I heard these words recently, “We gotta ‘Go’ for launching! We gotta ‘Go’ for launching!” Then it dawned on me. There can be no launching without a great shaking. I don’t know about you but I’m sitting at the edge of my seat for what’s next, for the King is calling.
The King calls for us in many ways to launch us.
“Like an eagle stirs up her nest, that flutters over her young, He spread out his wings and took him; He lifted him on His pinions” (Deut. 32:11).
Is your life being stirred, shaken and interrupted? Have you taken authority over the enemy but he’s not listening to you? I’ll tell you why. The Lord has greater things for you. Like an eagle, He has landed and is shaking the hell out of the place where you are. Embrace the shaking and kiss your normal life goodbye. It’s time to spread your wings and fly, cause you’re an eagle, not a chicken. Don’t die in your nest.
Forty years ago when I started attending our church, in the Spirit I saw a huge eagle in a nest in our balcony. It was stirring the nest in people’s lives. It stirred and shook 26 of us members out into full-time ministry. Some went overseas and never came back but for visits for they fell in love with people over there. Some like myself stayed in the states. After 40 years, I saw this eagle returning to our church and to the body of Christ at large. The eagle has landed! The eagle has landed in our lives!
The Eagle Has Landed to Stir Up Spiritual Gifts and Talents We Didn’t Know We Had
When the eagle landed 40 years ago in our church, it began to stir a hunger inside of me to hear God’s voice. Back then, I lived two blocks up the street and I would walk to church begging God to let me hear His voice in the church service, for I needed to know what to do with my life. I never came to church to hear my pastor preach, I came to hear God speak to me. Because I was expecting to hear from the Lord Himself, He never failed to anoint my pastor or anyone else who stands in our pulpit to minister exactly what I need to hear. For 40 years in the same church, God still speaks to me, for my expectation is only to hear from Him.
This eagle will stir, shake and interrupt our lives. Looking back over my life, God has been in my interruptions more than He’s been in my plans. I hear the Lord saying, “Kiss your normal life goodbye!” Your nest has had some nice comfortable feathers in it, but this year, as the nest shakes, the sharp sticks will jab and prick us out of our comfort to help us out of the nest, cause we were born to fly. Every storm and adversity you have ever faced has come to prepare you to spread your wings this year. Don’t die in the nest. The harvest is now. God often comes when we least expect it, when we are just going along in life minding our own business and our dream is within reach and we’re almost there. That’s when the eagle often comes, interrupting our lives, to be about our Father’s business.
The Lord says, “There’ll be no sitting on the sidelines this year. I’m taking the benches out. There’ll be no benches to sit on. I’m calling everyone onto the field of their neighbors, city sidewalks, market places and the nations. Wherever you go, I’ll be there.” The move is on! The King is calling for you.
‘Don’t Tell Me Where I Can’t Send You This Year’
A minister from the states was communicating with a tribal leader, who had a village far out in the bushes, in a foreign country. The minister said to the tribal leader, “If you can tell me of a road to get to where your village is, I will come and minister. The tribal leader responded back to the minister, “You better stay home. If you can’t blaze a trail to get to where we are, you won’t do us any good when you get here.” This eagle is stirring its nest looking for trailblazers. Unless we have enough of God’s love in us to compel us to blaze a trail and make a way where there is no way to reach the lost, we better stay home.
“Prepare for takeoff!—Make sure your seat belts are fastened securely.”
These were the words my wife, Dagmar and I heard sitting on a flight to Houston, Texas recently to minister. Then the pilot came on the intercom and said, “We are expecting a nice flight to Houston today.” He also said, ” I want you to know that I have more experience in flying than Captain Sulley who landed the plane in the Hudson River.
When I heard this, I said, “Thank you, Lord, we are on the right plane with the right pilot.”
A little later he said, “I see a couple minor things up here that concern me. I will get the mechanics to check it out, then we’ll be on our way. After a while, He said, “I have good news for you. And I have bad news. The good news is, “You will be going to Houston. The bad news is, not on this plane.”
Those words pierced me and have never left me, for I believe it’s a prophetic word for the Body of Christ this year.
I’ve Got Good News and Bad News
I heard the Lord say, “We will be arriving at our destination that God has for us this year, but not by sitting in the pews of our churches. These pews will not take us there; neither will this nest.” We had to exit the plane to board another. Standing in a long line to board again, they announced yet another gate change for another flight. (There will be some gate changes coming for many of us this year.) I was frustrated with all these changes. I said, ‘Lord, what are you doing, because I’m on a mission for you?” He said, “First of all, I just saved you from a plane crash. Another thing, “I’m up to something good!” Many of God’s people with all the stirring, shaking and interruptions are wondering what is going on their lives. They are wondering where God is or where He went to. Let me tell you. “God is up to something good in your life”. He is reaching down and taking the good, the bad and the ugly and stirring it all around and causing everything to work together for good for them who love Him and are called according to His purpose. He has even pulled the stinger out of death and is using it for His glory!
From the pit, from the prison to the palace, the King is calling for you.
“So Pharaoh sent and called for Joseph, and they brought him hastily out of the dungeon. He shaved himself, changed his clothes, and came to Pharaoh” (Gen. 41:14).
There are many who feel like you’ve been in the pit for a long time. Others have felt like you’ve been in a prison. But we are in a “But God” season. This year, the King is calling you to the palace.
I think we have the wrong impression of what that palace was like for Joseph being second in command. The Bible doesn’t describe how beautiful that palace was but it does talk a lot about the reason God brought him there. “To save much people alive in the time of trouble and the famine that was coming.” Joseph considered the palace only to be a launching pad to launch his dream to save the people.
A King was building a palace in another country. He ordered huge pieces of glass mirrors to hang on the walls of the palace. When the shipment arrived, most of them were broken through shipment. He became so angry that He said his servants, “Break these huge pieces of glass into tiny pieces and throw them away. So they began smashing those huge glass mirrors into tiny pieces. As they were sweeping up all of the tiny pieces of glass to throw in the dumpster, one of the servants said to the king, “Oh, King, this stuff looks like diamonds! This stuff looks like diamonds!” As the King looked down on all those broken pieces, he had a divine thought. He had his servants pick up all those tiny broken pieces and he began pasting them all over the walls of the palace. When people came and began admiring the diamonds filling the walls of his palace, the king would finally tell them, “What you are looking at is just tiny broken pieces of glass.”
Though hidden, the broken and crushed in spirit will rise out of the dust and ashes of life. God is making diamonds out of dust this year. He’s making diamonds out of us. This is the year for broken people to be healed and redeemed and our King will be decorating the walls of His palace house with broken people who shine like diamonds in His kingdom.
We’re Not In Kansas Anymore!
I am reminded of the Wizard of Oz movie where a tornado picked up Dorothy’s house in Kansas and whirled it to another place. When it landed, Dorothy said to her dog, “Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore.” I hear the Lord saying to the body of Christ, “We’re not in Kansas anymore. You can’t go back and live like you used to and do the things you used to do. You will have to think different for you are in a new place.”
The King is calling for you and me. This is the moment we were born for. Ask the King what’s next for you. Don’t be surprised by what you hear. It may blow your mind. {eoa}
Bill Yount has been a member of Bridge of Life in Hagerstown, Maryland, for the past 36 years where he is now an elder and a home missionary. He is currently an adviser-at-large for Aglow International. Bill faithfully served in prison ministry at Mount Hope for 23 years and now travels full-time, both in the U.S. and internationally, ministering in churches and Aglow circles. “Humility and humor” characterize his ministry as he brings forth a fresh word that is “in season,” proclaiming the word of the Lord. The shofar (or ram’s horn) is often used in his meetings, breaking the powers of darkness over regions, churches and households. The shofar represents God’s breath blowing into the nostrils of His people, reviving them and awakening the lost. Many of God’s messages, which Bill ministers prophetically, come out of his everyday life with his family and friends. Please visit Bill’s website at billyount.com.
