The Release of Glory - Alamo

I'm Impressed!

Over the last two days I have had the honor to spend time with three of our Texas State Representatives. I was with two them during the Texas State Prayer Breakfast yesterday in Austin. Today I had lunch with the third here in Arlington.

I'm impressed. Each of them revealed an underlying trait of humility and servant hood to the people of Texas. These are godly men. They love the Lord. They desire for Him to be glorified through their public and private lives. They are faithfully seeking God's wisdom as they make crucial, life-changing and hard decisions in Austin.

I promised all of them that my role as coordinator of the Texas Apostolic Prayer Network is not to lobby and pressure them. I desire to development a relationship with the men and women that serve us so that I can have a better understanding on how to release prayer for them and with them. It is one kind of prayer to place these servants on a prayer list where we pray regularly for them, their spouses, their families and jobs. It is another depth of prayer to understand their heart, their struggles, and their agonizing decisions regarding some bill or legislation. We need to seek, with them, God's will and heart for kingdom action.

I won't share who, but one of them exhorted me to get out the word to each of you to contact your legislators and NOT just for the purpose to express your opinion or to encourage them to vote for this or that. Call your legislators - encourage them, stick by them, tell them that you know the decisions are hard and whether or not they make a decision which is popular or not - that you will stand behind them with prayer. These three men are sincerely seeking God's will and it is not always easy to discern that "will" over the sounds of public opinion, unfolding crisis or our own reasoning.

I shared that the Lord had instructed me years ago as my personal prayer list of needs was not being met, that number 1 on my list was His number 5. I want to know the Lord's heart on the matter - whether it regards my personal walk or a legislator making policy. As the Lord intercedes for us at the right hand of the Father - I desire to know what He is praying regarding Texas. I want to know His opinion of the border, entitlements, life, education, etc. I will guarantee you that His ways and thoughts are not ours.

We elected these representatives to represent us, but first and foremost they are to represent and honor God. Let's pray for them. Stand behind them. Walk with them as together we seek His face.

Independence Day - Washington on the Brazos

Whenever justice and liberty is declared - it is time to celebrate.  This will be one of our most significant prophetic acts.  Kay and I, our daughter Amy, and our grandson TJ will have a noon picnic (weather permitting) at Washington on the Brazos State Park on Wednesday, March 2.  We invite you to join us at one of the picnic spots,  Bring your own food.

At 1 PM we will meet at the Star of the Republic Museum. We will declare the establishment of God's everlasting government.  We will call forth His army!  We will call on the Lord of Hosts to release His angelic forces.  We will establish our boundaries in Him. Read my former blog: The Release of Glory.

One of the most important documents in Texas history is the Declaration of Independence, adopted in general convention at Washington-on-the-Brazos, March 2, 1836. Richard Ellis, president of the convention, appointed a committee of five to write the declaration for submission to the convention. However, there is much evidence that George C. Childress, one of the members, wrote the document with little or no help from the other members. Childress is therefore generally accepted as the author.
The text of the declaration is followed by the names of the signers of the document in the style in which they signed the document.

Declaration of Independence of the Republic of Texas
UNANIMOUS 
DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, 
BY THE 
DELEGATES OF THE PEOPLE OF TEXAS, 
IN GENERAL CONVENTION, 
AT THE TOWN OF WASHINGTON, 
ON THE SECOND DAY OF MARCH, 1836

When a government has ceased to protect the lives, liberty and property of the people from whom its legitimate powers are derived, and for the advancement of whose happiness it was instituted; and so far from being a guarantee for the enjoyment of those inestimable and inalienable rights, becomes an instrument in the hands of evil rulers for their oppression; when the Federal Republican Constitution of their country, which they have sworn to support, no longer has a substantial existence, and the whole nature of their government has been forcibly changed without their consent, from a restricted federative republic, composed of sovereign states, to a consolidated central military despotism, in which every interest is disregarded but that of the army and the priesthood – both the eternal enemies of civil liberty, and the ever-ready minions of power, and the usual instruments of tyrants; When long after the spirit of the Constitution has departed, moderation is at length, so far lost, by those in power that even the semblance of freedom is removed, and the forms, themselves, of the constitution discontinued; and so far from their petitions and remonstrances being regarded, the agents who bear them are thrown into dungeons; and mercenary armies sent forth to force a new government upon them at the point of the bayonet. When in consequence of such acts of malfeasance and abdication, on the part of the government, anarchy prevails, and civil society is dissolved into its original elements: In such a crisis, the first law of nature, the right of self-preservation – the inherent and inalienable right of the people to appeal to first principles and take their political affairs into their own hands in extreme cases – enjoins it as a right towards themselves and a sacred obligation to their posterity, to abolish such government and create another in its stead, calculated to rescue them from impending dangers, and to secure their future welfare and happiness. Nations, as well as individuals, are amenable for their acts to the public opinion of mankind. A statement of a part of our grievances is, therefore, submitted to an impartial world, in justification of the hazardous but unavoidable step now taken of severing our political connection with the Mexican people, and assuming an independent attitude among the nations of the earth.

The Mexican government, by its colonization laws, invited and induced the Anglo-American population of Texas to colonize its wilderness under the pledged faith of a written constitution, that they should continue to enjoy that constitutional liberty and republican government to which they had been habituated in the land of their birth, the United States of America. In this expectation they have been cruelly disappointed, inasmuch as the Mexican nation has acquiesced in the late changes made in the government by General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, who, having overturned the constitution of his country, now offers us the cruel alternative either to abandon our homes, acquired by so many privations, or submit to the most intolerable of all tyranny, the combined despotism of the sword and the priesthood.

It has sacrificed our welfare to the state of Coahuila, by which our interests have been continually depressed, through a jealous and partial course of legislation carried on at a far distant seat of government, by a hostile majority, in an unknown tongue; and this too, notwithstanding we have petitioned in the humblest terms, for the establishment of a separate state government, and have, in accordance with the provisions of the national constitution, presented the general Congress, a republican constitution which was without just cause contemptuously rejected.
It incarcerated in a dungeon, for a long time, one of our citizens, for no other cause but a zealous endeavor to procure the acceptance of our constitution and the establishment of a state government.
It has failed and refused to secure on a firm basis, the right of trial by jury; that palladium of civil liberty, and only safe guarantee for the life, liberty, and property of the citizen.
It has failed to establish any public system of education, although possessed of almost boundless resources (the public domain) and, although, it is an axiom, in political science, that unless a people are educated and enlightened it is idle to expect the continuance of civil liberty, or the capacity for self-government.
It has suffered the military commandants stationed among us to exercise arbitrary acts of oppression and tyranny; thus trampling upon the most sacred rights of the citizen and rendering the military superior to the civil power.
It has dissolved by force of arms, the state Congress of Coahuila and Texas, and obliged our representatives to fly for their lives from the seat of government; thus depriving us of the fundamental political right of representation.
It has demanded the surrender of a number of our citizens, and ordered military detachments to seize and carry them into the Interior for trial; in contempt of the civil authorities, and in defiance of the laws and constitution.
It has made piratical attacks upon our commerce; by commissioning foreign desperadoes, and authorizing them to seize our vessels, and convey the property of our citizens to far distant ports of confiscation.
It denies us the right of worshipping the Almighty according to the dictates of our own consciences, by the support of a national religion calculated to promote the temporal interests of its human functionaries rather than the glory of the true and living God.
It has demanded us to deliver up our arms; which are essential to our defense, the rightful property of freemen, and formidable only to tyrannical governments.
It has invaded our country, both by sea and by land, with intent to lay waste our territory and drive us from our homes; and has now a large mercenary army advancing to carry on against us a war of extermination.
It has, through its emissaries, incited the merciless savage, with the tomahawk and scalping knife, to massacre the inhabitants of our defenseless frontiers.
It hath been, during the whole time of our connection with it, the contemptible sport and victim of successive military revolutions and hath continually exhibited every characteristic of a weak, corrupt and tyrannical government.
These, and other grievances, were patiently borne by the people of Texas until they reached that point at which forbearance ceases to be a virtue. We then took up arms in defense of the national constitution. We appealed to our Mexican brethren for assistance. Our appeal has been made in vain. Though months have elapsed, no sympathetic response has yet been heard from the Interior. We are, therefore, forced to the melancholy conclusion that the Mexican people have acquiesced in the destruction of their liberty, and the substitution therefor of a military government – that they are unfit to be free and incapable of self-government.
The necessity of self-preservation, therefore, now decrees our eternal political separation.
We, therefore, the delegates, with plenary powers, of the people of Texas, in solemn convention assembled, appealing to a candid world for the necessities of our condition, do hereby resolve and DECLARE that our political connection with the Mexican nation has forever ended; and that the people of Texas do now constitute a FREE, SOVEREIGN and INDEPENDENT RE-PUBLIC, and are fully invested with all the rights and attributes which properly belong to the independent nations; and, conscious of the rectitude of our intentions, we fearlessly and confidently commit the issue to the decision of the Supreme Arbiter of the destinies of nations.

RICHARD ELLIS, president of the convention and Delegate from Red River.
Charles B. Stewart

Thos Barnett

John S.D. Byrom

Franco Ruiz
J. Antonio Navarro
Jesse B. Badgett

Wm D. Lacey

William Menefee
Jn Fisher

Mathew Caldwell
William Mottley
Lorenzo de Zavala

Stephen H. Everitt

Geo W. Smyth

Elijah Stapp

Claiborne West

Wm B. Scates

M.B. Menard

A.B. Hardin

J.W. Bunton

Thos J. Gasley
R. M. Coleman
Sterling
C. Robertson

Benj. Briggs Goodrich

G.W. Barnett

James G. Swisher

Jesse Grimes

S. Rhoads Fisher
John W. Moore

John W. Bower

The Release of Glory - Alamo

JOIN US IN SAN ANTONIO ON MARCH 6TH!

 

My eyes were attracted to just one tee shirt.  We were finishing up our time at the Alamo as we journeyed down the El Camino Real de los Tejas. Whether it be a myth or not, the act of Colonel Travis using his sword to draw a line in the dirt at the Alamo is still a powerful testimony.  It is a call to make the choice to stand up against every tyranny that faces us - even to the point of death.

 

"Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm" (Ephesians 6:11-13). 

Several times along the El Camino Real de los Tejas, I was compelled to take a sword and exhort intercessors and leaders in Texas to make the same decision.  But our battle is not against flesh and blood but against the forces of evil and death that seek to destroy us.  Several references to the Alamo came up in our meetings (and none of those referred to our present or past relationship with Mexico).  The context was always - are you willing to take the necessary stand for the Lord and His kingdom?

175 years ago, William Barret Travis and almost two hundred other defenders found themselves surrounded at the Alamo Mission in San Antonio in late February of 1836. Refusing to surrender, they held off the invading armies of Mexican Dictator Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna for almost two weeks.

 

On March 6, the courageous Texans were overrun and slaughtered by well over 2000 Mexicans. The resulting delay of Santa Anna's eastward movement gave other Texans more time to organize, both politically and militarily, and to ultimately defeat and capture Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto, fought April 21, 1836.

 

The letter below was written by Travis soon after the Mexicans first appeared in the area around San Antonio. It is often referenced as a supreme example of the virtues of courage and self-sacrifice.

To the People of Texas & All Americans in the world — 
Fellow Citizens & compatriots —

I am besieged, by a thousand or more of the Mexicans under Santa Anna — I have sustained a continual Bombardment & cannonade for 24 hours & have not lost a man — The enemy has demanded a surrender at discretion, otherwise, the garrison are to be put to the sword, if the fort is taken — I have answered the demand with a cannon shot, & our flag still waves proudly from the walls — I shall never surrender or retreat.  Then, I call on you in the name of Liberty, of patriotism & everything dear to the American character, to come to our aid, with all dispatch — The enemy is receiving reinforcements daily & will no doubt increase to three or four thousand in four or five days. If this call is neglected, I am determined to sustain myself as long as possible & die like a soldier who never forgets what is due to his own honor & that of his country — VICTORY OR DEATH.

William Barrett Travis, Lt. Col. comdt. 

We shall never surrender or retreat.  Victory or death! What will you choose?  

 

We will take a stand for victory on Sunday, March 6 in San Antonio.  In the afternoon we will visit the Alamo on the 175th anniversary of its fall.  Sunday evening at 7 we invite you to join us for worship at the:

San Antonio Apostolic Prayer Center

8308 Fredericksburg Road

San Antonio, Texas

MAP

The Release of Glory - Washington on the Brazos

GATHER WITH US AT WASHINGTON ON THE BRAZOS

We are called to release an army to follow the Ark of God's presence.

We are to gain the boundaries the Lord has established for us.

We are here to declare the government of our Lord against the tyranny of Satan.

The Lord instructed us to retrace the steps of the 1835-36 Texas War for Independence.  We are to go to the sites of specific events on the 175th anniversary of those events.  The first event of the revolution took place in Gonzales on October 2, 1835.  Our second stop on the Independence Trail was November 6 in San Felipe, Texas.

Chuck Pierce declared on October 10, 2010:

"In the midst of this struggle you are in and how you enter this season of war is how you'll gain the boundaries of your inheritance and all the blessings of your inheritance. Who you war FOR and HOW you express your warfare is how He's going to pour in your covenant blessings in days ahead. "Some of you" - the Lord is saying today - "Press further for you're about to give up a portion - Abram went the full distance and God made covenant with him and said, "It's all yours now." You might not see this (come to pass) but someone WILL see it because I Am God. There is a seed in you that says I want the full inheritance that God has for me. Let Me reorder your warfare for you now - so you receive all I have for you."

Chuck prayed, "Father expand our strength - let us look deep into the warfare around us - press us to the uttermost parts of the boundaries of our inheritance. We say we will not settle until we have moved with You the full boundaries of our future."
 

After the consultation at San Felipe adjourned, they decided to meet at Washington (on the Brazos), on the 1st day of March, 1836.  In addition to other important matters, it was provided that  "there should be a regular army created for the protection of Texas during the present war." To give aid and assistance in organizing this army, in adopting rules for its government, and in providing the personnel and materiel, General Houston remained in attendance on the governor and council until the 16th of December, when he was ordered to remove his headquarters to Washington. 

The Birthplace of Texas

Washington-on-the-Brazos is known as "the birthplace of Texas", a distinction it earned when on March 1, 1836 it became the meeting place of the Texas delegates who formally announced Texas' intention to separate from Mexico and who drafted the constitution of the new Republic of Texas, organizing an interim government to serve until an officially elected government could be put in place.

Replica of the building at Washington-on-the-Brazos where the Texas Declaration was signed. An inscription reads: "Here a Nation was born".

The delegates declared independence on March 2, 1836. Their constitution was adopted on March 16. The delegates worked until March 17, when they had to flee, along with the people of Washington, to escape the advancing Mexican Army. The townspeople returned after the Mexican Army was defeated at San Jacinto on April 21. Town leaders lobbied for Washington’s designation as the permanent capital of the Republic of Texas, but leaders of the Republic passed over Washington in favor of Waterloo, which later was renamed Austin.

Gather with us at Washington on the Brazos outside of Navasota (Map) on Wednesday, March 2 at 1 PM. We will meet at the Star of the Republic Museum. We will declare the establishment of God's everlasting government.  We will call forth His army!  We will on the Lord of Hosts to release His angelic forces.  We will establish our boundaries in Him.

Upcoming journeys:

• March 6 - The Alamo
• March 14 - Gonzales
• March 27 - Goliad
• April 21 - San Jacinto
  

Roma - El Camino Real de los Tejas

The assignment is over.  Our journey on the El Camino Real de los Tejas is complete.  Today we head home and we ask you to pray for our safe passage.

The best way to describe what happened on this journey is through pictures Pat Wistner and my wife Kay expressed.  

Before we left Pat had seen a vision of our trip: "I saw the trail littered with debris, bones, clothes, personal items and bodies.  I believe that as you travel that there should be a declaration peace and restoration to every soul and their descendants who have been affected by slavery, drugs, oppression, etc.- breaking the curse of families and the State of Texas - which I know you are already doing.  Then I heard - NO MORE - the Clean-up crew if here!"

Yesterday Kay saw a carotid artery blockage.  The El Camino Real was blocked.  As we made the journey from Natchitoches/Los Adaes, Louisiana, the Lord used us to clean out this blocked artery so that the blood flow from His heart could once again surge with glory and healing into the entire body (Mexico and the United States).  The Lord also reminded us last night that just as a team had been used to reverse the curse of the Trail of Tears in Oklahoma, He had now started the process of reversing the curse of all the iniquitous roots that had been laid down over 300 years ago on this route.

Yesterday, on the anniversary of the signing of the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo we met with saints from the the town of Ciudad Miguel Aleman on the Rio Grande bridge. We repented to each other.  We blessed each other.  We made a covenant bond that we will work together for God's kingdom to be released.

Last night we did the same before the gathering of the body of Christ in worship at Bethel Mission.  We worshiped.  We humbled ourselves.  We gave the very generous gift gathered throughout the journey. 

The artery is open. The debris is cleaned away.  Healing is released from and through this same town on the border of two great nations.  Watch carefully as the words prophesied to Texas by Chuck Pierce find fulfillment:

"There is a nation in your loins and you will birth a nation. God is giving you the authority to address giants who are stopping it. The Giant will be addressed. There will be a grassroots movement from Texas that will be seen throughout the nation and the Giant will be addressed. It will be known that from Texas a nation was birthed, a nation went to war, and a nation had the victory.” 

"....The prince that has ruled the atmosphere along the border between the U.S. and Mexico will be dethroned because of the uniting of the hosts of Heaven and the armies of the earth! Because of what is beginning today, and what will be occurring in the next 24 months, satan's rule on this border will now be addressed, begin to shake and eventually fall!" (Spoken in 2009)

Tomorrow night (Friday) we gather in Arlington to witness part of that dethroning at the Roots of Islam gathering.   Last night, not surprisingly to God's timing, a radically saved former Muslim from India attended and was greatly encouraged by our willingness to stand against this giant! See you in Arlington on Friday at ROOTS OF ISLAM.

Laredo - El Camino Real de los Tejas

Last night we were hosted by Pastor Esther Gallegos and Christ Miracle Center in Laredo.  The local worship team led us into intimate worship before the throne before Jeremy Burk led us into warfare.  The Lord prophetically revealed two things:

• I brought my wife Kay before the group and spoke lovingly as a husband to her - expressing my deepest love.  I then handed her a sword and instructed her (out of that love) to destroy those things which steal away her destiny.  The message of our Lord (husband) is the same to us (His bride).
• He also instructed us to take the flags of Mexico, United States and the Church.  We placed them together and wrapped the trail of healing flag around them all.  He is destroying the enemy at the border and binding us together as a people and nations in a fresh healing.  It is not by chance that the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848) between Mexico and the US was officially signed today - February 2.

Our trip during the day was powerful but restful.  The Lord took us into the "heart of the beast" but we did not feel the oppression of the day before.  Today we sensed victory in the face of the enemy - Psalm 23.  He allowed us to dine in his presence.  Our only two stops were the Spanish Governor's Palace and the Alamo.  The Alamo (Mission San Antonio de Valero) was the first structure of religion or government in the region.  It pre-dates the establishment of San Antonio de Bexar itself.  The Lord gave us keys to close and open (Isaiah 22:22) the gates.

As a prophetic sign He showed us a physical museum display with two old keys - one for the Palace and one for the Alamo. 

Today we finish our journey.  We reach and witness in Roma tonight.  Keep us in prayer.  Pray Psalm 91. 

San Marcos - El Camino Real de los Tejas

I remind you again of yesterday's blog:

The Lord had prophetically exhorted us on Saturday night - "You are heading into the hornet's nest."  He also declared according to Exodus 23:28 - "I will send hornets ahead of you so that they will drive out the Hivites, the Canaanites, and the Hittites before you." We had been strictly commanded to pray DAILY Psalm 91 over ourselves, our families and over everyone connected in anyway with the trip.  We have done so and I admonish each reader to do so as well.

We spiritually ran into that nest as we entered Caldwell.  Outside this city in central Texas there was twice an attempt to establish a new Mexico City in the heart of the Texas province.  It was called Fort Tenoxtitlan.  It was a hard but essential location to find.  As a matter of fact, if the Lord had not sent us an angelic servant Joe - the landowner - we would not have found this spot.  But let me back up.

The Lord had prepared us for the task that morning. That morning our entire team was led to go on the campus of Texas A&M University.  We visited one spot - the Century Tree.  It is at the center of the campus near the Academic Building.  Under this tree many a young man has proposed to his future bride - including my son Josh and his wife Andrea.  As we approached the tree, my daughter Amy (a student) "warned" us that anyone who walks together under this tree is together for life.  We deliberately, as a core team, when under the tree.  We are sealed covenantly in Christ Jesus with each other.  The Lord promised and promises His everlasting love and protection to those He has redeemed and called.

Even though the entire day was marked by feelings of hornets peskily interrupting us - we endured.  We carried out our assignment.  We dealt with strong root issues in the State - especially this false capital that the enemy had tried to establish near Caldwell.  By the way the mascot for Caldwell is "The Hornets."  We ended the day in San Marcos - hosted by Bob Long, TXAPN Council Member.  A co-leader of the worship team - Jeremy Burk - imparted the Davidic heart of a worshiper into each of us.  We renewed our covenant in the Lord.  This morning, before we head in San Antonio we will commune together.

The journey continues.  The roots get stronger and deeper. But nothing is stronger or deeper than the love of our Savior Jesus.