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.”

So both Pam and Doug were overcome with fits of laughter, showing the connection with the birth of Isaac, whose name means “laughter.”

The Circumcision Sign

After this birthing experience in Hilo, we thought we might see a sign of the circumcision of the “son” on the eighth day of Tabernacles, as this is the day in prophecy that the sons of God will be caught up to the throne to be presented to the Father. The church calls it the “rapture,” but to us it is the presentation of the sons of God after being brought to birth on the first day of the feast of Tabernacles.

On October 4, 2007, the eighth day of Tabernacles, one of the mainstream television networks aired an interview with John Malvo. He was the Washington sniper who had killed 10 people in October of 2002, so the newsmen wanted to do a 5-year follow-up on that story.

Recall that his killing spree around Washington D.C. pictured the circumcision of Washington. So that was an interesting sign of circumcision on the eighth day.