Devotions

In Isaiah 25 God shows the prophet a lavish, supernatural banquet taking place on a mountain: “In this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined” (Isaiah 25:6).

Do you get what Isaiah is saying here? This marvelous feast will take place just prior to Jesus’ return. At that time, God’s people won’t be mourning, wallowing in fear, stressed out and defeated. They won’t appear as frail, skeletal figures of spiritual leanness. No, Christ is going to return to find His people feasting on “fat things full of marrow.”

God Himself has prepared this feast. And right now, in this final hour, the banquet is already in progress. The Lord is telling us, in essence, “I’ve saved the best wine for last. And now I’m pouring it forth for My people. They are feasting on wonderful things in My presence.”

I see this incredible feast taking place as I travel all over the world. Young men and women of God are hungry for a gospel that touches them deep in their spirits. They have rejected the gospels of hype, crowds and professionalism. They seek only to be shut in with Jesus, to receive revelation from Him. And they are coming forth from prayer with a fire that stirs everyone around them.

Now, the mountain where this feast takes place is very significant. It represents a holy place, a house where the presence of Christ is manifest. It’s a place where God’s people commune and sup with Him, worshiping Him in spirit and in truth. This mountain of God’s presence is an important concept for His people. Everything the Lord is doing in these last days is closely tied to His presence. And His feast of fat and wine can only take place where Jesus’ presence is manifest.

Now, when I speak of Christ’s manifest presence, I’m not talking about something mystical and otherworldly. Whenever Jesus makes Himself known, everyone present senses it. The Psalmist says the hills melt like wax in the Lord’s presence (see Psalm 97:5). Simply put, every spiritual wall and fleshly blockade evaporates when Jesus makes Himself known. Christ’s presence is so real when it is manifested that you can almost touch it.
 

Right now, we are living in the biblical period known as the “latter rain” and God’s plan has been set in motion. All around the world, the high walls of Satan’s city are coming down.
Think about what has happened to Communism. Literal walls have come down in Germany, Russia and throughout Eastern Europe. Millions of people who once lived under Satan’s tyranny are being freed, and many are hearing the gospel preached for the first time. A “strong people,” once hardened in sin, are now praising God.
I tell you, we are living in a special time. I have never seen anything like it in my fifty-plus years of ministry. Our team conducted a crusade in Nigeria, and 500,000 people came on a single night. There is a hunger for God that seems to be unprecedented as we are seeing things happen I never would have dreamed possible.
One of those wonders is taking place in Iran. Several decades ago, my book The Cross and the Switchblade was printed covertly there. An estimated 25,000 copies have been in circulation. Also, the Jesus film has been shown in secret to hundreds of groups. Now hundreds of thousands of Iranians are being saved through gospel messages such as these.
I recently received a stirring report about a Teen Challenge drug program in a Middle Eastern nation I’m not allowed to name. This Islamic country is riddled with alcoholism and drug addiction. Government officials admit that the problem is over their heads, yet through the delivering power of Jesus Christ, the Teen Challenge program has produced hundreds of graduates who have been saved, delivered and set free.
One graduate is now the overseer of a Pentecostal denomination there. He says that the nation’s drug czar attended Teen Challenge’s graduation ceremony. This prominent Islamic leader heard dozens of young men stand up and testify of how Jesus healed them of their addictions. (What the czar probably didn’t know is that over one hundred graduates have gone on to start churches in that nation.) The government now recognizes Teen Challenge as the most successful drug program in the country.
It’s happening all over the world in unbelievable ways: Satan’s walled city is coming down!
“And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh” (Acts 2:17).
 

Isaiah 25 describes an incredible vision. In it, the prophet Isaiah is transported into the future, to the very last days. Bible commentators agree that this is one of the clearest pictures in Scripture concerning the end times. Isaiah shows us precisely what God intends for the nations and for His Church just prior to the end. And right now, we are living in the very hour Isaiah describes.

In the first five verses, Isaiah outlines what God has in store for the nations. In an instant, God reduces Satan’s empire to rubble. And suddenly the nations being held under demonic tyranny are set free. Isaiah breaks into jubilant praise at the sight: “O Lord, thou art my God; I will exalt thee, I will praise thy name; for thou hast done wonderful things; thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth” (Isaiah 25:1). He is saying, “Lord, You’re never taken by surprise. You’ve done great wonders in the past, and now You have a plan for this hour. You ordained it from the foundation of the world.”

As Isaiah watches God’s plan unfold, it thrills his soul. He exclaims for generations to follow: “In the last days, God is going to crush and annihilate Satan’s power. These palaces of strange demonic beings will be brought to ruin and the devil’s city will be reduced to a pile of dust.”

Chains begin to drop off the masses who have been bound. They are being freed from satanic prisons of fear and sin. Isaiah calls them “a strong people,” meaning “a once sin-hardened people.” And he tells us these same people begin to glorify God. For years they were terrified of their oppressor, Satan, but now they fear only the Lord, the one who delivered them.

In that hour, verse four will be fulfilled for the whole world to see: “Thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat, when the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall” (25:4).

I see this happening even now for millions of people all over the world. The poor in spirit are becoming strong. The needy are being rescued. And the distressed are finding an abundance of peace. Christ has become their protection, their refuge, their defender, their hiding place. When a blast of fiery temptation comes at them, it hits a holy wall surrounding them and disintegrates. And Satan’s once-fierce attacks fall harmlessly to the ground.
 

One Saturday evening, I walked down to Times Square as it bustled with tourists and others doing holiday shopping. It is estimated that at rush hour, nearly a quarter of a million people pass through that area. As I stood there, I prayed while watching the masses of people.

At one point, the Holy Spirit whispered to me, “David, take a look at these throngs. Multiply them several times, and that’s how many of my people died in the wilderness. Out of all those masses, only two entered into my rest, Joshua and Caleb. Everyone else died before their time, in despair and unbelief.”

The thought was overwhelming to me. As I watched the crowds, I realized they all had the gospel message available to them at any time, through television, radio, literature, even free Bibles in their hotel rooms. If only they wanted to know, they would be told that the same God who performed miracles for ancient Israel does the same for all who love Him today. Yet these don’t want to know Him. If they see someone handing out a gospel tract, they race by and wave him away. They have no gods but pleasure, money and possessions.

Suddenly, I began to see the value of a single believer in God’s eyes. And I hear Jesus asking the same question today: “When I return, will I find faith in the earth?” (see Luke 18:8). I see Christ, the searcher of men’s hearts, scouring all these venues, and finding few who truly love Him. I see Him searching college campuses, asking, “Who here will believe Me?” I see Him searching Washington, D.C., for those who would accept Him, and finding few. I see Him searching entire nations, and finding only a remnant.

Finally, He searches His church, looking for servants with a true faith. Yet, what He sees breaks His heart, grieving Him deeply. I hear Him cry as He did over Israel, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem . . . how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!” (Matthew 23:37).

As a minister of the Lord, I bear my Shepherd’s burden. And I feel His grief. Right now, I hear Him saying, “Even in My house, I find so few who have faith. Many of My own children, including My shepherds, faint in their times of trial. They don’t trust Me for their families, their jobs, their futures. Indeed, many have made their choice.”

So, what about you? The Lord comes to all of us, asking, “Will you believe Me? Do you trust Me? When I come, will I find faith in you?” How will you respond?
 

In illustrating for us the rich, satisfying life He has for us, Jesus uses the image of a sheep pen. “I am the gate. Those who come in through me will be saved. They will come and go freely and will find good pastures” (John 10:9). In the pen, His sheep are safe from all enemies. They feed on the “good pastures” of God’s kingdom, enjoying health, peace and freedom.

It is this blessed life that our enemy, the devil, seeks to steal from us. Satan is bent on destroying our precious faith, and Jesus describes him as a thief who sneaks into the pen: “Anyone who sneaks over the wall of a sheepfold, rather than going through the gate, must surely be a thief and a robber. . . . The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy” (10:1, 10).

If there is anything Satan wants to steal from us, it is the life God has designed for us. He does this by seeking to remove us from the “good pasture” (i.e., crucial spiritual food) that Jesus has given us. Immature Christians are most susceptible, as long as they remain on a diet of “milk,” never advancing to the meat of God’s Word. They are especially subject to Satan’s wiles in times of crisis. They spiral into a panic, filled with fear and worry, thinking, “I don’t know how to make a decision. Where are You, God?”

I saw this happen a lot when I was on the pastoral staff of Times Square Church in New York City. The teaching that people fed on there was deep and meaty, drawn from the dedicated study of God’s Word. Imagine my shock whenever parishioners told me they had skipped services to go hear a known charlatan whose only focus was money. How could they do that after a steady diet of solid, biblical food?

This brings up a second hindrance every Christian faces: the alluring gospel of a false teacher. Jesus teaches, “[My sheep] won’t follow a stranger; they will run from him because they don’t know his voice” (10:5). Such “strangers” look, sound and dress like any good pastor. But the gospel they preach gradually leads people away from Christ’s rich, satisfying “good pasture” to the destruction of their souls.

It is absolute necessary that we learn the voice of our Good Shepherd and be able to distinguish it from the voices of false shepherds. How do we do this? By feeding on the meat our Shepherd has so generously provided: “So faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ” (Romans 10:17). The only way to detect a counterfeit is to know the original intimately. Only by immersing ourselves in God’s pure Word will we become intimate with the look, sound, scent and taste of that which comes from heaven.