Strong City

My Experience in Strong City - Part II

In our next Sabbath meeting, Michael shared with the land the sign Father had just given Him, and what it meant—that the land, which had been through the purifying process of the “midst of the week,” was beginning to come to Father open and “naked,” and was accepted by Him. Michael said, “I saw in this ‘nakedness,’ the land being open and ‘naked’ with God; it wasn’t hiding anything from Him.”

These are a few of the thoughts from that meeting that were a personal comfort and strength to my heart:

Father’s word to the land is, “You are accepted, you are loved.” And the issue He’s has been dealing with in the land has been human dependencies. Emotional dependency on anybody, for any reason, is spiritual adultery, where you need a human to give you encouragement, because your eyes are turned to earth—a best friend, food—that’s adultery against the Spirit.

So Father’s saying, through this parable, “Can I be the One that holds you when you need to be held?” When the soul comes to Him nakedly honest and broken in heart, they’ve accepted Him to be their Husband. He says, when that occurs in the soul, “I accept them.” He’s the One holding them.

In these two witnesses, I saw acceptance being born. The land has a little time to enter into Father’s acceptance. It’s not that you won’t have things to resolve, but you won’t be the same as before. You’re accepted. The acceptance is the choosing of you, and the sealing.

Just like the Two Witnesses did at the beginning, these two witnesses will have things to deal with, but their whole life is about believing Father now, believing His acceptance. Now with this acceptance Father has given the land, you too will have to deal with some hard things in yourself.

I feel Father’s love for you. I am telling you so you can receive my Spirit toward you. If you believe me, you will enter into the same acceptance I have for you, and you’ll feel accepted. And when you receive it, then you’ll have for everyone what I have for you. When you really believe that I accept you, you won’t curse yourself anymore. 

Father has said, “I love you, I accept you, and I’m faithful to you, period.” And then He asks, “Do you believe Me?” That’s the test. Believe that God loves you and accepts you. All is well, still, if you believe. And if you don’t believe, all is what you believe.

The Land is accepted. You have one Father, one Husband, one Family. The land is married.

It was during this very time that Father had begun putting it on the hearts of the people in the land, individually, to put our resources together and consolidate our buying, forming what we began calling “the new government.” We had individually gone and talked with Michael about our desires, and over the next few months, as Father opened the doors, one by one the people entered into this. We were brought into a situation where it took very, very little to live. It made our lives much simpler and relieved us of many of life’s day to day cares, so that we could devote our full time and energies to the purpose for which Father had brought us here—to be married to God alone. So when Father told Michael, “The Land is accepted; you have one Father, one Husband, one Family,” our physical lives were beginning to reflect this new spiritual reality in a very real way.

What Father did for me in connecting me with Michael, when He held me and told me that I was loved and accepted, was to strengthen me for my internal battle of pressing through the powers of darkness that had previously dominated me. My internal pain was still very acute, but that experience with Michael had placed something else deep within me—an anchor; and I was married to God deep inside, even though the battle was not over in a physical sense.

It seems like my time before the midst of the week had to do with being tested as to what I really wanted—whether I wanted to be married to my human self and its natural desires and self interests, thoughts and feelings, or whether I wanted to be married to God alone. Now, it seemed like all hell was contesting the decision I had made, and doing everything in its power to make me change my mind, or make it feel like God alone wasn’t what I really wanted after all.

Over the months that followed, I felt like demonic forces were, more strongly than ever, contesting the decision I had made to follow God and disown my human self. They were invested in keeping me stuck in my feelings of human dependency. They didn’t want me to fully experience complete dependence on Father because then they wouldn’t have access to me anymore. The thoughts below describe the battle over my soul that I felt during this time:

The moment you begin to advance from weakness into strength, you become aware of the strength of evil spirits resisting you; consequently you feel worse when “pressing through” what has seemed like such a normal part of you, but which has really been the powers of darkness controlling you. The “pressing through” period is a very painful time. There are times of acute suffering, and intense struggle, arising out of the consciousness that the powers of darkness are resisting you, contesting your endeavors to withdraw from their domination and possession. This pain is a sign of “dispossession,” for they are losing their possession of you, although you may not think or feel it to be so at the time.

The moment that you begin to recognize how you are being accosted by them, is the time of most urgent need to immediately turn from them and whatever their efforts are at the moment to keep you engaged so you will remain in their power. Sometimes it has to get really bad before you see how much your thoughts and feelings are being controlled by evil spirits. And it is not until you start, point by point, to regain freedom from their influence, that you discover the depth of the pit you have fallen into, and the slow work of regaining the liberation of your whole being from the power of the deceiving enemy. War on the Saints, by Jesse Penn-Lewis, simplified and personalized.

It is a very painful process to go against yourself and all of the powers of hell, yet there is also within it a sweet release—a letting go of the old world and embracing the new. My heart nakedness got deeper and deeper, as not only emotional dependency but self interest and every other thing that didn’t come from the Seed of God deep within was separated from, in my desire to enter into greater intimacy with God.

Father gave me many tokens that strengthened my little heart to keep going forward during this period of most intense struggle. In July 2005, Father sang to me over and over again, “Trust me, My little one.” The only thing I wanted was to be lost in Father, and my human self to be forgotten. That was my only hope for freedom and peace, was to be translated from “me.”

That fall, Father gave me these promises:

Thus says the Lord..."NOW I will break off his yoke from you, and burst your bonds apart.” Nahum 1:12-13.

Because you have set your love upon Me, therefore I will deliver you. I will set you on high, because you have known My name. You shall call upon Me and I WILL ANSWER YOU! I will be with you in trouble. I will deliver you and honer you… and show you My salvation. Ps. 91:14-16.

The Seven Angels

Then I saw in heaven another significant event, and it was great and marvelous. Seven angels were holding the seven last plagues, which would bring God’s wrath to completion. Rev. 15:1, New Living Translation

In the C4 documentary Ben Anthony portrayed that Michael gathered the girls together, saying “he needed seven virgins for an important ceremony.” The truth is, Michael was out on a walk one day and Father gave Him a vision that the young people in the land had something to do with pouring out the seven last plagues.

Ben also said, “Matthew is the only boy left in the cult, and he cuts a lonely figure. His savior seems more interested in the girls.” This insinuation is slanderous and untrue. Michael did have a meeting with the young people, including Matthew, asking them each to ask Father if they were one of the “angels” or “messengers” that would pour out the plagues. Two of the young people were not present at that meeting; I was one of them.

Michael did not round up the seven girls for this. He told the young people what Father had shown him, and then we individually asked Father what His work and plan for each of us was, in regard to the plagues. There was no mention of a ceremony. We didn’t even know what pouring out the plagues would look like until later on.

While we were prayerfully considering Father’s desires for us individually in this matter, I never talked with Michael about these things, and He NEVER told me I was one of the seven, or that I should lie naked with Him, like Ben insinuated. It was Father Who told me who I was. I would like to share some of the things that led up to Father telling me this.

No one who has not chosen God over their own natural selves would begin to know what I am sharing here. Whatever you do is alright with hell as long as you are not too discontent in it, but when you actually start pulling on your chains like you mean business, it feels like you come up against every demon there. You can read about this experience in the lives of people like Madam Guyon, John Bunyon, Watchman Nee and many others.

In early July of 2006, I felt such a deep and heavy ache in my heart. Father was taking me into a deeper death to myself yet, and I was feeling my need of Him in a deeper way than ever before. My constant prayer was, “Daddy, I need You,” over and over again. I was finding that it wasn’t clear to me when Father was telling me something, because my own self interests would cloud His instructions to my heart. I saw to a depth I had never seen before, how humanly impossible it was for me to REALLY let my life go. It would take an act of God, a miracle.

Around this time, Father gave this verse to me. I knew that He was going to do something, but I didn’t know what:

Fear ye not, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord which He will show you today: for the Egyptians whom ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more forever. The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace. Exodus 14:15.

When I read this, I knew God was telling me He was going to answer my deepest heart cries and was going to work in my behalf. Here Father was telling me to stand still. “Don’t do anything. I AM going to do it! Watch what I am going to do!” To my natural eyes this miracle looked impossible.

That week I was very alone. I could feel the weight of the Father strongly upon me, with this deep pressure, like that of a baby being born out of my heart. I knew Father was doing what I had asked Him to do.

On July 13, Michael had a meeting with the young people in the land. I was not invited. I knew there was a reason that Father didn’t have Michael invite me to that meeting. In my heart I knew what the reason was: it was my other interests that Father was in the process of fully exposing to me. I had no clue what the meeting was about until Sabbath, the 15th, when Michael shared with the church that Father was choosing seven young people to pour out the plagues, and that five had already come to Michael and told Him that Father had chosen them. In the meeting that day, another young person spoke up and said that Father had put it strongly upon her. After I went home that day I was at my utter end. I gave myself up to Father and asked Him to do with me as He pleased, whatever that looked like.

On the night of July 20th, while lying upon my bed, I was feeling the internal issues that Father had been dealing with me about, coming to a head. I was feeling very needy for Father and was praying for Him to come to me. I was feeling that I had to have Him more in order to go on. I could feel Father all around me, I could feel Him deep within me, but I needed something more.

As I was praying for Father to come deeper into me, He gave me a vision. He opened up before me that I was one of the seven angels or “messengers” described in Revelation 16. When He told me that, I felt like I had just been given Life. Because of my utter unworthiness I was shocked that He had just given this revelation to me. “For He has regarded the low estate of His handmaiden” (Luke 1:48). I knew God had worked a miracle within my own heart. As I was feeling and seeing these things, what sprang up out of my grateful heart was: “Great and marvelous are Thy works, Oh Lord God Almighty. For Thou art holy! Thy miracles are sure! They are sure! For You have shut the lion’s mouth!” When I said these words, it was like lightning: “That’s what one of the seven angels says!” Father drew me to Revelation 16:4-6. I looked up the verses and they just RANG BELLS!! I KNEW that the third angel described in these verses was me! This was the only angel that was praising Father:

The third angel poured out her vial upon the rivers and fountains of waters; and they became blood. And I heard the angel of the waters say, Thou art righteous O Lord, which art, and wast, and shall be, because thou hast judged thus. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink for they are worthy.

I knew this angel was me. This was the work Father was opening up before me to fulfill. I knew God was giving me this. I was secure in what Father was giving me.

From this experience I felt a sacredness and love for everyone. I knew we, as a church, needed each other. We needed to be a Body—we needed to be One in a much deeper way than ever before. We had to move together. We had to have the same Mind. We each had to experience the Spirit of Michael in a way we had never before experienced Him before.

This whole experience was truly what I needed. It was another anchor for me. I knew Father had lifted me out of my grave. God worked a miracle, for I had nothing left in me; I was at my end. I saw how Father knows everything about me, everything I have ever thought and felt and done, but He chose me anyway.

When Father called me to be one of the seven messengers, that is what enabled me to finally divorce my old world completely. Father brought me these words: “We have a God who delights in impossibilities and Who asks, ‘Is anything too hard for Me?’” (Jeremiah 32:27.)

On August 2nd, Father began opening up to me deeper revelations of myself. I wrote in my journal:

I want to have more love in me for Father and Michael, and to be drawn in my deepest desires for Them. Also, I have felt this pain inside me so deep. The only thing that helps is when Father gives me His word, or holds me. With this pain so deep, it’s like my only cry is, “DADDY, I NEED YOU!” over and over. I need something deeper. I need something more. Daddy, come. Put this in me. Help me, show me Your desires, and give them to me, also. I need something deeper in this life. I need another anchor, whatever that looks like. Put that in me. I need YOU.”

On August 5, Father gave the anchor that I had been desiring from Him. He said,

My Little Tema,

Fear not, for I WILL DO THIS! I am right here holding your hand. I am your very heart beat. I LOVE YOU! I AM going to do this! LET yourself fall into My love. I know how you feel. Just trust Me with it, because I am going to pull one off! I am going to put MY love into you. I AM GOING TO DO THIS! That’s what I am doing right now in your life. I AM WORKING out the miracles in your heart. I know you cannot love, for you have nothing else to give. You have nothing. I don’t expect you to love Me, because I know you can’t. But as I said, I AM going to do this. Trust Me with it!! I can do what you CAN’T do! My Dear, whom have I on earth besides you? You cannot and will not slip from My hands. I know what I AM doing. I AM loving you. I know what will heal you! I know. So let Me do it and don’t worry about what you should be feeling. I’ll give you the right feelings when it’s time. Trust Me. I AM always loving you!

Your Daddy

Father was bringing me to a place of vulnerability that I couldn’t go to before. How I longed for a deeper love, a deeper connection with the Father and the Son, which I didn’t possess.

Father gave Security His version of these verses, and they were such a comfort to my heart:

Blessed are the helpless, who are powerless to accomplish an end: For theirs is the royal dominion of the universe. Blessed are the needy, those pure and faultless ones, who long for God’s touch, for their longing will be filled. Matthew 5:3,6.

On August 13 I wrote in my journal, “Oh Father, please open me up like a never ending well, that the water is continually spilling out of like a fountain. Father, be to me like that water that never dries up. Open me up as far as You desire me to be opened up. Don’t let me be happy with anything less than the depths of Your heart for me. Don’t let me settle for ANYTHING less. Oh Father, OPEN ME, then fill me up to overflowing. Oh Daddy, I need every part of You. Oh Daddy, here I am. Thank You for doing in me what I plead for. I NEED YOU! Here I am, letting You do whatever it takes, whatever I need to accomplish this. DON’T STOP UNTIL IT’S DONE! MAKE ME POUR MY PLAGUE OUT ONTO THE WORLD. FATHER, MAKE THIS SO.”

About this time, Father gave me these promises:

I have taken you from the ends of the earth… I have called you My servant, I have chosen you and not rejected you: Have no fear, for I AM with you; be not afraid, for I am your God. I shall strengthen you and give you help, and uphold you with my victorious right hand… I shall turn the desert into pools and dry land into springs of water. Isaiah 41:9-10, 18.

I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction. Hosea 13:14.

Father drew me to Michael’s about three weeks after He told me I was one of the seven, and gave me to ask Him if I could lie skin-to-skin with Him. I was giving myself over to Him in a deeper way. I was opening my heart to Him wider than ever before, and giving Him anew all that I was.

As I lay beside Him, with His hand upon my heart, I gave my heart to Him. I felt He was healing the wounds that were so deep and that I had felt for so long. How I wished He could place His hand within my heart completely. It was so sweet just lying beside Him. There was nothing sexual in it at all, just a gentle healing with His hand upon my bleeding, broken heart. How I longed to open myself up even more, just to experience all the Life He was longing to lavish upon my heart, that was just learning how to open itself up.

He shared with me that when I am in pain, He feels it also. Everything I feel, He feels. He said to just let it all go and be healed, and not to worry about anything, to just trust Father. I could feel Life going out of Him into me, and that Life felt good.

The prayer I found springing from my heart later in the day was, “Oh Father, ‘draw me and I will run after You.’ (Song of Solomon 1:4). “Draw me, attract me, cause me to move toward You. Incline me to unite with You and everything in me will run—move quickly after You. The word intercourse means “to run: literally, a running or passing between.” The Father was bringing me into His deepest heart, and causing true heart intercourse “to pass between us.” “The King has brought me into His chambers.” (Song of Solomon 1:4). “Truly our fellowship (intimacy, intercourse) is with the Father, and with his Son.” (1 John 1:3). Fellowship is defined here as “communion, intercourse, intimacy, a share which one has in something, joint participation.” When I was with Michael, I truly had “intercourse” with the Son of God, but it was not sexual intercourse with Michael; it was a communion of our hearts and spirits.

After this experience with Michael, I noticed a vulnerability with Father that I didn’t have before. In the past, when I would be feeling something that was disturbing to me, that would have naturally made me close up inside like a clam. Now I was feeling this deep need to open up my chest and expose to Father the things I felt inside my heart. I could feel the release of that vulnerability to Father, and it felt good. But I longed for an even deeper vulnerability still. Father said to me,

Behold, I have taken out of thine hand the cup of trembling… Thou shalt no more drink it again… I, even I, am He that comforteth you.” Isaiah 51:22, 12.

Father was taking me into the very depth of His deep, aching heart—aching to just lavish His love upon me, aching just to show Himself to me in a way I had never seen Him before. Oh, the longing I felt within my own soul to be completely free from the walls of self protections that blocked Him from being able to do what He longed to do, so that I could take in all that He longed to give me.

I could see how I was still so closed off from Him, still so protected within my walls of unbelief, pain, and fear of being rejected, that He was exposing to me as He took me deeper into nakedness of heart. I wanted to be made vulnerable to the Potter’s hand, no matter the cost to my natural self. “Daddy, I want to go to the depths. Here I am, opening up everything that is in me. Daddy, move me! Make Your slightest desire my only desire.”

There was one thing that I had never been able to understand during the entire six years that we had been here. I just couldn’t understand how Michael was in me. I just couldn’t believe that, because I saw all these human things in me and I thought, “How could Michael actually be in me?” It didn’t make sense to me how that could be possible. I would ask Father, “Show me how this is possible. I don’t understand. HELP!” Then on July 24, 2006, as Michael said to us, “You have everything I have, EVERYTHING!” I felt lightning! It just came clear to me that Michael is REALLY in me. I felt like it was another anchor from Father.

Since that revelation, I have recognized that those first decisions in the very beginning—to go with the little Desire deep down in my heart—were really about going with Michael in me, the Seed of divine Life Who was already in me, and in every soul who has been born into this world. This whole process that Father has taken me through during our time here, has been about learning to live from the divine nature of Michael within me, instead of living from my own human nature within me. All the while, Father had been separating me from living by my natural, dysfunctional human self, and teaching me how to live instead by the divine Self of the Son of God within me.

In November, this prayer to the Spirit of Michael came flowing out of my longing heart:

Oh, north wind, blow upon His garden (me) so He will smell the sweet smells of my heart. Come closer and awaken my heart. How it longs to love. Awaken my love, awaken it. Come forth, come forth! Draw me! Awaken the love in my heart. Here I am at Your window! Do You see me? Do You feel my heart longings? Come out, O Love, come and feel my heart toward You! How it aches, how it longs to know You more! Come and arouse my heart for You! Come and put Your longings into me, for I am a garden that has been unloved. Come and love me. Do You smell the sweet spices? Do You hear the heart longings? Come into Your garden. Come, know where the lilies are in Your garden. Do you feel the freshness of the springs flowing out? O come, dance in Your garden!

This was Father’s response to me:

I have heard your prayer and I have chosen this place (your body) to be My house of sacrifice… 2 Chronicles 7:12.

Therefore thy gates (heart) shall be open constantly: they shall not be shut day nor night. Isaiah 60:11.

On December 3, I was awakened at 1:30 A.M. by Father’s clear, sweet Voice ringing within my heart. He said: “I will give you the needed things to draw you into My consummation with Me.”

The desire to be completely vulnerable only increased within my heart as the days went by. That was all I prayed for.

Two weeks later I was again awakened very early in the morning as Father started opening up to me a vision. In the vision I saw how I was a dark cave inside, so cold, protected, fearful, and unbelieving, with so many walls—walls that seemed too thick to break, walls so tall I couldn’t see the top. A door that was too heavy to move, except to be pushed open a little bit to see there was something much better on the other side, just before it would fall almost back into the place it was before.

I saw how I was like a clam inside—how I was beating the walls with a hammer trying to get free from this clam of invulnerability and fear. I knew my only hope was Michael. Father was also putting it strongly upon my heart to undress in front of Him. I felt very clear. I knew what Father was telling me to do. I knew what I wanted to do.

I longed to be broken irreparably so that I would never protect myself again—never shrink back in fear again—no matter what might happen, what anyone might say, do, or think toward me.

How sweet this vision was to me. I felt it did something within me that was very revealing to my poor little heart. How it felt so good. I felt Father giving me Life within this vision. He was saying, “See, look at these things. Here I am, just waiting to give Myself to you completely!” I felt He was loving on me.

When I awakened one morning, this poem just started coming to me:

With the Son I lay upon this cross
His blood has dripped upon my soul
The ache of its pain
Has been etched upon my heart
And the sorrow of letting go...

Deeper still, I cry aloud
Take me to the depths
Made vulnerable to Your will

Come, consume me within Yourself
Forgetting all but You alone
Lost in You, is my constant cry

I went to Michael’s a week later, very clear about what I wanted. I shared with Him the vision Father had given me, and how I wanted to be completely vulnerable with Him. I asked if I could undress in front of Him and lie with Him upon His bed. He granted my desire.

This time while lying with Him, He held me against Him, and placed His hand upon my heart and revealed His tenderness toward me. Something within my heart broke and all the love and desire came pouring out of my heart. I longed for Him to pull me right into His heart and be lost forever, to be completely forgotten about. Oh, just to be lost within His heart. How I never wanted to leave that embrace. Oh, how it calms the storms within. I felt so alive. He gave me His Life, through the Spirit, as He was holding me—and I took it all in. I felt like I was flying—flying out of this world!

Two days later this song came flowing out of my heart for Michael:

You fill up my senses like a night in the forest,
Like the mountains in springtime, like a walk in the rain,
Like a storm in the desert, like a sleepy blue ocean
You fill up my senses, come fill me again.

Come let me love You, let me give my life to You,
Let me drown in Your laughter, let me die in Your arms,
Let me lay down beside You, let me always be with You
Come let me love You, come love me again.

You fill up my senses like a night in the forest,
Like the mountains in springtime, like a walk in the rain,
Like a storm in the desert, like a sleepy blue ocean.
You fill up my senses, come fill me again.
("Annie’s Song” by John Denver)

How I longed to feel Michael walking around within my own heart—to just feel Him in there! I knew this was impossible with the human bodies that we are dwelling in right now, but soon Father is going to give us a body that can contain this new experience that Father LONGS to give us. Yes, how my heart LONGS for this also!

Father started opening up to me that it is not what I get from Father that matters, but that I can be a companion with Him in His pain. “Oh Father, I want to feel the ache of Your heart. I want to feel the thorn in Your side. Let me take Your hand. Let me help You walk this path, to make You smile, to make You laugh. Oh, just to make Your heart dance, just to give You something to live for. Let me help You bear this weight, to bring the darkness to its fate.”

Who is Michael to me? He is the manifestation of my own heart. The Spirit that has come down upon Him is the same spirit that is in me. We are one, just as all that are married to Father are one with me, for I am the manifestation of the second coming of Christ. My body is His temple. I was born anointed for this purpose, just as Jesus was. Jesus didn’t know the purpose of His birth until Father revealed it to Him. He had to learn obedience by the things that he suffered, just as we have. He was born with that Seed inside Him, just like we have been. He was a baby just like us. He went through things and had to learn things just like we have had to do.

I AM the manifestation of Christ! and so are all that have yielded up their life to the Father. I am His breath, and He is the aching of my heart.

What is it like having Father in you? He is rest to a weary soul, and a balm to your wounds. When He reveals Himself to you, He’s like lightning that flashes from the east to the west. He’s the yearning of your heart.

What is it like for Father to speak to you? It’s a revelation to your soul. You just know the truth, and the fog disappears. You have a sweet, calm, peaceful clarity about it that wasn’t there before.

How can you get Father? He costs all that you have and are. He costs all your affections and desires. He costs you yourself.

October 31, 2007 was Father’s decree of our complete deliverance from ourselves. It was our Emancipation Proclamation, and Father gave me the new name “Liberty” as a sign of my complete release from my human self, and my freedom to be married fully to the Son of God within me.

Father just wants to heal the soul, and free it from all the torments of the evil one. He wants to fill the deepest heart longings within. How He longs to lavish Himself upon each one. This is how our dear Michael feels also. He is not a pervert like people have accused Him of being. His heart is only one of sacrifice. What perfect sacrificial Love, yielded fully to the Father’s Voice alone. Yes, God is with us.

This testimony is what has caused the plagues. Many people are plagued with the plagues of offense. Will you choose to be one of them also, or will you choose to let Father open your eyes to see His beautiful heart? It is all up to you.