Sanctification Precedes Wonders

Let us turn to the word of the Lord in the book of Joshua. I want to go to chapter 7. I was thinking about this path along which the Lord has led us in terms of our meditation on the Word over these past Sundays, beginning with December 31. And by way of summary, I want you to follow the thread of the different themes we have been addressing during these days, so that you can see how they connect with what I am going to focus on today.

A few weeks ago, we had that first message which, as I told you, was not something I had sought out or planned. The Lord simply placed that thought in my mind: because you have never gone this way before, you have never gone this way before. And from there came that meditation about the Lord leading us into another realm, another land—rather, another dimension—that was about to open up before us; and it is a path, a realm, a dimension where we have never been before.

I do not know exactly what that means, but what is clear is that it is something new, something different, something unfamiliar—a land, as He said to Abraham: Go to a land that I will show you. And the Lord caused me to dwell on that idea of a path, an unusual new dimension into which God was leading us, and that we should have this expectation of something new being triggered, being unleashed: a different anointing, a deeper entrance into the calling God has had for us as a church.

The following Sunday, I completed that thought with the idea we see in the book of Joshua, in the preceding chapters: that since we are traveling a different path, unlike any path we have traveled before, we must therefore follow the ark, because the ark is what guides us through that unexplored land into which God is leading us. And that is why, in that same chapter 3, God tells the people that when they see the ark of the covenant—the ark carried by the priests and the Levites—they are to set out and follow it, so that, as verse 4 says:

“…so that you may know the way you are to go, since you have never gone this way before.”

So the idea God placed in my heart as part of a thought that has been developing in my spirit is this: if we are going to embark upon a path that has never been explored before, completely outside what is familiar, we must allow ourselves to be guided by the ark; we must be open to the Lord’s specific direction; we must be open to revelations, thoughts, and unexplored things.

I believe this is a time for the Lion of Judah congregation when we should allow ourselves… when we should learn, brothers and sisters, to flow in the Spirit, so that if God brings something new into the service or calls us along a different path, we will be completely open to whatever God desires. This is a time to be flexible, brothers and sisters. This is a time to pay attention to what God says, to be attentive to subtle changes in the worship program, and to let go and not be so tense, because tension…

I have heard—and you can correct me—that women do not give birth when they are too tense; when women relax, they can give birth. And I have heard of women—we have known some. I remember, for example, a family in Maine where the woman had already been told that she could not give birth. For years she wanted to become pregnant, but they could not conceive, and so, having finally lost hope, they decided to adopt an Asian girl, as a matter of fact. After she adopted that girl, she began having children, and I believe she had two or three more afterward. Why? Because she relaxed.

And apparently it is true that doctors say that when a woman is very anxious and tense about giving birth, paradoxically, the more she strives, the less likely she is to give birth. But when she relaxes, she may have said, “Well, now I have my daughter—how wonderful,” and then the blessing came.

And I have heard this—I see many of you nodding as though I am talking about something that… I am not making this up. And I believe that many times, in order to give birth to the presence of God, the gifts of God, and the blessing of God in a congregation, we need to relax. The more tense we are about the program, and the more tense we are about everything turning out perfectly, the more control we want to exert—and sometimes the less blessing there is.

It is not that we should be disorganized or undisciplined; it is that I believe that if we are a people who allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit, then we must expect the Spirit to direct us. And we need to relax.

Take this morning here, for example. Suddenly I was thinking… because this morning Gregory was the one leading Communion: okay, do we do it before the announcements, after the announcements, this and that? And look how easily things work themselves out, because I left it in the hands of the Spirit, and it is a blessing.

Again, it is not that we are going to be disorderly. I believe in order; I believe in planning. But I have also learned over the years that we must allow ourselves to be led by the Lord. So that is the first message for today. But what I wanted to tell you is this: when a people desires to let itself be led by the Holy Spirit, it must pay attention to where the ark is going—whether the ark goes this way or that way. How do you watch that GPS? You are going somewhere you do not know, and you keep looking at what it is telling you: which street to take, whether to go right or left, how many miles, how many feet before you turn, when the last announcement came telling you to turn and when the next one will come, once you are right there at the corner. You know what I mean.

In the same way, one must listen to the voice of God, and God wants a people who will allow themselves to be led by the Holy Spirit—a people who pray, a people who wake up every morning saying, “Okay, Father, what are today’s instructions? What do You have for me?” Not simply going on autopilot. “Well, I prayed three weeks ago, so that anointing should carry me forward.” How often do you eat? When it comes to that, we are not very spiritual, are we? Three, six times a day. But when it is time to nourish ourselves spiritually, we think it is fine that we ate two weeks ago.

A people led by the Holy Spirit is a people attentive to the voice of God, allowing themselves to be guided by the ark of God—the presence of God—at every moment of their lives. That is why the more we want to be led by God, the more we will have to depend on prayer, the diligent reading of the word of God, and keeping our ears attentive to the Lord—keeping a listening ear.

That beautiful sermon Brother Isaiah preached—he is actually outside because he has the flu, and if he is listening to us, we bless him. We send a word of blessing and healing to our brother Isaiah. But in that sermon he preached, Eli tells him, “Lie down again and listen attentively for the voice of God; and when He speaks to you, tell Him, ‘Here is the servant of the Lord. I am listening for whatever You want to tell me.’”

So, that ark… the second sermon I preached was about that, and I believe it is important for us as a church. These are times, brothers and sisters—listen to this—for the Lion of Judah congregation to be attentive to the voice of God: times of silence, times of stillness, times of waiting on the Lord. We should lie down asking the Lord, “Father, give me spiritual dreams; give me a vision of what You want for my life. Guide me in a detailed way.” And whatever God’s people expect, that is how it will be.

If you expect a God who will speak to you, God will speak to you. If you are attentive to God’s voice, you will hear from God and receive instructions from the Lord. So we spoke about the ark, which the people had to keep their eyes on, because that ark was what would guide them through the unknown land they were now about to enter. And that was the second part, the second piece of the armor that God instructed me about.

After that, in a third sermon, we reflected on how, when they enter the Promised Land, they have to take on that first spiritual challenge. Before them stands the first exceedingly powerful city they had to defeat in order to continue their journey and move farther into the Promised Land. And there is Jericho—shut up, tightly shut up, with immense walls and a battle-hardened people enclosed inside, ready to hold out for as long as necessary. They have to penetrate it, and God gives them a crazy strategy.

And instead of telling them, “Look, launch an attack against the walls and build scaffolds and things to break those walls down and enter,” and so forth, He tells them, “The only thing I want you to do is this: for six days, go around the walls once each day, very quietly, while the priests alone move and sound the shofar. On the seventh day, go around seven times in silence, very quietly; and when the priests sound the shofar on the seventh circuit, you shout.” And that shout was a symbol of praise, a symbol affirming the power of God. Our bodily movements channel spiritual energy. The symbolic movements of God—the amens, the hallelujahs, the lifting of hands, standing, kneeling, coming forward during worship, declaring the glory of God in a place. Our physical actions—a Pentecostal people, a people who flow in the Spirit, believe in the power that the body’s physical movements have to channel the power of God. Amen.

So God tells them, “Shout,” and when you shout, the walls will fall. Then go straight in and do what you have to do. And so I spoke about the importance of believing in God’s strategies and using counterintuitive methods—methods that seem like madness but come from God and therefore, although they may seem strange, produce results.

The idea is that we must be a people with a supernatural mindset, a people unafraid to use the tools God has placed in our hands: prayer, crying out, symbolic acts such as pouring out oil in the belief that God has power, fasting, holiness—all these things that are part of the tools of a people who believe in the power of God. When we are overwhelmed by a problem and the walls in our lives are shut up, tightly shut up; when there is a wayward child who, like the prodigal son, has left and there is no recourse; a closed-off marriage; finances, health, work, documentation or immigration situations—walls shut up, tightly shut up—we have to use the tools of the Spirit, we have to use the armor of God, we have to use the prescriptions found in the word of God.

Our weapons are not carnal, the Apostle Paul says, but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds. They are not the weapons people normally use, and many times it is God who gives us the strategy, and we must follow God’s strategies. And it is very important that if we want to tear down those walls of Jericho, we arm ourselves with the mindset of a man or woman filled with the Holy Spirit.

And let me say in passing that this is why knowing the word of God deeply is so important. Why? And I say this to the many new brothers and sisters in the congregation—people who have come to know the Lord recently, people who are just beginning to walk in the ways of God, brothers and sisters who need to go deeper into the realm of faith and of the Spirit—the way you will understand how to use the armor and what armor is available to you is by knowing the Word, because the Word contains the precedents you can use.

Brothers and sisters, I say this to all of you now: let us saturate ourselves with the word of the Lord. God speaks to me; one of the most urgent and frequent ways God speaks to me is through the Word, activating a verse, activating an image, activating a thought. Because I have known that Word since I was a child, that Word forms the foundation of many things—not only what I preach, but also how I live my life, how I tackle challenges and problems. And what happens when you read the Word is that the Word gradually formats your mind and changes the way you think and resolve life’s challenges. Then, when situations arise in your life, immediately a precedent from the word of the Lord comes to mind—a verse, an event, a person, a theme, a chapter—and it is activated. God then has material to use to give direction to your life. That is very important.

So Jericho teaches us that as we enter the land God is going to give us, as we take on the great events of life and the challenges awaiting us in that quest for our inheritance and our possession, we must use the weapons of the Spirit—not the weapons of reason, not the weapons of common sense, not human weapons that have no power, but the weapons of the Spirit, the weapons of light, which are often very different.

The fourth thing we saw last Sunday, which the Lord also impressed upon us, was the fact that when the Hebrews enter the Promised Land and begin to eat the bread of the new land, the manna ceases. When they enter fully into their destiny, into their maturity, when they enter into the culmination of that toward which God has been guiding them from Abraham through the patriarchs, through Joseph, through their centuries in Egypt, through the 40 years in the wilderness—when they finally arrive where God wanted to bring them, to the Promised Land—and when they enter that Promised Land after crossing the Jordan and begin to eat the fruit found in that land, and begin to make use of what God had intended for them, the substitutes are no longer necessary: the manna, the clothes they had that did not wear out, the guidance of the cloud and the pillar of fire. Even the tabernacle was something temporary that I did not mention last Sunday. But that movable tabernacle was something to tide them over until the permanent temple came. And God gave them a temporary provision in the form of this immense tent; it was something that was set up and taken down while they were in the wilderness, but when they entered the land, then the true temple…

And you know what? Even that temple was a representation of the temple up above, and of other things. So God leads us in our lives, in our experience, through different stages of our existence. He provides some things for a time; they are generous provisions from the Lord while the real thing is on its way. And I was saying that God is bringing us, and is bringing His church in general, into a new stage. We prophesy that times are coming when we will see that everything the church has enjoyed up to this point is manna. And God has something even greater for us. Amen.

There is yet another blessing. And I invite you, my brothers and sisters, to live eagerly awaiting that time. Do not be content where you are; let us not be content with the blessing we have received. Let us remain hungry for something more that God has for us. And the blessing of God will be in accordance with our appetite. The blessing will be in accordance with what you expect and desire from the Lord, what you long and cry out for in order to receive from God. Let us be a people hungry for more. It is very important.

So that is an important part. Now I want to put the final piece of this framework in place, I believe, and it is this idea found in Joshua chapter 7. And it is, frankly, a weighty subject, but I do not want it to be a negative subject for my brothers and sisters, but rather a healthy, fatherly call to all of us, including me, to sobriety in the Lord, to caution and care, and to maintaining a tender conscience before the Lord concerning sin, concerning those things that disrupt God’s blessing. Because this message… I could not finish this series without addressing this, and you will see why. If I limited myself only to promises of blessing and triumph and provision and good things God has for us, and omitted this part, I would be doing an injustice to the full character of the word of the Lord.

Because, you see, in this process of conquering the land God has for the Hebrews, there are great triumphs. That triumph at Jericho was something extraordinary, but a moment comes when something happens, which is what chapter 7 recounts. And I say this, brothers and sisters, for the following reason: if we are going to enter a time of conquest and opposition to the enemy, of wresting weapons away from the enemy in an extraordinary way, we must expect that there will be a counterattack, and so we must make sure that our ark, in the sense of Noah’s ark, is caulked. Do you know what caulked means? That it is sealed all around so that water cannot get in. The idea is that when Noah made the ark, he coated it with something impermeable, because that ark was going to be in the water for a very long time, and if he allowed water to get in, that entire structure, all that work, would have been for nothing. In the same way, our spirituality must be covered and protected, because if we are going to attack the enemy and plunder him, as the Hebrews did, we must make sure of that, brothers and sisters. And I believe that one message entails the other.

In chapter 7—I am not going to read it; you can read it. If you can put chapter 7 up on the screen. God gives the Israelites a great victory; they defeat Jericho. It is something powerful: an incredibly strong and battle-hardened nation collapses before God’s provision on behalf of the Hebrews. And then, when that task, the destruction of Jericho, is finished, God tells them, “Go in and destroy everything in that city. Do not take anything home with you, because everything in there is cursed; it is anathema.”

In other words, the word anathema—some of you have heard it, and sometimes we do not know exactly what it means. The word anathema, herem, in Hebrew, is a very complex word because it refers to two things. First, it is everything consecrated to the Lord for His service. Sometimes we think it is only negative because in the New Testament it is almost always used negatively, but in the Old Testament the idea has two aspects. Number 1: something consecrated to the Lord and to the Lord’s service. For example, the temple utensils could be anathema in the Old Testament sense; that is, they were consecrated exclusively for use in worship.

But the second use of that word is something set apart and devoted to destruction, and also, in a sense, set apart for God. It is something God reserves for Himself and of which He says, “Set this apart to be destroyed and annihilated.” So God tells them, “Everything in that city”—and the terrible thing is that this includes men, women, children, cows, everything—“everything inside that city is anathema; it is reserved and set apart for destruction. And I have a personal interest in its being so.”

And that is where this unity, this connection, comes from: anathema as something consecrated to Jehovah and also something that may be intended for destruction, yet in a sense is also consecrated to the Lord, but for destruction. And God derives a kind of special satisfaction from its being destroyed. It is also a sacrifice before God, but with a negative connotation.

So God tells the Hebrews, “When you enter, everything in there is contaminated, it is unclean, it causes displeasure, it is an abomination to Me, and therefore destroy it all and leave nothing. Only leave the metal objects and certain other things that are reserved, and set them aside for the sanctuary.” You see there that strange mixture of consecration to God and consecration to destruction as well.

And He gives them specific instructions concerning the only things that may remain. Everything else, in a sense, is contaminated. So time passes; they destroy Jericho, and then they encounter a second city called Ai, a very fitting name because they said, “Ay!” after they went in there.

The city of Ai is a tiny, insignificant city; compared with Jericho, it is a little hole-in-the-wall, as we say. And it should not require any effort from the Hebrews, who have just destroyed a superbly equipped city like Jericho. Joshua sends a few spies, and they return with a very self-assured report. Brothers and sisters, beware of excessive confidence. When God blesses you and God prospers you, be careful; that is when you most need to exercise humility and simplicity of heart before God and ask God to have mercy on your life. Overconfidence—carelessness when blessings come—is one of the greatest dangers. I have seen so many people prosper in the ways of God when they come in and consecrate themselves to the Lord, and then they become puffed up and think they are better or that they know more than even the pastors or whoever else, and you see the decline. We must be very careful. Humility is our greatest protection.

The Hebrews go to this city, and the spies tell Joshua, “Look, Joshua, do not bother the people. Send 2,000 or 3,000 soldiers, and in two hours we will eat them up like bread and butter. So do not worry; let everyone else stay back there listening to the radio or whatever.” And what happens? When they reach Ai, they are the ones who cry, “Ay!” The inhabitants of the city counterattack them, kill 36 Jews, and everyone turns tail and runs for dear life. Then Joshua panics and says, “Lord,” and he goes off somewhere and cries out before God, “Lord, You have brought us to this city, to this nation, to this land, to destroy us. You made us a promise, and now look at what is happening to us,” blaming God. And the Lord says to him, “Hey, why are you crying out like that? Get up; I am going to tell you what is happening.”

And here something very interesting comes into play: without Joshua or Israel’s intelligence services knowing it, a man named Achan, when they destroyed Jericho, disobeyed God’s strict instructions and kept for himself some of that property of which God had said, “That property is cursed, that property is contaminated, that property is an abomination in My sight. Do not bring it into the camp of Israel.” And Achan could not resist. He saw a beautiful piece of cloth, a Babylonian robe; he saw some silver coins; he saw a bar of gold. He was overcome by greed, and he did not have the courage or willpower to say, “That is accursed.” He took it and quietly carried it away, thinking that no one had seen him. He put it under his tent and buried it; I imagine he put a chair or a table over it and thought, “Out of sight, out of mind; if I cannot see it, it is not there.” And he kept it there in the bank to take out again one day. What he did not know was that God was watching what he had done.

That is something, brothers and sisters, that should terrify all of us: God is always watching our actions. And that act of bringing the anathema into the Lord’s territory brings a curse upon the entire people. And it is interesting that when the Lord speaks to Joshua, notice what He tells him in verse 11:

“Israel has sinned.” It is not Achan, an insignificant man and member of one of Israel’s tribes, a minor man, along with his family… But it is not the man or the individual who has brought contamination; it is the act, it is the object, it is the curse God has declared. That must not enter among My people. And then He says, “Israel has sinned; they have broken My covenant that I commanded them; they have taken some of the anathema, and have even stolen, they have lied, and they have even kept it among their belongings.”

The idea that it is not Achan alone, but that the whole people are contaminated by Achan’s action, makes me afraid. And then He says, “For this reason the children of Israel will not be able to stand before their enemies, but will turn their backs before their enemies, because they have become anathema.”

In other words, what Achan does by bringing in this object that God abhors, which is spiritually contaminated, which has been devoted to destruction, and which is inextricably associated with God’s holiness, with His character… Because these nations have been cast out of the land and consigned to total destruction because of their utter perversion. For centuries God had given them an opportunity to repent, and the Bible says in one passage that God had waited until the cup of His wrath had been filled by these nations.

For God is a mysteriously generous God. And when the point came at which He felt entitled, in a sense, to exterminate them and expel them from the land, only then did He allow the Hebrews to come, and He made the decision to expel those nations and give that land to the people of God.

And so these people, with their idolatry, their worship of demons, their sexual perversions, their persistent sinning before God, their continually offending God, had become an abomination before the Lord, and everything they possessed was abominable in God’s sight. And God then told Israel, “If you truly want to succeed in your undertaking, you must completely disassociate yourselves from that past. Wipe the slate clean. You must remove all that filth.” By failing to do so, Achan, I would say, brought a biological bomb into Israel. It is as though every plague in the world can always be traced to one person, to a contaminated animal, or whatever it may be, and from there it spreads by contagion and association, multiplying, and its roots sometimes extend throughout the world.

There are plagues that spread throughout the entire world and have destroyed millions of people. Achan, in a sense, brings a totally contaminated object into the heart of Israel, and the blessing is cut off there. So when the Hebrews, without knowing what is happening, enter this war against this insignificant little group, I believe they realize something, and perhaps God allows it so that they will understand that they are not the ones carrying out the victory—it is God. Because if they cannot prevail against a tiny little people like this, then what happened at Jericho was definitely something God did.

When they do not have the power of God, the presence of God, the favor of God with them, they cannot succeed even against a tiny city like Ai. And then God tells Joshua, this is the problem. And that is why, brothers and sisters, this calls us—you, me, and every one of you—at this time when we are longing for, desiring, and envisioning great things that God is going to do among us, to understand something: what happens here in Joshua takes place in the context of spiritual warfare; it takes place in the context of spirits that have to be driven out and that will look for any excuse and any opening to bring accusations against the people of God and to reduce our effectiveness in spiritual battle.

Some time ago, you may remember, I told you about a serpent I saw, and I know that must have caused a little intrigue for many of you. That serpent was in the basement of our house, because I know that I have been—my family and I, we have been—in spiritual warfare, and there are spiritual powers… Do not be too alarmed, you know, brothers and sisters. I see that as something very natural, in the sense that Satan looks for ways to destroy the servants of God, and sometimes spiritual battles arise to prevent people and congregations for which God has great purposes from entering into their destiny and their inheritance.

So for many years I have known that there is spiritual warfare in the heavenly realms concerning God’s calling for this church and for my life, that these things are very powerful, and that we are engaged in spiritual warfare. Those powers, then, are going to look for ways to counterattack, weaken us, and prevent God’s destiny from being fulfilled in our lives. And I saw that serpent, and I was drawing closer to its head, but it was asleep, calm, simply exerting influence and doing the work it does. But I knew that I was approaching its head and that God had already clearly determined the moment when its head would be cut off and it would be completely destroyed. It was a green, muscular, dense serpent. Looking at it now in my mind as I saw it in the dream, I would say it had a diameter of about 18 inches, and it was so full of muscle that to cut through its body with a sword you would have had to… it was more like a tree trunk.

But that does not shock me. I tell you, brothers and sisters, it does not frighten me, because I have walked with this understanding of spiritual warfare and of the struggle that I and this congregation have in order to enter into God’s destiny. Just as these Israelite tribes had to fight demonic powers, these tribes were consecrated to Satan and were fighting against all odds to protect their lives, their families, their economy, and their culture, and they were not going to give up that territory lightly.

If you will give me just a little more time, I am going to tell you about a dream my brother Sergio Pérez had. Yesterday he called me at home to tell me, “Pastor, I had a dream, and I want to share it with you because I believe it has to do with New England in general.”

We talked for a very long time about all this. Sergio tells me that he was with some brothers, some pastors whom we also know, and they got out of the car they were in, near the place where their church is located. They used to have their main offices there, and he says—I am shortening it—that when he got out of the car, he got out first, and when he set his foot on the ground, he realized that he was not stepping on earth but on the skin of a serpent that had just shed its skin.

Imagine it: it was underneath, and suddenly he puts his foot on the serpent and realizes at that very moment that it is not the ground but a serpent. And then he says that he was not afraid, but he realized that the serpent was very long and very thick and could easily take their car and wrap itself around it. It was like a boa constrictor. He says he realized that, in the undergrowth in front of him, the serpent was looking at him, was aware of him, and was watching him.

What is happening? You see, when Satan moves… many times there is contamination in cities, there is contamination in regions, there is contamination in our lives. The devil does not have to be throwing stones at you or shooting darts or spears at you; he is content simply to contaminate and infect your life.

When I saw that years ago… I had that dream of poisonous spiders, which are simply symbolic expressions of evil over the city of Boston, as large as airplanes. They were very still, simply settling like a cloud over the city’s skyscrapers. They were not doing anything; they were not hurling anything. They simply settled like a cloud of influence over the city of Boston. And all they did simply by being there was contaminate and infect. Now, as I have also told you, above that, in the firmament, I saw that lion’s face, which I understood to be the Lion of Judah, also looking upon that scene and exerting influence with his gaze. And I said to that lion three times, “You are the Lord, you are the Lord, you are the Lord,” opposing the influence of those demonic presences with the influence of God, of the Holy Spirit. Because in the world of spirits, there is no need for so much struggling. Spirits simply exercise the authority they possess.

I know, and over the years I have come to understand, that there is a battle, and you have that battle too. Perhaps I have it in a different way; the León de Judá congregation has it in a different way. But in your life, too, there are powers, there are spiritual battles; there are tribes, so to speak, demonic tribes in the spiritual realm that want to prevent you from entering into the blessing God has for you and for your life. God has a future for you. God has a future for your family, for your marriage, for your health, for your finances, for your children, and for your generations. And there are powers that will try to prevent you from entering into the blessing God has for you, the destiny God has for you. And you are going to have to plunder those powers.

The devil is not going to allow the blessing to come into your life unless it comes through spiritual warfare, through a struggle. The devil is not going to allow the church of Jesus Christ to leave Egypt and go out to worship God, as the Hebrews did outside Egypt, unless it happens through a battle like the one involving the 10 plagues. Because those are symbols, symbols of what exists in the spiritual world. Every great victory, every great success, every great feat in the world of the spirit must be preceded by a great conflagration, a great battle, a great conflict, so that God may be glorified.

And many of us are in that battle. God wants you to break the bonds that are in your life; he wants generations of dysfunction in your life—poverty, madness, incest, alcoholism, drug addiction, divorce, ignorance, family conflicts, divisions—all of that to be overcome. But there is an enemy at the door seeking to prevent it.

We are always engaged in spiritual warfare, brothers and sisters. And I believe that part of what I want through this sermon is to remove the blindfold from our eyes, to strip away our innocence, because I believe that many of us live the spiritual life like little rabbits in a jungle, unaware that there are wild beasts that want to devour us. And so we go hopping along through the jungle, happily, and we do not know that there is a serpent waiting, ready to seize you and destroy you.

And it is not that we should live in paranoia, brothers and sisters. God does not want us to live in fear, but God does want us to live alertly. There is a difference between living in paranoia and fear and living alertly. Yes or no? Does not the word of the Lord say, “Be sober and vigilant, because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour”?

That is in the New Testament, not the Old. Because sometimes we think that now, in the New Testament, we no longer have to concern ourselves with those things. And the Apostle Paul also says, “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood.” In other words, the nature of the believer’s struggle, of the believer’s daily life, the drama that you and I live through—our struggle is not against flesh and blood. In other words, it is not against society, it is not against culture, it is not against the emotional problems we have, it is not against my father who abused me, nor is it against the sin I committed that now besets me and keeps me bound; it is not against illness, it is not against my lack of immigration documents, it is not against this oppressive culture that takes my money. It is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, the Word says, against hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

We must understand that, parallel to this world of time and space that we inhabit, we are also within another spiritual world, another tremendously serious world, another world where the risks are greater than we can imagine, where there are powers sworn against our well-being, our progress, our blessing, our health, and the progress of our families. We must be aware of this and walk soberly, walk carefully, take nothing for granted, and keep short accounts with God.

If we offend the Lord, what must we do? Go immediately and settle accounts with the Lord; denounce ourselves. Put safety ropes around ourselves and ask the Lord, as David says, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my thoughts, and see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the everlasting way.”

Why did David say that in Psalm 51? He had just sinned terribly, and God had exposed him and punished him severely, and David says, “Lord, I do not want that to happen again. Create in me, O God, a clean heart; renew a right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence; do not take your Holy Spirit from me.”

Brothers and sisters, the call of this very forceful word for all of us is that the days of childhood are coming to an end for this church. The mischief of adolescence is already coming to an end. And as we enter into the maturity of the Promised Land, the promises are great, but the price of disobedience is equally great. And the Spirit of God is telling everyone, down to the newest person in this church—beginning with me at the head and extending to all of us, brothers and sisters—that we must examine our ways and walk soberly before God, because we have an enemy who will not overlook any excess, any escapade we might want to indulge in.

And it is a call from the Lord. Jesus Christ has said in his Word, “Whoever wants to plunder a strong man’s house must first bind him and then plunder it.” Much of the church has wanted to enter the devil’s house, where these souls are here in this city. This is a Jericho; Boston is Jericho. Its walls are walls of intellectualism, walls of culture, walls of technology, walls of intellectual elegance, walls composed of great universities, great medical centers, and a wealth of elegant history; walls of great culture, world-class symphonies, world-class museums—an Athens, in one of the most developed nations on earth, a city of influence. And its walls are shut, tightly shut, and one wonders: how are we going to penetrate the impenetrable wall of a city like this?

How are we going to plunder those who are inside? We must receive a strategy from God, we must receive revelation from the Lord, and we must bind that strong man, because that strong man is going to counterattack. The image of… Sergio consulted me and shared this with me, and it agrees with everything I have been telling you.

Chuck Pierce, this prophet of the Lord who came here recently, spoke of an immense serpent standing at the gates of this great city of influence that is Boston. And that serpent must be defeated. Michael the archangel must come and wage war against those powers so that the destiny of God’s people may be released, because there are zones of influence where those gates, through which the King of glory will enter, are at this very moment bound and blocked by those supernatural powers.

Then Sergio was telling me, “I have understood that this dream is not merely something local or something for me, but something regional in nature.” And I shared with him my dream and the dreams I have had over many decades about that opposition that holds back the blessing of God’s people, just as it held back the blessing of entering the Promised Land. It kept the Hebrews from entering into their inheritance.

And that blessing, brothers and sisters, which God has for your life—I now individualize and personalize this word for every one of you who are here, and for myself as well. And I ask you in the name of the Lord to conduct a healthy examination, not compulsively or fearfully, because this is not meant to fill you with fear; it is meant, rather, to set you free. For we have a God so merciful and kind that the Word says that if we confess our sins, he is faithful to forgive them.

But what God wants, brothers and sisters, is for persistent sin, systemic sin, repetitive sin, and the offense against God in our lives to cease, and for our hearts to become very tender concerning what God expects of us. Because one man was able to halt God’s blessing for an entire nation by violating God’s will, specifically expressed in the command that the accursed thing must not enter among his people.

And there are many things in our lives that keep God’s blessing from coming in, and we wonder why it is that in my life I just can’t seem to get anything right; I am always crying out, and I build structures of blessing, but they fall apart on me, and I do not prosper spiritually. I am battling the same things all the time. And brothers and sisters, many times it is because there is an accursed thing buried there.

Again, beloved brothers and sisters, the blessing is this: it is so easy to take that thing out and hand it over to the Lord. We confess our sins, ask the Holy Spirit to examine us, take some time for reflection, and make a vow of purity or honesty before God. The businessman who is cheating says, “That’s it, Father, I confess; I am going to put my life in order.” The person who is placing a love above God says, “No, Father, I am going to follow your commandments; I am going to put my life in order.” The person who is so immersed and invested in advancing their career and neglects the things of God says, “Father, I am going to consecrate myself; I am going to put you first in my life.” The person who has been careless about the things of the Gospel says, “Lord, I am going to take my consecration to you more seriously.”

What God wants, brothers and sisters, is for us to look beneath our tent and ask ourselves, “How am I influencing my own life and the lives of the people I love from my position of authority or influence? And how can I correct this in my life?” And he wants us to carry out a healthy analysis.

Because what I see here is simply this... That is why this has been placed here: because if we are approaching an unprecedented time, we have to seal up that part. And that is why, in all honesty, I could not finish this series of messages without putting that piece into the puzzle: a call to sanctification, to the consecration of our lives to the Lord as a people.

And Meche was saying to me this morning—and I feel that this is something I do not know how we are going to do during this time when I am stepping away for a while—but she said to me, “Look, Roberto, perhaps what we need to do is respond to the sermon from this morning’s English service. Perhaps, as a church, we are going to find a time to have... something like a consecration of God’s people. And we are going to think about that and pray about it.”

So that, as a people, we can come before the Lord and have a moment of holy reflection. Does that not make sense in the Spirit? And I want to commission all of you, brothers and sisters—all who are here, and even those who are not here, including those who were at the morning service—to form a holy resolve right now, individually: those who come from time to time, those who are new, those who are a little more consecrated, everyone who is here. I want to invite you, when that call goes out...

Listen to me, I am committing myself to something very serious. We will see how we do it during this time. When you hear that call, commit yourself to coming. Let us fill this house and hold a holy convocation of acknowledgment before God. Before entering the Promised Land, God told Joshua, “Tell the people, ‘Sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow I will do wonders among you.’”

Sanctification preceded the wonders. And that is why God called them to be circumcised, because they had not been circumcised; they had not settled those accounts with the Lord. In a sense, they were still impure. And so God called them: “Be circumcised, settle accounts with me, celebrate the Passover for the first time in 40 years, and then you can enter the Promised Land and enter the destiny I have for you.”

Because I know that, as a church, after 35 years of use, how many things have we done to offend the Lord during that time? We have done beautiful, precious things, and glory to God, and we are free in the Lord. This is not so that we throw dust on our heads and all leave here depressed. God has used us in great ways. God has blessed us in great ways. God has prospered us and allowed us to exercise great influence and advance the Kingdom of God. But all use produces sweat; every machine that works produces waste and impurities, its nuts have to be tightened, and the system has to be cleaned, and all those things.

And I believe that after these thirty-some years of work as a church, of suffering, hardships, victories, and falls, there must be a time of reflection before God, when we come before the Lord and say, “Father, we thank you for all the beautiful things you have done in our lives, but we also want to admit that we have failed you and offended you. We want to settle accounts with you, place ourselves once again before your presence, and receive fresh anointing for the future.” Amen.

And we come here... I need us, brothers and sisters, to celebrate a Passover before God, to prepare our hearts and our lives as a congregation for what we will call a holy convocation: a time to humble ourselves before God, ask forgiveness because we have offended him, and seek his face. To say, “Lord, here we are. We want to be used by you, we want to do great things, we want to perform mighty deeds, we want thousands of lives to be converted, and we need you to pour your oil and your holy water over us so that we may enter freely to serve you as you desire.”

Because God wants both things: he wants good desires and good intentions, but he also wants holiness from us. And that is why he told Joshua, “Look, go and determine where it is.” God knew where the accursed thing was. He takes them through a process, and they finally come to Achan. And Achan confesses; he says, “Yes, I have sinned against God. I did this, I did that,” and terrible things happen.

Thank God that we are under the Lord’s grace, because Achan did not have that privilege, and he and his entire family were destroyed. Do not ask me how that is justified. God did it; God decreed it. But... until that central tumor was removed, Israel could not enjoy God’s protection, blessing, power, and endowment.

So, brothers and sisters, right now, if you would like to bow your head or stand to your feet—perhaps you have not yet given your life to the Lord Jesus Christ—then I encourage you right now: do not play games with the Lord. We have a God who is pure love, but he is also a consuming fire, and he wants a people who can present themselves before his presence in an appropriate manner and handle his ark according to the instructions he gives.

So, my brothers and sisters, I invite you right now to form in your heart a holy resolve to surrender to the Lord and humble yourself before God. If you have not received Christ as your Lord and would like to do so from where you are, then I invite you to come forward, if you have not done so. If you want to reconsecrate your life, this is a moment for a wholesome surrender to the Lord. God’s people are before God.

The divine X-ray is passing through this place, and God is speaking to us and calling us, as a church, to holy consecration in our lives. Let us humble ourselves before the Lord and form that holy resolve to walk in the way God wants us to walk. The days of adolescence have passed, and the days of maturity and responsibility before the Lord are coming.

God tells us, “No more milk.” He wants meat; he wants solid food for our lives, in the name of Jesus. Father, we confess our failures before you; we confess our sins before you, Lord.

If you will allow me, I am going to impose my will on our brothers and sisters, because there is a chorus that says, “Teach me your way, Lord.” And I want us to sing that chorus as a petition, as a prayer before God, because this morning we sang a chorus that was very beautiful, but it did not correspond to the theme of this sermon.

What we are asking the Lord is that he search our hearts and convict us, purify us, and enable us to humble ourselves before the Lord, as I am doing right now before you, presenting my petition before God so that he may do his work in my life.

We want to offer the Lord a clean, pure congregation before him. We will never be perfect, but we can be tender in our desire for holiness. And we can be very meticulous and careful in asking the Lord to do his work in our lives.

So, Father, in the name of Jesus, we reconsecrate ourselves to you; we surrender ourselves to you. We acknowledge that we cannot stand before you, Father, except by your grace and mercy, and we receive this call from you, Lord, to a life that honors you, a life that pleases you, Father. We refuse to give Satan entry, to give him the right to accuse us, to give the enemy any kind of foothold, any kind of reason or excuse to cause harm in our family or our church. And this afternoon, Lord, we choose to consecrate ourselves before you, to reconsecrate ourselves, Lord, and to acknowledge our need for your healing, Lord.

Deal with us and take us to that place, Lord, where you want to take us. Purify us, and if there is anything in us that is not in accordance with your will, Lord, cut it out of us and reconfigure us according to your desire and your requirements. In the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus. Amen.