2

WHO ARE YOU TALKING TO?

MY NAME SHALL BE GREAT

“For from the rising of the sun, even to its going down, My name shall be great among the Gentiles; in every place in-cense shall be offered to My name, and a pure offering; for My name shall be great among the nations,” says the Lord of hosts. (Malachi 1:11)

In the final book of the Old Testament, Malachi shows up and confronts the nation of Israel over their half-hearted offerings,

lame sacrifices, and corrupt priesthood. The prophet calls them to just “shut the whole thing down” because they have lost the revela-tion of God and His infinite worth. But then he delivers one of the most powerful prophecies concerning the emergence of worship and prayer in the earth before the second coming. In response to Israel’s blindness, God will go to the four corners of the earth and release the revelation of His name until incense arises from every nation. This global movement will attest to God’s greatness and provoke an obstinate people to jealousy.

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The core reality of Malachi’s prophecy is the greatness of God’s name. Right now there is so little prayer and worship because our view of God is so small. But God is anointing preachers and teach-

ers who will release the knowledge of God and restore the revelation of His greatness and the worth of His Son. When the Church enters into this revelation, our lives will

be transformed and we will join in with the song of heaven, prais-ing the worthy Lamb of God.

WHO IN THE WORLD DO YOU THINK YOU’RE TALKING TO?

“Who in the world do you think you’re talking to?” This is the phrase I heard as I was looking in the bathroom mirror. I was in Basel, Switzerland, getting ready to preach at a morning confer-ence session on prayer. In the middle of my preparations I sud-denly heard the Lord say, “I have two questions for you.” When He spoke, I knew in my spirit that these questions contained key revelations concerning prayer. The first question arose within me, as clear as day: “Who in the world do you think you’re talking to?” Immediately I understood that God was highlighting the need for us to change our thoughts and beliefs about who He is, what He is like, and how He feels about us.

There is no greater hindrance to a life of prayer than wrong thoughts about God. In his book The Knowledge of the Holy, theo-logian A. W. Tozer addresses this very issue.

The heaviest obligation lying upon the Christian Church today is to purify and elevate her concept of God until it is once more worthy of Him—and of her.1

Our God is glorious, beautiful, and good, and He cannot be improved upon. Yet so few of us are connected to this reality, and

RIGHT NOW THERE IS SO LITTLE PRAYER AND WORSHIP BECAUSE OUR VIEW OF GOD IS SO SMALL.

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our low estimation of God manifests in our prayer life. Like Israel, we fail to recognize that He is a great king worthy of our time and energy, our love and worship. This is why developing a strong and faith-filled life of prayer must begin with changing our thoughts about God.

In Luke 11, after spending years observing His interactions with heaven, the disciples concluded that the secret to Jesus’ life was prayer. “Teach us to pray.” The first thing Jesus told them to do was forget about their shopping list of needs and problems. Instead, in the very opening of the Lord’s Prayer He highlighted the impor-tance of connecting to a person and a place. The person is the Father and the place is heaven. “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name” (Luke 11:2b). The source and foundation of all faith and intimacy in prayer is found in a true revelation of the Father.

Sadly, a majority of the Body of Christ has been more impact-ed by the father of lies, Satan, who constantly bombards us with doubt and accusations against our Father in heaven. The enemy knows that if he can sow unbelief into our hearts and minds con-cerning who God is and how He feels about us, then we will never pray. This unbelief is typically rooted in two areas: God’s ability and God’s emotions towards us. Either we believe God does not have the resources to help us, or we believe He is stingy and will withhold those resources from us. Many of us view God as a middle-class, working dad with seven billion children; He has a good heart, but there are so many demands placed on Him, and we are just another voice crying out for something. Others view God through the lens of their relationship with their earthly dad who was emotionally absent and unwilling to meet their needs. Without even realizing it, they attribute those same characteristics to God. In both cases we allow broken, fallen men and the lies of the enemy to form our beliefs about our heavenly Father.

THE SOURCE AND FOUNDATION OF ALL FAITH AND INTIMACY IN PRAYER IS FOUND IN A TRUE REVELATION OF THE FATHER.

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The only way to break free from this unbelief is to feed our-selves on the knowledge of God—the truths concerning who He is and how He feels about us. That morning in Switzerland, after the Lord confronted me and asked what I really thought about Him, I preached on the greatness of God. The Bible is filled with the revelation of God’s nature. He is merciful, long-suffering, pa-tient, faithful, and compassionate. He is jealous—an all-consum-ing fire—and He is love. He is not just loving, for that is an action, but He Himself is love. He is rich to all who call upon Him, not just in provision, but in generosity. He is overflowing in abun-dance toward those who call out to Him. He is kind, all-knowing, all-powerful, and present everywhere. He is eternal—the Alpha and Omega, beginning and end. He is meek and humble, just and righteous. And that is only the tip of the iceberg. As Job declared, “Indeed these are the mere edges of His ways, and how small a whisper we hear of Him! But the thunder of His power who can understand?” (Job 26:14).

Have you ever stopped to ask yourself when God began? Gene-sis 1 states that “in the beginning” God was there. In John 17 Jesus speaks about the glory He experienced with the Father “before the foundation of the world” (John 17:24). Have you ever meditated on the truth that our Father is uncreated? Everything else in existence, from the smallest atomic structure to the most powerful angelic being, is created. God is in another class; He is uncreated and He has no beginning. He is eternally powerful and eternally wise. No one gave Him anything and no one can take anything from Him. He is so transcendent and infinite that He must humble Himself to behold the heavens and the earth:

The Lord is high above all nations,His glory above the heavens.Who is like the Lord our God,Who dwells on high,

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Who humbles Himself to beholdThe things that are in the heavens and in the earth?(Psalm 113:4–6)

In Isaiah 40 God releases a powerful message of comfort to His people in the hour of their greatest suffering. What is this message? All flesh is grass, but the word of God stands forever. Our source of comfort and confidence comes from seeing the greatness of God! Isaiah then goes on to describe this greatness: God measures the seas in His palm and the heavens with the span of His hand. He weighs mountains in a scale. The nations are like drops in a bucket to Him, and all the people like grasshoppers. He names each star and calls it forth in His strength. There is no one like Him. (See Isaiah 40:7–26).

In 1999 I heard a message preached on Revelation 4 titled “15 Doors into the Beauty Realm of God.” For over an hour the speaker elaborated on the descriptions of the throne room found in Revela-tion 4, and I barely understood a word he was saying! The concept of meditating on the greatness of God and encountering Him on His throne was totally foreign. However, I determined that I would unlock whatever God might have for me in this chapter, and so I began to consistently meditate on Revelation 4. Today, I am con-vinced that when Jesus taught the disciples to pray, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name” (Matthew 6:9), He was thinking about the greatness of the Father on His throne.

In Revelation 4 the apostle John is supernaturally transport-ed by the Spirit to heaven. The first thing that he sees is a throne, and then he describes the One seated on the throne. If you have ever tried to explain something unfamiliar to an individual, then you know what it’s like to use examples and analogies in order to paint a picture. This is what we read in Revelation 4. John is trying to use familiar objects to describe the heavenly scene before him. He says the One on the throne is like a jasper stone and a sardius

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stone. A jasper stone is the ancient equivalent of a diamond, and a sardius stone is red, so he is describing something diamond-like with fiery red intermingled. Then there is a rainbow like an emer-ald surrounding the throne. These gemstones are beautiful in the natural, but the beauty of God transcends what can be seen with natural eyes. His beauty is the compilation of all His perfections. It is the product of His nature and His very Being. God is blinding light and holiness, He is an all-consuming fire of love and jealousy, and He overflows with covenantal mercy. He is beautiful, burning, and merciful.

This mercy is clearly demonstrated as John describes the scene around the throne. Twenty-four elders are seated on thrones, wear-ing robes and crowns. Our God does not give us what we deserve! Instead, He shares His throne with us, clothes us with His own righteousness, and crowns us with rewards. When we awaken to the revelation of our place before God, I believe prayer and worship will erupt across the earth.

The book of Revelation does not describe the glory and great-ness of the Father alone. Immediately in the first chapter we read a description of Jesus that reveals the divine glory of the Son. In Revelation 1, just before the throne room scene in Revelation 4, John hears a voice like a trumpet. When he turns to see the source of this voice, he beholds a Man standing among seven lampstands. His white hair represents His wisdom, His garments represent His calling as an intercessor and High Priest, His eyes are eyes of fire, zeal, jealousy, and love. His bronze feet represent His zeal to op-pose unrighteousness. His voice like waters is creative in power. The sword in His mouth is the power of the Word of God. His hands holding the seven stars represent His nurturing of prophetic mes-sengers. John was so overwhelmed by the beauty and glory of this Man that he fell at His feet like one dead (Revelation 1:12–20). I believe the day is coming when an entire generation will fall on their faces at the revelation of Jesus. Isaiah 4:2 says that in the last days the Branch of the Lord will be seen as beautiful and glorious.

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Jesus is the Branch—the promised King who will come and rule the earth—and all of humanity will see His beauty and glory when He returns to reign. Isaiah 33:17 prophesies that our “eyes will see the King in His beauty.”

I have often heard Mike Bickle share a powerful encounter he had concerning the glory and beauty of Jesus. During a Friday night prayer meeting in 1996 he quietly said to the Lord, “Jesus, You are so beautiful.” He said this because he had been thinking about the Song of Solomon—but as soon as the words left his mouth a powerful surge of God’s presence rushed through him. He was surprised by this, and so he said it again: “Jesus, You are beautiful.” Again the presence of God rushed through him like electricity. This went on for five hours. Every time Mike declared, “Jesus, You are beautiful,” or “Body of Christ, open your gates to the beautiful God,” the power of the Holy Spirit would touch him. A week later Mike received a letter from a woman who wanted to share a dream with him. The night of the prayer meeting, while he was declaring the beauty of Jesus, this woman received a word from the Lord in her dream: “God said that He would give you the revelation of His beauty, and you were to call the Church to the beauty of God.” We are not supposed to know Jesus as someone who simply meets our needs and gives us things; He is the beau-tiful God who will overwhelm our hearts and exhilarate us with the revelation of His glory.

THE MOST IMPORTANT QUESTION“Who do you say that I am?” This is the question Jesus asked His disciples over two thousand years ago, the question I heard in Swit-zerland, and it is what God is asking us today.

When Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying, “Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?” So they said, “Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

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He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” (Matthew 16:13–16)

Many believers are content to listen to what others say about who Jesus is. They think it is enough to be connected to someone who owns their convictions. But what others say about God should be a catalyst for our personal journey of faith and discovery. This is why Jesus asked the disciples what others were saying about Him. He wanted them to wrestle over whether or not they were basing their faith on personal revelation. It as is if He was saying, “Are you living your life through the words of a man or a woman? Have you truly grappled with your beliefs? Have you come to your own con-clusions and do you possess your own revelation?”

Then Jesus asked a second question: “But who do you say that I am?” Simon responded immediately with the confession, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” This is more shocking than God using Balaam’s donkey to deliver His message! Simon, the fisherman with no education and even less wisdom, released the revelation of who this Man is. Jesus declared, “Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you.” In other words, “You didn’t hear this at the ‘Who Do You Say I Am’ conference. You didn’t get it from a man or woman. My Father revealed this to you.” It does not matter how many teachings we hear, how many anointed speakers we listen to, or how well we can parrot what we’ve heard. Only the Father can reveal His Son to us.

Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever

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you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” (Matthew 16:17–19)

Notice that when Simon received the revelation of who Jesus is, Jesus turned the tables on him: “Now that you know who I am, I will tell you who you are” (paraphrase). Simon turned into Peter at the revelation of Jesus—and so it will be for everyone who goes on the journey of receiving the revelation of Jesus. Many believ-ers in the Church today are obsessed with finding their identity, but only those who find the Son will truly understand who they were created to be.

Jesus then went on to state that He will build His Church on this foundation: “On the rock of what you believe about Me, I will build a Church that will prevail even against the gates of hell” (para-phrase). Here we are given an amazing glimpse of the anointing the Church will operate in when believers are rooted in the revelation of Christ. Notice that it is a prayer anointing. When we know who He is and who we are before Him, we will carry an authority that will overthrow the gates of hell because heaven will back up our voices. What we bind will be bound and what we loose will be loosed. This prayer anointing will move the Church from a defensive position to an offensive position. We will cease living in our old, defeatist pat-terns and moving from cycle to cycle of fear, shame, and rejection. When we receive the revelation of Jesus and discover our identity within Him, we will rise up and storm the gates of hell.

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?“Who do you think you are?” This was the question that thun-dered in my spirit the second morning of my stay in Basel, Swit-zerland. The revelation of who He is and the revelation of who we are to Him are the pillars on which confidence and author-ity in prayer rest. We cannot separate the quest for our identity from the knowledge of God. Many believers experience identity crises because they are trying to find themselves outside of God.

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But as Peter discovered, if we know who He is, then He will tell us who we are.

Isaiah 62 is one of the clearest illustrations of the powerful prayer anointing that is released when we know who we are in God and how He feels about us. In 1995 Mike Bickle dreamed that he was preaching in a huge arena.2 As he looked out at the crowd, suddenly the voice of God filled the arena and the Lord said, “Call them Hephzibah. Tell them I delight in them.” In the dream, Mike saw a change sweep across the room as this word was released. He clearly saw the dramatic shift in the hearts of the people as they heard God proclaim His delight in them. The very nature of their inner life was transformed. When he woke up, Mike decided to share this message in his sermon that morning. He grabbed the Bible and turned to Isaiah, knowing that the passage containing “Hephzibah” was somewhere in the Old Testament prophets. He skimmed through all of Isaiah, but skipped chapter 62 because he was certain the reference wasn’t there. Isaiah 62:6 speaks of the glob-al prayer movement. In it, God promises to raise up intercessors and watchmen who will pray continually until Jesus establishes His throne in Jerusalem. Mike preached on this verse more than any other verse, and so he assumed he knew the chapter inside out. An hour later, after fruitlessly searching through all the Old Testament prophets, he finally broke down and pulled out his concordance. The reference for Hephzibah was Isaiah 62:4.

You shall be called by a new name,Which the mouth of the Lord will name . . .You shall no longer be termed Forsaken,Nor shall your land any more be termed Desolate;But you shall be called Hephzibah, and your land Beulah;For the Lord delights in you . . .And as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride,So shall your God rejoice over you.I have set watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem;

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They shall never hold their peace day or night.You who make mention of the Lord, do not keep silent,And give Him no rest till He establishesAnd till He makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth. (Isaiah 62:2b, 4, 5b–7)

The revelation that struck Mike’s heart when he finally found this verse was that the source of perseverance in prayer is the knowl-edge that God delights in us. Mike had been exhorting believers to take their place on the wall of intercession, but he had not realized the secret to raising up watchmen lies in proclaiming the truth that God enjoys His people. Although the ultimate fulfillment of Isaiah 62 will take place when the Lord returns and the nation of Israel enters into the fullness of her identity, God is releasing this new name to the Church today so that we might embody this revelation. He is changing our paradigms concern-ing who He is and how He feels about us. The power of shame, condemnation, and guilt are being broken as we receive this one simple truth: He delights in us. As God begins to fill the earth with mes-sages and songs proclaiming His love, it will awaken confidence in our hearts.

For many of us prayer feels like drudgery. We secretly think God is ugly, boring, and doesn’t like us, so we keep our distance and avoid talking to Him. But the truths of Isaiah 62:4 will free us from religion, boredom, and complacency and awaken us to the realities of confidence, authority, and partnership. In the first verse of Isaiah 62 God declares, “For Zion’s sake I will not hold My peace, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not rest, until her righteousness goes forth as brightness, and her salvation as a lamp that burns.” A few verses later we read that the watchmen will give God no rest until Jerusalem is a praise in the earth (Isaiah 62:7). God wants a part-ner, a bride. He wants to bring His people forth in love and then

THE SOURCE OF PERSEVERANCE IN PRAYER IS THE KNOWLEDGE THAT GOD DELIGHTS IN US.

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fill them with the burnings of His heart. We are not going to stop praying, because we know what He wants and we are joined to Him in love. This is what will set one hundred million interces-sors on the wall for Israel. The revelation that we are His beloved bride will be the foundation and fuel of the prayer movement in the last days. Isaiah 62:4 is a prophetic promise. Believers whose identity is founded on the truth that God delights in them will not stop praying until heaven and earth are united and Jerusalem is a praise in the earth.

NOTES1. A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy (New York: HarperCollins, 1961), 4.2. Mike Bickle, “Called to Song 8:6, Hephzibah, and Jesus in Red,” Session 6 in Encountering Jesus: Visions, Revelations, Angelic Activity from IHOPKC’s Prophetic History, http://www.mikebickle.org.edgesuite.net/MikeBickleVOD/2009/20090919A-T-Called_to_Song_8_6_Hephzibah_and_Jesus_in_Red_IPH06.pdf (accessed February 3, 2013), 7–8.