A Season of Fruitfulness

January 4, 2010

A Season of Fruitfulness

In the previous blog, I wrote about a prophetic word we had received during our weekly prayer meeting about the spiritual season of winter being over. In scripture, winter is a season of dormancy that can be associated with pruning and testing.

In 1 Peter 1: 6b we read, “though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials”. Peter acknowledges the challenge of enduring times of testing, but he follows this statement with a promise, “that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” In John 15:2, Jesus said that the Father will prune every branch so that it may bring forth more fruit.

The ultimate goal of a winter season in our lives is to increase our capacity to bear fruit. The season of testing, trials, and pruning will always be followed by a fresh season of fruitfulness.

We have completed 10 years into a new millennium and interestingly, in the bible the number 10 is associated with testing. In Exodus 8-10, God sent ten plagues on the Egyptians, to test them. God gave Moses 10 commandments to test the hearts of men and in Revelation 2 in the letter to the church at Smyrna, He said they would experience trials and tribulations for ten days. But every season of testing includes the promise of blessing that will follow.

The past decade has certainly contained it’s fair share of trials globally beginning with 9/11 and the advent of increased terrorism, more than one economic crisis’, and an unusually high number of environmental disasters like hurricane Katrina and the destruction of the tsunami in Asia in which 250,000 perished.

As we enter 2010 and a new decade, we are entering a new season of renewal and fruitfulness and fruitfulness for the believer begins with fresh revelation. In Matthew 20 we read about the parable of the workers in the vineyard. The workers who are part of the harvest in the first hour and those who join in the 11th hour, all receive the same pay. I see in this parable, a spiritual acceleration as the harvest approaches the end and this reflects an acceleration of spiritual resources that God will make available to the church to bring in the harvest.

We are living in the 11th hour in which we can expect an outpouring of fresh revelation that will empower the church to gather in the harvest as never before. I believe we will see an outpouring of divine revelation beginning in this season that can exceed the revelation the church has received in the past centuries.

I recently read in a daily devotional, Today God is First by Os Hillman, a quotation by C.S. Lewis which says, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts to us in our pains; it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” (C.S. Lewis in The Problem of Pain) The season of winter opens the door for a great outpouring of revelation.

When we gather for the Unite for Dominion conference in Calgary on January 28-30, we are believing for fresh prophetic revelation to be released for the coming decade and beyond. I believe this conference comes at a very strategic time for the Kingdom of God and we would love to see you there.