When Joshua was by Jericho, he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, a man was standing before him with his drawn sword in his hand. And Joshua went to him and said to him, “Are you for us, or for our adversaries?” And he said, “No; but I am the commander of the army of the L-RD. Now I have come.” And Joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshiped and said to him, “What does my lord say to his servant?” And the commander of the L-RD’S army said to Joshua, “Take off your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy.” And Joshua did so.
Joshua 5:13–15 ESV
“We might do some things together. I don’t know about sides. I go my own way; but your way may go along with mine for a while.”
Fangorn, The Two Towers, “Treebeard”
We are told to pick a side repeatedly, and when neither side actually walks with righteousness, and there are very clearly several dynamics of compromise on either side, and, instead of having the faith to ask the Father if He wants to rip up the whole superstructure, we shrink our faith and ask Him which side He wants us to pick, based on slogans, and a whole lot of deception and skulking half-truth.
I want you, gang, to consider whether or not you are even on the right path asking the right question.
It’s not about sides.
It’s about that which is deeper.
When you are handed a group of wicked rulers and you pick one, and call them good, and make excuses for that ruler, then you open the door for all sorts of other junk.
But when you question the whole system, and ask the L-rd if He has a problem with the whole system, or even something deeper than where you are, then I would urge you to ask the L-rd what He wants you to do with that truth.
He may ask you to join with others and ask Him to begin the process of asking Him to quash that whole structure, or He may say, “the structure is fine, but there is a focal point over here.”
Find that focal point He has for you, and direct your prayer there.
Staring At the Right Place For the Wrong Reasons
You can be drawn to and prophesy over the right focal point with the wrong words.
Gang, I am encouraging you all to go deeper and ask much deeper questions than “which of these two men do You have for this job?”.
And for some, that might be the right question, and if the L-rd says “go with this or that person, regardless of how they present to others”, then do that.
But I would also challenge you to ask a bunch of questions and even some that you may not be hearing others ask.
Be willing to ask things like, “L-rd, are the roots of the system I am looking at an praying over off even a little bit?”
“Are our cornerstones fully square?”
Are the stones in the foundation off, or are they on-point and made with the right material.
“Are we asking based on presuppositions, and, as a result, blind to something else You are wanting to show us?”
“Father, is there something I am missing that You wish to show me? Is there something that, because of my perspective or hardwiring, or even my gifting, I am missing.” Sometimes, because of the way we are uniquely hardwired, there are things difficult for us to see. Whether it is justice, or empathy, or deeper understanding, or revelation, or management of resource, or systems, or flow, or felt needs….
The truth is….we know in part and we prophesy in part.
This sort of mindset requires that we leave aside questions that are readily evident that everyone is asking and seeing to answer, and dig for the questions that NO ONE is asking.
Gang, don’t be hasty.
Ask the L-rd to shine His light, and refuse to coach Him on where to shine it.
And be at peace with all that you are doing.