Fear of the all-too-real

In the previous posting, we meditated on the nature of irrational fear (and the spiritual agents behind it) in order to avoid being entrapped by it. In this article, we shall meditate on the fear that is not irrational but is actually derived from dangers that are all too real. To do so, we shall consider two incidents involving Simon Peter the disciple.

From Gethsemane to fear

"55 In that same hour said Jesus to the multitudes, Are ye come out as against a thief with swords and staves for to take me? I sat daily with you teaching in the temple, and ye laid no hold on me. 56 But all this was done, that the scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled. Then all the disciples forsook him, and fled. 57 And they that had laid hold on Jesus led him away to Caiaphas the high priest, where the scribes and the elders were assembled. 58 But Peter followed him afar off unto the high priest's palace, and went in, and sat with the servants, to see the end." (Matthew 26:55-58)

"69 Now Peter sat without in the palace: and a damsel came unto him, saying, Thou also wast with Jesus of Galilee. 70 But he denied before them all, saying, I know not what thou sayest. 71 And when he was gone out into the porch, another maid saw him, and said unto them that were there, This fellow was also with Jesus of Nazareth. 72 And again he denied with an oath, I do not know the man. 73 And after a while came unto him they that stood by, and said to Peter, Surely thou also art one of them; for thy speech bewrayeth thee. 74 Then began he to curse and to swear, saying, I know not the man. And immediately the cock crew. 75 And Peter remembered the word of Jesus, which said unto him, Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. And he went out, and wept bitterly." (Matthew 26:69-75)

Notice that Peter was trapped in a situation fraught with fear, fear generated by the heavy spiritual oppression that enveloped the place as the enemy endeavoured to destroy Yeshua forever. This fear not only had a spiritual component but a tangible one, for the environment threatened to physically imprison, torture, and kill anyone who dared to express overt resistance to it. In other words, Peter had a legitimate reason to fear, at least in the natural, but it was clear to Peter (and to anyone reading about the incident afterwards) that Peter reacted incorrectly, succumbing to the fear and committing 3 acts of betrayal in quick succession.

Given the reality of the danger surrounding Simon Peter, the question becomes, What should Peter have done to prevent his betrayal? To answer that, we must consider some of the events that happened shortly before the betrayal. Earlier in Matthew 26, the Spirit of God declares the following:

"36 Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Sit ye here, while I go and pray yonder. 37 And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. 38 Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me. 39 And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt. 40 And he cometh unto the disciples, and findeth them asleep, and saith unto Peter, What, could ye not watch with me one hour? 41 Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. 42 He went away again the second time, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done. 43 And he came and found them asleep again: for their eyes were heavy. 44 And he left them, and went away again, and prayed the third time, saying the same words. 45 Then cometh he to his disciples, and saith unto them, Sleep on now, and take your rest: behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. 46 Rise, let us be going: behold, he is at hand that doth betray me." (Matthew 26:36-46)

Notice that Yeshua took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee (James and John) to pray with Him in the Garden of Gethsemane as His heart became weary with the weight of death. Notice also that the Spirit of God only mentions Peter by name, as if to indicate that Peter was the disciple who most needed to heed the events going on around him. Notice also that the passage above ends with Yeshua saying, "he is at hand that doth betray me" (in the very next verse, Judas is described as appearing with a crowd, meaning that verse 46 above is the last verse describing Yeshua's interaction with the disciples in Gethsemane). Hence, we can see how the passage above links Peter with the spirit of betrayal that was weighing on the spiritual atmosphere at the time.

Notice also that Yeshua went to pray by Himself 3 times and that, each time, He returned to find Peter and the other disciples sleeping. This correlates with the 3 betrayals that Peter would commit a short time later. Hence, we can conclude that Peter's betrayals stemmed from His inability to stay awake and pray with Yeshua. The Lord had clearly expressed His deep sense of sorrow and heaviness (v37), but Peter and the other disciples were unable to fully connect with Yeshua's sorrow and to war with Him as He faced that lonely battle. Clearly, the 3 disciples had mental and soul love towards Yeshua, but their love had not fully reached the Spirit level, for which reason they were not aware enough to discern the fullness of the spiritual sorrow that was weighing on Yeshua and on the entire atmosphere. Their minds did not see a visible problem around them; on the contrary, their souls felt a sense of soul unity, especially since they were there together and had just had soul communion with each other (in the form of the so-called "last supper"). As a result, they were susceptible to the spiritual influence in the air and could not fully grasp the gravity of the sorrow enveloping Yeshua's heart at the time.

Notice also that, when Yeshua returned to them the 3rd time, He said to them, "Sleep on now, and take your rest" (v45) and warned them that the betrayal would manifest itself shortly. In other words, the time for staying awake and praying was over, and it was time to "hibernate", even though things would become visibly worse. In the natural, you go to sleep when things are nice and calm, and you stay awake when problems are visibly swirling around you, yet Yeshua had asked them to stay awake when things seemed calm and to go to sleep when things became visibly problematic. All of this points to the key reason why Peter succumbed to fear and failed: Peter betrayed Yeshua 3 times because he had failed to recognise the time of preparation that had been given to him when things seemed calm and manageable. He was ready mentally, and he was somewhat ready at the emotional level, but he was clearly not ready at the heart level. This is evidenced by his immediate reaction as the spirit of betrayal became tangibly visible:

"50 And Jesus said unto him, Friend, wherefore art thou come? Then came they, and laid hands on Jesus, and took him. 51 And, behold, one of them which were with Jesus stretched out his hand, and drew his sword, and struck a servant of the high priest's, and smote off his ear. 52 Then said Jesus unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. 53 Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels? 54 But how then shall the scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it must be?" (Matthew 26:50-54)

It is interesting to consider that, in verse 51, the Spirit of God chose not to say the name of the disciple who drew his sword and chopped off the ear of the high priest's servant. However, John had no problems "ratting out" that disciple when he describes the same events:

"10 Then Simon Peter having a sword drew it, and smote the high priest's servant, and cut off his right ear. The servant's name was Malchus. 11 Then said Jesus unto Peter, Put up thy sword into the sheath: the cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" (John 18:10-11)

Why did the Spirit of God avoid mentioning Simon Peter's name when narrating events through Matthew but mentions his name when narrating the same events through John? This writer is not too clear on the answer, but, for one, it clearly shows that the Spirit of God is not about exposing people every time they do something wrong. There is a level of discretion that the Spirit of God uses when making judgements, which is something that the Jebusite spirit (the distortion of the apostolic endowment of judgements) has a hard time understanding. As we have shared before, the Gospel of Matthew was written from the perspective of the apostolic Lion Face of judgements, so it is ironically fitting that the most "apostolic" (i.e. the most judgement-centric) of the 4 Gospels actually chose not to expose the identity of the disciple who incorrectly chopped off the servant's ear, thereby establishing a contrast between Jebusite-style judgements that shame people willy-nilly and apostolic judgements done in the Spirit.

As we have also shared before, the Gospel of John is written from the prophetic Eagle Face perspective, meaning that it is the Gospel written from the "highest", "birds-eye-view", overtly-spiritual perspective. This may be why the Spirit of God chose to mention Simon Peter's name in the Gospel of John, since the challenge that Simon Peter needed to prepare for was very spiritual in nature and could not be tackled with the physical and emotional swords that Simon Peter felt so comfortable wielding. This is also why the Gospel of John refers to him as "Simon Peter" in John 18:10 above, as opposed to the name "Peter" used by the Spirit of God in Matthew 26:37. "Simon" was Peter's name before he encountered Yeshua, meaning that it points to his not-yet-matured nature, as opposed to the name "Peter" (meaning "rock"), which points to the "rock" spirit nature that began to develop in him when he came under Yeshua. In a sense, it can be said that Peter's actions following Yeshua's arrest were the actions of a "half-baked individual", i.e. an individual who had developed many good qualities in him but who had not "stayed in the oven" long enough to be ready for what was about to come upon him. Peter had not reached "level 3" of his baking, for which reason he fell back to his "level 1" physical sword and his "level 2" emotional indignation to battle against the spirit that was coming against them.

To summarise, we can say that Peter's defeat at the hands of fear during his 3 successive betrayals of the Lord were the result of him not making use of the preparation time afforded to him by God in the Garden of Gethsemane (and earlier). Notice that, when Yeshua returns to find them sleeping the first time, His words are "Watch and pray, that ye not enter into temptation" (Matthew 26:41). It is interesting to this writer that Yeshua does not recriminate them for not supporting or upholding Him in prayer as He faced the intense struggle to remain in the Father's perfect plan. I must confess that I would have more than likely fallen asleep as well in the Garden (leaving the Lord to fend for Himself); I can only wonder if my heart would have ached for the spiritual weariness in Yeshua's heart, and I wonder if I would have loved Him enough to try and uphold Him in prayer as He faced such an intense battle. I do not know if my prayers would have helped Him any, and I don't know if the Holy Spirit would have redirected them towards preparing myself for what was about to come, but it is utterly interesting to me that Yeshua acted as if He was not "expecting" my (or any of the disciples') support and was more concerned about their own spiritual well-being, as if assuming from the beginning that this was a burden that He had to carry alone, with no expectation of help from anyone.

Preparation, preparation, preparation!!!

"11 Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come. 12 Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. 13 There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it." (1 Corinthians 10:11-13)

This writer must confess that, as a teenager, verse 13 was one of the verses that I committed to memory, and it was one of the passages that I had written out in record cards that I would carry around to practise my memorisation. I must also confess that it was one of the verses that caused the most internal conflict in my heart, a verse that satan would use over and over again to taunt me and make me question the inerrancy of Scripture. This is because I would think of the times when I would be in a situation where I would have a knee-jerk reaction that I knew was not right; satan would then come and ask me,

"Didn't God say that you would not be tempted beyond your strength? Didn't God say that he would provide you a way to escape the test or temptation? If that is true, why did you have that reaction? Did you really have any time to consider your reaction before you manifested it? Didn't God know that you would have an automatic reaction like that? If so, why did he allow you to be in such a situation to begin with? Doesn't your reaction prove that 1 Corinthians 10:13 is a lie and that the Bible has errors that cannot be blamed on the translation?"

Dear believer, I must admit that satan's argument taunted me for years and years, causing much internal unrest and turmoil that I had no way of verbalising to anyone else, especially since there was neither a person who understood why Scripture's objective inerrancy was so important to me (i.e. why Scripture's inerrancy was not just some blindly-accepted dogma to me), nor was there a person who could formulate an argument that could counter satan's and render it null and void. With the passing of time, I was forced into surrendering in my internal battle and to rest in faith, trusting that 1 Corinthians 10:13 was somehow true and that I would eventually understand why satan's argument was truly invalid. It was after I finally rested and forgot about my dilemma for a while that God finally made me understand the answer, an answer that, in retrospect, had always been at the edge of my mind's door but that, for some reason, I had not allowed to enter, either out of unbelief or ignorance.

Once the answer became clear to me, it became so obvious that I would wonder why I had not seen it from the get-go. The answer lay in the following reality: When God says "a way to escape" in 1 Corinthians 10:13, He is not necessarily referring to an escape at the very moment when the problem arises. Consider, for example, a person driving along a motorway who is listening to the traffic report on his car radio. He is informed that there is a big traffic jam 3 kilometres ahead of his current location, a traffic jam caused by a stalled vehicle that is blocking two lanes. Because of the traffic report, he is being given "a way to escape" the jam by taking the next available exit and using some side roads to either get around the jam or reach his final destination directly. If he chooses to ignore the warning and continues down the same motorway, determined to take an exit only until he can see the traffic jam with his own eyes, there will come a point after which he will have no way to exit the motorway. So, even if he can now see the jam, he will be forced to join the improvised car park and wait until the obstructing vehicle is finally cleared. As you can see, the driver cannot claim that he was not given a way to escape, even if there was truly no way to escape the jam once he was in the middle of it. He was provided with a car radio and a traffic report transmitted to that car radio that gave him ample time to alter his route, meaning that, if he either had his radio off or chose to ignore what was being said on the radio, he had no one to blame but himself for getting caught in the traffic jam, and he also had no one to blame but himself for any angry, obscene utterances that may have emanated from his mouth (without thinking) as a result of the delay.

In the same way, God often provides a way to escape the temptation or test at some point before the temptation or test rears its ugly head. This writer has found that the Lord often exposes me to "trial runs" where I am allowed to see my reaction to a situation and then shown how that reaction would have been incorrect had it been a "real-life" scenario that "counted". Just to give a generic example, I may, at some point, be (visually) presented a person on the street about whom I make an instant, knee-jerk judgement (whether positive or negative), only to have that judgement proved false by some other detail that God allows me to see immediately afterwards. Because the situation was a "test run", my knee-jerk reaction is not taken as "sin" by God, and it is only seen as a reflexive, involuntary response from my soul, so I am not seen as having "failed" a test/temptation. However, if I choose to ignore that test run, without working on the part of my soul that triggered the incorrect reaction, I may either be given a "stronger" test run to further expose the flaw in my soul, or I may end up running into the very situation (i.e. the "traffic jam") I was being warned about, and my reaction at that time will be counted as sin and have potentially strong consequences, even if it was as "reflexive" and "involuntary" as in the previous test run(s).

Having said the above, it must also be noted that there will be times when the "way to escape" will be provided at the very moment of the "traffic jam", but even so, that on-the-spot exit may only become audible if you have your "car radio" on, and you may have run across previous scenarios where God was making evident to you that your "car radio" was off, meaning that you will be held accountable if you do not hear the way to escape on your radio. In other words, you will not be allowed to say, "Lord, how can you blame me? I did not know. Didn't you notice that my radio was off, Lord??", for the Lord will respond, "Yes, I noticed it was off, and I kept warning you, but you kept ignoring Me, so you have no excuse." Temporary insanity is not a valid plea if you were warned about your temporary insanity before you fell into it.

As a side note before proceeding, it is worth noting how Peter fell asleep when the Lord was asking him to stay awake and how he leapt into action (to chop off Malchus' ear) right after Yeshua told them to "sleep now and take rest" (Matthew 26:45). Peter was even allowed to hear Yeshua telling the Judas crowd that He could summon 12 legions of angels to rescue Him but was not doing so because Scripture had to be fulfilled (Matthew 26:53-54). In other words, when Yeshua was asking him to act, he rested, and, when He was asking him to rest, he acted, thereby evidencing one of the fundamental flaws in Simon Peter's soul: his reliance on the "two swords", i.e. the sword of physical resources and the sword of emotional resources, instead of relying on the 3rd sword, the sword of the Spirit. This is why he was unable to fight the invisible enemy that was hovering in the atmosphere when all of this unfolded, and this is why the Spirit of God narrates the following in the Gospel of Luke immediately before narrating the events in the Garden of Gethsemane:

"35 And he said unto them, When I sent you without purse, and scrip, and shoes, lacked ye any thing? And they said, Nothing. 36 Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one. 37 For I say unto you, that this that is written must yet be accomplished in me, And he was reckoned among the transgressors: for the things concerning me have an end. 38 And they said, Lord, behold, here are two swords. And he said unto them, It is enough." (Luke 22:35-38)

Peter heard the Lord's words above shortly before Gethsemane, and he even heard Yeshua's frustrated "It's enough" response, yet he was unable to discern that, strong an evangelist as he was, he would not be the conqueror he was meant to be unless he stopped relying on those two swords. The other sword Yeshua was referring to seemed incomprehensible, and even non-sensical to him. He did not understand what it was, he saw no need for it, and he had no idea what "garment" he had to sell in order to buy it. This is why he grabbed the sword and chopped off Malchus' ear, and this is why, instead of "resting", he followed Yeshua from a distance after He was arrested, unconvinced that Yeshua was not meant to come out of this conundrum without dying in apparent defeat at the hands of the Romans. He wanted to be part of some last-minute, miraculous victory over the Roman army if it was going to happen, and he wanted to be remembered for all time as the only disciple who had stood by the Lord in His moment of darkness, the only disciple who was "there" to help Him triumph over the Romans and the Jews. However, because he did not heed the "way to escape" that God had prepared for him, he instead became entangled in one of the most publicised failures in history, his 3 denials of the Lord.

Fellow believer, this writer does not know with certainty whether Peter was supposed to have followed the Lord from a distance after His arrest. However, I can say with certainty that, had Peter embraced God's preparatory words and time before everything unfolded, he would have known exactly what to say to the 3 people who confronted him about being one of Yeshua's disciples. All that time before Yeshua's arrest, Simon Peter had been unwilling to understand Yeshua's need to die in prophetic sacrifice, meaning that he was still not open to the prophetic operations of the Spirit. Had he been open to them, he would have allowed God to inject prophetically creative answers into his heart and mind as he was hounded by Yeshua's enemies that day, baffling and confronting them, keeping him safe from being physically assaulted by the crowd without having to compromise his principles or deny the Lord (consider, for example, how often Yeshua would utter responses that would baffle his enemies even when they seemed on the verge of trapping and killing Him before His appointed time). Such prophetic answers, however, require fine-tuning your prophetic ear ahead of time, and God will, as stated in 1 Corinthians 10:13, give you ample time and opportunities to perform such fine-tuning before the crucial moment finally arises.

Words for sea-fearers

As you may know, Simon Peter's 3 denials are not the only thing that he is famous for. He is also known as the only disciple (or, at least, the only disciple explicitly reported in Scripture) to have walked on the sea just as Yeshua had:

"22 And straightway Jesus constrained his disciples to get into a ship, and to go before him unto the other side, while he sent the multitudes away. 23 And when he had sent the multitudes away, he went up into a mountain apart to pray: and when the evening was come, he was there alone. 24 But the ship was now in the midst of the sea, tossed with waves: for the wind was contrary. 25 And in the fourth watch of the night Jesus went unto them, walking on the sea. 26 And when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, It is a spirit; and they cried out for fear. 27 But straightway Jesus spake unto them, saying, Be of good cheer; it is I; be not afraid. 28 And Peter answered him and said, Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water. 29 And he said, Come. And when Peter was come down out of the ship, he walked on the water, to go to Jesus. 30 But when he saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me. 31 And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him, and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt? 32 And when they were come into the ship, the wind ceased. 33 Then they that were in the ship came and worshipped him, saying, Of a truth thou art the Son of God." (Matthew 14:22-33)

Notice that, just as was the case outside the palace during Yeshua's arrest, the fear that Peter experienced whilst on the water did not have an "imaginary" source. Just as the risk of arrest and death was real outside the palace, the wind that was blowing on Peter's face was real, and the water that the wind began to splash around him was all too real. Peter was "defying" the law of gravity at that time, being held up on the water by a power that he could barely comprehend, a power whose duration he did not know (for he did not know where that power came from). The danger around him was very real, yet God was expecting him to overcome that fear and the real danger behind it. However, as indicated in verse 30 above, Simon Peter was unable to overcome the fear. As a result, the danger he feared began to materialise, and he began to sink (to a dire death by drowning, it seemed) before the Lord rescued him.

Notice that Yeshua's reaction when Peter began to sink was to "immediately" stretch forth His hand and catch him (v31). In other words, Yeshua did not let Peter splash around in panic for a few seconds, chuckling uncontrollably at Peter's ineptitude before lifting him out of danger. His reaction was one of immediate concern, responding very quickly to Peter's precarious condition in order to immediately separate him from any danger. Thus, it was very clear that Peter really did not have anything to worry about. Yeshua was lovingly looking after him with every step that he took, real and threatening as the danger around him was. Even so, the fact that Yeshua chided him for his "little faith" (v31) shows that God was holding Peter accountable for what he had done (or not done). In other words, this incident was not a mere "test run", meaning that, as per 1 Corinthians 10:13, Peter had been given "a way to escape" the state of fear that he fell into at that moment. However, just as happened at Gethsemane, Peter had not fully heeded the preparation that God had granted him, for which reason he only had a partial victory over the sea that night.

The question then becomes, What preparation did Peter receive in order to escape from fear that night on the sea? The answer lies in the chapter in Matthew that immediately precedes the narration of the "sea incident", i.e. Matthew 13. In that chapter, Yeshua spoke various words intended to prepare Peter's heart for his big "sea walking" moment. We shall meditate on some of those words in the rest of this posting.

"1 The same day went Jesus out of the house, and sat by the sea side. 2 And great multitudes were gathered together unto him, so that he went into a ship, and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore." (Matthew 13:1-2)

Notice that Matthew 13 starts with Yeshua going towards the sea and sitting by it, meaning that everything that He would say from there was with the sea as a backdrop, thereby indicating that it would all somehow be related to the sea and to dealing with it. Notice also that, as the multitudes gathered around Him, He then went into a ship and sat, meaning that He went into the sea as the crowd that listened to Him stood on the shore. Therefore, we can infer that everything Yeshua was about to teach them was related to how to step out of the safety of solid "land" and into the "uncertainty" of liquid "sea".

The parable to understand parables

After sitting in the ship on the sea, the Lord spoke the well-known parable of the sower:

"3 And he spake many things unto them in parables, saying, Behold, a sower went forth to sow; 4 And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up: 5 Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth: 6 And when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. 7 And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them: 8 But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold. 9 Who hath ears to hear, let him hear." (Matthew 13:3-9)

Notice that verse 3 emphasises that He spoke many things unto that crowd at the edge of the sea "in parables", as opposed to speaking in "direct" terms. Thus, the Spirit of God is declaring that, to be prepared for the test or trial (as per 1 Corinthians 10:13), we must be willing to listen in the Spirit and receive the "preparation material" in a "format" or "packaging" that will not be "obvious" to the natural mind. In other words, the preparation material will go "over our heads" and we will miss it if we are expecting it in a blunt, "in-your-face", no-thinking-required format. This is why the soul cannot overcome trials and temptations, especially the stronger ones, for the preparation material is accessible only in the Spirit. Therefore, we must be determined to keep our ears open for the subtle hints and words that the Spirit of God will direct at us through various circumstances and events to prepare us for the trials and temptations ahead. At the end of the day, it is all a matter of disposition. If your heart is constantly looking up towards God, He will ensure that you will hear His "parables" and understand them. If you fall asleep instead, the "parable" will go over your head, even if you are immersed in the middle of it, just like the people standing at the sea shore that day who heard Yeshua's parables and left the shore as clueless as when they arrived, all because they were expecting things to be spoon-fed to them in a way that their natural souls could understand (without having to rise to the level of the Spirit).

Too proud to care

Interestingly enough, it can be said that the first parable that Yeshua spoke to the crowd that day was a parable on how to ensure that you do not miss the meaning of the parables that God "throws" your way. The seed that fell by the wayside refers to the "parables" that God throws at a heart that is simply not interested in anything that the Spirit of God has to say. Being non-receptive (by disposition and deliberate choice), such a heart is too hardened to absorb anything that God sends its way, so it has no soil that can take in the seed and let it take root in any way. As a result, the birds come and devour the unabsorbed seed. This means that, when your heart disregards the words that God sends your way, you empower the spirits of the air. Why? Because, had you absorbed those words, you would have been empowered to defeat them. With you absent from the battle, the spirits of the air can win by default and either preserve the dominion they would have lost at your hands or gain new dominion that would have been yours for the taking in Him.

Notice that the main problem with the "wayside" soul is the will. In other words, such a soul has chosen not to care, meaning that the problem lies in the heart per se, for that is where the will resides. As we have shared before, the evil spirit most directly related to the heart is the Amorite spirit, which is the spirit of kingly pride and self-exaltation. Thus, the "wayside" soul is the soul that has decided that it is the king of its own life and that therefore sets out to care after its kingdom and its kingdom only, with no interest in the expansion of God's Kingdom on Earth.

Too emotional to endure

The seed that "fell upon stony places" refers to the "parables" thrown by God at souls that are willing to receive His words but that are too ruled by their emotions to embrace the process required to have His words produce the intended fruit. As declared by Yeshua when He explained the parable to His disciples in private (Matthew 13:18-23), the "stony place" souls do receive God's logos word (Matthew 13:20) with joy, but, when they realise that it is a word laden with judgement process (and, hence, with some potential growing pains), their emotion-centric acceptance of God's word vanishes, like water vapourised by the hot Sun of Righteousness. That is when they quickly tune God out and abort the process that they had allowed into their hearts when they embraced God's logos word at the beginning.

From the above, we can conclude that the "stony places" refer to souls that are not friendly to God's judgements, meaning that they are influenced by the Canaanite spirit, since that is the spirit most prone to hating His Spirit judgements. As we have shared before, Canaanites focus more on emotionalism than on the mind, and they are more focused on "pleasing" than on doing what is right, meaning that they lean towards pleasant emotions and resent anything that produces unpleasant emotions, making them very impatient with words that involve growing pains. This is why Canaanite "stony-place" souls will be quick to drop out of any "preparation course" from God that requires too much pain or effort, enthusiastic as they may have been when they initially enrolled in it.

Interestingly, the phrase "stony places" in verse 5 was translated from the Greek word petrodes, which is derived from the Greek words petra meaning "rock" and eidos meaning "shape, appearance". Thus, we can say that "stony places" refers to something having the "shape of a rock" or that looks externally like a rock. This subtly points to Peter himself, since, as you may have discerned, the name that Yeshua gave to Simon, i.e. Peter, is derived from the Greek word petra meaning rock. In other words, had Simon Peter been spiritually attentive, he would have perceived that the part of the parable about "stony places" was referring directly to him. The fact that petrodes literally means "having the shape/appearance of a rock" points to people who appear to be rock-solid strong on the outside but who are, in truth, weak on the inside. This again points to Simon Peter, who relied on his natural, evangelistic strength without realising that such a strength was not enough to apostolically endure through the spiritual trials needed to complete the race.

Too mental to fly

As Yeshua explained to the disciples a little afterwards (Matthew 13:22), the "thorny" soil refers to souls obsessed with matters of the natural, visible world and that are easily deceived by its tangible pursuits. Thus, they are souls gripped by the Girgashite spirit, since that is the spirit that prompts people to focus on the natural, visible realm. Interestingly, the phrase "sprung up" in the phrase "the thorns sprang up and choked them" of verse 7 was slightly mistranslated from the Greek verb anabaino, which is often translated as "go up". This means that, once you are caught up in the natural realm and its pursuits, the natural realm will (like a force of nature) actively go out of its way to pursue you and drown out any possibility of you heeding the things of the Spirit. The Girgashite spirit causes you to fall asleep spiritually, even if you appear to be moving to and fro in the natural. And, when you fall asleep spiritually, you remain inert and become easy prey for the active forces in the natural realm. You are then swallowed up by the Earth's Girgashite soil and become unable to fly prophetically. You become engrossed in minuteae, but you also become unable to see the big picture of what is going on. Missing the forest for the trees, you cannot look towards the future and foresee what is coming.

It is also interesting that, when Yeshua explains the thorny soil to His disciples, He speaks of the "care" of this age (mistranslated as "world"). In Matthew 13:22, the Spirit of God uses the Greek word merimna to refer to "care", a word that is derived from the Greek verb merizo meaning "to divide, separate". This means that the Girgashite spirit will work to distract you, like a child lured by a rattler, preventing you hearing the words of the Spirit and preparing for the test/temptation lying ahead.

A recap of the 3 bad soils

As we shared above, the first "soil", the "wayside soil", represents an Amorite heart that is too busy forging its own kingdom on Earth to be worried about God's Kingdom. This means that such "soils", or souls, are quick to engage in warfare against evangelists. This is due to the fact that, as we have shared before, true evangelists are warriors who expand God's Kingship on Earth, meaning that they will quickly collide with Amorite kingdoms in their expansion path, since those kingdoms endeavour to remain independent and uncontrolled by the God of Truth. Hence, the "antidote" to being a "wayside soil" is to simply turn your heart against the "independent-kingdom" Amorite spirit and towards an evangelistic attitude bent on conquering the Earth unto the God of Truth. This will immediately turn you into the wayside souls' enemy, but it is the only way to open your heart towards the "parables" and the "preparation material" that the Lord God of Israel will send your way.

On the other hand, the second soil, the "stony-places soil", represents a Canaanite soul that is willing to embrace God's Kingship (hence the initial joy upon receiving God's word) but that is reluctant to embrace apostolic judgements because of the pain they may cause. Due to their emotion-centric attitude, whatever is pleasing and comforting becomes more important to them than what is real and true, which slowly turns them into vicious enemies of anyone who promotes apostolic judgements. Hence, the "antidote" to being a "stony-places soil" is a soul that embraces apostolic judgements and stands against Canaanite attitudes that favour "social emotionalism" and pain avoidance over truth-revealing and truth-developing judgements. This will allow the "parables" and "preparation material" that God throws your way to take root and grow without withering at the first obstacle. You will not absorb God's "preparation material" unless you are willing for it to expose weaknesses in you and issues around you that need to be addressed and prepared for. It pained Simon Peter to think that he could not rely on his brute strength and charisma to bowl over Yeshua's enemies, so he suppressed that reality every time Yeshua exposed it through His words, causing Simon to miss the opportunity to overcome the enemy on the night of his 3 betrayals.

By contrast, the third soil, the "thorny soil", represents a Girgashite soul that is also willing to embrace God's Kingship in some way but is too entangled by the natural realm and what its mind can perceive to actually discern the invisible things of the Spirit. Hence, the "antidote" to being a "thorny soil" is a soul that embraces the prophetic and stands against Girgashite paradigms that glorify methodology and dismiss the invisible as irrelevant or inefficient. This will allow the soul to fly above the natural realm, out of the reach of the thorns that will try to reach up and trap it, allowing the soul to hear the unusual "parables" and "preparation material" that will be sent its way.

Type of "soil"	Hindering spirit	Main flaw	Affected soul part	Antidote endowment
Wayside	Amorite	Seeking own kingdom	Proud heart	Evangelist
Stony places	Canaanite	Emotionalist pain avoidance	Weak emotions	Apostle
Thorny	Girgashite	Trapped in natural realm	Stagnated mind	Prophet

Notice that the 3 evil spirits in the table above correspond to the vertices in the triangle of evil that we have studied before:

This means that these 3 spirits broadly encompass the entire triangle of evil, acting as its "pivot points". Notice also that the Canaanite and Girgashite spirits are the distortion of the 2 "female" ministries of (Canaanite) pastor and (Girgashite) teacher. Given that these 2 distorted ministries endeavour to establish a "kingship" of the soul over the Spirit, it is fitting that the other spirit, the Amorite spirit, is the one that endeavours to establish kingdoms that are independent of God, the Father of Spirits. Thus, we can say that the pastoral matriarchy, the spirit of the first beast, is the one responsible for turning the souls of men into "wayside places", "stony places", and "thorny places" where God's parables and "preparation material" cannot thrive, leading to falls later on when the test/temptation comes.

Grading of the good soil

As indicated at the end of the Matthew 13:3-9 passage above, the good soil brings forth fruit, some 100-fold, some 60-fold, some 30-fold. As we have shared in detail before, these 3 levels of fruitfulness indicated by the Lord point to an apostolic foundation of "30", an additional prophetic foundation that adds 30 more to reach "60", and an evangelistic expansion that adds 40 more to reach "100". This writer believes that every "parable" or "preparation material" that God sends our way is intended to produce "100-fold" fruit, but it is possible for us to only reap a partial benefit from it. If our souls are apostolically and prophetically sound, they may still not reach the "100" mark (staying at "60") because they are not fully aware of the evangelistic Kingdom expansion capabilities of what has been reaped. Said another way, if our souls are not yet fully inclined towards evangelistic expansion (due to matriarchal indoctrination or lack of maturity), we may miss the "expansion" opportunities afforded when we pass the test. A fully mature believer will always have a carpe diem attitude, rapidly seizing every opportunity to expand God's Kingship on Earth the way that a great striker in football (a.k.a. "soccer") does not forgive the defence when they make a tiny mistake and scores a goal, or when an (American) football running back bursts through a tiny lane that opens up in the line of scrimmage to streak downfield for a touchdown.

By the same token, our souls may be apostolically sound but still not mature or willing enough to fully embrace the prophetic, leading to a "30" fruit that overcomes any Canaanite hatred of pain and judgements but which does not prophetically fly high enough to break Girgashite paradigms and create new things in the Spirit when facing our test/temptation. In the same way, our souls may be prophetically sound but still not mature or willing enough to enforce apostolic justice and break all the Canaanite emotional binds that could have been broken when facing our test/temptation.

Lingering issues

After narrating the parable of the sower and explaining it to His close disciples, Yeshua narrates another parable:

"24 Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: 25 But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way. 26 But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. 27 So the servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares? 28 He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? 29 But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn." (Matthew 13:24-30)

Notice that the parable of the sower, in and of itself, speaks of sowing seeds in general. Naturally, the main intent is to illustrate the factors that can affect our receptiveness to God's words and hinder us from producing the desired fruit. However, the parable itself illustrates spiritual patterns that affect our receptiveness to any type of seed. Thus, it also speaks of how receptive or unreceptive we may be to the enemy's words. We shall be as "wayside soil" to the enemy's seeds if our hearts are intent on forging God's Kingdom rather than the enemy's or our own. We shall be as "stony places" to the enemy's seeds if our hearts are quick to apostolically realise the long-term pain and loss that results from allowing the enemy's seed to take root. And we shall be as "thorny places" if our souls are prophetically distracted from events in the natural realm by the invisible things of the Spirit. Therefore, when the enemy's seeds were successfully sown in the above parable, it was because the soul in question was not "wayside" enough, or "stony" enough, or "thorny" enough to prevent those seeds taking deep root. Thus, the Lord is indicating how our souls can potentially be receptive to both God's and the enemy's seeds, causing them to grow side by side in our souls.

Notice that Yeshua emphasises the fact that the enemy's seed was sown "while men slept" (v25). Interestingly, the word "slept" was translated from the same Greek verb, katheudo, as the word used to describe Peter and the disciples sleeping in the Garden of Gethsemane in Matthew 26:43. This emphasises the fact that the enemy's seed is successfully sown when we are "sleeping" instead of preparing for the test/temptations ahead. If the disposition of our hearts is right, we will allow God to prepare us for any and all tests or attacks from the enemy, and the enemy will never be able to sow any seeds into our hearts. It requires a wilful decision on our part to "sleep" and not "study" our preparation "parables" before the enemy can successfully sow its tares.

The question then becomes, What does it mean that God's wheat and the enemy's tares will grow side by side until the harvest? In the context of an individual soul and the temptations/trials it is to face, it means that certain aspects of our lives will remain more difficult or complicated until the time when the tares can be separated from the wheat and destroyed without harming the wheat. Said another way, we will be facing trials/temptations that will be more difficult than originally needed because of the "weakening" effect brought on our souls by the tares that will be sapping nutrients and spiritual resources that would have otherwise gone to develop and strengthen the wheat.

It can also be said that the tares' successful sowing reveals an area of weakness, a vulnerability that remains with a potential to grow enough to destroy our calling. Therefore, even if we eventually regret and repent of the tares in our hearts, we are forced to endure through the extra difficulties that those tares will produce in our lives because the removal of those difficulties would allow that vulnerability to be exploited by the enemy, leading our soul down a degradation path that would culminate with the good potential in us being destroyed. For example, if a person has a vulnerability towards pride and self-exaltation, he or she may at some point allow a seed of pride to be sown into his or her heart. If that soul has good qualities and is receptive to the words of God, that seed of pride will end up growing alongside the good seeds that God has successfully sown in it. If there is enough good potential in that soul, the Lord may allow that seed of pride to start producing a minor disability in that person, a disability that will make that soul's life more complicated and increase the difficulty of the trials and temptations it must face. Because of that minor disability, the person will be more prone to accepting his or her "lowliness", making the person less susceptible to being deceitfully overwhelmed by pride that would engulf his or her good potential and destroy it utterly. However, all of this will imply tests and trials that will be more difficult to endure and overcome, but the Lord will still provide a way out if the Amorite-tares soul is willing to overcome.

By the same token, a soul with a vulnerability towards social communion may at some point allow a seed of Canaanite emotionalism and anti-judgement to be sown in its heart. If that soul has good qualities and is receptive to the words of God, that Canaanite seed will end up growing alongside God's good seeds. If the soul has enough good potential, the Lord may allow that Canaanite seed to start producing a physical impediment that will create unpleasantness and make it more difficult for that soul to socialise with others. Because of the impediment, the person will be less susceptible to the allures of Canaanite fellowship that would engulf that soul's good potential and destroy it utterly. However, all of this will imply tests and trials that will be more difficult to endure and overcome, but the Lord will still provide a way out if the Canaanite-tares soul is willing to endure.

In the same way, a soul with a vulnerability towards the visible realm may at some point allow a Girgashite seed of materialism and agnosticism to be sown in its heart. If that soul has good qualities and is receptive to the words of God, that Girgashite seed will end up growing alongside God's good seeds. If the soul has enough good potential, the Lord may allow that Girgashite seed to start producing financial failures and limitations that will prevent it focusing on material acquisition and will stop it from increasingly relying on strength from natural things. However, all of this will imply tests and trials that will be more difficult to detect and outmaoeuvre, but the Lord will still provide a way out if the Girgashite-tares soul is willing to listen and learn.

The small clues

After the parable of the wheat and the tares, Yeshua narrates the following parable:

"31 Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field: 32 Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof." (Matthew 13:31-32)

In the context of trials and temptations, this parable speaks of how the smallest of "preparatory lessons" can have a significant effect on your growth and on your victory over trials and temptations. Thus, to miss and/or dismiss small preparatory "parables" that are cast your way is to deny yourself future growth and spiritual expansion.

As we have shared before, the smallness of the mustard seed points to the apostolic tendency to see the value in small things, which leads it to constantly use induction to derive general principles and truths from small particulars. This means that, to avoid missing or dismissing God's small preparatory "parables", one must apostolically embrace the value of small things, constantly deriving large truths from them the way that a grain of sand is processed into a precious pearl. And, as we have also shared before, the mustard seed itself points to the sting of the prophetic anointing, which speaks of an incisive spirit that breaks through the surface like a knife to make visible what cannot be seen with the natural eye. This means that we must prophetically peer through the surface and discern the hidden meaning (or treasure) of the small things transpiring before us.

Notice that Yeshua speaks of "birds of the air" coming to lodge in the mustard tree's branches once the seed has grown into a tree. To better understand the meaning of this, we must consider the first time where the Greek words for "birds", peteinon, and "air", ouranos, are used in Scripture, translated as "fowls" and "air" respectively:

"Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?" (Matthew 6:26)

Notice that the Lord Yeshua speaks of the "birds of the air" not sowing, reaping, or gathering, yet being fed. Therefore, the "birds of the air" lodging in the mustard tree's branches speak of the people who will be blessed by you allowing God's preparatory parables to be sown and grow in you. In other words, it will not only be you who are prepared for the coming trials/temptations, it will also be others who will come afterwards and receive a direct impartation of the same preparation that you reaped. They will benefit from specific branches spreading out from the tree that grows in you, but without having to go through the process that you went through.

The expanding words

"33 Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened. 34 All these things spake Jesus unto the multitude in parables; and without a parable spake he not unto them: 35 That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world." (Matthew 13:33-35)

To better understand the meaning of the parable of the leaven, we must consider the word "hid" in verse 33 above, which was translated from the Greek verb egkrypto, which is itself derived from the words en meaning "in" and krypto meaning "to hide". In other words, the word "hid" was translated from a Greek verb that could literally be translated as "encrypt" and has a connotation not only of hiding but also embedding something within something else. Interestingly, the only other appearance of egkrypto in Scripture is in Luke 13:21, in the parallel narration of the same parable in the Gospel of Luke, meaning that the Spirit of God made sure to link this concept of "encryption" or "embedded hiding" only with the "heavenly leaven" of this parable.

It is also interesting to consider that the root verb krypto appears later in Matthew 13, in verse 44, when referring to a treasure hidden in a field. Therefore, we can say that the word egkrypto used in verse 33 has the connotation of embedding out of sight something that is considered precious. This means that, in the context of God's "preparatory material", the parable of the leaven speaks of a soul that treats that material as precious and embeds it deep within itself so that it will take hold.

As we have shared before, the soul is spiritually "female" and "weaker", whereas the spirit is "male" and "stronger". Therefore, the fact that Yeshua speaks of a woman, as opposed to a man, hiding the leaven emphasises that it is a soul doing this in a state of weakness. This means that, even if God's "preparatory material" seems too "strong" or "complex" for the soul to handle in its current state, it can still take in the material and allow it to do an active work of its own, even if the soul remains "passive" on the outside. Leaven has a life of its own, and it expands through the mass rapidly and proactively without the need for outside intervention. It only needs to be allowed a point of access, a point of entry so that it can do its work, and the deeper (or more centralised) that access is, the more efficient its expansion can be.

As many of you may know, leaven is usually used in a negative context in Scripture, but it is clear from Yeshua's words in verse 33 that the leaven is equated with the kingdom of heaven, meaning that it must be taken in a positive context. The fact that leaven is otherwise used in a negative context emphasises the Kingdom of Heaven's appearance to the "soul world". In the matriarchal world of "female souls", the Kingdom of God is like a dangerous and "unholy" leaven that must be kept out at all costs, for it has the power to "infect" and undermine its Canaanite ideologies and Girgashite mindsets.

As you may have already discerned, the 3 measures of "meal" refer to the 3 parts of the soul, i.e. the heart, the emotions, and the mind. This means that the "leaven" of God's preparatory material will operate on the will in your heart, on your emotions, and on your mental understanding to ensure that you are ready for the upcoming trial/temptation. The 3 measures also point to the 3 "male" ministry endowments, meaning that your mind will be prepared with the necessary apostolic judgements, your emotions will be prepared with the necessary prophetic flow, and your heart will be prepared with the necessary evangelistic, conquering will to successfully overcome the trial/temptation.

Notice that, immediately after narrating the parable of the leaven, the Spirit of God declares in verses 34 and 35 that Yeshua only spoke to the multitude in parables to fulfil the prophetic declaration that He would open His mouth in parables and utter things that have been kept secret from the foundation of the (matriarchal) kosmos (Genesis 3:24). This is to emphasise the "cryptic" nature of God's transformative words. If your ears are only open to direct and literal words or to words that appeal directly to your emotions, you will only be open to uni-dimensional, or at best, bi-dimensional words that will have a very limited application (as when you learn the recipe for a dish that you will only need to prepare once in your life). On the other hand, if you are open to God's fractal, 3-dimensional words, your mind and your emotions may initially be unable to fully discern the meaning behind the words, but the deepest parts of your soul (in your heart) that are closest to your spirit will begin to resonate with the Lord's intended message. And, since those words will have a life of their own, they will begin to do a work that will spread through your soul, expanding your mental understanding, your emotional depth, and the texture of your will. Sadly, the vast majority of believers in the Church prefer one- or bi-dimensional words, which is why sites such as this one are so ignored and disdained, and it is why the Church, as it stands at the time of this writing, remains a spiritual cemetery incapable of stopping the onslaught of the enemy across the Earth, for the Church spends more time and effort attacking and suppressing those who bear God's fractal words than they do attacking God's enemies. The matriarchal Church is a million times more afraid of God's remnant than they will ever be of the God-less world, for they know that they can "survive" the God-less world by simply caving to it whenever it is "necessary". By contrast, God's remnant are steely in nature, and they will not accept anything short of the full surrender of the pastoral system to the God of Israel.

The treasure and the field

After the parable of the mustard seed, Matthew 13 narrates Yeshua sharing the following parable:

"Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field; the which when a man hath found, he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field" (Matthew 13:44)

To better understand the message behind this parable, we must endeavour to ask the questions that naturally arise but are suppressed by our fear of asking the "obvious". If the man found the hidden treasure, why didn't he simply take it with him and go home? Why hide it back in the field and then buy the entire field? It seems, therefore, that the treasure is somehow tied to the field, and that it was not possible for the man to simply take the treasure with him and go away. It is also evident that the man did not own the field, which may explain why he could not simply walk away with the treasure, possibly because the treasure technically belonged to whomever owned the field. We can say, therefore, that separating the treasure from the field would have delegitimised the treasure in some way or in some form denied its nature. This then leads to the question, What does the field itself represent?

Prior to the parable of the hidden treasure, Matthew 13 narrates Yeshua's high-level explanation of the parable of the wheats and the tares. There, Yeshua declares that the field (of the wheat and the tares) represents the "world" (Matthew 13:38), where the word "world" was translated from the Greek noun kosmos. As we have shared before, the word kosmos refers to the matriarchal system that has taken hold of human affairs. Thus, the treasure in the field refers to the valuable things that are present in the midst of the matriarchal system but whose value the matriarchal system is unable to discern. In part, the matriarchal system's inability to discern the treasure's value protects it from being misused or destroyed. However, when the treasure's value is discerned by someone who is not trapped by the system, the treasure becomes vulnerable to being discerned by those in the matriarchal system as well (for good and bad humanity are intertwined, like the wheats and the tares), for which reason the man needs to hide the treasure again to protect it from being detected and manipulated by the system. However, the treasure is not to remain hidden forever, for it is valuable and it needs to be unearthed and manifested. Unfortunately, this requires paying a price, which is why the man sells all that he had to buy the field.

Notice that the man had to buy the entire field in order to unearth and manifest the treasure. This means that the treasure cannot be properly manifested until the entire system that forces it to be hidden is dethroned. God's deeper treasures cannot be unearthed and made to "peacefully coexist" with the matriarchal system, for the pastoral matriarchy is against God and God is against the pastoral matriarchy. The soul system must first be dismantled, meaning that the battle must be carried out against the entire system. The believers who stubbornly refuse to understand this will never enter into the Kingdom of Heaven or share in the deeper treasures of God. You cannot honour the Church's pastoral system and truly claim that you value the deeper things of God. In other words, to honour the Church's pastoral system is to evidence before God that your love for Him is superficial and that you cannot look beneath the surface and discern the valuable treasures of God.

When considered in the context of God's "preparatory material", we can say that the parable of the hidden treasure once again points to the fact that we will miss His material if we are satisfied with a superficial perception of the things happening around us. Because the parable focuses on seeing beyond the naturally visible, we can say that it emphasises the need to move in the prophetic endowment, since that is the endowment that allows us to see beyond the natural and into what is operating in the spirit realm. This also means that this parable speaks of going against the Girgashite spirit that focuses on what is naturally visible and on staying on safe routines and avoiding any thinking that goes outside the box.

This connection to the Girgashite spirit is emphasised by the description of the one who found the hidden treasure. In verse 44, the person is described as a "man", which was translated from the Greek word anthropos. As we have shared before, the word anthropos points to one's natural humanity and earthly weakness, meaning that it refers to the part of us that is most vulnerable to embracing the Girgashite spirit of natural understanding and focus on the naturally visible. Thus, the parable of the hidden treasure speaks of how we must overcome our natural inclination towards Girgashite earthliness in order to prophetically perceive the valuable but invisible preparatory material that God will send our way, making the necessary sacrifices to make that material ours, even when those sacrifices may make no sense to those who only perceive the visible (as when the man's friends may have wondered why he spent so much on a field that did not appear to have anything valuable in it).

The fact that the man bought the field and not the treasure directly also emphasises the fact that he understood that he was investing in something in order to receive something else that is embedded in it. This points to the concept of sowing and reaping, which, as we have shared before, is intimately connected to the prophetic endowment, which prompts people to invest in things so as to obtain returns that will come in the future.

The word "goeth" in the phrase "goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field" of verse 44 was translated from the Greek verb hypago, which is derived from the Greek prefix hypo meaning "under" and the verb ago meaning "to lead, to bring". Thus, hypago has the connotation of someone who carries himself to a new place, being under a burden as he does. This once again correlates with the prophetic endowment, which is the endowment that prompts us to carry emotional burdens, as evidenced by multiple passages such as Isaiah 13:1, Isaiah 23:1, Jeremiah 23:33 and Malachi 1:1 that refer to prophetic words from God as "burdens" in the prophets who receive them and relay them to others. Thus, the parable of the hidden treasure speaks of a person who prophetically values the invisible treasure and allows that treasure to become a prophetic "burden" that he or she gladly carries in his soul until the treasure and its value can be fully manifested. This is the attitude that will allow you to recognise and "harvest" the prophetic "preparation material" that God will send your way.

The word "selleth" in the phrase "goeth and selleth all that he hath" of verse 44 was translated from the Greek verb poleo. Interestingly, poleo's first appearance in Scripture (right before its second appearance in verse 44) is in verse 29 of the following passage, translated as "sold":

"28 And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. 29 Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. 30 But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 31 Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows." (Matthew 10:28-31)

Notice that poleo is used in the context of selling 2 animals, as opposed to selling inanimate objects. As we have shared before, animals have souls, which indicates that poleo in Matthew 13:44 is related to the concept of giving away part of one's soul as a prophetic libation in order to "harvest" the invisible treasure that God has laid in our path.

The precious pearl

Immediately after the parable of the hidden treasure, Yeshua narrates the following parable:

"45 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls: 46 Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it." (Matthew 13:45-46)

As we have shared before, pearls point to apostolic wisdom and to the precious things that can develop from "small" things (as when a pearl is developed from a simple grain of sand). Therefore, this parable speaks of how we must be apostolically aware of the value of the small things, the small clues around us, and it speaks of how, if we treasure these small things, they can develop from "simple" things to profound wisdom that will prepare us for the coming trial/temptation.

Notice that the Lord does not refer to the person who found the pearl simply as a "man" (or anthropos in Greek). Instead, He refers to him as a "merchant man", which was translated from the Greek words emporos, meaning "merchant" and anthropos, meaning "man". Interestingly, the word emporos is only used 5 times in Scripture, and, outside of Matthew 13:45 above, all those appearances are in Revelation chapter 18 when speaking of the fall of Babylon. As we have shared before, Babylon is a figure of the pastoral matriarchy that has dominated the Church and the world, meaning that it points to the unlawful dominance of the pastoral endowment, which, when corrupted, turns into the Canaanite spirit.

Thus, it is no coincidence that the word for "Canaanite" in Hebrew, kenaani, is derived from the Hebrew noun kenaan, which in the King James Version is translated as "merchant" 5 times (in Isaiah 23:8, Isaiah 23:11, Ezekiel 17:4, Hosea 12:7, and Zephaniah 1:11) and as "traffickers" or "traffick" twice (in Isaiah 23:8 and Ezekiel 17:4). This connection between "trading" and Canaanites points to how the Canaanite spirit pressures people to constantly "please" each other, even if it means compromising one's core principles. This leads to a constant trading of "pleasantries" (literally and figuratively), and, slowly, those amongst them who are more cunning at the art of trading begin to submit the rest under them. Through their trading, these more cunning merchants entangle the rest in their spider webs of soul obligations obtained from subtly inequitable trades.

"3 For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, your tongue hath muttered perverseness. 4 None calleth for justice, nor any pleadeth for truth: they trust in vanity, and speak lies; they conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity. 5 They hatch cockatrice' eggs, and weave the spider's web: he that eateth of their eggs dieth, and that which is crushed breaketh out into a viper. 6 Their webs shall not become garments, neither shall they cover themselves with their works: their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands. 7 Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; wasting and destruction are in their paths. 8 The way of peace they know not; and there is no judgment in their goings: they have made them crooked paths: whosoever goeth therein shall not know peace." (Isaiah 59:3-8)

Notice that verse 46 declares that the merchant "went" and sold all that he had in order to buy the pearls, whereas verse 44 declares that the man "goeth" to sell all that he had to buy the field. Even though both words are variations of the same verb ("to go") in the KJV translation, they were actually translated from different verbs in the original Greek text. Whereas "goeth" was translated from the verb hypago (studied above), the word "went" in verse 46 was translated from the Greek verb aperchomai, which is derived from the prefix apo meaning "from" and erchomai meaning "to come". Hence, aperchomai has a subtle connotation of separation, as when one separates oneself from one place in order to come or arrive at another. This correlates with the apostolic endowment, since that is the endowment most directly related to judgements, meaning that it is the one that prompts you to separate good from evil and to separate yourself from evil when you recognise it somewhere. It is also the endowment most likely to separate yourself from your emotions or feelings so as to do the right thing. Thus, when you apostolically aperchomai to sell "all that you have" in order to buy the pearls of wisdom that you encounter, you will detach yourself emotionally from the things that your soul may hold dear, focusing with your mind on the inherent value of the pearl that has been placed before you, and you will directly go and do the specific things that you need to do to make that pearl of wisdom your own.

The word "selleth" in the phrase "went and sold all that he had" of verse 46 was translated from the Greek verb piprasko. Notice, therefore, that the Spirit of God chose to use one verb for selling in verse 44 (poleo, seen above) and a different verb, piprasko, a mere 2 verses later (just as He did with the words "goeth" and "went"). This is not by happenstance. The verb piprasko is used in 2 of its 9 appearances to refer to someone being sold into slavery (Matthew 18:25 and Romans 7:14, its last appearance). Hence, it has the connotation of "heartlessness" or "cruelty" where you detach yourself emotionally from something as you give it away in exchange for something else. This once again emphasises the emotional detachment that you must apostolically exhibit as you value objective truth over emotional valuations or emotional pain. This is the only way to value and attain the pearls of preparatory wisdom that God will place before you.

As a parenthesis, it is worth mentioning that the verb piprasko is derived from the word peran, which is often translated as "beyond" or "the other side" in the KJV. Hence, it speaks of something that is placed beyond reach so that it can no longer be accessed. This once again points to the use of an apostolic mind that makes a mental decision devoid of emotional influences in order to detach itself from whatever as necessary in order to attain the pearl of wisdom that has been placed before it.

Casting the net

"47 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a net, that was cast into the sea, and gathered of every kind: 48 Which, when it was full, they drew to shore, and sat down, and gathered the good into vessels, but cast the bad away. 49 So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, 50 And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." (Matthew 13:47-50)

Notice that the Lord speaks of casting a net into the sea, which implicitly speaks of people getting on a boat and taking a net with them for the specific purpose of catching fish. Thus, it speaks of people going on an evangelistic quest to conquer new things. This contrasts slightly with the previous 2 parables, where the person seems more to "stumble upon" a valuable thing, as opposed to actively searching for valuable things. It also contrasts with the previous 2 parables in that multiple valuable things are found, as opposed to finding a single thing of great value.

Notice also that the net is cast into a sea that may have both good fish and corrupt fish, meaning that the Spirit of God does not condemn the net being cast into a sea that is not "perfect" and that may contain things with no value at all. This means that there will be times when you will be led by the Spirit to seek out valuable things in "less than ideal" places or places with "issues". You will then be prompted to collect what you can find and pick out the things that are valuable, discarding the things that are not.

In the context of the "preparatory material" that is made available to us before a test/trial, this parable speaks of the need to have an evangelistic heart that is willing to proactively go out and grasp new "material", new levels of understanding without waiting for that "material" or understanding to appear in our path. This parable also speaks of the need to go through potentially flawed sources and the readiness to discern amongst the things you run across, embracing what is good and discarding what is not.

It is worth noting that the word "good" in the phrase "gathered the good into vessels" of verse 48 was translated from the Greek word kalos, which, as we have shared before, refers to prophetic usefulness or potential. Therefore, we are not to expect the material that we must absorb to come in a "pre-packaged" and "completed" state. This means that it will take some prophetic intuition and discernment to determine what material has potential and deserves further meditation and development.

It is also worth noting that the Greek word in the original text used to describe the "bad" fish in verse 48 is sapros, which, interestingly enough, is translated as "corrupt" in the KJV in all the other verses of Scripture where it appears, making one wonder why the KJV translators chose the word "bad" in verse 48 alone. The word sapros is derived from the verb sepo meaning "to rot, to corrupt, to destroy". Thus, it has the connotation of something that is rotten or damaged at its core and is beyond redemption. Hence, as we proactively venture out to find God's preparation material, we must be ready to encounter corrupt things and to have the discernment to discard them. This need to look through things that are both good and corrupt stems from the tares that the enemy has sown amongst the wheat. It is naive to expect that we are to only look through "pure" wheat, and it is spiritually reprehensible to abstain from any evangelistic search out of a self-righteous demand that all places we should search through be "pure" and "pre-filtered" for us.

Teacherly vessels for the prophetically useful

Notice that the Lord speaks of placing the kalos, i.e. the prophetically good fish into "vessels". As we have shared before, vessels or containers are spiritually related to the teacher endowment, which is the endowment most prone to "warehousing" things and organising them into categories for easier reference. This reveals the strong connection between the parables of Matthew 13 and the teacher endowment, meaning that they apply to "learning material" that God makes available to us. The word "vessels" in verse 48 was translated from the Greek word angeion, which, interestingly enough, only appears twice in Scripture, the first time in verse 48 above and the other time in verse 4 of the following passage, where it is also translated as "vessels":

"1 Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. 2 And five of them were wise, and five were foolish. 3 They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them: 4 But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. 5 While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept." (Matthew 25:1-5)

Notice that the passage above refers to people gathering something in preparation for a future event, which correlates with everything we have said here regarding God's "preparation material". Notice also that what is placed into the angeions is oil, which, as we have shared before, is strongly connected to the prophetic anointing. This once again correlates with the kalos, i.e. prophetically useful fish placed into the angeions (by the way, it is worth noting that the passage in Matthew 13 never refers to "fish" explicitly, but we refer to fish here for convenience).

Matriarchally corrupted fish

As a final note, it is worth mentioning that the Lord says that the judgement on the corrupt "fish" shall lead to them "wailing" and "gnashing their teeth" (Matthew 13:50). As we have shared before, the "wailing" points to a strong emotional manifestation and refers to the Canaanite spirit, and the "gnashing of teeth" refers to the Girgashite spirit due to the connection between teeth and the teacher endowment in a positive sense and, hence, to the Girgashite spirit in a negative sense (since Girgashites are "teachers gone bad"). As we have also shared before, judgements expose the nature of things, meaning that, as the corrupt fish are judged, the judgements expose what the Canaanite pastoral and Girgashite teacher spirits have turned them into. As Canaanites, the corrupt fish turn into perpetual "wailers", into perpetual crybabies unable to stand the pain of righteous judgements, crying out in bitter agony at the slightest touch of God's judgement rod. As Girgashites, these corrupt fish turn into "teeth gnashers" who are constantly chewing, i.e. dividing and separating things into their cursed containers of bureaucratic oppression, lashing out at anyone who dares to bring "prophetic disarray" into their structured little world of nothingness. Thus, it is fitting that the corrupt fish, corrupted by the matriarchal spirits of Canaanite pastor and Girgashite teacher, will be sentenced to perpetual wailing and teeth gnashing by the judgement fire released through God's remnant (i.e. His angels). Whereas the distorted "female" ministries corrupt people, the 3 "male" ministries prepare God's people for trials and temptations by prophetically enabling them to find hidden treasures, apostolically enabling them to find precious pearls, and evangelistically enabling them to cast their nets and proactively catch kalos things.

Dutiful scribes

"51 Jesus saith unto them, Have ye understood all these things? They say unto him, Yea, Lord. 52 Then said he unto them, Therefore every scribe which is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old." (Matthew 13:51-52)

Notice how Yeshua asks the audience whether they understood all the parables He just shared, just as a teacher would to his students at the end of a lesson. This once again emphasises the spiritual connection between all these parables and the "learning material" needed before a test/temptation. Notice also that Yeshua speaks of "scribes", which yet again points to the teacher endowment, since scribes were teachers of the Law at the time of Yeshua's earthly ministry. The word "scribe" itself also points to the teacher ministry, since it is translated from the Greek word grammateus, which is derived from the word gramma meaning "letter, document, record". Hence, it has the connotation of someone who transcribes or records something in writing, meaning that it is related to the activity of "remembering things", which points to the teacher endowment's connection to memory and remembering things from the past.

The fact that the Lord describes the scribe as someone "bringing forth things out of his treasure" points to a student who learns things and keeps them in his mental database in order to pull them out and apply them when the circumstances merit it. This yet again emphasises the spiritual connection between the parables of Matthew 13 and the "preparation material" that God makes available to us, material that we must "pull out" and apply as the circumstances arise. As good students know, learnt material cannot be promptly applied "in the field" if it is simply received and stored without giving it a second thought. To be readily applied "in the heat of battle", one must process the material and revisit it as needed until it becomes part of your nature and modus operandi. That is when we can quickly locate it in our "treasure chest" and bring it forth effectively when the test/temptation arises.

The fact that the scribe is described as bringing forth "things new and old" points to how a good student is not satisfied with his current wealth of knowledge but is constantly seeking to expand that knowledge. This is when he becomes prophetically and apostolically receptive to the treasures and pearls that cross his path, whilst also making periodic evangelistic incursions into the sea to catch and store the potentially useful things that fall into his net, discarding the inherently corrupt things that get caught in the net.

The bad students of Nazareth

After Yeshua taught all the previous parables, the Spirit of God narrates that the following happened:

"53 And it came to pass, that when Jesus had finished these parables, he departed thence. 54 And when he was come into his own country, he taught them in their synagogue, insomuch that they were astonished, and said, Whence hath this man this wisdom, and these mighty works? 55 Is not this the carpenter's son? is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren, James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas? 56 And his sisters, are they not all with us? Whence then hath this man all these things? 57 And they were offended in him. But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country, and in his own house. 58 And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief." (Matthew 13:53-58)

Notice that Yeshua is described as "teaching" in the congregation (v54) immediately upon arriving in "His own country" (i.e. Nazareth in the natural). This yet again emphasises the spiritual connection between Matthew 13 and God's "preparation lessons" for us. It is worth noting that the constant reinforcement of this spiritual connection is consistent with the teacher endowment per se, for, as we have shared before, teachers are by nature repetitive, reiterating the same material in different ways to ensure that the students will "memorise" it and "know it by heart".

Notice also that the people in Yeshua's "own country" did not even pass the first step in "preparation retrieval", i.e. the ability to prophetically see the treasure before them. Because Yeshua had no natural claim to "authority" or "wisdom", they could not see the treasure of His anointing, meaning that it was hidden from them. Instead of selling all that gave them a sense of value and identity in order to buy the "field" that the treasure was in, they saw the field as a place of no value and moved on. Thus, the Spirit of God ends Matthew 13 with a saddening illustration of what most Christian believers (i.e. those who claim to be from Christ's "home town") do with the preparation material that God sends their way.

Back to Peter's post-Gethsemane test

As you may recall, we began this word by meditating on how fear defeated Peter 3 times when he followed Yeshua after His arrest in Gethsemane. As we saw earlier, Peter failed to prepare for the test that was soon to come upon him by succumbing to sleep in the Garden. Had he prayed, he would have allowed Yeshua's words in Matthew 13, along with his water-walking experience, to work his heart and prepare him for what was about to happen. He had had plenty of time before that night to prepare, but he kept missing the mark on what God wanted him to understand. Had he been able to stay awake and pray that night, he might not have "aced" the test, but he might have been able to receive enough discernment so as to not fail the test so miserably. Regardless, we know that he failed the test and succumbed to fear completely. Let us therefore meditate on the details of what happened that day and what Peter might have done differently had he absorbed God's preparation material correctly.

Dying alone

The word "palace" was mistranslated from the Greek word aule, which literally means "courtyard", and the word "without" was translated from the word exo meaning "outside". Notice, therefore, how the Spirit of God emphasises the "outdoors" nature of the environment, meaning that it was a place where the wind could flow with freedom and where people were not encumbered by any artificial covering over them. This means that the place lent itself to prophetic freedom unrestricted by the Girgashite coverings of man.

The word "damsel" was translated from the Greek word paidiske, which is derived from a word meaning "son" and, therefore, has the connotation of a young child and, in this context, speaks of a young female servant. The fact that it was a woman, and a young servant woman at that, emphasises that this attack was being inflicted by a distorted "female" ministerial endowment living under the slavehood of the Old Covenant and unable to mature in its understanding of the things of God.

The fact that the young female servant referred to Yeshua as "Yeshua the Galilean" has spiritual significance. A detailed study of the usage of the words "Galilean" and "Galilee" in Scripture reveals that it is strongly connected to the teacher endowment, as is quickly revealed in Matthew 4:15, where Galilee is referred to as "Galilee of the Gentiles". There, the word "Gentiles" was translated from the word ethnos, which literally means "nations" and, as we saw before, is strongly connected to the concept of traditions that are taught down from one generation to the next. Hence, we can conclude that the young servant was speaking under the influence of the Girgashite spirit, since that is the spirit that arises when the teacher endowment is distorted by the "female" soul. This connection to the Girgashite spirit is emphasised by the fact that the young woman approached Peter before accusing him, meaning that she needed to have Peter in front of her before speaking, which points to how Girgashites focus on the visible and cannot believe something unless they can behold it right in front of their eyes.

The first parable in Matthew 13 that does not explicitly refer to seeds is the parable of the hidden treasure, which, as we saw earlier, speaks of how the Girgashite spirit that focuses on the natural and the visible can prevent us recognising God's prophetic preparation material. Thus, Peter needed to act prophetically to overcome the fear produced by the Girgashite young slave, and he was in the "perfect" place to do so since, as we saw above, he was in an outdoor courtyard where the prophetic wind could flow freely and was not hindered by Girgashite coverings. Said another way, God had set up an environment around him that could have inspired Peter to respond in a prophetic way to the woman's Girgashite accusation, and he would have done so had he been prepared and not ignored the preparation treasures that Yeshua had placed within his reach before that moment.

As is often said, "hindsight is 20/20", so it is "easy" for us to criticise Peter's response and to declare that he should have acted "prophetically". Therefore, the question remains: If we had been in the same situation, what should/would we have said? This writer sincerely believes that, had Peter been ready, Yeshua's frequent words about His need to die would have come to his mind:

"23 And Jesus answered them, saying, The hour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified. 24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. 25 He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal. 26 If any man serve me, let him follow me; and where I am, there shall also my servant be: if any man serve me, him will my Father honour. 27 Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour. 28 Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again. 29 The people therefore, that stood by, and heard it, said that it thundered: others said, An angel spake to him. 30 Jesus answered and said, This voice came not because of me, but for your sakes. 31 Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. 32 And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. 33 This he said, signifying what death he should die." (John 12:23-33)

Anointed by Yeshua's words above, Peter would have then responded on that day at the courtyard with something like this:

"Yes, I was with Yeshua, and He would often tell us that He needed to die and be sown as a seed into the ground in order to bear much fruit unto the Father."

You may ask yourself, How would that have helped the situation? To answer that, you must consider the motivation for the young woman's accusation and the reason why it produced fear in Peter's heart. By "ratting Peter out", the young woman was in essence informing everyone that one of Yeshua's followers was nearby and that he was possibly there, along with other followers, to carry out some sort of "covert operation" to rescue Yeshua from the "authorities'" hands. This instilled fear in Peter's heart because, if everyone there became convinced that he was there to carry out some sort of violent "extraction" operation, he would have been immediately surrounded by guards, arrested, and then tortured to "give up the goods" on the rest of his henchmen. Therefore, by declaring that Yeshua spoke of His need to die and by implicitly declaring his own agreement to Yeshua's death, Peter would have immediately assuaged the "concerns" of everyone there, reassuring them that Yeshua was not your typical "militant rebel" instigating a violent "overthrow" of the current powers, meaning that they had no reason to fear a violent covert action from Peter or any of the other disciples. On top of this, the people there would have been puzzled by the question of why Yeshua wanted to die, and it would have been a question that would have burrowed deep into their hearts as they slept at night over the next few days, preparing them to eventually open their eyes about the true nature of Yeshua. Unfortunately, instead of confronting the young woman's Girgashite attack with its antithesis, the prophetic endowment, Peter responded with words that were full of the Girgashite fear of death. Instead of being inspired by the outside courtyard and responding in the prophetic endowment, which produces out-of-the-box answers that throw a curve at fastball-expecting minds, Peter responded in an unoriginal and limited way, thereby failing the test. Had he acted like a sacrificial prophet and lost his fear of death, his mind would have been free to remember that Yeshua always emphasised that He was to die alone and that he therefore had no reason to fear for his life, at least at that moment in his walk. He would have then given an answer that would not only have saved him from arrest and torture but would have also prevented him denying Yeshua, and he would have left a "sleep-disturbing" and "mind-confounding" seed in the minds of those hearing him.

As a parenthesis, it must be noted that, in a certain way, it can be said that there was a "prophetic" element to Simon Peter's response, but, because it was tainted by the soul, it was a "distorted prophetic" answer, meaning that it was Hittite. As we have shared before, the Hittite spirit is a spirit prone to constant deceptions and denials of right-handed "mental" truths. This is why, instead of exercising "prophetic redirection" under the guidance of the Spirit, Simon Peter gave a "Hittite redirection" through outright deception. He denied a mental truth by claiming not to "know" (eido in Greek) Yeshua and he Hittitely hid his connection with Yeshua through an outright lie. Thus, his answer did not impart grace to anyone there. It only fed the Girgashite fear of natural death that was present in the atmosphere, and it prevented those there understanding that Yeshua's plans were not the plans of an earthly rebel but were, instead, plans operating in a higher realm.

Judgement coming

"71 And when he was gone out into the porch, another maid saw him, and said unto them that were there, This fellow was also with Jesus of Nazareth. 72 And again he denied with an oath, I do not know the man." (Matthew 26:71-72)

The word "porch" was translated from the Greek noun pylos, which is better translated as "gate". As we have shared before, gates are spiritually related to judgement making, and judgements are spiritually related to the apostolic endowment. Hence, we can say that Peter was now in a location that promoted apostolic behaviour and judgement making.

The word "maid" in the phrase "another maid" of verse 71 does not appear in the original Greek text but was added by the KJV translators to indicate that the word "another" that does appear in the original text is in feminine form, thus indicating that it was another paidiske (or young female servant) who was making the accusation. The fact that the Spirit of God did not bother to explicitly include the word paidiske means that we are to consider both women as a pair. This immediately points to the spirit of Canaanite pastor, since that is the "other" spirit aside from the Girgashite teacher spirit (represented by the first young woman) that forms the pastoral matriarchy of the 2 distorted "female" ministries. This woman's connection to the Canaanite spirit is emphasised by the fact that she is described as going out of her way to say "unto them that were there" (v71) that Simon Peter was a follower of Yeshua. This is because the Canaanite-pastor spirit promotes unrighteous soul communication and peer pressure to get what it wants. Whereas apostles tend to judge on the objective foundation of what they perceive to be true, standing in judgement by themselves if necessary, Canaanite pastors like to judge in groups or mobs, gathering soul support to isolate and shame anyone who is not conforming to their hypocritical rules. In other words, people who operate in the Canaanite-pastor spirit tend to declare something "true" by subjective suggestion. If enough people can be pressured into accepting something as "true", it becomes the "truth", regardless of any objective reality. If people subjectively "feel" that it is true, then it must be "true", and the minority that dares to disagree will be vindictively punished for daring to make the majority feel bad about their version of the "truth".

Notice also that this second woman refers to Yeshua not as "Yeshua the Galilean" but as "Yeshua of Nazareth". The original Greek text actually says "Yeshua the Nazarene", using the noun Nazaraios. To better understand the spiritual significance of Nazaraios in this context, we must consider the second to last time that it appears in Scripture, in verse 5 of the following passage:

"1 And after five days Ananias the high priest descended with the elders, and with a certain orator named Tertullus, who informed the governor against Paul. 2 And when he was called forth, Tertullus began to accuse him, saying, Seeing that by thee we enjoy great quietness, and that very worthy deeds are done unto this nation by thy providence, 3 We accept it always, and in all places, most noble Felix, with all thankfulness. 4 Notwithstanding, that I be not further tedious unto thee, I pray thee that thou wouldest hear us of thy clemency a few words. 5 For we have found this man a pestilent fellow, and a mover of sedition among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes:" (Acts 24:1-5)

Notice how the high priest and the elders joined as a mob to accuse Paul before Felix. Instead of a single one of them standing on the authority of the "truth" to speak before the man in power, they went as a gang to show Felix how "popular" their version of the "truth" was. Notice also how these men, who pretended to be men of high integrity and "spiritual" principle, grovelled before the heathen Felix, exalting him for the great "tranquility" that he had brought to the region and his "very worthy deeds". This once again points to the Canaanite spirit, since that is the people-pleasing spirit that prompts people to constantly "dance" for each other, i.e. to compromise core principles on a consistent basis to get other people's approval, all with the expectation that those other people will compromise something to please you on the next dance.

Notice also how the priest and elders' accusation against Paul centred around Paul disrupting the harmony of thought that existed in the region before his arrival. This yet again points to the Canaanite spirit for, as we have shared before, the Canaanite spirit values soul unity and "harmony" over truth. Canaanites would rather have a society where everyone is thinking in unison, believing the same lie and in perfect agreement with "mama shepherd", than a society where some begin to disrupt that harmony because they have become aware of the truth and are starting to live by it.

Notice also that they refer to Paul as a "ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes", meaning that the word "Nazarenes" (not "Galileans") had become the word used by people, including God's Canaanite enemies, to identify Yeshua's followers as a group. Given that Canaanites believe that individuals must derive their sense of identity from the larger group that they belong to, we can spiritually infer that, when the young woman referred to Peter as being "with Yeshua the Nazarene", she was identifying him by his "clan" or "group", meaning that she saw him as a small part of a bigger whole (i.e. one of the many small people that form the larger group called "Nazarenes"). To her, Peter was a small member who was accountable to a larger group (in this case, the "Nazarenes"), which is what Canaanite pastors are wont to doing in an unrighteous way. They always reduce others to "little sheep" that are, at the end of the day, indistinguishable from each other and have no individual identity that is worth respecting. These "little sheep" only have a sense of value and identity in the context of the larger herd, for without the herd, they have no raison d'être. This is why, when the little sheep need to know whether something is true or not, they must always resort to the "herd", which will be represented by its "leaders", i.e. its "shepherds" or "pastors", and it will be these "leaders" who will provide the "final verdict". As indistinguishable drones in a larger herd, the little sheep's calling in life is to serve "something greater than themselves", i.e. to serve the herd and its shepherds. All of this is why the second woman referred to Yeshua as "the Nazarene".

Faced with the Canaanite trial brought on by the second woman, Simon Peter's response was to reiterate his denial, this time with an oath, which was tantamount to an oath of allegiance to the group there and a denial of any sympathy with the "Nazarene" and His group. Whereas Simon Peter's first denial was an evasive and non-specific "I don't know what you are talking about", this second denial was direct and personal, making a reference to Yeshua as the "man" (anthropos in the original Greek text). All of this points to a very Canaanite response where Simon Peter affirms his soul's allegiance to the group gathered there and denies any relationship with the "Nazarene" or his group. As we have shared before, the antidote to the Canaanite spirit is the apostolic endowment of justice and judgements. Unfortunately, Simon Peter chose to respond with a Canaanite attitude instead of making use of the apostolic environment provided by the pylos gate and putting into practice the apostolic "preparation material" that God had made available for him before that day.

The second parable in Matthew 13 that does not explicitly refer to seeds is the parable of the precious pearl, which, as we saw earlier, speaks of how the Canaanite spirit uses peer pressure, social compliance, and emotional attachments to keep us separated from God's apostolic preparation material. Thus, Peter needed to act apostolically to overcome the fear produced by the Canaanite young slave, and he was in the "perfect" place to do so since, as we saw above, he was by a gate designed for the making of judgements. Said another way, God had set up an environment around him that could have inspired Peter to respond in an apostolic way to the woman's accusation, and he would have done so had he been prepared and not ignored the preparation pearls that Yeshua had placed within his reach. Had he been prepared, he would have immediately detached himself emotionally from the crowd and even from his feelings for Yeshua and the suffering He was going through. He would have then remembered that Yeshua had warned them that He needed to go through everything that was happening.

"17 And Jesus going up to Jerusalem took the twelve disciples apart in the way, and said unto them, 18 Behold, we go up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man shall be betrayed unto the chief priests and unto the scribes, and they shall condemn him to death, 19 And shall deliver him to the Gentiles to mock, and to scourge, and to crucify him: and the third day he shall rise again." (Matthew 20:17-19)

Again, hindsight is 20/20, but this writer believes that, had Simon Peter embraced and absorbed the preparation material that God had put in his path, his emotional detachment from the situation and his own feelings would have led him to respond with something like this:

"Yes, I knew Him, and, based on what He said, God's judgement is now upon Him, and God has sentenced Him to death, for He is now guilty of the sins of the whole world, and He will not escape the sentence that God has decreed upon Him. No one, including any of you here, can escape the judgements of God. Repent, or God's fury shall be upon you."

Had he said something like this, Peter would have, in an odd way, shown "agreement" with the Canaanite mob around him that were clearly not friendly towards Yeshua and shared the death wish that their shepherds had against Him. Therefore, Peter would have had no fear of reprisals from the mob, and he would have been safe from any harm. However, as he declared these words of apparent "agreement", he would have revealed two pearls of wisdom that would have made them wonder what he meant. One of those pearls is that Yeshua was being sentenced to death by God, not by this mob's shepherds, thereby nullifying the authority that these men claimed to have over Yeshua's life. The second pearl would have been that Yeshua now had the weight of the world's sins upon Him and that that was the reason why He had to die. On top of that, Peter would have turned a situation from one where he was being judged by the Canaanite mob to one where the Canaanite mob was being judged by God (by telling them that God was coming after them just as He had come after Yeshua). Part of their Canaanite souls would have reacted in rage at the thought of God judging them (for Canaanites have a visceral hatred of God's judgements), but they would have more than likely been unwilling to express thair rage for fear that it would have appeared to the rest of the mob that they were also opposed to God's death judgement against the Nazarene. They would have had to take their mixed feelings home with them, where they would have been tormented for days about the possibility of God judging them the way that He did Yeshua, and they will have been wondering what it meant that the sins of the world had been placed on Yeshua, making them wonder if He had also borne the sins that they were now worried about (i.e. their own). After hearing of Yeshua's resurrection, their concern over their judgement would have intensified, and their hearts would have been ready to be caught unto the Kingdom, like the good fish in the parable of the dragnet.

As a parenthesis, it must be noted that, in a certain way, it can be said that there was an "apostolic" element to Simon Peter's response, but, because it was tainted by the soul, it was a "distorted apostolic" answer, meaning that it was Jebusite. This Jebusite component can be seen in his decision to deny with an oath, which meant that he was binding himself under judgement if what he was saying was not true. As we have shared before, Jebusites have a tendency to add to the laws of God, creating laws in the flesh that they burden others and even themselves with. The Jebusite component can also be seen in the certainty and specificity with which he declared that he did not "know the man", which contrasts with his "I-don't-know-what-you-are-talking-about" response to the first woman, which was non-specific and evasive about his relationship with Yeshua. Being apostles gone bad, Jebusites are hackers that machete others with direct statements of "truth" that often turn into weapons of false accusation on those who hear them. By speaking with such directness and even adding an oath to his declaration, he was almost turning the accusation around on the woman, as if to say, "You are speaking falsehoods, and you should be ashamed of yourself!!". However, since Simon Peter was not speaking with genuine spiritual authority, his attempt at reversing the accusation was completely useless against the emotionally-strong Canaanite crowd that was surrounding him.

The defeated crowd

"73 And after a while came unto him they that stood by, and said to Peter, Surely thou also art one of them; for thy speech bewrayeth thee. 74 Then began he to curse and to swear, saying, I know not the man. And immediately the cock crew. 75 And Peter remembered the word of Jesus, which said unto him, Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. And he went out, and wept bitterly." (Matthew 26:73-75)

Notice that this third denial was prompted by a crowd of people, as opposed to the first two denials, which were instigated by a single woman servant. The fact that the gender of those speaking is no longer specified means that it was no longer an attack from one of the "female" endowments (i.e. Canaanite pastor or Girgashite teacher). What spirit or distorted endowment was operating, then? To answer that question, we must meditate on the gist of the crowd's accusation against Simon Peter: his "speech".

The word "speech" in verse 73 was translated from the Greek noun lalia, which is only used 4 times in Scripture. Its first appearance is in verse 73 above, its second appearance is in Mark 14:70, again in the context of Peter's third denial. Its other 2 appearances are in the Gospel of John, the first one of those in verse 42 of the following passage, translated as "saying":

"39 And many of the Samaritans of that city believed on him for the saying of the woman, which testified, He told me all that ever I did. 40 So when the Samaritans were come unto him, they besought him that he would tarry with them: and he abode there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his own word; 42 And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world. 43 Now after two days he departed thence, and went into Galilee." (John 4:39-43)

As you may have noticed, the above passage is referring to the Samaritan woman who encountered Yeshua by Jacob's well. Notice that the Samaritan woman evangelised many of the Samaritans, and those she evangelised refer to her words as lalia, thereby evidencing the spiritual connection between lalia and the evangelistic endowment. Considering that Simon Peter's preeminent ministry was that of evangelist (Luke 5:10, Acts 2:14-41, Acts 3:11-4:4), we can conclude that the first 3 appearances of lalia are associated to evangelists. The final appearance of lalia is in verse 43 of the following passage, translated as "speech":

"42 Jesus said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me. 43 Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. 44 Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it. 45 And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not." (John 8:42-45)

In most translations of John chapter 8, the chapter starts with the tale of an adulterous woman that Yeshua supposedly saved from stoning. As we have shared in detail in a previous posting, the manuscript evidence, as well as the flow of the narration in John chapters 7 and 8, proves that this loved-by-matriarchals fairy tale was artificially inserted into the original text to make Yeshua more appealing to the soulish masses. It is possible that there was an adulterous woman in real life who encountered Yeshua and was somehow saved from being stoned, but, if so, it is certain that events did not unfold as described in the fake passage inserted into John. When we remove this fake passage inspired by the father of lies (i.e. John 7:53-8:11), John 7 and 8 turn into a fluid story describing a day when Yeshua was speaking to a crowd in Galilee during the Feast of Tabernacles. Near the middle of John 7, the Spirit of God declares the following:

"31 And many of the people believed on him, and said, When Christ cometh, will he do more miracles than these which this man hath done? 32 The Pharisees heard that the people murmured such things concerning him; and the Pharisees and the chief priests sent officers to take him. 33 Then said Jesus unto them, Yet a little while am I with you, and then I go unto him that sent me. 34 Ye shall seek me, and shall not find me: and where I am, thither ye cannot come. 35 Then said the Jews among themselves, Whither will he go, that we shall not find him? will he go unto the dispersed among the Gentiles, and teach the Gentiles?" (John 7:31-35)

Notice that Yeshua had, in effect, evangelised many of the people there, convincing them to believe in Him. Thus, the people that Yeshua is speaking into in John 8:43 above are those who refused to be evangelised, thereby reinforcing the fact that lalia, the word used in John 8:43 to refer to Yeshua's "speech", points to evangelistic words.

From the above, we can conclude that the crowd accusing Simon Peter were spiritually referring to Simon Peter's evangelistic endowment when they declared that his "speech" evidenced that he was "one of them". Notice also that, contrary to the first two women, the crowd did not accuse Peter of "being with Yeshua" per se but, instead, put him in a crowd of followers. Hence, we can say that they were thinking of Peter as part of an evangelistic army in multitude-conquering mode (for that is what evangelists do). This means that that crowd, which was sensitive to Peter's evangelistic nature, saw themselves as a conquering army and perceived Peter and the rest of Yeshua's followers as an opposing army trying to take back what they had just conquered. Therefore, we can safely say that the crowd were operating in Amorite mode, since Amorites are "evangelists gone bad", and they were coming against any evangelists who were coming to take back their most recent conquest.

Notice also that, when describing the first two denials, the Spirit of God mentions the location (the courtyard and the gate), but, in this third denial, a timeframe ("after a while") is mentioned instead of a location. This emphasises how the first 2 denials are strongly related to each other, given that they are spawned by attacks from the 2 distorted "female" endowments of Canaanite pastor and Girgashite teaacher, with the 3rd endowment coming from an attack by a distorted "male" ministry of Amorite "evangelist". The fact that the first 2 denials are associated with a specific location also points to the "stay-at-home" nature of the "female" endowments, whereas the 3rd denial's connection with a time interval points to motion and, hence, to the outward-projection nature of the "male" endowments. In the first 2 "female-induced" denials, Peter was supposed to respond prophetically and apostolically, whilst, in the 3rd denial, he was supposed to respond evangelistically. This points to how the endowments of apostle and prophet act as a foundation from which the evangelistic endowment can launch itself out in conquest.

The word "while" in the phrase "after a while" in verse 73 was translated from the Greek word mikron, which literally means "little" and appears 16 times in 13 different verses. Interestingly, 10 out of those 16 appearances are in the context of Yeshua leaving for "a little while":

"Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also" (John 14:19)

"16 A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father. 17 Then said some of his disciples among themselves, What is this that he saith unto us, A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me: and, Because I go to the Father? 18 They said therefore, What is this that he saith, A little while? we cannot tell what he saith. 19 Now Jesus knew that they were desirous to ask him, and said unto them, Do ye enquire among yourselves of that I said, A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me? 20 Verily, verily, I say unto you, That ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: and ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. 21 A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world. 22 And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you." (John 16:16-22)

"35 Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompence of reward. 36 For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise. 37 For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry. 38 Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him." (Hebrews 10:35-38)

[Contrary to the other appearances of mikron, the phrase "a little while" in verse 37 was not translated from mikron alone. The words "a little" were translated from mikron and the word "while" was translated from the word hosos]

From the passages above, we can see that, had Peter absorbed the preparation material that Yeshua had made available to him, he would have responded evangelistically with words such as these:

"Yeshua said that, for a little while, He would be gone, and we would see Him no more and that, after a little while, we shall see Him again. You who hate Him have your joy now and we have sorrow, as the Father Himself had appointed would happen, but we shall rejoice again, for He will go to the Father and we shall see Him again, and we shall have joy in our hearts for His amazing victory, a victory that no one will be able to turn back."

These words would have apostolically admitted the reality of the moment, i.e. the apparent "defeat" that Yeshua and His spiritual army were experiencing at the hands of this enemy crowd, and it would have implicitly admitted that Yeshua was to suffer judgement from the Father. However, they would have also acted as evangelistic fighting words by declaring that Yeshua and those who believe in Him would have an ultimate victory that they would be unable to contain. These words would also have had a prophetic effect on the Amoritely belligerent crowd by confusing them, prompting them to ask themselves, "How can Yeshua have victory if he is going to the Father? Doesn't that mean that He will die? If God is allowing all of this, doesn't that mean that we deserve this victory? Why, then, would God then take this victory away from us? How can they see him again if he is going to the Father?". They would have realised that, even though Peter's words sounded defiant and combative, he was not referring to any plans to fight in the natural. They would have realised that he and the rest of Yeshua's followers were not planning to use (the 2) natural swords to fight for Yeshua's freedom, meaning that they had no reason to "fear" any rebellious action from the Galilean who was sitting with them at the time, but their hearts would have wondered on the inside what was going to be of all of this, and many of them would have had their hearts prepared for when Yeshua resurrected 3 days later. Many of them would have remembered Peter's words and recognised that they were fighting for the wrong army, and a moment of defeat for Peter would have become another evangelistic conquest for God's Kingdom. However, since Simon Peter had not embraced Yeshua's evangelistic preparation material and remained bent on fighting the evangelistic battle with natural means, he responded like an Amorite evangelist, as shown by how he became like an insistent used-car salesman, swearing and cursing in an effort to convince the audience in front of him that he "did not know the man".

The third parable in Matthew 13 that does not explicitly refer to seeds is the parable of the dragnet, which, as we saw earlier, speaks of applying the evangelistic endowment to proactively search for God's preparation material even in the midst of corrupted things. In other words, it speaks of certain things that God will make available for us as we venture out in evangelistic-conquest mode, aware that these things will come through the gifts that God has placed in people, which is why those gifts are susceptible to corruption that we must filter out. When that crowd was drawn to Peter to accuse him, he was supposed to see them as fish that he had just pulled out of the sea in a net, knowing that some of them were kalos "good", i.e. that their prophetic potential was still alive, and some of them were "bad", i.e. corrupt to the core and unredeemable. Had he then challenged their Amorite pride with an unyielding and evangelistically strong will, he would have been able to beat back their assault on him and sow seeds of salvation into their hearts, reminding himself as he did that he was to act like one of the (apostolic-evangelistic) angels that Yeshua had described in the parable, taking control over the fish and judging them in his hands, aware that he had the power to decide their fate instead of them deciding his. He would have been able to do all of this with no fear in his heart, knowing that Yeshua had declared that He would die alone, meaning that Peter was not there to die with Yeshua that day but was there to conquer hearts after whatever would happen next happened. Even if Peter had not had a full understanding of where Yeshua was "going" with all of this "business" of dying alone in apparent defeat, he would have been able to rest that night in the assurance that he was there to catch fish and discard the corrupt ones and that satan's army was about to lose "a few good men" even as it danced in victory around the prisoner Yeshua. Unfortunately, the parable of the dragnet was not in Peter's heart and mind that night, and he succumbed to fear, using his evangelistic endowment instead to convince the crowd that he was one of them and not one of Yeshua's. Simon Peter also used his apostolic, judgement-making endowment during this act of fear by "swearing" (which meant that he was binding himself under judgement) and "cursing" (which meant that he was declaring judgement over anyone who disagreed with his statements). He was thus acting like an apostolic-evangelistic angel, only in reverse.

Post-test preparation

As a final note, we must meditate on the significance of the cock crowing after Simon Peter's 3 denials (Matthew 26:74). As we have briefly shared before, the cock represents proud dominance over weaker female "hens", meaning that it points to the Amorite spirit of pride and self-exaltation. Thus, when the cock crowed over Peter at the end of his third denial, it was a figure of the Amorite spirit celebrating its victory over Yeshua's evangelist Simon Peter, which came on top of the Amorite authorities' arrest of Yeshua Himself. The question then becomes, Why did Yeshua prophesy to Peter about the cock crowing after his 3 denials? The answer becomes clear when one meditates on Peter's immediate reaction:

"And Peter remembered the word of Jesus, which said unto him, Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. And he went out, and wept bitterly." (Matthew 26:75)"

Notice how the cock's crowing immediately triggered Peter's memory about Yeshua's words. Yeshua knew that Peter would fail miserably after His arrest, so He left a word in Peter's heart to make him know that Yeshua knew that Peter would fail in such a specific way. Why? Because, first, it was important to immediately convict Peter over what he had done. Had he been allowed to continue in "denial mode", it is possible that Peter would have stayed in that place and committed even more heinous denials (not only on that night but in the days that followed) that would have pushed him past the point of redemption. The second reason why Yeshua stored the cock-crowing warning in Peter's heart and mind was to ensure that the shame that Peter would eventually feel over his actions would not destroy him. Why? Because, as Peter would rewind Yeshua's words in his heart and feel shame, he would eventually realise that Yeshua did not follow them up with a total rejection of him. He did not say, "And you, Peter, shall deny me 3 times, after which I and the Father shall deny you for all of eternity". That is when Peter would remember that Yeshua also said to him,

"And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it" (Matthew 16:18)

That is when he would know that there was a door for redemption despite the great wrong that he had committed. Had Yeshua not prophesied his denials to him, and had Yeshua not used a crow to remind him of the prophecy on that night, Peter would probably have gone down a hole from which he would have never climbed out. However, because Peter at least had this preparation material in his heart, he was able to survive his post-test tribulation and become the man through whom the Spirit of God would catch 8,000 souls in just 2 sermons a few weeks later (Acts 2:41, Acts 4:4), thereby kickstarting the rise of the Church on Earth.

Back to Peter's test at sea

Now that we have meditated on how Peter should have responded to his fear test after Gethsemane, let us consider how he should have responded to his fear test during his walk on the sea. This involves considering the specific thing that triggered Peter's fear:

"But when he saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me" (Matthew 14:30)

The word "wind" was translated from the Greek word anemos, which, as we have seen before, is the root of the English word "animal", meaning that it refers to a soul force, given that animals are souls without a spirit. The word "boisterous" was translated from the word ischyros, which, as we have shared before, is related to Amorite strength. Hence, we can say that a strong Amorite force was attempting to intimidate Peter, which, as you may have discerned, is also what happened during Peter's denials. Because of the evangelistic strength in Peter, the enemy was constantly attempting to humiliate him in an Amorite way in order to abort his calling before it could be fully manifested.

From verse 30 above, it becomes clear that Peter's fear was triggered by the Amorite soul winds. Aside from the spiritual element of the attack, why did Peter become afraid all of a sudden, especially since he had been able to walk on the water and head towards Yeshua (v29)? If one considers the natural elements of this incident, it becomes clear that Peter became afraid because the strong wind began to disturb the surface of the water, causing a greal deal of water to splash on Peter's legs and, possibly, above his waist. This disrupted the more or less plane surface that Peter was placing his feet on, which immediately destabilised his walk. Up until then, Peter had seen the water as a form of "ground" that had miraculously turned "hard" enough to sustain his weight. He embraced this concept with faith and walked confidently towards Yeshua. However, when the level surface of this "ground" became disrupted, he no longer perceived that the water would sustain him any longer, since the water was now rising menacingly above his feet as he continued to walk. Thus, when he no longer had a stable walking surface he could see and set his feet on, he lost faith and began to sink. This points to one of the reasons why we can be overcome with unGodly fear when faced with a real and menacing danger: our inability to prophetically see the hidden treasure beneath our feet.

If Peter had embraced the parable of the hidden treasure that Yeshua had shared with him a little before this incident, he would have understood that he needed to go beyond what the Girgashite, natural eye can see and be on the lookout for prophetic treasures that are invisible and are hidden beneath our feet. This means that, as the waters began to rise above his feet because of the wind, there was still something beneath his feet that was sustaining him, even if his feet were now below the water's surface. He would have been aware that there was a spiritual force holding him up and that the "surface" he was walking on was not dependent on the water's surface, even if those surfaces seemed to coincide during the first part of his walk. This would have assuaged any alarms in his mind, and he would have been able to continue walking on the "surface" hidden beneath the water's surface even as the waves began to crash against his legs and upper body. When you are sensitive to God's prophetic hidden treasures, you will be quick to recognise that the apparently inevitable outcome that the dangerous circumstances seem to predict are not taking into account invisible factors or possibilities (introduced by God) that will neutralise the danger if you are willing to go out on a prophetic limb and trust in them.

A second element that contributed to Peter's fear can be discerned when we meditate on other persons who also faced a fear that was all too real:

"16 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter. 17 If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. 18 But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up." (Daniel 3:16-18)

Notice that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego knew that God could save them from the fiery furnace, but they also made an emotionally-detached decision that, even if God chose not to save them, they would still not bow to the king's golden image because they were not about to serve or worship any gods but the God of Israel. This meant that they were going to continue walking on the path they were walking on, regardless of the consequences, because it was the right thing to do. This correlates with the parable of the precious pearl where the person emotionally detaches himself from everything that is valuable to him, selling it all to buy the precious pearl of wisdom because of the inherent value of that pearl. Thus, if Peter had apostolically detached himself from his life and any emotional need of him that his family had, he would have continued walking. He would have ignored all Canaanite voices to value himself and those emotionally attached to him above the voice of God, and, just as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego had said, Peter would have said in his heart,

"I know that God can keep me above the water if He wishes to, but, even if He does not, I must continue to walk towards Yeshua, for that is what He commanded me to do, and I shall continue to do so, even if it means my death, for that is the right thing to do."

Had Peter also embraced the parable of the dragnet that Yeshua had spoken to him shortly before this incident, he would have also overcome a third element that can trigger unGodly fear in the face of a real danger: the fact that you cannot expect "good" fish only whilst carrying out your appointed task. Up until the moment when the anemos became bolder, Peter's walk had been more or less smooth as he placed one foot after another on a relatively calm and flat surface. Suddenly, the wind picked up and the water's surface became wavy and uneven, and he no longer could see where his feet were under the surface. This agitation was the result of the spiritual corruption in the area surrounding that sea, meaning that Peter was now catching "corrupt" fish in his "spiritual net". Had he understood that he would encounter both "good" and "corrupt" fish as he ventured out into the water and walked on it, he would not have been as fazed by the sudden environmental shift as he was, and he would have continued dragging his spiritual "net" across the water as he walked towards Yeshua. He would have taken evangelistic dominion of the "corrupt" fish, dismissing them in his heart, knowing that he would cast them into the fiery furnace (Matthew 13:50) after he finished his walk. In other words, he would have declared something like the following in his heart,

"It was Yeshua who commanded me to walk towards Him, so I know that I am on the right path. These waves washing over my legs and feet do not mean that I should have never started walking on the water or that I started to do something wrong with the way I am walking here. These are just some of the corrupt fish, some of the tares, that I was to inevitably run into. I will take dominion over them, leave them in my dragnet, dismiss them for now, and then cast them into the fiery furnace when I am done with this walk."

It is worth emphasising that there are times when God will send you out on a conquest mission where things will not go "perfectly" and where you will face very real obstacles produced by external corruption. Unfortunately, we sometimes take these obstacles as a possible sign that we are walking in a wrong direction not decreed by God, which will then weaken our faith in what we are doing and make us vulnerable to falling at the hands of the enemy. Obviously, as illustrated by what happened to Balaam when God blocked him from cursing Israel (Numbers 22), there will be times when God will send obstacles to block our path because that is not the path that He had for us, but there will be times when the obstacles seem to be from God but are not, and it may even appear as if we are avoiding corruption by heeding those obstacles and stopping our walk. In those cases, however, the presence of corruption and corrupt obstacles does not mean that we are walking in the wrong path. Instead, it is an indication that we must sift through the corruption by judging it as we continue on a path that will end up rescuing good things from that corruption.

Brief conclusion

From all of the above, we can conclude that the key to overcoming menacing trials without succumbing to fear is to be on the prophetic, apostolic, and evangelistic lookout for the preparation material that God will make available to us before the trial. If we are attentive to that material and absorb it, we will be ready to react prophetically in unexpected ways, discerning unseen things and avenues that will enable us through the trial. We will also be able to detach ourselves emotionally from the situation and from things close to our souls, doing so enough to act with wisdom and judgements in order to do what needs to be done. We will also be able to step out in evangelistic conquest to take dominion over the corruption that may come against us, and we will even be able to rescue things and people from the grip of the very enemy that was trying to conquer us through fear.