The rise of the house of David, part 17

Round two of the Dragon War (1998) led us to the Divine Court where we spiritually and prophetically resolved the dispute between Hagar and Sarah and between Ishmael and Isaac.

The revelation for this came through Sunny Day Roberts. She received a word from the Father to hold a “Symposium” in Spokane, WA from April 2-4, 1998.

Background Revelation

The first hint of revelation about this Symposium was given to Sunny Day on October 1, 1997, when the Lord said to her:

“This is about the placing of My Overcomers in lieu of the important events that are approaching.”

On November 10, 1997, she received another word Symposium.

“A Symposium…Those in the wilderness of unbelief will be calling upon you in the near future. So prepare yourself for meetings of a NEW kind (nature). I bring you that Word NOW.”

She looked up the word Symposium in Webster’s Dictionary. Its definition was “a merry feast; a convivial party; a discussion by different writers.” It was a pun, of course, about the Spoken Word coming out of Spokane. This showed her the location of the Symposium.

In the dictionary in my office, the word was defined as “a conference for discussion of some topic.” It comes from the Greek word sumposion, “a drinking party.” In this case, the wine was the new wine of the Spirit.

On January 10, 1998 Sunny Day received another word:

“Your wilderness days are over. My Kingdom Day is come. Watch and wait for My leading. I will guide thee and instruct thee in the way that thou shalt go. The guidelines and the signposts to make clear your path are going to be obvious soon. Magnify My Name, and I shall visit you with My glory.”

This suggested that the overcomers’ wilderness time was soon coming to an end. The biblical pattern, of course, was when Israel crossed the Jordan into the Promised Land. Two days later, on January 12, The Lord spoke to her again, saying,

“Know that your concern to do only My will in these matters has come up before Me, and I shall answer thee. Yea, enter into My Throne Room as I accelerate the pace of My Kingdom coming to earth. Much of the activity which you have seen in the Spirit shall now come to pass, and you will recognize the significance of all that I am doing. We shall be in direct communication and association as My decrees and declarations are issued forth from My Throne Room.”

This meant that we were to hold a Divine Court session in God’s “Throne Room.” Further, we were to bear witness God’s “decrees and declaration” as the earthly witness to what we were hearing Him say. In other words, God’s verdict was coming about an important issue. This was confirmed later on March 10, 1998,

“Out of the mouths of My Scribes and Servants shall issue forth a decree; a declaration which shall be a sending forth of My light and life within My chosen vessels to carry the Everlasting Gospel to the uttermost parts of the earth.”

Our Promised Land was not to be as it was in the days of Joshua. Israel received a land inheritance in Canaan under the Old Covenant, but our inheritance is another city and country which Abraham sought. It is the dust of the earth which we know as our bodies, which are being transformed into the image of Christ through the feast of Tabernacles. This truth is also “the Everlasting Gospel” which we are called to carry “to the uttermost parts of the earth.”

The Symposium

In all, eight of us met, four men and four women, which provided a balance of male and female. We also took note that there were eight of us. Eight is the biblical number of new beginnings.

Our discussion soon identified the issue at hand. It was the dispute between Hagar and Sarah as to whose son would be the inheritor of Abraham. Which son was truly called to extend the blessings of God to all families of the earth? Would it be done through the children of the Old Covenant (Hagar) or the New Covenant (Sarah). Who were the true seed of Abraham, and what quality of faith would be required to fulfill this calling?

One must understand Galatians 4 to know the answer to this. In our discussion at the Symposium, we realized that God was about to issue His verdict to “cast out the bondwoman and her son” (Galatians 4:30) and to recognize Isaac as the son of promise (Galatians 4:28). God had gathered us to the Symposium to represent the children of Isaac and to hear the divine verdict.

On the afternoon of April 3, 1998, as the Symposium met, the Spirit suddenly came upon one of the women whose name was Faith. She suddenly burst forth in prophecy saying (in part),

“It is the hour of the declaration of the work of the living God. And thou shalt go forth from this place, and nothing—nothing—shall be the same. And the natural man shall say to thee, 'But what was accomplished by the Lord in this place?' And in this time thou canst not know the fullness of what I do bring forth in thy midst, for thou shalt go forth from this place, and My word shall begin to run, because of this time that I have drawn thee to me.

“Thus saith the Lord, It is not a prophetic word as thou hast known it, but it is the declaration of the Most High God. For He doth announce before the face and in the ears of this people that which He is about to do.”

I had a tape recorder going, so I was able to transcribe it perfectly afterward.

How to Cast Out the Bondwoman

In the time of Abraham, the two mothers and their sons competed for the birthright. Ishmael claimed the birthright on the grounds that he was the firstborn son. For thirteen years this view was undisputed. But then, when Abraham was 99 years old, God revealed to him that a son would be born to Sarah who was to be given the birthright (Genesis 17:19).

This distressed Abraham, because he loved his son, Ishmael. But God was very clear about it. Paul later explains why. It is because this was a historical allegory about the two covenants. The Kingdom cannot be established through the Old Covenant. It is the Old Covenant that must be cast out, and those who have Old Covenant faith are not the inheritors of the promise.

This does not mean that they cannot be saved but that to be saved they must claim a different mother, even as the Apostle Paul himself did. Paul spent his early life as a child of the earthly Jerusalem (Hagar). He knew what it meant to be a spiritual Ishmaelite who persecuted the church (Isaac). When at last he met Jesus face to face, he was converted from being a child of the flesh (Ishmael) to being a child of promise (Isaac). His faith shifted from the Old Covenant to the New.

Ultimately, Sarah told Abraham to “drive out this maid and her son, for the son of this maid shall not be an heir with my son Isaac” (Genesis 21:10). God confirmed this word to Abraham, yet told him that He would also bless Ishmael.

Ishmael also had a promise from God, which was given to Hagar through an angel at the well of Beer-lahai-roi (Genesis 16:14). Ishmael’s name means “God hears” (Genesis 16:11). She called the name of the well “Living After Seeing.” It was a prophecy that the children of the flesh, who were to be “too many to count” (Genesis 16:10), would be given immortal life after “seeing” the God of heaven.

The New Testament pattern for this is seen in the conversion of the Apostle Paul. In other words, the path to life is to have an encounter with Jesus Christ. New Covenant faith is necessary in order to be one of the children of promise—the Isaac company. Yet the angelic promise given to Hagar is that her seed, the children of the flesh, would indeed have such an encounter, whereby they would receive the promise of immortal life.

There is an outpouring of the Holy Spirit yet to come upon the children of the flesh. This has already begun through Pentecost, but it must be completed through the feast of Tabernacles. When the Holy Spirit is poured out upon all flesh at the end of the age, many Ishmaelite children of the flesh will follow Paul’s example and receive New Covenant faith in the promises of God. Having an encounter with Jesus Christ is the path to life.

For this reason, at the Symposium it was revealed to us that the everlasting gospel of the Kingdom had to go out to the rest of the world. It was to convert the children of the flesh so that they might be blessed with faithful Abraham. But the children of promise were the only ones truly called to dispense the Abrahamic blessing to all families of the earth.

So we were led to cast out the bondwoman and her son, not so that they would be lost forever, but so that the children of promise could do the work of bringing the gospel to the children of flesh.

The Hagerstown Conference

After returning home from Spokane, I flew to Hagerstown, Maryland for another conference the following weekend. I had been invited to speak at this conference months earlier, of course, long before the Symposium had taken shape. I immediately recognized that Hagerstown was like a double witness to the Symposium. What are the odds of meeting at HAGAR'S TOWN at that particular time?? At the conference God gathered another eight people (four men and four women) to confirm the Symposium decree casting out the bondwoman.

Of course, the other major contender for the Scepter and the Birthright is Judaism. Both Christianity and Judaism consider the fleshly Jerusalem to be the mother of the Kingdom. The secular Jews believe that the Israeli state itself is the messiah. The religious Jews and Christians believe that a messiah will come to the Old Jerusalem and live in a rebuilt temple, where Aaronic priests will sacrifice animals, and from which place their messiah will rule the world in the Age to come. Christians think it will be Jesus; Jews look for another.

The Symposium, however, was where God issued His final verdict from the Divine Court, declaring Sarah to be the mother of the promised son. Hagar and her son were cast out so that they would lose confidence in the flesh and replace their Old Covenant with the better covenant. As long as Hagar and Ishmael were still contending for the Birthright, they would remain blind to the path of life.

Hence, the divine verdict clarified this age-old legal challenge, which has caused so much conflict and bloodshed over the centuries.

This was the nature of round two of the Dragon War. It built upon the New Covenant marriage revelation of 1997.