October 20, 2025

Many find the account of Gideon’s commissioning somewhat humorous. He was hiding from his enemies, the Midianites, while threshing wheat; these oppressors loved to steal the Israelites’ crops (Judges 6:11). An angel came to him in his hiding place and said, “The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valor,” (verse 12). 

At that moment, Gideon looked nothing like a “man of valor.” Aren’t you glad God sees into the future, knows the plans HE has for us, and deals with us accordingly. In today’s post, Gina Gholston reminds us of this truth and applies it to God’s prophetic timetable. Her insights will encourage you! Gina’s title is:

God Is Ordering Our Steps

A few years ago, the Lord showed me a vision of clock hands rotating at a very high rate of speed. Then I heard Him say, “Time has accelerated.” By the Spirit, I understood that we were entering a specific time God had set on His timeline, and things were going to begin happening very quickly. We are definitely seeing that acceleration take place now governmentally, socially, and spiritually. It is a holy moment, and God is calling the church to get into position. He is joining and positioning His body. As we each take our place and release our supply, we will function in the demonstration of the Spirit that gives evidence of the reality of Jesus. (Ephesians 4:13-16)

This is a set time, and set times bring acceleration. This isn’t an indication that God is behind schedule, trying to catch up; rather, He causes things to shift and align with His timing and plans. Though these actions may feel like “suddenlies,” they’re actually the unfolding of plans God has been weaving. For many of us, what unfolds in these times may stretch us beyond our perceived limitations, but we must trust that God knows what He is doing. The Holy Spirit will awaken us to gifts and abilities He has placed in us that are necessary for His plan. God has led us, prepared us, and now He will launch and position us for the fulfillment of His plans and purposes. 

I recall a transitional moment in my life that unfolded several years ago. During that time, many things in my personal life shifted and stretched me. One evening, as I was driving, the Lord visited me in my car and began speaking to me about what He had been doing - and was about to do - in and through my life. Words cannot explain what I felt in that encounter. It was life-changing! I was hearing God say to me, in essence, “I placed in you a purpose for this time, and now, I am opening the way for you to be and do what I’ve created you to be and do.”

This was a defining moment for me. His words did not produce pride; to be honest, I struggled to fully embrace what He was saying about me. My initial thoughts were more like those of Gideon’s: You must have the wrong person! Who am I that You should say such things to and about me? My mind immediately began trying to figure out the “how” of what He was saying. Nothing in my present moment indicated that what I was hearing could possibly be true. But God wasn’t speaking about who I WAS; He was speaking about who I was BECOMING. What He revealed that night pointed me in a direction I would never have been aware of, had He not spoken. His words awakened in me a right perspective for the things that would transpire in the days and years ahead, as He unfolded the future He had planned for me. 

As we surrender ourselves to the Lord, He will guide us down the path of destiny He has designed for our lives. God’s part is to order our steps and plan our ways; our part is to trust Him and obediently step where He orders. As we do, this enables us to release the supply He has placed in us. 

When God began unfolding His plan for my life, I never thought that sharing the dreams, visions, and prophetic words He gives me would be an avenue through which He would use me. But He knew, and was orchestrating all the necessary components to mature and harvest the seeds He had planted in me...because it was time. Though I had not realized it, all along my journey, God had been ordering my steps. He saw what was ahead, and had been consistently guiding and preparing me. More often than not, we don’t realize that our steps are being ordered by the Lord. But God, in His infinite wisdom, is always working His plan for our lives. And at the right time, He brings us into launching moments for His will to be fulfilled.

Proverbs 3:5-6 instructs us to “Trust in and rely confidently on the Lord with all your heart and do not rely on your own insight or understanding. In all your ways know and acknowledge and recognize Him, and He will make your paths straight and smooth...” (Amplified Bible) The focus of these verses is not so much on straight and smooth paths, but on the fact that if we follow and focus on the Lord, He will direct our steps and clear our paths. The fulfillment of God’s intentions for our lives will only be fully realized as we trust in, rely on, recognize, and acknowledge Him in all our ways. With faith in Him, we can follow the path and discover all that the journey has in store.

Yahweh knows every step we are to take. He knows the “how” and He knows the “when.” And we have entered a “when” moment! There are things that will now be put in place quickly in order for the purposes of God to be realized. We must not allow our perceived limitations to dictate our responses to His leading. Rather, we must trust His wisdom, and allow Him to strategically position us for His plan to be revealed and fulfilled…because it is time.

Pray with me:

Father, You are awakening and launching important aspects of Your plans for this season. You have declared the end from the beginning (Isaiah 46:10), and at Your command things are quickly aligning with Your will and purposes. Though we do not know every detail concerning what is ahead, we trust and believe that every part of the plan You have established for us will be fulfilled. You are imparting great grace to instruct and enable us to perform our part in Your plan. 

Help us to believe and embrace the revelation of who You say we are and of what You are calling us to do - without filtering it through the confines of our perceived limitations. As we trust in, rely on, recognize, and acknowledge You in all our ways, give us the understanding and strength to accomplish all that You have called us to. Like Gideon, we will become who You say we are, defeating the enemies of our destiny, and partnering with You in Your present plans. It is time, and we will reap the harvest of Your full intentions. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

Our decree:

We decree that God has prepared and positioned us for our future, and will fulfill His plans and purposes for our lives. 

Click on the link below to watch the full video.

https://youtu.be/Wjzrk8zjfX8

Today’s post was contributed by Gina Gholston. Portions were taken from her new book, Along the Journey. You can learn more at ginagholston.com.

October 17, 2025

Make the Shift

In August of 2022 my brother, Tim Sheets, said there was coming a stronger merger in Christ’s Kingdom between the natural and spiritual realms, the earthly and heavenly. This merging would result in new levels and manifestations of the Kingdom of God. Tim declared:

“A merger is now beginning that will accelerate a new era Pentecost. Power and Kingdom authority will be seen on earth as never before. We have been prophesying this for a long time, and Holy Spirit says, ‘The merger is now occurring. The glory of My presence will now fill prepared territories, regions, and nations.’”

Tim went on to say, “Ekklesias are getting traction in these places. I also heard Holy Spirit say, ‘Surge after surge of the King’s manifest presence will spawn sudden miracles. The enemies of the Kingdom will be disoriented and will fight each other, resulting in freedoms decreed by King Jesus and His Ekklesia. This will be assisted by My angel armies, for I will release My mighty ones to labor with you; My mighty angels are moving into the earth realm.’”

Then he stated, “The glory of God is going to amp up in certain regions and territories in such a way that it will create miracles and breakthroughs. I believe we are moving NOW - not years from now - into a season of suddenlies. Sudden strikes of high-ranking angels, under Holy Spirit’s supervision, fueled by the decrees of a functioning Ekklesia.

“I feel the Ekklesia as a whole is shifting into another gear. Holy Spirit is bringing change, prophetic words are about to come to pass, and powerful angels are being released. Something has shifted, and we are moving into another gear.”

Then, knowing it can be difficult to shift into a new season, Tim used an interesting analogy, saying, “Dutch, you and I are old enough to know how cars with standard transmissions and stick shifts operate. You use a clutch when shifting gears. Sometimes, if the clutch is bad or the gears aren’t perfectly synchronized, the gears grind somewhat as an attempt is made to engage them. I feel this is occurring now in the spiritual realm. We are struggling to shift into this next gear, but will do so.”

While listening to Tim, I recalled a similar experience I had several years ago. While in worship I suddenly heard the sound of gears grinding. This wasn’t something I was hearing literally but inwardly, in the spiritual realm. When I asked Holy Spirit what this meant, He said, “I’m shifting the church into another season.” Exactly as Tim had referenced! The Holy Spirit knew that by using this mechanical analogy, I would immediately understand what He was saying. Due to ignorance, uncertainty, resistance, hesitancy, past paradigms, etc., some in the church were experiencing difficulty in shifting. 

Holy Spirit is once again shifting the church into a new season. We have been in a forerunning season of preparation; we are now moving into an awakening that will produce salvation, healing, deliverance, and ultimately great reformation. The healing aspect of this new season is what we are focusing on in tonight’s Healing Summit. Holy Spirit is shifting our mindsets and awakening our faith to the fact that it’s time to shift. 

John 5:1-9 tells the story of a paralyzed man healed by Jesus. It was believed by the Jews of the day that an angel periodically stirred the waters of the pool named Bethesda, located at the Sheep Gate, and the first person into the water was healed. At the Pool, Jesus approached a man who had been in a paralyzed condition for 38 years and asked what seemed like a strange question: “Do you truly long to be well?” (John 5:6 TPT). The man’s answer revealed that although he was waiting at the pool, he really had no hope of being healed. “I have no one to help me into the water and someone else always gets there first.” 

I believe Jesus asked the paralytic this question to point out that his hope was misplaced. Although he was waiting for the miraculous stirring of the pool, Yahweh - not the pool itself - was the source of the miracle he needed. A couple of feet and only seconds away from his miracle, just moments from total restoration, the man wasn’t able to recognize it. He needed to shift his thinking; his paradigm and his faith were based on the past. But Jesus had come - it was a new season! That which Bethesda symbolized was now being fulfilled.

This symbolism of Bethesda is truly amazing:

• Bethesda means “house of lovingkindness or mercy.” 

• The Sheep Gate (verse 2) next to it (verse 2) was where the lambs - used for the temple sacrifices and picturing Christ, our Passover Lamb - were brought into the Temple. 

• Five, the number of porticoes around the pool (also verse 2), is the biblical number of grace.                                        

  
  

Putting all of this together, the pool of Bethesda and the symbolism associated with it pictures Christ, the Passover lamb, entering our fallen world to give us grace and mercy. He would bring wholeness and health to the “diseased” human race.

This disabled man was staring at THE Lamb Himself, God’s gift of grace, the fulfillment of what everything around him pictured, yet didn’t realize it. An incredible opportunity, his kairos moment, had arrived, but he was trapped in the past. The gears were grinding, but Jesus helped him shift into the new season and a new life.

We must listen carefully to Holy Spirit - “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches” (Revelation 2:7) - in order to recognize the timing for God’s shifts. Reader’s Digest told of the late, great golf instructor, Harvey Penick: In the 1920s, Penick bought a red spiral notebook and began jotting down observations about golf. He never showed the book to anyone other than his son until 1991, when he shared it with a local writer and asked if he thought it was worth publishing. The man read it and told him yes. The writer presented it to Simon and Schuster, then left word with Penick’s wife the next evening that they had agreed to an advance of $90,000!

When the writer told Penick, the golfing expert seemed troubled. Finally, Penick came clean. With all his medical bills, he said, there was no way he could advance Simon & Schuster that much money. The writer had to explain that Penick would be the recipient of the $90,000!

His first golf book, Harvey Penick’s Little Red Book, sold more than a million copies, one of the biggest best-sellers in the history of sports books. His second book And If You Play Golf, You’re My Friend, sold nearly three-quarters of a million.(1)

Whether it be book writing, physical miracles, or the salvation of a loved one, we sometimes live in the waiting stage so long that it becomes difficult to believe in God’s mercy when it is offered. Listen with faith! God is saying it is time to shift. 

Accept the offer.

Pray with me:

Father, thank You for moving us from glory to glory, strength to strength, and faith to faith. You are not a stagnant God! And You said there would be no end to the increase of Christ’s Kingdom (Isaiah 9:6-7). We are confident of this, our faith in You is strong.

You have told us that a new merger of Your glory, angelic warriors, and an empowered Ekklesia is coming. We are determined to participate in this. We will shift with You. We ask You for an infusion of strength, revelation, and power enabling us to make this shift us into the new season.

We ask You for the miracles spoken of. We ask for the suddenlies. We ask for strong outpourings of your Spirit to spring up. We ask for an increase of prophetic anointing to discern and hear clearly what You are doing. And we ask that the fruit of this will be the rescue of millions of hearts around the world. Give us the billion soul harvest we have been prophetically hearing of. 

We ask that You continue to dismantle evil systems and render ineffective those who oppose You. With the keys of Your kingdom we now bind every attempt to stop this divine shift, in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.

Our decree:

We decree that we will shift into God’s new season of signs, wonders, and worldwide harvest.

Click on the link below to watch the full video.

https://youtu.be/aYyzGCUEzGY

Watch the Healing Summit livestream at 7PM EST at oasiswired.org.

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1. Adapted from: Edward K. Rowell, Fresh Illustrations for Preaching and Teaching (Grand Rapids, MI: Christianity Today, 1997), p. 100.

October 16, 2025

The Mouse and the Elephant

Unlike most of you, I love to wait. NOT! I mean, really, who enjoys waiting? There are several things regarding waiting that I would fix immediately if I were put in charge of the world.

• Driving in the passing lane of a highway without passing another vehicle would result in a $500 fine for first-time offenses and automatic loss of the driver’s license on the second occasion. Retaking driver’s education would be required in order to get it back. Actually, I might just make EVERYONE take (or retake or take for the first time) driver’s education, even without this offense, then they all would know how to use BLINKERS.

• Families or friends whose group stretches ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE TERMINAL CORRIDOR in airports, walking slowly, chit-chatting, and blocking those of us who have places to go and things to do, would lose all flying privileges. (Unless they took an Airport Walker’s Education class.)

• Folks standing in check-out lines talking with the cashier, telling them their life’s story while the rest of us in line wait, albeit patiently. They will be charged an extra $100 for their purchase.

In my book, The Pleasure of His Company, I share several more ways I could improve the world if I were in charge. It’s easy to see that, given the right opportunity, I could correct much of the injustice in the world and eliminate the stress caused by unnecessary waiting. These “injustices” aren’t actually a big deal to me, by the way. For the most part, I’m a pretty well-adjusted, mild-mannered, cool, calm, and collected guy.

Okay, so I don’t like waiting. Most of us don’t. But there is one type of waiting I’ve learned to enjoy: waiting on God. Before you question my honesty, let me point out that I’m not talking about waiting for God to answer my prayers. Like you, I don’t enjoy that. The waiting I enjoy is spending time in His presence.

The biblical concept of “waiting on the Lord” is understood by few people these days. Like many other biblical words, much is lost in the translation. Carefully defining three Old Testament words translated as “wait” or “waiting” will give us much clearer insight. The first word is duwmiyah,(1) which means “silently waiting with a quiet trust.” The thought conveyed is a strong, calm, quiet trust in the Lord. David said, “My soul waits in silence for God only; from Him is my salvation. He only is my rock and my salvation, My stronghold; I shall not be greatly shaken” (Psalm 62:1-2).

The second word, chakah,(2) means “adhere to” or “long for.” The psalmist said, “Our soul waits for the Lord; He is our help and our shield” (Psalm 33:20). The writer was clinging to the Lord, knowing that He would come through as a help in time of trouble. When David said, “My soul thirsts for God” (Psalm 42:2; 63:1), he was chakah - longing for God’s company. 

The third word, qavah,(3) has two important meanings. The first is to “wait for with eager expectation.” Notice the combination of excitement and faith in this definition. Those who qavah for the Lord are doing more than passively waiting; they’re anticipating and expecting. Psalm 27:14 tells us, “Wait for the Lord; Be strong and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the Lord.”

Another powerful meaning of qavah exists, however: “to bind together by twisting,” as in a braid or a rope. As we spend time with the Lord, our hearts are joined, creating oneness of desires, thinking, and actions. Passions are shared, creating energy and action.

Another result of braiding, however, is increased strength. Isaiah said, “Yet those who wait (qavah) for the Lord will renew their strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary” (Isaiah 40:31).

The renewing of strength this verse promises is the result of being braided together with God. When the strands of a rope are braided into one, the strength of each strand is synergistically transferred to the other. When we wait on God by spending time with Him, His strength is transferred to us and vice versa. Guess who gets the better deal? It’s like the mouse and elephant who were best friends. They hung out together all the time, the mouse riding on the elephant’s back. One day, they crossed a wooden bridge, causing it to bow, creak and sway under their combined weight. The mouse, impressed with their ability to make such an impact, said to the elephant, “We sure shook up that bridge, didn’t we?”

In our union with God, guess who the mouse is?

Let’s summarize these three meanings of biblical waiting, combining them into one complete definition of “waiting on the Lord”: Quietly waiting with a strong, calm trust; longing for His presence and eagerly expecting Him, for you know He’ll come; and knowing that as He does, you and He will experience an increased oneness, a braiding together, your hearts and lives becoming more entwined.

That’s what I’m talking about! If that doesn’t float your boat, you need a new boat.

Practically speaking, what describes this type of activity? Do we sit quietly, trying to enter a trancelike state wherein we can more easily enter the spirit realm? No. The meditation process taught in Scripture — which is but one form of waiting on God — is not an altered state of consciousness. It is simply musing on, thinking about, or reflecting on God or a passage of Scripture.

Waiting on the Lord can be done while sitting, kneeling, walking, lying down, or driving–it isn’t the position of the body, but the posture of the heart. Prayer, worship, or contemplative thinking are all ways through which we “wait upon” Him. There is nothing complicated about it. A quality “quiet time” is a means of waiting on the Lord. Make it enjoyable - sit with a cup of coffee and visit with Him. I’ve sat in front of a fire for hours, enjoying the pleasure of His company. For me, it doesn’t get any better than that. Quality, however, is more important than quantity. I’ve received great revelation and insight from Holy Spirit from just a few minutes of visiting with Him. 

It is also important to wait upon Him with regularity. All of us should have regular quiet times of waiting on the Lord that are shorter, whether they be thirty minutes or an hour, and all of us should occasionally spend longer times with Him.

Learn to wait. In this hectic world of microwaves, bullet trains, and air travel, some things still take time. Slow down. If only for a few minutes a day - slow down and find Him. I promise you that if you will, you’ll live longer...and you’ll live better.

Pray with me:

Father, help us to become comfortable with the art of waiting on You with strong, calm, quiet trust. Bind our hearts tightly to Yours, as we abide. We want to be one with You in thought and desire, reflecting the glory of Christ.

We choose to slow down and position our hearts to wait. Echoing the prayer of the psalmist, this one thing will we seek: to dwell in Your house all the days of our lives, meditating, gazing, simply beholding every facet of Your beauty (Psalm 27:4)...enjoying the pleasure of Your company.

As we do, cause us to experience a oneness with Your heart, a braiding together with You. May we think Your thoughts, desire Your desires, love what You love, and hate what You hate. 

And we embrace Your promise that we will run with Your strength, move in Your gifts, release Your power, and speak Your words.

Fill us afresh and anew as we wait on You! In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.

Our decree:

We declare that we will re-prioritize waiting and listening to Holy Spirit, knowing that as we do, He WILL share His heart with us.

Today’s post was taken from my book The Pleasure of His Company, published by Baker Books.

Click on the link below to watch the full video.

https://youtu.be/nf7V_2GMPyA

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1. James Strong, The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1990), ref. no. 1747.

2. Ibid., ref. no. 2442.

3. Ibid., ref. no. 6960.