DEAD HOUSES

WE

hear much in the Church today about REVIVAL. But the things we hear about are souls being saved, getting "zapped" in the Spirit, entertainment, healing and emotional highs associated with hyped up meetings. In the midst of it are some blessings for the sake of the lost. But, for the most part, God’s people have not counted the cost and are not sold out to Jesus! There is a fair showing of the FLESH! None of this has anything to do with REVIVAL! Revival is purification of the saints! They come forth as gold ONLY when they go through the FIRE! Jesus said, "I came to cast FIRE on the earth; and would that it were already kindled! I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how I am constrained until it is accomplished! Do you think that I have come to bring peace on earth. No, I tell you but rather DIVISION." Luke 12:49-51

    Jesus can do little or nothing through a filthy unyielded vessel that will NOT submit to HIS FIRE. "For our God is a consuming FIRE." Hebrews 12. "Who among us can dwell with the consuming fire? Who among us can dwell with everlasting burnings? He who walks uprightly and speaks righteously." Isaiah 33:14 "The Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to His temple, the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, He is coming, saith the Lord of Hosts. But who can endure His coming and who can stand the day when He appears? For he is like a Refiner’s Fire and Fuller’s Soap and He will purify the sons of Levi…(the saints) Malachi 3:1-4. "Do you not know that you are God’s temple and God’s Spirit dwells in you?" 1 Corinthians. 3:16. "Then I will draw near to you (God’s people) in judgement. I will be a swift witness against sorcerers, adulterers, those who swear falsely, those who oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow and the orphan, against those who thrust aside the sojourner, AND DO NOT FEAR ME, saith the Lord of Hosts." Mal. 3-5. "Judgement begins in the House of the Lord." 1 Peter 4:17

    Most of God’s people today do not fear Him! Their fear of Him is a commandment of men learned by rote! Many treat Him like some kind of Santa Clause to respond to their desires! "Gimme," they say. "Give me resurrection power-but NOT the Cross!" "Give us smooth things- -But not the cross!" "And he who does not take up his cross daily and follow me is not worthy of me." Matthew 10:38.

    "Those who feared the Lord spoke with one another; the Lord heeded and heard them and a book of remembrance was written before Him of those who feared the Lord and thought on His name. They shall be mine, saith the Lord, MY REMNANT ON THE DAY WHEN I ACT and I will spare them as a man who spares his son who serves him. Then once more you shall discern between the righteous and the profane, between one who serves God and one who doesn’t." Malachi 3:16-18.

    "For behold the day comes, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and evildoers will be stubble."

Malachi 4:1.

    The shaking has already begin (Hebrews 12:27) in God’s House and it is indeed the hour filled with His refining and reproving fire, but we have yet to see it in full measure and manifestation. When true revival occurs, everything hidden will be revealed. Filthy vessels will repent, submit and be cleansed or be stubble! Those who submit will be on their faces on the the ground as God’s refining fire cleanses them for His use. Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5) will occur in the gatherings again; the fear of God will be evident and so will awesome signs and wonders. The responsibility associated with and the evidence of God’s Glory will be revealed and manifest again in the Church for His purpose and glory. Amen! "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." Proverbs 1:7.

    "You are God’s field, God’s BUILDING." 1 Corinthians 3:9b. These are two paradigms God uses in scripture to describe His people and His dealings with them. It is the second to which this refers. It was a tent and a building under the old covenant which contained God’s Glory in the Ark of the Covenant. It is the body of the true believer under the new covenant which is God’s building for His Spirit and Glory. "We are being changed into His likeness from one degree of Glory to another." 1 Corinthians 3:18. "For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit." Jesus is referred to as the Cornerstone and believers as Living Stones to be built into a collective Spiritual House. "Come to Him to that Living Stone, rejected by men, but in God’s sight chosen and precious, and like living stones be yourselves built into a Spiritual House, to be a Holy Priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." 1 Peter 2:4-5.

    "And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house upon the sand, and the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat against that house, AND IT FELL and GREAT was the FALL of it." Matthew 7:26-27 In verses 24 and 25, He tells us to build our house on the ROCK - on Jesus, on the Word! - that is if we wish to stand! Many have built their houses on the idols of entertainment, materialism and false prosperity, false doctrine, religion, lusts, mammon - anything but the ROCK and what His Words require! THESE HOUSES WILL NOT STAND! THEY ARE ABOUT TO COME CRASHING DOWN! "For this iniquity will be to you like a breach in a high wall bulging out and about to collapse, WHOSE CRASH COMES SUDDENLY IN AN INSTANT." Isaiah 30:13. "Woe to the rebellious children." Isaiah 30:1 "Woe to those who go down to Egypt - but do not look to the Holy One of Israel." Isaiah 31:1 There is trouble at hand for God’s children who have harloted themselves to the world and trust in it’s ‘crap’ rather than in Jesus Christ who requires ALL of each of us and requires us to heed ALL of His Word, NOT just the comfortable smorgasbord selections most choose for themselves!

    "We’ll have some of this and some of that, but not those words-it’s too hard! God has always had Watchmen and sends them to warn His disobedient people. Today as always when the Lord sends a vessel with a hard word of reproof or rebuke (2 Timothy 4:2) to these, the vessels are mocked, stoned, persecuted and cast out. His warnings are ignored to their eventual downfall after God’s infinite patience is just pushed too far! "The Lord, the God of their fathers sent PERSISTENTLY to them by His messengers because He had compassion on His people and on HIS HOUSE, but they kept mocking the messengers of God, despising His words and scoffing at His prophets, ‘till the wrath of the Lord rose against HIS PEOPLE, ‘till there was no remedy." 2 Chronicles 36:15-16. "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings and you would not! Behold your house is forsaken and desolate. You will not see Me again until you say, "Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord." Matthew 23:37-39.

    Today in the Church many say, "Don’t quote to us from the old testament, things are much different under the new testament." "Where they not justified by grace through faith? They were certainly not justified by the Law! Galatians 2:16. They were saved through faith! Habakuk 2:4. Where they not warned first and then eventually judged for disobedience? "Now these things happened to them as a warning, but they were written down for our instruction upon whom the end of the ages has come. 1 Corinthians 3:10. ALL scripture is God inspired and suitable for teaching, reproof, correction and for training in righteousness. 2 Timothy 3:16" And does not God require MORE of us under the new covenant who have so much more light? "Everyone to whom much is given, of him will much be required. Luke 12:48" And to whom did He swear that they should never enter His rest, but to those who were disobedient? Hebrews 3:18. Today when you hear His voice do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. Hebrews 3:15 "For rebellion is as the sin of WITCHCRAFT and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Isaiah 15:23.

    If you believe you can be born again into God’s Kingdom, then settle down into some comfortable, worldly, lukewarm, lifeless or hyped-up fellowship, with impunity then you are soon to experience a hard awakening! We are right at the end of God’s tolerance of hard-shelled religious tradition which is in for a CRASH! "I set watchmen over you, saying, ‘Give heed to the sound of the trumpet!’ But they say, ‘WE WILL NOT GIVE HEED." Jeremiah 6:17. Remember God said He would vomit such a House out of His mouth! Revelation 3:16. He also said that such a bunch were deceived thinking they were ‘rich and prosperous’ in God. And we hear such a thing frequently today of these. But God said of them, "You are wretched, poor, pitiable, BLIND and naked." verse 17...REPENT!

    "Harken to Me you who pursue deliverance, you who seek the Lord; look to the ROCK from which you were hewn, and the quarry from which you were digged." Isaiah 51:1. Did not Solomon follow the Lord’s instruction as to HOW and WHERE to build the House of God?" When the House was built it was with stones prepared at the quarry so that neither hammer nor axe, nor any tool of iron was heard in the temple while it was being built." 1 Kings 6:17. "They quarried out great costly stones in order to lay the foundation of the house with dressed stones." 1 Kings 5:17. "Then Solomon began to build the House of the Lord in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah where the Lord had appeared to David his father at the place David had appointed the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite." 2 Chronicles 3:1. Are we not great COSTLY stones (living) bought at a GREAT price on the cross? And hewn by the ROCK, if we submit, and digged from His quarry to be built at His instruction into a Spiritual House? 1 Peter 2:4 -- however and wherever He determines? Solomon built God’s House without use of a human tool or the racket of such hammerings being heard in the building! Should not His Spiritual House be built WITHOUT the racket and disorganization of FLESHY USELESS MAN*MADE TOOLS?

    Because David was an obedient servant after God’s own heart and because Solomon obeyed, GREAT GLORY CAME INTO THE HOUSE OF GOD! "And the priests could not enter the House of the Lord because the GLORY of the Lord FILLED the House of God."

2 Chronicles 7:2. In 2 Chronicles 5:14 the priests could not STAND to minister because of the Cloud and the GLORY. "When all the children of Israel saw the FIRE come down and the GLORY of the Lord upon the Temple, THEY BOWED DOWN WITH THEIR FACES TO THE PAVEMENT ON THE GROUND AND WORSHIPPED AND GAVE THANKS TO THE LORD." 2 Chronicles 7:3. That is REVIVAL! This occurred in the early Church who were prepared for it! They were submitted in the Upper Room! Acts 2:1-3. There was great GLORY on the early church with signs and wonders. There was also great RESPONSIBILITY! When Ananias and Sapphira lied to the Holy Spirit, in the midst thereof, they were STRUCK DEAD! Acts 5. This was Holy Ghost, NEW TESTAMENT Church! Within a generation the glory was already ebbing away from this early church as they became disobedient and worldly. The Dark Ages were a time of little evidence of God’s Glory. Since Martin Luther there have been showers of revival. God always has a remnant. He is preparing a remnant for one last great move of His Spirit before His return. In some areas this is already begun. The scriptural pattern for his disobedient children is first warning and then judgement by bringing down the House they have built for themselves without God. From the ashes a remnant emerges to again prepare for His GLORY to accomplish His purpose, not that of man in His name.

    "But if you turn aside and forsake my statutes and my commandments which I have set before you and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will pluck you up from the land which I have given you and the House which I have consecrated for my name I WILL CAST YOU OUT OF MY SIGHT. And at that house which I have exalted everyone passing by will be astonished and say ‘Why has the Lord done thus to their land and to this house?’ Then they will say, ‘Because they forsook the God of their fathers who brought them out of Egypt and took hold of other gods and worshipped them; therefore He has brought this evil upon them." 2 Chronicles 7:19-22. Following Solomon, one can read the chronicle of a largely disobedient people who were repeatedly warned by the prophets but persisted in evil. Finally, "They burned the House of God (the Chaldeans) and broke down the walls of Jerusalem." 2 Chronicles 36:19.

    But that wasn’t the end of it! God called a remnant from the disobedient who were in captivity to return and rebuild His House. Nehemiah wrote, "The God of Heaven will make us prosper and we his servants will arise and build." Nehemiah 2:20. "And each of the builders had his sword girded at his side while he built," Nehemiah 4:18. And Paul said to the Church, "Gird up you loins with truth....take the sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God." Ephesians 6:14-17. God’s glory came to the temple of Nehemiah, in fact the latter glory was greater than the former. (Haggai 2:9) Jesus came to this House!

    God is saying today to a fleshy, worldly church much the same as He spoke through Haggai the prophet, to a disobedient people. Few are listening but a remnant will! "This people say the time has not yet come to rebuild the House of the Lord. Then the word of the Lord came to Haggai the prophet. ‘Is it a time for you TO SIT IN YOUR PANELLED HOUSES WHILE MY HOUSE LIES IN RUINS?’ Haggai 1:2-4 "Build My House that I may take pleasure in it and that I MAY APPEAR IN MY GLORY saith the Lord." Haggai 1:8. "And the people feared before the Lord." verse 12. That was the BEGINNING of wisdom! "And the Lord stirred up the spirit of....all the REMNANT of the people and they came and worked on the House of the Lord of Hosts, their God." verse 4. As already mentioned, most of God’s people today do not fear Him - but they will!

    By the time Jesus came, the people were again in severe disobedience led by a bunch of Pharisees and Sadducees that He called hypocrites, liars and murderers - even sons of satan! They had destroyed the commandments of God for the sake of their traditions! Matthew 15, Mark 7. They preached truth, however!! Jesus said, practice and observe whatever they tell you, but do not do what they do for they PREACH but DO NOT PRACTICE. Matthew 23:3 How comfortable many are today in dead churches, comforted by hearing truth only but doing nothing of what the Spirit desires in building God’s House!

    Jesus, Himself went into the House of God and overturned the tables of the idolatrous mammon worshippers. He said, "My House shall be called a House of prayer but you make it a den of thieves." Matthew 21:13. Jesus pronounced judgement on this house! His disciples came to point out to Him the buildings of the Temple, He answered them, "You see all these do you not? Truly I say to you there will not be one stone upon another, that will not be thrown down." Matthew 24:2.

    God built these Glorious Houses for His Glory. When His people obeyed they experienced His Glory; when they disobeyed, they were warned and finally judged and these same houses destroyed. Once man puts his hand to the Glory, he brings death and destruction!

    David built an OXCART in 2 Samuel 6, to carry God’s Glory rather than carry it on the shoulders of the Levites as The Word clearly instructed. David had the Word of the Lord on what to do but he substituted man’s way for God’s way, and it brought DEATH! Uzzah put out his hand to steady the Ark on the oxcart, "And the anger of the Lord was kindled against Uzzah, and God smote him there because he put out his hand to the Ark." (verse 7) David was initially angry but then he FEARED God (verse 9) and eventually repented and did it God’s way and was blessed! In the new testament, Ananias and Saphira DROPPED DEAD because they stooped to cheat and lie in the Face of God’s Glory! There are believers today of good heart who have come out of dead churches and have a vision of God’s will but they are building an oxcart rather than do it God’s way.

    Righteous Stephen had visible Glory on him as he spoke just prior to being stoned to death (Acts 6). Moses descended from the mount covered in visible Glory. The hardened disobedient kick against it and receive their just divine punishment! Korah, Dathan and Abiram kicked against the GLORY in Numbers 16. True to the prophecy of Moses (verse 30); "So they and all that belonged to them went down ALIVE into SHEOL and the earth closed over them and they PERISHED from the midst of the assembly." (verse 33) HELL SWOLLOWED THEM UP ALIVE!! It is truly a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

The following is the Word of the Lord as spoken through his handmaiden and prophetess, Angelika Loewen, on Jun 30, 1985.

    God is angry with His people and what they are and are not doing! He will give beauty for ashes to the repentant who will submit to His refining and cleansing fire and enter His rest. The hardened disobedient will be cut off! The hurting sheep, fleeced by greedy shepherds, the broken in Spirit, those who truly hunger after righteousness, the persecuted obedient castoffs, those who weep over the sin in the land and in God’s House will become a glorious remnant. "I will assemble the lame, and those who have been driven away and those whom I have afflicted; and the lame I will make the remnant and those who were cast off a strong nation." Micah 4:6. His FIRE will increase and His Glory will come on a powerful remnant to do a quick powerful work in these last moments before His return! "If you are willing and obedient you shall eat the good of the land; but if you refuse and rebel you shall be devoured by the SWORD. (The Word) Isaiah 1:19.

    "Arise, shine for your light has come and the Glory of the Lord has arisen upon you. For behold darkness covers the earth and thick darkness the peoples, BUT the Lord will rise upon you and HIS GLORY WILL BE SEEN UPON YOU and nations shall come to your light and kings to the brightness of your rising." Isaiah 60:1-3. "And I will GLORIFY MY GLORIOUS HOUSE!" Isaiah 60:7.

    In 1980, God called my good wife and I out of the denominational system to fast and pray and seek His face and to listen and be obedient to Do His Word. He began to show us the deeply backslidden condition of His Church and growing worse. He called us, amongst others, to be watchmen and sent us to warn them to turn from their harlotry to the world and its idols. He offered them beauty for ashes if they would turn and walk in the Spirit and be obedient to HIS calling on their lives. Church house after church house refused any of it and mocked, stoned and sent his messengers away. "I have PERSISTENTLY sent My servants the Prophets to them day after day yet they did not listen to ME or incline their ear but stiffened their neck." Jeremiah 7:25-26. Early on in the process God showed us clearly that the houses would not listen but that we must go in obedience anyway. "So you shall speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you. You shall call to them but they will not answer you." Jeremiah 7:27. "Stand in the Gate of the Lord’s House and proclaim there these words and say, ‘ Hear the Word of the Lord all you men of Judah who enter the gates to worship the Lord. Thus saith the Lord of Hosts the God of Israel. AMEND YOUR WAYS AND YOUR DOINGS AND I WILL LET YOU DWELL IN THIS PLACE. DO NOT TRUST IN THESE DECEPTIVE WORDS, THIS IS THE HOUSE OF THE LORD, THIS IS THE HOUSE OF THE LORD, THIS IS THE HOUSE OF THE LORD." Jeremiah 7:24. "Behold you trust in deceptive words to no avail. Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, burn incense to Baal and go after gods that you have not known and then come and stand before Me in this house and say ‘We are delivered--only to go on doing all these abominations? Has this house which is called by My name become a den of thieves in your eyes!" Jeremiah 7:8-11.

    One by one the houses God sent us to were given a specific word (leaders and sheep) entitled, ICHABOD- the glory has departed from Israel. 1 Samuel 4:22. He who had an ear to hear what the Spirit was saying to the churches was instructed to come out of ICHABOD and seek the Lord and the messengers He sent. God has walked away from these dead disobedient houses, written Ichabod over the door and left them to themselves. "Your wickedness will chasten you, your apostasy will reprove you." Jeremiah 2:19. God will judge these houses severely and they will be brought very low! Many churches in the land have Ichabod written over the doors! Even now the axe is laid to the tree. Many will be uprooted and burned. Others will be cut off at the trunk and the dead tree of human tradition will be burned! "You leave the commandment of God and hold fast the tradition of men." Mark 7:8. Out of the severed trunk will spring a willow which will become a mighty oak in Jesus, in the Spirit! There will be beauty for ashes for some who are brought low but the houses they have built for themselves will be destroyed. Others will be uprooted and burned for continual unrepentant disobedience. Out of the ruins (like Nehemiah) will be built a mighty House of Living Stones. Even now the foundation is being laid-built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets." Ephesians 2:20. "And His gifts were that some should be apostles,some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and some teachers,to equip the saints for the work of ministry for building up the Body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God." Ephesians 4:11. We are no where near that yet! Many leaders today believe apostles and prophets are no more. They make the Word of God a lie!

    COME OUT OF DEAD HOUSES AND SEEK THE SPIRIT WHO WILL TEACH YOU ALL THINGS. STOP BUILDING OXCARTS WHICH CANNOT CARRY GOD’S GLORY! COME OUT TO A GLORIOUS FUTURE. LISTEN TO WHAT THE SPIRIT IS SAYING TO THE CHURCHES-not dead disobedient leaders WHO will be judged severely for leading the sheep astray (Ezra 34) It is not easy! "Indeed all who desire to live a Godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." 2 Timothy 1:2. Jesus said "Woe to you when all men speak well of you." By accepting the luke-warm, dead, entertaining, middle of the road standards, that are a STENCH in the nostrils of God, you can avoid suffering the reproach of the cross. But your house will collapse in judgement and you will not stand in the coming tribulation as the world waxes worse. Are you truly in faith? "By rejecting conscience certain men have made a shipwreck of their faith." 1 Timothy 1:19 "Not everyone who says to me LORD, LORD shall enter the kingdom of heaven but he who DOES the will of My Father who is in heaven." Matthew 8:21.

    "Everyone who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wiseman who built his house upon the ROCK and the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon that house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on the ROCK." Matthew 8:24-25. Are you solidly built on the ROCK doing ALL He desires and not just the comfortable? God is longsuffering for those who would repent but time is so short! While this refers to the Spiritual House God’s people are building, He has also shown us that some of the physical church structures will be destroyed. It is not these which are His concern, however, but the House of Living Stones!

    The remnant Church is emerging through suffering and persecution as have ALL the remnants of God’s people. The foundation is being laid! God will have His Church without spot, wrinkle or blemish (Ephesians 5:27) after a massive housecleaning is completed! Have you humbled yourself and submitted to the FIRE willingly-are you baptized with Fire-or will you come very low when God’s Glory arises in full measure?"Now for a little while you may have to suffer various trials so that the genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold which though perishable, is tested by Fire." 1 Peter 1:6-7. "Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all with unveiled face, beholding the Glory of the Lord, are being changed into His likeness from one degree of Glory to another."2 Corinthians 3:17-18. "awaiting our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ." Titus 2:13.

You can come forth as GOLD, a precious costly stone to be used for His Glory to build on the cornerstone, Jesus, the Spiritual House of Almighty God. Praise His Name!

You CANNOT come forth as gold, "in the way of eye-service as men-pleasers" in HARDENED DISOBEDIENT, DEAD HOUSES where there is much bad teaching in addition to preached truth, "and where doing the will of God from the heart" is scarce indeed. (Ephesians 6:6). Faith without works is dead!

"Of a TRUTH many houses shall be desolate, even great and fair, without inhabitant." Isaiah 5:9.

Written in obedience to the Holy Spirit
by Dale Loewen,
Apostle of Jesus Christ.

(Ephesians 4:11)

Copyright © 1985-2001 "Believers In One Accord (bioa) ~ Remnant Fire Ministries"