A couple of
years ago, K.S. Rajan posted an article on FiveDoves, by
Joel Rosenberg, about needing another Dunkirk:
http://www.fivedoves.com/letters/aug2011/ksrajan88-1.htm
The link had
been sent to me by my brother (in the flesh & in the
LORD).
I had responded
to him, at that time, with the following:
I had read that Dunkirk article over the weekend. The
miraculous aspect is exciting.
However,
Dunkirk was one of the greatest retreating of all time.
From a spiritual warfare aspect it seems the wrong
thing.
I
remember hearing the message when we visited you in
Greenville, some 20+ years ago, when your Pastor Boyd
preached on the whole armor of God.
The
armor is only for either standing and holding ground or
for offensive advance, there is no armor to protect us
in a retreat.
Also,
Jesus said that we are to occupy until he comes,
.
but at Dunkirk, they retreated to allow the enemy to not
only occupy what they had previously occupied,
.
but allowed the enemy to put up strongholds that made
the human cost of re-occupation so high on D-Day, those
years later.
Also
when Jesus said that the gates of hell would not prevail
against his church, since then,
.
most commentators and preachers seemed to imply that
this is describing a defensive scene.
However,
I have never seen nor heard of gates attacking anyone.
The
scene that comes to mind so often when I’ve heard this
preached on,
.
is Christians hunkered down,
protected “within” the church (what, the building?),
.
with the enemy assaulting on the outside, but unable to
penetrate.
However,
for that to be so, then the gates of hell were somehow
attacking - that is too weird.
Gates
are a defensive mechanism - that is why there were
battering rams used, to breakdown gates to get
victoriously on the inside.
So, the
scene should not be preached, where it is the “gates of
the church”, that hell cannot prevail against, to get
inside,
.
but rather the gates of hell are to be assaulted by the
church.
The
church should be on the offensive, and the church should
know from what Jesus said, that hell cannot keep the
church from crashing through those gates of hell,
.
to victoriously bring the light of the gospel of Christ
straight in to the strongest holds of the kingdom of
darkness,
.
to see souls saved right out of the clutches of the
enemy, right there in the kingdom of darkness itself,
.
and even to recover backsliders who were taken captive
by the devil, like backsliding Christians who had gotten
addicted to something.
No, I
think that Dunkirk is the wrong picture.
The
church is to either occupy, and stand, holding ground
against the assault of the enemy,
.
or to take the offensive and charge the gates of hell,
wearing the full armor of God, brandishing the sword of
the Spirit, which is the word of God.
Even
the blessed hope (rapture), is too often portrayed as a
Dunkirk type retreat. Again, that is wrong.
The
blessed hope is a complete victory over the enemy, not a
retreat.
The
songs on the other side will be like the song that
Israel sang when they were safely on the other side of
the Red Sea,
.
and saw behind them the complete and total destruction
of the host of the enemy, by the LORD, all by himself.
It will
be the same for the overcomers, according to the book of
Revelation, safe, completely on the other side,
.
watching as the LORD triumphs over the host of the
enemy, starting from the victorious moment when the
Lamb, as it had been slain,
.
taking the book with the seven seals out of the hand of
him who is sitting on the throne -
.
through all those victorious scenes, both in heaven and
on earth, that the church will witness from on high,
.
throughout the seven years of tribulation, as John saw
it prophetically back in 90 A.D.,
.
we’ll get to see first-hand from heaven during that
actual time - all the way up to the victorious second
coming at the battle of Armageddon, at the end of the
seven years.
The
blessed hope is not a retreat, but rather overcomers
finally reaching the other side by the hand of the LORD,
.
to watch from that other side, as the LORD, by himself,
takes out the kingdom and power of the enemy -
.
the same way that Israel saw the same thing from the
other side of the Red Sea -
.
they did not retreat from Pharaoh, but they were taken
to a place where they could not only watch the demise of
the enemy by the hand of the LORD,
.
but by crossing the Red Sea, it forced Pharaoh, a type
of the devil, full of pride and without fear,
.
in his madness to rush head-on into the trap that the
LORD had set for him, that Pharaoh couldn’t see coming.
It will
be the same for the devil at the end.
Even
right there in Revelation 16,
.
right between where it says that the three unclean
spirits like frogs will gather the kings of the earth to
the battle of the great day of God Almighty,
.
and to where it says that he will gather them in
Armageddon, right between those two verses, he says that
he will come as a thief.
Even at
the climax of the Tribulation, the LORD gathers the
enemy hosts
.
(v. 16 says “he” will gather them, by apparently
allowing the three unclean spirits to do their work, v.
14),
.
that what looks to the enemy to be “their” gathering for
victory, will actually be the LORD gathering them for
defeat.
The
devil and his dark forces, in their madness and pride,
will be taken totally by surprise, Jesus will come as a
thief:
Revelation
16:14 For they are
the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth
unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to
gather them to the battle of that great day of God
Almighty.
15
Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth,
and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see
his shame.
16 And
he gathered them together into a place called in the
Hebrew tongue Armageddon.
So, these were
the thoughts that I had when I read that Dunkirk article -
I think that it is the wrong analogy for the church.
What do you think?
Gino