THURSDAY, JUNE 11
Scripture: Joel 2:23-25

Joel 2:23-25 says, “Be glad then, you children of Zion, And rejoice in the Lord your God; For He has given you the former rain faithfully, And He will cause the rain to come down for you— The former rain, And the latter rain in the first month. The threshing floors shall be full of wheat, And the vats shall overflow with new wine and oil. So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, The crawling locust, The consuming locust, And the chewing locust, My great army which I sent among you.” The key to this passage is understanding that God gives the rain or the anointing, according to what the ground requires. That is the Hebrew word tsaw-dak and it means, ‘As the ground requires.’ So if the cultural ground gets very, very hard in the last days, God pours out the anointing necessary to deal with the ground. We see today’s cultural ground washed in evil – it is a hard, hard ground. If the only way to deal with the evil is an anointing that causes our words to slay the wicked, then the promise is God will give an anointing that is so strong that our very words will slay them! Peter was anointed to deal with Ananias and Sapphira and the very breath of his lips brought death to the wickedness they were walking in. Peter is an example – he walked in that place! When James was killed by Herod and Peter was put in jail, the early church prayed. The angel got Peter out of jail and the angel visited Herod and put him in the grave. We can say that the very prayers of the early church were strong enough that the breath of their lips slew the wicked. Will we see an anointing in the last days where the very breath of our lips will slay the wicked? Isaiah saw it and he declared it! Joel tells us what will bring it about. The condition of the culture determines the anointing God will give. When individuals are so hardened to sin that they will not turn, then we can expect an anointing where the very breath of our lips will slay the wicked. The early church walked in it and Isaiah prophesied it for the here and now. We will see it in the last days and it is time to walk worthy of the call.