Preface: In April, 2008, I posted a warning of impending Depression and economic turmoil that would spread across the globe. Within a few months the events I spoke of were in full view and slowly unfolding across the world. What started in America soon began to affect other nations. Within a year, it was clear - things were changing, and not for the better. Even now, as of this writing in 2014, the effects of the events I spoke of nearly six years ago are still reverberating throughout the world. America is still mired in one of the slowest recoveries on record, China has suffered an economic slowdown, too. Even now, the value of the dollar continues to decline (because the Mint continues to print money, unsupported by anything).

Now, in 2014, I have been given a new message to speak. And this time it carries with it more troubling news concerning impending events, some of which are already in quiet process. Bear in mind, I do not like delivering these messages any more than you like reading them. But I must deliver them because, if they are true, I bear a responsibility to spread the warning as far and wide as possible.

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On the night of February 10^th, I was awaken by the Lord and instructed to read Isaiah, chapter 3. The voice was very clear, and the Holy Spirit spoke the instruction three times, after which I repeated it back aloud. So I read the passage as instructed.

The chapter opens with a statement regarding both Jerusalem and Judah. For the purposes of this message, the Lord has indicated Jerusalem refers to Christianity, the Church around the world, not just in America. And Judah refers to Western society, with America as its center.

A very real storm is coming, is already formed. And it will not be stopped. All our lives will be affected, even changed as a result of, and in the aftermath of this particular sequence of events that is coming.

All storms have a primary target. As a hurricane’s Eye is the ‘center’ of the storm, and where the Eye makes landfall is said to be the “target” of the storm, so America is the primary target in the secular sense, with the rest of Western society suffering significant collateral “damage” as well. On the spiritual side, Christianity is likewise the target of this storm, both around the world, and in America in particular. Isaiah 3 is the outline of how it will unfold.

What follows is the message the Lord has instructed me to present.

As stated, the objects of this warning are identified. We are told that God is going to remove both supply and support (v.1). These are two separate things. The whole supply of both bread and water will be removed first, both from the Church and from society. In other words, a drought that will affect the sustenance of the people, both spiritually and materially.

Materially, we are already seeing this in the Southwest of America, as a precursor of what is coming upon the land. And spiritually, we are seeing more churches succumbing to societal pressures to adapt the Bible to the age, to what people want to believe, destroying the integrity of God’s Word, the sustenance of the people of God, even abandoning the Bible altogether. It will only continue to worsen.

What is described next is the removal of support. First the mighty man and the warrior (v.2); from soldiers to police and fire services, to first responders, even emergency services, doctors and community/social activists and leaders. In the Church, this would be in the form of financial support, elders, counsellors and prayer teams, even pastors, which intercede and contend on behalf of their congregations.

Next, the removal of the judge and the prophet (v.2). Both judges and prophets are, at their core, tellers of truth, discerners of right and wrong (black and white), and they champion justice. For the prophet, it also includes messages from the Lord. As these fall silent, injustice will increase.

And many false prophets will be exposed because they go, though God has not sent them; and they will speak, though God has not instructed them. They will deceive many, and people will seek them (because they keep talking) for a ‘word’ from the Lord, which they do not possess, as the effects of the storm begin to ravage the people.

The removal of the prudent (as the KJV reads) and the elder (v.2). People with common sense, and older folks with knowledge, understanding, experience, wisdom and historic remembrance which the young cannot possess; their removal ensures mistakes of the past will be repeated, in the Church and in secular society, and ultimately result in failure of policy and practice.

Removal of the captain of fifty and the honourable man (v.3). These are people in authority (corporate, civil, spiritual), our defenders and our integrity resources; removal of these creates increased vulnerability and further compromise of truth and principles.

Counselors and expert artisans (craftsmen) are taken away (v.3). Whether therapeutic or in the capacity of expert advisors, knowledge resources; and artisans are the creative forces, the inventors, innovators, craftsmen and entrepreneurs – even people who make things happen.

Finally, the eloquent orators (as the KJV refers to them) (v.3). When you remove people who are good at conveying information, teachers, public speakers, topical experts, even pastors and scholars, you suffer a loss of intellectual property in the form of human knowledge and experience, materially and spiritually.

When combined together, all the people mentioned in these verses are our resources, our protectors, our champions of justice and truth, even righteousness. They are the reason we have civil order in society. Their removal will take away the restraints which keep society balanced, from falling into disarray. And even now our protections are compromised, civilly, nationally and spiritually.

In place of the now absent support, God says He will install children, even capricious children as leaders and rulers (v.4); it is already happening. These are unqualified people, lacking the education, experience and understanding to address the problems over which they will be exercising authority. And this is not just in society, but within the Church itself. These new leaders operate in a vacuum with no understanding of how things work, how things are done, introducing their own untested and untried ideas, barely more than notions, to manage and direct their charges.

The result is a kind of oppression (v.5) because they end up causing even greater harm with their rule, with policies and “solutions” that are heavy handed, irrational and which will have the result of undermining legal, even constitutional, protections and core spiritual principles. This creates a growing unrest in the people, who turn against one another as much as their leaders, leading to further oppression.

We can already see oppressive policies and laws. Federal regulations are choking job creation, and people go jobless, creating further unrest and discontent. Political correctness and “tolerance” add to the oppressive atmosphere we can already see spreading across the land.

Churches impose legalistic and narrow interpretations of Scripture and demand obedience, or open interpretation up so broad that they are tyrannical in their insistence that we cannot say with definitive certainty what something means – it might offend.

The youth rise against their elders (v.5), as every new generation has done. But this time they are not “settling down” and assimilating as previous generations of youth have done. They remain agitated and discontented, and not entirely without cause; lack of jobs, debt from education, broken promises, even betrayal by government, to name but a few reasons. And it’s only getting worse.

Likewise, the inferior rail against the honourable (v.5). We need only look at the recent Occupy Wall Street protests as evidence, who believe they have better solutions (vague and poorly articulated); they’re speaking out against those they perceive as their oppressors – and yet this disaffected people enjoy all the benefits provided by those they rail against, the so-called 1%, which they charge as the source of most, if not all, the problems they claim are plaguing the people and the world.

And in the mainstream Church, the rise of a “new kind of Christian(ity)”, a post-modern ideology driven by the young. They embrace ecumenicalism and universalism, contradicting – even eliminating significant portions of scripture (the ‘red letter’ movement), which is becoming the new ‘normal’. Lessons are now “experience” and “feelings” based lectures with only a token reference to scripture – just to keep it “spiritual”. This even to the point that what the Bible calls sin is no longer being considered sin at all. It is creating further divisions among the faithful, particularly pitting young believers against older believers, the scripturally ignorant against the scripturally literate.

With each verse in Isaiah 3, we see the storm gaining strength, having a greater effect upon the people inside and outside the Church. As the storm strikes deeper, the turmoil overtakes the lives of the people. And the unrest, the discontent, grows stronger, as lives are torn apart, irrevocably changed.

As we move deeper into Isaiah’s descriptions of the changes occurring, and the reason they are happening – we see God is behind it, in order that His will be done; not to simply “punish” the people for their evil, though there certainly are consequences for it, but to draw people to salvation.

In verse 6 we see people will seek to find someone, anyone, to lead them. They are desperate to fix what is clearly a ruinous situation (it is so stated), which is not getting better, because the policies and solutions created by the new, inexperienced and unqualified leaders are failing, even causing worse problems.

And in verse 7 the response of those entreated to lead; they will not take charge of “these ruins”. They will declare that they are suffering the effects as well. (It may be considered that these people refuse leadership because the solutions required to solve the problems require sacrifices nobody is willing to make, and they know it, so refuse the mantle of office – whether civil or spiritual in nature, even though the people all but hand over to them authority to act.)

Now we come to the reason for the storm, the unrest and turmoil, the reason God is moving (v.8). The Church is stumbling and the West, even America, has fallen. Why? “Because their speech and their actions are against the Lord, to rebel against His glorious presence.”

In the Church, as mentioned earlier, unbelieving pastors and hierarchy, compromised doctrine and destruction of the Bible as the authoritative word of God have crippled the people, caused them to stumble.

Seminaries are staffed with teachers who do not even believe in biblical truth; and preachers who do not even believe in God speak from our pulpits.

Self-serving shepherds ruin the flocks (Ez. 34: 2-4), even speaking against the sovereignty of Jesus as Lord and God, stripping Him of His divine origin and nature.

In secular society, we’ve gone from putting a man on the Moon to now raising children who are failing in all areas academically. The rise of licentiousness and removing the shame of sin, calling good ‘evil’ and evil ‘good’ is celebrated; the collapse of the traditional nuclear family, turning away from God as the Author of our liberty and freedom, even our prosperity. Our corporate board rooms and civil government are increasingly secular, growing more anti-Christian in their bias. The list is long and a clear indictment against mankind in his sin.

God further declares of them in verse 9; the expression on their faces shall bear witness against them, that they have no shame at all, displaying their sin like Sodom, openly, contemptuously, pridefully.

But even as this storm strikes deeper into the lives of the Church and society as a whole, God has words of comfort and encouragement for those who stand firm in Him:

Verse 10: “Say to the righteous that it will go well with them, for they will eat the fruit of their actions.”

These faithful are the righteousness of God in Christ, and they are not capitulating to the heresy and lies spoken as truth. Their righteous behaviour will provide them sustenance and protection as the storm strengthens and takes a greater toll on all around them, as we see in verse 11; “Woe to the wicked! It will go badly with him, for what he deserves will be done to him.”

Here is also presented a great opportunity. During the coming unrest and tumult, the righteous of God will be a testimony and bear witness of the love, grace and salvation of the Lord. They will be undaunted, undeterred and resolute to serve His will, to reach out to those in need – even though they themselves may suffer great loss during this time – and help them that do not know God to understand what is happening, and to draw them to Christ Jesus.

In their suffering, the unbelieving will wonder how people they may have ridiculed can still be so giving and loving, even in the face of such turmoil that surrounds them. It will change many hearts. The people will look upon these righteous of God with new eyes, and many will be saved who would not have even considered it had this storm not come to pass.

In verse 12 God turns toward His people, articulating their condition, that they are oppressed by children (inside and outside the Church), and women rule over them. We can look at ‘women’ and see it can mean “faithless”, too. So faithless leaders in the Church and in society lead them all, and in so doing, lead them astray and confuse the direction of their paths, drawing them farther away from the truth and salvation.

By changing the meaning of words, the post-modern advocates in the Church and society have asked a very telling question, “Can anyone know absolute truth?” They have asked this question – the very question Pilate asked Jesus – as a way to challenge all authority, destroying the power of the law, even the written word of God, and allowing them to rewrite them – even replace them – something never intended by the Founders or God.

And with an increasingly illiterate population standing before them, these leaders take the people down the broad path of destruction, causing further oppression and destruction.

Now we see God moving to finish this work He started. In verse 13, He arises to contend and stands to judge the people. Jesus contends for His own, they are in His hand, given Him by the Father. He argues for their protection. It is therefore the Father who stands to judge. Jesus remains seated until His enemies are a footstool at His feet, for the time of His standing, which signals His return, has not yet come.

The storm begins to reach its climactic fury, its most destructive phase, as the Lord enters into judgment of the people (v.14). He speaks first against the leadership within His own house, the Church. As Jesus taught we must remove the log from our own eye before attempting to remove the mote from our neighbour’s eye; so God shall do.

The Lord indicts those in power in the Church for their destructive practices, corrupt doctrine and false teaching, that they have devoured the vineyard (destroying the fruitful field), and plundered the people of their possessions – which are now in their houses. They have crushed the people and ground the faces of the poor (v.15), preying on their ignorance and trust. Again, Ez. 34:2-4 expresses the behaviour for which they are being judged.

The Church leadership has become bloated and self-serving, no longer concerned with seeking the lost, healing their wounds, comforting their hurts. Rather they have become modern Pharisees, unwilling to lift a finger to help those in need.

They force others to work and labour, while they rest in comfort, having grown wealthy off the work done by others. They focus on numbers and bottom lines (church growth). They conducting surveys of the likes and dislikes of the people regarding how services/church should be conducted (seeker sensitive), and so do little to nothing in training up a people for the work of the Great Commission (they are blind guides).

And finally, having initiated a purge in His own house of the corrupt and destructive leadership, the Lord turns His attention to the secular community. Here God mentions Zion (v.16), Western society, the meaning of which is ‘barren plain’; but Zion can also mean ‘pillar’.

The West, led by America, has been a pillar of liberty, freedom and democratic principles since the end of the Second World War. Our global reach has preserved the peace and contained tyrants and despots within their respective borders – until recently. In the past few years we have been withdrawing, disengaging from a number of areas of the world, the result being that those areas have fallen into turbulence – some of which we created. And our influence is likewise waning in these places, even in traditional Western friendly strongholds as well.

The West is also a very material society, rich and comfortable. Even the typical poor among us are wealthy when compared with nearly 4.5 billion people in the world (vvs.16, 18-23).

So the Lord makes the wealth and grandeur of the people useless, and afflicts them with scabs on their scalps and makes their foreheads bare (v.17), and continues describing their materialism (vvs.18-23). To remove all doubt, God says of their prosperity, that it will cease being sweet smelling and become putrefaction (v.24), which is rotting flesh, and reiterates that their well-set hair will be replaced by a plucked out scalp, their clothes sackcloth instead of fine raiment, even branding instead of beauty.

The symptoms described allude to two identifiable causes; the first being biological warfare, and the second being radiation poisoning. The worst case would be both. Whatever the source, this cannot be ignored as being a byproduct of war.

And in the 25^th verse, we are given further evidence it is indeed war that is coming: “Your men will fall by the sword, and your mighty ones in battle.”

War is the climactic event of this coming storm. And God compels the people to war. Left to our own devices, particularly in America, we have just come out of Iraq and Afghanistan and have lost our taste for war. So this war will be one in which we have no option but to respond with force and brutality against our attackers – and that assumes we are attacked first.

By whom, what or how the war is set in motion is not specified. But we know the effects, and even the aftermath is known because the last verse of the chapter lays out the end very clearly:

Verse 26: “And her gates will lament and mourn; and deserted she will sit on the ground.”

We know that in the time of Isaiah the city gates were the place of much commerce and business. Here is described gates, deserted, devoid of activity. And she, the West, with America at its center, is sitting in the dirt, abandoned and broken, alone.

This speaks to an economic collapse.

So the question arises: When will this happen? When will we begin to see the real effects of the storm beyond the telltale things we see at present?

In truth, the early effects of the storm have already been lapping at our shores. There have been ‘gentle’ winds occurring, signs of unrest and discontent have been seen, voices raised in protest to this and that social cause, even against government activity. With each passing day we can see more and more signs manifesting, revealing the fact that there is very real and severe trouble ahead of us.

Based on my previous experience in delivering messages, I would suggest between eight months and one year before the main storm begins, and people start to recognize that something is very, very wrong.

How long will the storm last? That, too, is unclear. But a storm like this does not rise overnight, and so it does not end overnight, either. And all indications are that this is going to be worse than the Depression of 2008-9 (which is still affecting people today). We must prepare to endure hardship for a good while, perhaps even a few years.

We need to warn people now, not later. This warning must be given voice – without soft pedaling it. The people of God are not children; they should be told the truth, and in no uncertain terms. Now. They will overcome the unsettling language and nature of the warning, and have time enough to prepare.

Remember, the Righteous of God will fare well, and they will be fed by their actions. God will provide. But that doesn’t mean they should not prepare. A prudent man sees the storm coming and prepares for it (Joseph in Egypt). Our people must be warned of this coming storm. And those who are not so active must also be warned, so they may be encouraged, even prompted, to change their habits and also have time to prepare.

Sound the alarm, and prepare. We will be needed in the days ahead, to minister to them who will suffer the worst of the effects from what is coming. But only if we prepare will we be most effective when this storm does come upon us.

The fields are ripe, and the workers are few. The coming days require we be vigilant, on guard, and warn people of what is on the horizon – and heading our way.

Is this not why we serve? Is this not our purpose?