The Woman under the Palm Tree Pt.4
JUDGES 17:6
6 In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes.
JUDGES 4:4-5
4 ¶ And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, she judged Israel at that time. (Deborah had a gift of wisdom from God to bring justice to the people that came to her with disputes)
5 And she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in mount Ephraim: and the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.
The Woman under the Palm Tree Pt.4
JUDGES 4:5
5 And she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in mount Ephraim: and the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.
Look at where judgement was proceeding from in that hour, from the mouth of a woman with a prophetic anointing under a Palm tree – and Deborah represents the bride of this hour, because the bride of this hour is also a woman with a prophetic anointing who dwells under the headship of the word which is the tree of life. The judgement of this hour is the word of this hour proceeding from the mouth of the bride – “Thou must prophesy again before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings” Revelation 10:11.
JUDGES 21:25
25 In those days there was no king in Israel: every man did that which was right in his own eyes.
The condition in the book of Judges of every man doing that which was right in his own eyes, the bible tells us was because of the political situation of having no king – it was a time of (as it were) the time of the rejected King, which is also the time we are living in now.
Man ruling over man is like “slightly more intelligent sheep” trying to be the leaders of “slightly less intelligent sheep”. The fact is that we are all like dumb sheep when it comes to leadership and leading one another, because God did not design man to be able to lead himself – God was to be the leader of man, and not man the leader of man.
But God can chose a man as a channel and an instrument to lead the people through, like with a godly king who is under the directions of a prophet, but that is still God leading.
HEARING.RECOGNIZING.ACTING.ON.THE.WORD.OF.GOD_ JEFF.IN V-13 N-7 SUNDAY_ 60-0221
207 Politics, lowdown, nation, corrupted... Well, look what they're going to put soldiers in shorts now. Oh, my. Politics, war; politics is at the end. Dictators is wrong. Politics is wrong. (Why didn't they stay with the godly king like God give them: David?) The great lord of England said, when this--when this democracy was formed, said, "It's all right now, but it'll come the time," he said, "it'll be nothing. It'll be all sails and no anchor." And he's right. Said, "Politicians stand on soap boxes on every corner with all kind of crooked things that corrupt the government." And the man was right. That's exactly what's going on.
THE.FIFTH.SEAL_ JEFF.IN FRIDAY_ 63-0322
356-1 {170} …It's just like we think democracy is right. I believe it is, too, but it'll never work right. It can't with a bunch of Rickys around here to run it. How in the world are you going to get it right? You can't. Notice, the real thing was a godly king.
IS.YOUR.LIFE.WORTHY.OF.THE.GOSPEL_ JEFF.IN V-5 N-5 SUNDAY_ 63-0630E
134 The real way, is, God being the King, and God sends a prophet. Didn't Samuel tell them before they ever got a king? He said, "God is your King.
So in this generation we have had a prophet that America and the world could have had a direct leadership from God through the channel of that prophetic gift, like what the prophet Samuel was to Israel in his day, but because this generation has failed to recognise what God had sent them, and because of their rejection of the true prophet of this hour, as a result of that we are living in an age where there is no King to lead us just as we find here in the book of Judges, and so now we are living in a world where everyone is doing that which is right in their own eyes of understanding according to the influence of the genre of movies and television shows they mostly watch that shapes their thinking into whatever way the wind blows.
THE.REJECTED.KING_ CHAUTAUQUA.OH FRIDAY_ 60-0610
E-36 That same thing got into our nation. Our nation used to be governed by real true politics, Christians who'd go together and pray and come out anointed, and try to govern our nation. Now, it's just as honeycombed as it can be with everything, crooked... They tell me that communist is all over the country, free-thinkers, and all them kind of a stuff of organizations rising up. And it's just in such a state, there's no stop to it. And it only shows one thing: that the true King, the Son of God, is coming to take over and reign, just as certain as we're in this convention tonight.
E-37 Oh, if people could only remember, no matter how long you stay here on earth, still you've got to meet God. You take and make God your King, your supreme Lord. Many people likes to see--receive Jesus as Saviour. "Oh, yes, I don't want to go to hell, so I--I'll take Him as my Saviour," but not your Lord. When He's Lord, He's got rulership. (Rulership is like kingship in your life) He comes right in and governs you and controls you. But you say, "Lord, you can be my Saviour, but don't go to meddling in my private business. Now, don't--don't--don't go to getting all these things." You don't want your private life, you don't want to surrender it all to God.
*So in our personal lives we can fall into the trap of doing what seems right in our own eyes instead of being under the leadership of the word.
So we can be like a little nation that wants to lead ourselves by our own will of the inner man, or we can be under the leadership of the Lord and be governed by His will.
**So we want to look at the condition of the time of the book of Judges when Deborah was a prophetess under the Palm Tree. Because that is the bride of this hour that has been anointed with a prophetic anointing by a prophetic message who is under the headship of the tree of life which is the revealed word of this hour.
JUDGES 2:8-23
8 And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, died, being an hundred and ten years old.
9 And they buried him in the border of his inheritance in Timnathheres, in the mount of Ephraim, on the north side of the hill Gaash.
10 And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the LORD, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel. (Notice - Somehow this knowledge was not communicated successfully to the next generation – just like this younger generation knows nothing of what God did just one generation ago when he sent a vindicated prophet to the world – that was not really the children’s fault, that was the parents fault, parent delinquency as brother Branham puts it)
11 And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim:
12 And they forsook the LORD God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the LORD to anger.
13 And they forsook the LORD, and served Baal and Ashtaroth. (Ashtaroth is what some Hebrew scholars think is basically another name for the goddess Astarte who was a warrior goddess and the goddess of sexual love and fertility – and if you notice how the book of Judges ended (it didn’t end well), it ended with sexual violence which resulted in a terrible civil war where scores of thousands of innocent men died killing one another – this is the spirit of the way this world is also headed)
14 And the anger of the LORD was hot against Israel, and he delivered them into the hands of spoilers that spoiled them, and he sold them into the hands of their enemies round about, so that they could not any longer stand before their enemies.
15 Whithersoever they went out, the hand of the LORD was against them for evil, as the LORD had said, and as the LORD had sworn unto them: and they were greatly distressed.
16 Nevertheless the LORD raised up judges, which delivered them out of the hand of those that spoiled them.
17 And yet they would not hearken unto their judges, but they went a whoring after other gods, and bowed themselves unto them: they turned quickly out of the way which their fathers walked in, obeying the commandments of the LORD; but they did not so.
18 And when the LORD raised them up judges, then the LORD was with the judge, and delivered them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge: for it repented the LORD because of their groanings by reason of them that oppressed them and vexed them. (God used the judge to rule and judge and to bring deliverance to the people through them)
19 And it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they returned, and corrupted themselves more than their fathers, in following other gods to serve them, and to bow down unto them; they ceased not from their own doings, nor from their stubborn way. (In other words, each generation became worse than the one before – that is why this end time age will top them all in their abandonment from the true God. Most young people today haven’t got one spec of knowledge of the truth of what God has sent in this day)
20 And the anger of the LORD was hot against Israel; and he said, Because that this people hath transgressed my covenant which I commanded their fathers, and have not hearkened unto my voice; (We see the parallel because this generation has also not hearkened to the voice of God in this day – God is the rejected Kind of this last generation)
21 I also will not henceforth drive out any from before them of the nations which Joshua left when he died:
22 That through them (The surrounding nations of different cultures and different gods) I may prove Israel, whether they will keep the way of the LORD to walk therein, as their fathers did keep it, or not. (If you were raised in a nation and a culture of Christian holiness and respect and that was all you knew, then it is much easier to live that way yourself because there is such a strong natural human desire to fit in and to conform with the culture that you are raised in – so there would not be a lot of test and opposition that goes with that so much. It is the opposing influence of the cultures that are around us that pose the greatest pressure and threat upon us. That was also what the book of Daniel was about – these Hebrew people were having to live in a Babylonian nation amongst a culture that was opposing to their own)
23 Therefore the LORD left those nations, without driving them out hastily; neither delivered he them into the hand of Joshua. (God left them there to test the true believers in that kind of environment)
***The book of Judges takes place after Moses the Exodus prophet with two signs had left the scene, and after they had entered into the Promised Land under the Joshua commission. And this was also a time when every man did that which was right in their own eyes.
So this exactly parallels the day that we are living in today because we have also had an Exodus prophet with two signs that has left the scene, and we are also living in the promised land of the restored word of the hour, and again, every individual and politician and man-made denomination is doing what seems right according to their own man conceived opinions, Why? Because they have no Kingship of the revealed word in their midst – they have rejected the King.
So this book of Judges is a prophecy referring to a group of people in this hour that have come out of denominations under a third exodus prophet’s ministry, just like the people of Israel came out of the nation of Egypt to the promise land that God has promised for that time.
**So we find that when Israel got to the promised land, and after the death of Moses and Joshua, that there were the people of the nations left amongst them that were idol worshiping people (Sports idols, movie star idols, pop singing idols, fashion idols, “American idol” - trying to find even more idols for the people to worship in this hour, thousands of idols, the more the better as far as they are concerned), and the bible tells us that God actually left these heathen people there amongst the true believers of that hour in order to prove the people of God to see if they would continue to hearken to the voice of the Lord or be seduced by the influence of the people and the idols of the culture that they mixed with while also being in the message of the hour land.
JUDGES 3:1-8
1 ¶ Now these are the nations which the LORD left, to prove Israel by them, even as many of Israel as had not known all the wars of Canaan;
2 Only that the generations of the children of Israel might know, to teach them war, at the least such as before knew nothing thereof;
3 Namely, five lords of the Philistines, and all the Canaanites, and the Sidonians, and the Hivites that dwelt in mount Lebanon, from mount Baalhermon unto the entering in of Hamath.
4 And they were to prove Israel by them, to know whether they would hearken unto the commandments of the LORD, which he commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses.
5 And the children of Israel dwelt among the Canaanites, Hittites, and Amorites, and Perizzites, and Hivites, and Jebusites: (Notice – the cultures of the people that were amongst them. It tells us in verse 1 that God had allowed the heathen to remain amongst them in order to test them. And the worldly culture and environment that we find ourselves today is one of the greatest tests of all time.
The pressure to belong and to conform to the culture that you are in is a very powerful human social instinct that all of us human beings possess because of our strong social characteristics that God has made us with.
That is why the worldly culture that surrounds us will test the real believer from the not so real believer.
We are all affected in some way by the culture of todays world, but as believers of the message of this hour we are called to be overcomers of the deception of the cultures of this day just like Danial and the three Hebrew children were in Babylon – they wouldn’t bend, they wouldn’t bow, and they wouldn’t burn.
**Just think - If the whole world, and everyone in the world was raised up in the teaching of the message of the hour with real Godly parents and real Godly pastors that feed the people the truth of the word, and every one dressed modestly and according to the word, then that would make the social environment of this present world a thousand times more easier for the believer to live in – but there would be no real test associated with that.
So these unbelieving idol worshiping people that were amongst the people of God, after a generation of around 40 years, and after the death of the Judge, their influence began to get the advantage of the people of God until the Israelite believers begin to marry the unbelieving people of these other nations and cultures. So then God had to bring hardship to the chosen people of God by way of them becoming captive to the enemy.
6 And they took their daughters to be their wives, and gave their daughters to their sons, and served their gods.
7 And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and forgat the LORD their God, and served Baalim and the groves.
8 ¶ Therefore the anger of the LORD was hot against Israel, and he sold them into the hand of Chushanrishathaim king of Mesopotamia: and the children of Israel served Chushanrishathaim eight years.
**This is why as an individual you can become enslaved by an enemy that will sorely oppress you for years as the result of where the influence of the world has lead you to spiritually.
That is also why Satan is trying as much as he can to keep message people away from fellowshipping with one another, because if you can divide your enemy, then you will conquer – that is one of the oldest tricks in the book, and the bride of Christ is the biggest enemy the devil had got.
**Why do so many people leave church for silly reasons? – “He looked at me funny one day”, “He didn’t shake my hand after church”, “He invited so and so for lunch more times than he invited me” – on and on. We are in a battle and not a picnic right now - we will have all of eternity to socialise as much as we want on the other side. So it’s the devil that influences people to be like that.
**It was in this environment of a rejected King, and where every man did that which was right in their own eyes, it was in this environment of where the book of Ruth the gentile woman who at harvest time came into a marriage union with the Lord of the Harvest, and she had all of the family inheritance that had been lost restored to her in that hour. So that is also what we can expect in this hour.
***And that was also the condition of the time of when this woman Deborah who was under a prophetic anointing, who knew about the battle and the outcome of the battle that lay ahead against an advanced military army with advanced weapons of steal, and who was willing to go and fight in that battle. That was the condition of the time that she lived in - and this is the condition of the time that we live in also.