Lessons in the Ladder Days

Candace Long: I’m Candace Long with Lessons in the Latter Days, offering biblical commentary to make sense of the times that we’re living in. In this episode, I want to zero in on one of the last things that Jesus taught his disciples to do before the day of the Lord, an insightful phrase he used three times in the gospels: "Take heed to yourselves."

Now, you might think, why talk about that? That seems rather bland. On the contrary, this admonition from the Lord goes against the grain of everything we’ve been taught in our walk as believers. What has been ingrained in us is: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Love your neighbor as you love yourself. There’s no greater love than laying down your life for another. And now here, Jesus does an apparent about-face and says, "Look out for number one: yourself."

To get us in the right frame of mind for this topic, I want to tell you about something that happened just the other day. I have a large bird feeder on my back deck, and when I’m spending time with the Lord, I’m able to enjoy all the birds coming to my home to be fed. So the other morning, I opened the drapes expecting to see all kinds of birds waiting for me to come out with the food. But not one bird was on the deck. I opened the door and listened. Silence. No bird songs, no chirping, nada. I thought, "Wait a minute, something’s wrong. Where are the birds?" I ran to the front door and went outside to see if I could hear those birds talking to each other like usual. Nothing. Silence.

A friend from Connecticut had told me just days before that an article in her paper mentioned the strange disappearance of a particular species of birds. So my mind immediately went apocalyptic: The birds have disappeared. I even did an internet search to corroborate whether this was true. A friend came by that evening, and I mentioned the strange scenario, and she knew the problem immediately. She said, "Oh, the reason they were quiet is that there were hawks around. They know when there is danger, and they stay still and don’t make a peep because that would give themselves away."

Such wisdom poured forth from this mountain woman. But also what insight I learned that day from the Lord: When there is danger in the air, the wisdom is to lay low. Take heed to yourself. Let's look at the passage at hand in Mark 13. Jesus said, and I’ll paraphrase it a little: "Take heed to yourselves, for they will deliver you up to councils; you will be beaten in synagogues, stand accused before governors and kings for my sake, and family members will turn on you." Again, he’s speaking of the time period right before the day of the Lord.

So let’s look at what the phrase "take heed" means. There are two Greek words used for this expression. The first one means to beware or perceive. The second word means to hold the mind toward something and be cautious about it. Be cautious about what? Yourselves. Jesus was telling his disciples they needed to turn inward, to build up their own reserves, to find their own safe place, and take very few into their counsel. The only one that you can fully trust at the very end of days is yourself and your God.

He was saying this because all of a sudden, things were going to shift rapidly because there was betrayal going on behind the scenes then that the disciples were clueless about. Now, this is important for us because that’s where we are now. A lot of us have pulled away from the media because we can’t trust it. We’re spending more time with the Lord, just as the disciples did. So in some ways, we don’t know what’s going on. We have no idea the depth of betrayal we are about to face.

Jesus told them that very soon, trouble and oppressions would spring up suddenly, almost overnight, in five places. Number one: In councils. This means sitting bodies of governing officials. Look at what’s happening now with all the hoopla and disruption over the vaccine mandates. Number two: Synagogues. The oppression will even come from those you thought you could trust, that you knew on a spiritual level. Number three: Rulers. Those in governmental authority. And true believers will have absolutely no favor with them at all. Number four: Kings. This is the foundation of power at the time, whose values will be diametrically opposed to God’s. And number five: Even family members will turn against you.

I want us to look at the context of when Jesus said this to his disciples, because in scripture, timetable is everything. This conversation took place right after our Lord’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem when the crowds shouted, "Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord." This glorious day was a high mark, and it marked the beginning of his last seven days on this earth. This is significant for two reasons. But first, I have to deal with two Hebraic concepts.

The first concept comes from Ecclesiastes chapter one, where we read: "What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done." Our Jewish forefathers, the sages, teach that we are to learn from what happened in the past, for that very thing will repeat. You see, Jesus was at the end of existing in his earthly body. He was preparing to go to the Father in the kingdom. That tells us that we need to examine everything Jesus teaches in his final days, because those very things are what we are going to go through at the end of our earthly existence.

The second concept I need to bring in here is understanding how God speaks using *tav-nee-oht*. We’ve talked about that word before; it means pictures. The Bible is filled with *tav-nee-oht*. This is God's language. So we're going to look at the layers of meaning in Jesus’ words, for he is the picture of the very stages leading up to his departure from this life and going to the kingdom. I believe this is a *tav-nit* showing us what we will go through on our way to the kingdom.

In Mark 14, we read: "It was now two days before the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread." There’s the timetable. Now, I’ve done considerable analysis of Jesus’ final week from Sunday to Sunday. On that first Sunday was his entry into Jerusalem. Just seven days later, the following Sunday was the Festival of Firstfruits, and that was when he rose from the dead. But during the days in between, he was betrayed, beaten, crucified, and buried. That’s a lot in just seven days.

Let’s touch on some highlights of what Jesus did that final week to see the parallel to our lives today and maybe some lessons of what we need to do. Monday was day two. He cursed the fig tree, he threw out the moneychangers in the temple and confronted all the religious leaders. He stood God’s ground against the deceit and corruption of the day, which caused shockwaves throughout the entire society since all the Jews were together in Jerusalem at the time of the Passover.

In application, his light that we carry inside of us will cause us to confront the worldview of an evil culture. It will rise up inside of us. We stand against vaccine mandates and they threaten lawsuits. We refuse to conduct a wedding of a gay couple and the crowd goes crazy, again threatening to destroy our lives with lawsuits. We want our bathrooms and locker rooms labeled men and women, boys and girls, and town hall meetings turn into brawls.

It is through this period where the factions, the wheat and the tares, are bound together in their respective ideologies and they confront each other explosively. Now, those who are followers of Jesus are not popular on this day, which will come right after we are celebrated and praised for the light that we carry. Even those of our own believing community can turn against us. Jeremiah stood alone against all the other prophets who said things were going to get better.

Today, the message is often: "The church will be victorious." But if you’re hearing another message—that the gavel of judgment has fallen on America—God help you. The intercessors want nothing to do with you because you represent someone in their mind who has no faith. Take heed to yourself. This shift will be sudden and you will be left standing alone. On Tuesday, day three, Jesus pulled away from the masses in order to pour his life into his disciples.

There were no more public discourses. If other people tried to get to him, like when several Greeks went to his disciples asking to see Jesus, they never got through. Only his faithful followers heard the last teachings from their Master. You see, Jesus’ number one priority shifted from the crowds to concentrate on his disciples and prepare them for the kingdom. On Wednesday, day four, this was our Lord’s final Sabbath rest before his agony. One last intimate time with his followers because the Passover was at hand.

This day was when he purged his disciples of the decoy in their midst, which was Judas. And once that evil one was expelled, the Lord was able to pour into them more freely during the Last Supper. Later that evening was his hour of darkness in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus came face to face with the realization that there was nothing he could do to remove this cup from himself. He had to drink it. He was forced to take heed to himself because no one else had it in them to stay awake and wait with him.

Learning from the *tav-nit* tells us that there will come a time for some of us when we realize we cannot escape an unbelievably difficult agony. The lesson is to willingly submit to whatever cup God has given each of us to drink. Most Americans have not reached this point yet because we have this "America always wins" mentality. But make no mistake, before the day of the Lord comes, if we are not quite there yet, we will get to this place of terminal agony.

During my 9/11 experience of losing everything, it took a long time for me to relinquish my hope and willingly submit to whatever God had for me. I share about it in depth in the episode "When Life Falls Apart." But let me just say here that I had no idea how long I would have to endure the brokenness, the closed doors, and total inability to move forward. I didn’t know then that this was something I had to endure for seven more years.

Thursday, day five, was an interrogation by the religious leaders that began before dawn, and then he was nailed to the cross at 9 AM. During this tribunal, everybody turned against him, just like he said would happen to us: the courts, the rulers, the synagogue, the kingdom in power, and his own followers, his spiritual family. Everyone turned away. Even the heavens were silent. There was no rescue, no praise gathering telling how God saved him from this hour. No, not this day.

This was an appointed time that could not be deterred, and it was a time when Jesus took heed to himself. We’re called the body of Christ. This is a *tav-nit*, a word picture, telling us that whatever happened to the literal body of Jesus in the order that it happened is what we will be called to experience in the future. When you think about it, the death of Messiah did not just happen in one day. Rather, God’s light that he carried inside of him was diminished through oppression more and more as the people’s rejection of him grew.

Fewer and fewer received him until one day there was a shift in the heavens and his time of departure was at hand. So how does this relate to us today? I relate very much to this insight because about two years ago, I began to sense a shift away from trying to reach a lot of people. I started to focus only on those who either opened my emails, considered my teachings, read my work, or listened to my podcasts. There was an internal shift that whatever I do, I’m now doing for the kingdom.

My work may well go unnoticed and rejected by the bulk of humanity, but my priorities are now different. There was a key dream I had in 2015 that showed me that my work at the very end of my life would involve the media, audio production in particular. And the day would come where all of a sudden there would be a shift and I would one day see where I fit. I would find my place. In the dream, I was in a major newsroom. I was standing around the water cooler with all of these copy editors, and everybody was discussing something big that was getting ready to happen.

In the dream, I didn’t really have a job, but my being there was okay. I wasn’t thrown out; I was accepted. But the very next scene, I saw something that was missing. Nobody was writing copy targeting everyday people in language they could understand. Inside this dream, I had an "aha" moment. While breaking out the dream, I came away knowing that in time, I would see my place. Remember, this was 2015. And once I saw it, I would know that I’ve been prepared for it my whole life.

I am living this dream now with these episodes, trying to make sense of these times in language hopefully people can understand and encouraging you how to find your place in it. I expanded my company, Audeo Media Group, in order to publish and distribute resources worldwide to help people survive and thrive in these latter days. In other words, I’m busier now and more purposeful in what I do than I’ve ever been.

So just because the world seems to be falling apart all around you, God has a place for you and your influence that only you can fill. There is a shift that has taken place. I learned an important lesson from Jeremiah because he witnessed firsthand an unrepentant country, Judah, just like ours is today. He knew God’s judgment was happening all around him, and he was in your face about it to the people.

All of the other prophets said what the people wanted to hear, namely that everything was going to be fine and Judah would triumph because God would save the day. But that was not the reality that Jeremiah saw. So his message was diametrically opposed to the religious community of the day. He was thrown into a pit. But in chapter 32, God told Jeremiah to do something radical. Jeremiah was confined in a prison because he had been telling the people that God was turning Judah over to the Babylonians.

And then Jeremiah wrote: "The word of the Lord came to me." He said, "Behold, Hanamel, your uncle, will come to you and say, 'Buy my field which is at Anathoth, for the right of redemption by purchase is yours.'" In other words, God wanted the prophet to buy a piece of property in his hometown, invest in a land that was soon going to be taken over. There is a lot of wisdom here. That verse hit me between the eyes.

God does not want us to sit back passively while our country implodes. Investing in a piece of land was a prophetic act on the part of Jeremiah to say that God still had plans for Israel. The Lord began speaking to me specifically about this and asked me to make several decisions about investing in the place of my birth, even though things look so bleak as to our country's future. I invested in a weekly radio show called Lessons in the Latter Days, which airs in my hometown in North Georgia.

My investment is a spiritual seed that I’m planting in the land of my forefathers. I’m also working in an international consulting role using my longtime business connections in Georgia to help bring new industry into the area. The admonition for you perhaps is that God may be calling you to invest in something wherever you live, to deposit a spiritual seed there that would benefit others while it is still day.

I have a theory regarding the kingdom that I’m still searching out in the Bible, but it bears mentioning here. We know, for instance, that the kingdom lasts 1,000 years on earth, and believers will be in leadership positions serving the Lord’s purposes for the land and the people. My theory is based on two things. Number one: God’s word to our forefathers whenever they died; he would say in the scriptures, "Be gathered unto your people." And number two: There’s a passage in Leviticus 25 where God describes the Jubilee year that happens every 50 years. He says, "Hallow the 50th year; each of you shall return to his property."

I believe these are *tav-nee-oht* of what is to come. I can’t swear to this, but my gut tells me that during the kingdom, we will return to the land of our forefathers to complete our ancestral destiny of caring for the people, the land, and its resources. So I believe that my place in the kingdom will be North Georgia. It would make sense, therefore, for the Lord to prompt me to invest in its growth for the good of the people and to be busy doing so until he comes.

When that day comes, we will each stand before God alone. No one can share this time. Everything we have done will pass through the fire and only what contains his light will remain. One of the greatest blessings the Lord has given me is to know what I will be doing in the kingdom. It’s all the things that I’m doing now, which is why I’m so committed to helping others find their destined place. Your place.

If you do not know your calling, please log on to my website at candacelong.com and look at my resources. I have podcasts, monographs, books, webinars, and courses, all designed to help you identify what the Lord put inside of you to accomplish with your life, to do your part to fulfill your ancestral destiny. It is never too late, and you’re never too old to seek that out. Now, to sum up what Jesus was saying: The hawks are out, and it's time to take heed to yourselves.

If you’d like to know more, I invite you to subscribe to my website at candacelong.com. When you do subscribe, I’ll send you links to my books, my articles, online courses, and individual webinars that will help you understand the signs of these times and how to find what God would have you do while it’s all unfolding. To listen to more of my teaching, go anytime to candacelong.com/podcast. If you’d like to make a donation and help support this ministry, you’ll find a donate button in the description notes to any episode. I hope you join me again for Lessons in the Latter Days. God bless.