A Man Named Michael

 

A Man Named Michael

The Word a Witness . . .

 

 

“But I will shew thee that which is noted in the scripture of truth: and there is none that holdeth with me in these things, but Michael, your prince.” – Daniel 10:21.

 

“And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book.” – Daniel 12:1.

 

 

 

There was a time when the things written in the book of Daniel were a complete mystery to me.  The churches do not embark much on this portion of scripture, concentrating instead on the Gospels, and the Revelation, and the Jews.

 

And now, most of their congregations are lost.  They are immersed in liturgy, denominational doctrine, concordances and Jewish fables.  None of this is of the Holy Ghost.

 

If it were not for a man named Michael, I might have missed my blessing.  He was my blessing; for it was through this man that the Word was revealed to me.

 

He may have been your blessing too, if you can receive what I am about to tell you.

 

Some of you may shake your heads in disbelief, or vehemently disregard it completely.  It’s not an easy thing to accept, even though it is written.

 

Most of you may have heard of this man.  You may know him.  You may have even seen him, or worked with him.  You may have been a member of his family.

 

And sadly, some did not know him at all.

 

I believe most of you have had a “Michael” in your life.

 

The Michael I know, knew God.  He talked about Him often.  More often than some of his closer circle of influence would have liked.  He talked about God, and Jesus, and the importance of reading the Bible for understanding. 

 

He talked about the power of prayer, and how genuine love was the core, the foundation of everything that was created; and he talked about them in the world that sought to remove it from the letters of the living.

 

I didn’t know him, before one late summer evening almost 16 years ago.  I can’t believe that time has passed so quickly, because so much has happened in that time.  A lot of changes, both in me, and in the world.

 

I’ve taken some pretty squiggly paths to get where I am now: sometimes seeing shadows instead of signs.  I’d pray, and just like the dream I had back in 1980, Jesus would appear and put me right back on the path with some stern but loving reminders of the “straight and narrow”.

 

Truth be told, there were some things I didn’t want to see or learn.  I didn’t want to know how corrupt people could be.  I didn’t want to see how badly we had been lied to and how fake our histories were, or how our so-called leaders were compromised.

 

I didn’t want to know that our country’s government or part of it took part in experiments that would turn your blood cold, or that there were men who bought and sold souls, or ordered murders with no remorse.

 

I didn’t want to know about the abuse of children by elements in our own government; or how they were used to compromise prominent people.  I didn’t know how bad it was, until I found these verses in Micah:

 

“And I said, hear, I pray you, O heads of Jacob, and ye princes of the house of Israel; is it not for you to know judgment?  Who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones;

 

Who also eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them; and they break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as flesh within the caldron.

 

Then shall they cry unto the Lord, but he will not hear them: he will even hide his face from them at that time, as they have behaved themselves ill in their doings.” – Micah 3:1-4.

 

This is JACOB he is talking about.  Note he didn’t call them “Israel” because they are not.  He also said “who eat the flesh of my people”:  MY PEOPLE, he said: who were not the “heads of Jacob” or the “princes of the house of Israel”. 

 

And if you have any doubt, Jeremiah 7:30 reveals the “people” who place the abomination in the house called by the Lord’s name.  These are the things the man named Michael knew, and rejoiced when I replied “The Jews are antichrist.  They have always been antichrist”.  And yet I still sorrowed, because he showed me where God placed His Name, and those that would suffer for His namesake.

 

I’ve been angry during this journey.  It’s one thing to see on the news, or know about from the company of others that death of the innocent is a goal post for those without that “letter” of love.  But scars will form when it comes this close to your house.  It will blindside you, even though you asked to help bear a burden.

 

And how do you not let “love wax cold” because “iniquity abounds”, and it is the cord that binds in the midst of us?

 

 

 

The Word a Lamp, A Light

 

To know that there are people in the world who labor for the death of others, who murder and have no remorse is more than the humanity in us can bear; yet they exist.

 

There is an element among the living on the earth who claim to be “pure” while corrupting the living.  And it talks about these in the scriptures.

 

They have no “light”: God’s Word is not in them (John 8:37).

 

If it weren’t for the man I knew as Michael, I probably would not know about them either.  But I’ve seen them.  I’ve seen them in the people I’ve known: friends, sometimes family members, co-workers and even people with whom I’ve attended church.

 

If you haven’t been at some point in your life blindsided by an unprovoked attack, verbally assaulted about a faith that had nothing to do with your disagreement with a person; and it’s happened at various times, through different people; then you know affliction.

 

If you have ever had your circle of influence come down on you with pressure because of a knowledge revealed to you by the Lord in his scriptures, that you were trying to share: then you know oppression.

 

Persecution is a level above oppression: it is terroristic activity.  This would include being stalked (seen and unseen); members of secret societies or religious organizations subverting your household via a family member, spouse, child (they labor to divide and conquer through the weaknesses of loved ones).

 

You might also be the subject of fighter jets from a nearby base buzzing your rooftop close enough rattle windows and blow the grain off the shingles of your roof, where you can hear them skittering down.

 

They up their torment because none of the above was working.  And yet they cannot touch you because God has his hand on you.  All they can do is try to turn you, terrify you.  Make you take back up your offering.  And always, God provides a way out.  You can do nothing but rejoice at knowing HE SEES and cares.

 

You might find a loved one being used, blackmailed, manipulated or entrapped into drugs, prostitution (or patronizing prostitutes) and their entire lifestyles become lascivious and you no longer know them anymore: anything to drag you away from the calling in which God sealed you: then you know persecution.

 

Those that are closest to God have seen crucifixion.  Look up the meaning of that word.  David saw it, and talked about it in his Psalms.

 

The man I knew named Michael saw it; and through him, we all saw it.  You may not have recognized what was going on, or thought it was “his punishment”; or a product of his environment at the time; but you saw it.  The adversary boasted his “fall from grace” everywhere.

 

The Lord gave us these through his prophets for a reason:

 

“Princes have persecuted me without a cause: but my heart standeth in awe of thy word.” – Psalm 119:161.

 

“Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.  Rejoice, and be exceedingly glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.” – Matthew 5: 11-12.

 

“Remember the word that I said unto you, the servant is not greater than his lord.  If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you, if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also.” – John 15:20.

 

A man named Michael has endured all of the above.  And if you receive John 15:20 in truth and love; you are a witness to the Word and where it was published.

 

“According to the Word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you: fear ye not.” – Haggai 2:5.

 

“Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake.” – Matthew 24:9.

 

The Word is the “Covenant”. This Word is protected in a strong vessel.  So fearful is the adversary of this “Word”, they seek to steal it out of the very substance with which we are made (Psalm 139:14-16, Mark 4:15). It’s more valuable than gold to them.

 

Why would they kill for Christ’s “namesake”?  What is the Name that they hate so much?

 

“His eyes were a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew, but he himself.  And he was clothed in a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God.” – Revelation 19:12-13.

 

This “Name” is given to he who overcomes in Revelation 3:12, and it was given him by Jesus himself, who wrote it in him. 

 

The same is given by Jesus in the form of “The Morning Star” in Revelation 2:28: Forasmuch as Jesus IS the morning star (Revelation 22:16), and is “The Word” (John 1:1 and 1:14).

 

This one shall be the last to bear the Ark of the covenant.  Jesus spoke of him as the “coming of the Son of man” (Matthew 10:23, Matthew 13:41, Matthew 24:30-39, Mark 13:26-34).  He spoke of himself, yet in the third person: because His Name is in him (Exodus 23:20-21), The Word, Jesus Christ in he whom Jesus published his Word.

 

 

 

They were After the Word: His Publishing

 

His Name IS the Word.  That Word was “covenanted” with the children of Israel.  And the Lord saved a remnant of them (Isaiah 10:20-22, 17:3, Micah 5:3, Romans 9:27).  They will be the first fruits of Christ (Revelation 14:4).

 

The “firstfruits”: the “remnant” are the 144,000: 12,000 from each tribe of Israel of which the “multitude that no man can number” (Revelation 7) will be “the land” in which Israel will be increased (Exodus 1:7, Jeremiah 3:16).

 

“The Lord gave the word: great was the company that published it.” – Psalm 68:11.

 

The Lord gave the Word:  the great “company” that published it is mentioned in the verses of Revelation chapter 7.  The remnant of Israel, that was scattered among the nations, in the midst of many people as dew from the Lord: and among the Gentiles in the midst of many people (Micah 5:7-8) is the “land” where God scattered them.  We are the “land”.

 

This “publishing” is the Word in which all the law will be fulfilled (Galatians 5:14, Matthew 22:39-40): in those who “call upon the Name of the Lord” and are “saved” (Romans 10:13).

 

The Word, which is Jesus Christ, will be published first in the “firstfruits” which are sealed by it: then written in the substance of many.

 

“And the word of the Lord was published throughout all the region.” – Acts 13:49.

 

“And the gospel must first be published among all nations.” – Mark 13:10 concerning the end times and the return of “the son of man”.

 

They were after his “publishing” you see: they were after Michael’s publishing.

 

The man I knew as Michael was the subject of a big fight. And he stood with God because he also knew the value of this publishing.

 

It was because of this man that I called upon the Name of the Lord; and at that same time, the Lord revealed himself to me, in Shiloh, by that Word of the Lord.

 

From that time until now, I suffered tribulation, and affliction, and oppression.  Not as he did, for my purpose was different.  Instead, my prayer was answered through him who became my Shiloh.

 

I asked God to give me his pain; and God showed me, through what I suffered, what Michael suffered, to a lesser degree.

 

At first I struggled with what God showed me.  I didn’t want to believe it.  It was too ugly, too traumatic.  And I wrestled and prayed over what is inherently evident in the scriptures. 

 

I travailed to the point where in tears I prayed to God, that he reveal to me the truth, to show me in scripture so that I not lead people in the wrong direction.

 

So the Lord lead me to Revelation 12.

 

Then the Lord showed me the prophecies of Daniel, which are also given as a warning by Jesus in Matthew 24:15 and Mark 13:14. 

 

He showed me Isaiah 52 and 53, which described some of the physical events that Jesus didn’t endure, but another did.

 

Then he opened understanding to me of 2 Thessalonians 2:3-8, Jude 1:9, Daniel 10:13-21, where Daniel is told about the war in heaven that Jesus reveals to John in Revelation.

 

Then he showed me Deuteronomy 31:26 in context with Isaiah 44:13-17 and Revelation 21:17; and David’s knowledge of the substance in Psalm 139:14-16.  This revealed the hundred and forty and four thousand and how it would be “gathered”, then “increased in the land”.

 

The last thing the Lord showed me, which was over the course of years from the prayer I prayed, was the story of Micah in Judges 17 and 18.

 

In Judges 17-18, beginning with the very first verse, we are introduced to a “man of mount Ephraim, whose name was Micah”.

 

Micah and Michael: those names mean the same thing with the exception of the “El” missing from “Micah”, rendering it “Who is like the Lord” as opposed to Michael’s “Who is like unto God”.

 

The prophet Micah also has a book in the minor prophets of the Old Testament.

 

The mention of Mount Ephraim associated Micah with the tribe of Joseph.  Joseph was the son of Israel who was sold into slavery, because his brothers were jealous of his visions of having station over them; forgetting the prophecies of their father Jacob concerning Judah and Joseph (Genesis 49:6-21).

 

His sons were Manasseh and Ephraim.  Ephraim was blessed over the older Manasseh; and in whose hand was the stick of Joseph.

 

In verses 7-9, something interesting happens.  A young man out of “Bethlehemjudah” (House of the Name of the Lord, in Judah) who was a Levite sojourned to Mount Ephraim, to the house of Micah and there became his “father and priest”.

 

In chapter 18, the “Danites” sought the tribes of Israel for an inheritance to dwell in, for their inheritance had not fallen to them (there as no king in Israel during this time).

 

The Danites sent a family of five to “search the land”.  They found mount Ephraim and came to the house of Micah and lodged there.  This is what it says after that:

 

“When they were by the house of Micah, they knew the voice of the young man the Levite: and they turned in thither, and said unto him, who brought thee hither? And what makest though in this place? And what has thou here?” – Judges 18:3.

 

They knew the voice of the Levite!  What did this mean?

 

Among the things I studied through God’s scriptures, and most believers understand, is that the Levites were the one tribe that had no inheritance of their own land: because God was their inheritance (Joshua 13:33).

 

The Levites lived “within the borders of Israel” (Numbers 18:23).  That means that a Levite could be a Judaite, or a Benjaminite, or a Josephite or any of the other tribes.

 

Levites were the only ones who could bear the Ark of the Covenant.  David was from the tribe of Judah, was also a Levite.  How do we know?

 

You know what else the Levites were?

 

The Levites were the chief singers.  They were the “singers” and “musicians of skill” in the “temple” (1 Chronicles 15:16, 2 Chronicles 34:12).  David played instruments, he danced before the Lord” and is voice “soothed the soul of Saul”.

 

During this time the Danites coerced the priest to be their father and priest, and took the engravings from Micah’s house with the priest.  And here it says:

 

“they set them up Micah’s graven image, which he made, all the time that the house of God was in Shiloh.” – Judges 18:31.

 

 

 

A Prince Named Michael

 

Michael, the great prince, assisted the angel of the Lord who came to teach Daniel the meaning of his dreams and visions.  He was being withheld in battle.  That battle the angel told Daniel about was the event of the war in heaven in Revelation 12.  Michael is the one who withholds the devil from the throne as the man child is caught up.

 

Michael is also named as the “Archangel” who withholds the devil from the body of Moses in Jude 1:9.  He is identified as “he who withholds” twice: Jude 1:9 and Revelation 12:7.  So now you know what is “taken out of the way” in 2 Thessalonians 2:3-8.

 

In 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17, it is revealed that the “Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel” to gather his people.

 

The Archangel and the “Ark” of the Covenant have the same purpose: to protect the pure Word, the Name and to he whom it is written.  The Word = Jesus.

 

The man named Michael, who showed me all these things, in whom the Lord revealed himself to me, in “Shiloh” by the Word of the Lord, is a Levite.

 

He is a Levite, and he was a singer of great skill, and wrote poems and allegories in the songs that he sang.  He was a “Psalmist”, much like David.

 

If any of this were untrue, I would not have endured what I have endured, or had the level of people around me that served up my affliction.

 

But the one true, inarguable witness I have, that these things are true, is the Word itself: one that I called out before I knew that was what I was doing.

 

Before I “travailed, I had brought forth”: Before my “pains came, I was delivered of a man child” (Isaiah 66:6-8). And that “man child” was revealed to me, by the Word, the Name that I called upon when I prayed for him fifteen years ago.

Everyone knows a "Michael".  That name means "Who is like God".  

The Michael in the Bible plays a huge role in the end times; but it is not his only purpose.  He is named as a chief prince, the great prince, the "Messiah the prince" and the "archangel".

The man I knew by the name of "Michael" showed me all of these things through his affliction and sacrifices.  His publishing would not have been sought if all of this was not true.

None of those people would have done what they have done to him, if he were not who he was, and what he had.