PROPHETIC WORDS

AWAKEN!

by Janet Chambers

This prophetic word was given at the NZ Council of Prophets meeting in Christchurch, February 2021.

Last year as I prayed into the Behold Conference and what I felt God was saying for 2021 I found myself in a vision. I was standing in a cave, watching the rear end of a bear that was awakening and emerging from hibernation. I knew instinctively that the bear was the church, and it had been awakened from hibernation, and now emerged with a fierce hunger for fish and for honey. The emphasis was in the fierceness of the desire felt. Nothing would stop it, and nothing would be allowed to stand in its way.

Regularly before then, and still today, I’ve been seeing the repetition of 11:11.

God has been highlighting that to me. (Internationally,  prophets have also been speaking the phrase “awakening”, with many commenting on the repeated appearance of 11:11.)

The awakening of the prophet Jonah has been also brought to my attention and, pulling all these aspects together, I believe I can share what I feel that God is saying to the church.

The Bear

In hibernation the bear’s heartbeat drops to 1 beat per minute, but on awakening it speeds up to 8 beats per minute. The number 8 represents ‘new beginning’ and this indicates that the church has been in a state of hibernation – not dead, but slumbering – with a heartbeat that is not adequate for  fishing and hunting, but a new beginning is upon it. For it to really live, passion, strength, and vigour is necessary, not apathy-induced stupor, or twitching inconsistencies. What we’ve seen of church influence is akin to sleepy twitching compared to the emergence that is coming. A new heartbeat and rhythm will now truly represent the heartbeat of God. During hibernation, superfluous fat is stripped away, but bone density and muscle mass is not diminished. We are in a season that has begun, and is continuing, where the superfluous has to be stripped away. (Perhaps one example of this that we’ve already seen is large meetings with concert type programs pared back to simple heartfelt messages, live-streamed from pastors’ kitchens, studies and garages.)

I believe that a great awakening is upon us, where a passion to fish for souls will overtake all of us, and a fierce, focused desperation will come upon us to search for honey – speaking of a longing for the Word – and for the sweetness of His presence, a focus that we were created to have.

It should be noted that a bear that does not arise from hibernation, and continues to slumber,  will diminish and die, and I do believe that we are in a critical time where we MUST awaken!

I believe that we have come to a Jeremiah 16 time

“Behold I will send for many fishermen”, says the Lord,” and they shall fish them; and afterward I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain and every hill and out of the holes in the rocks.” (Jer 16:16.)

.. from the Hebrew – “…and they shall eagerly hunt them from every high promoted place (I believe this is places of influence) and from every place of illicit worship (I believe that we will see a greater surge of those involved in false religions, as well as those practicing occultic practices, being swept into the Kingdom) and out of the strongholds” (strongholds of depression, oppression, thought and opinion.)

… it carries on in v 19-21

“O Lord, my Strength and my Stronghold and my refuge in the day of affliction, to You shall the nations come from the ends of the earth and shall say, Surely our fathers have inherited nothing but lies, emptiness and futility, worthless things in which there is no profit! Can a man make gods for himself? Such are not gods! Therefore says the Lord, “Behold, I will make them know- yes  this once will I make them know My power and My might; and they will know and recognise that My name is the Lord.” (Jehovah- the Existing One)

Here is a season where we see a tremendous focus coming on the lost:

• It is where the Lord Himself is awakening, compelling and sending the fishermen and the hunters to the lost.

• It is a season where unsaved people will realise the futility and lies of what they've been taught, because of what God is stirring in their hearts (even in New Zealand – the ends of the earth.)

• It is a season where we will see a dramatic increase in people seeing and experiencing the power and might of God, and thus recognising that He exists.

The repeating of 11:11 

John 11:11 “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, But I AM going there to awaken him.”

He appeared dead, he was declared dead, but Jesus said he was sleeping…

The church has appeared dead, and is declared dead and irrelevant by the world, but Jesus says that she is just asleep, and He is awakening her.

The Lord declares what He is about to do and He Himself is doing the awakening. 

An awakening call to the prophets

The captain of the ship awakened a sleeping prophet – Jonah. There will be now an awakening of prophets who have made themselves comfortable in a ship (the world) that’s heading to a destination of entertainment and sin, with commercial activity as its focus. Prophets who were called to be rebuking and warning, with a strong motivation of love, have instead been sleeping soundly (in a stupor) in the sinking ship. Many have been shutting their eyes tightly to the impending judgement, reticent and resting, instead of bringing rebuke in love, that would lead to repentance.

The strong command came to Jonah to “Arise and pray” – the word ‘arise’ used here means to stand up, become powerful, and accomplish. That command comes again now to the prophets of our time.

To sum up

I see God giving a sudden wake up call that causes a fierce, determined, hunger for souls, and an enveloping hunger for the presence of God and His Word, to come upon the Body of Christ. Evangelists will be fishing, and many, if not all, will feel an urgency to fish for souls. I feel a rebuke and a wake up for the prophets, a call to sound an alarm, to not fear the faces, to make a clear call for repentance, and to lead in prayer and intercession to our God like never before.

Because the Lord is causing this, and He is initiating this, I see, as in Jer:16:21, a response coming from the ends of the earth and across the earth, of people recognising the futility of lies they have believed, and seeing and experiencing the reality of the power and might of The God that exists.

BIO