David’s Tent DC

Enthroning a Latter-Rain 24/7
Altar Presence on the White House Lawn 
During an Election Season

“David’sTentDC”

Very few Christians or unbelievers have any idea of the significance of the term “David’s Tent.”  Nevertheless, various affiliate organizations  of the burgeoning Apostles and Prophets movement (NAR, the New Apostolic Reformation) are going to camp out at the White House Ellipse lawn from September 25, 2012 through the election, engaging in their round-the-clock 24/7 worship, and they are calling this activity “David’s Tent.” The Christian News Wire reported on August 28th that

DAVID’S TENT DC will be held September 25 through election day, November 6th, 2012 on The White House Ellipse in Washington DC. For 40 days, continuous 24 hour worship in joyous celebration will take place on the The White House grounds.[3]

The same report quoted Washington House of Prayer leader, Jason Hershey, explaining the rationale, which is consistent with the doctrine of the International House of Prayer (IHOP) movement:

“Before America ever goes into the polls to vote for the leadership of this country, we want to first enthrone Jesus on our praises continuously for 40 days…. Like King David established, worship will be next to the seat of government.”[4] [bold added]

David’s Tent = Tabernacle of David 

Many of the people who will be praying and singing around the clock for 43 days also have no idea of the history of the term “David’s Tent.”  They simply want to establish a “throne for Jesus” in DC.  “David’s Tent” is actually a shortened title for “Tabernacle of David” which has a history of its own going back 50 years, first being taught by the those involved in the fringe Pentecostal Latter-Rain movement in the early 1950s. Since those days the Latter-Rain Movement, which included the false teaching called the Tabernacle of David, has filtered upward though the fringes of Pentecostal Christianity. The Latter Rain and its various new false teachings at first faded in the 1950s  but then it was reintroduced into the Charismatic Renewal. It progressed into the Toronto Blessing and now is seen in the wider prophetic movement. The moniker Latter Rain has always been carefully avoided as new names and mutations were added.

Back in the 1950s the Latter Rain gained a very negative reputation. Its relationship to William Branham in those days didn’t help. Branham was an anti-Trinitarian false prophet who called Trinitarians agents of the Devil. Another reason the term Latter Rain was avoided is that the Assemblies of God denomination, which lost hundreds churches to this movement in the early 1950s, passed a resolution repudiating the Latter Rain.

But today very few people, including Assemblies of God people and pastors, have any memory of the Latter Rain, and so also do not know the controversial history of Tabernacle of David heresy.  Nevertheless, the simple fact is that “David’s Tent” today is just simply a reintroduction of the Latter Rain false teaching called the “Tabernacle of David.”

Early proponents were called the New Order of the Latter Rain (NOLR).  NOLR began in North Battleford, Saskatoon, Canada in 1948. In the previous year Rev. Hunt and Rev. Hawtin, Canadian Pentecostals, received an impartation from William Branham by the laying on of hands.  They proceeded to long fasts (a la Franklin Hall). And in a Canadian camp meeting in 1948 over a thousand people gathered.  Hunt and Hawtin began to preach the new doctrines of the Latter Rain. These new teachings included: (1) Laying on of hands for the filling of the Holy Spirit. (2) Believers can be inhabited by demonic spirits and cast out by the laying on of hands. (3) The restoration of the office gifts of apostle and prophet. (4) Personal and directive prophesy (5) The Tabernacle of David teaching. (6) An end of the ages revival resulting in the defeat of all the enemies of God including death before Jesus can return.

Notice! The Tabernacle of David teaching was an integral part of this Latter Rain movement. This then is the historical source of David’s Tent DC.

The White House Ellipse Kickoff for David’s Tent

Below is a sample of the current public announcements on David’s Tent.

We want to announce an unprecedented witness to this grace. Imagine 24/7 worship on the Ellipse, the backyard of the White House, from Yom Kippur til election day! To my knowledge, this has never been done. God is granting us a literal picture of the Tabernacle of David, in our governmental seat of authority, at the capitol of our nation….


For more than a year, God has been speaking to us about the significance of Tabernacles, that 2012 would actually be a fulfillment of Cindy Jacobs’ vision of the “X” over our nation that transforms into a Bridal Canopy.[5] [bold added]

Jon and Jolene, Hamill of Lamplighters are related to the Reformation Network, sponsored by Cindy Jacobs of Generals International, who is the leading prophetess in the NAR and claims to be the apostle over America. Jacobs is on the Board of Advisors of the David’sTentDC event. Birthing literally hundreds of affiliate organizations, the New Apostolic Reformation operates as a  conglomerate that especially includes the International House of Prayer (IHOP) movement. Their agenda is both a national and global ambition of building 7 mountains, which is often referred to as the “Next” or the “Third Great Awakening.”

This is the group that is leading the David’s TentDC operation. They are launching the effort through Twitter, Facebook, and all the hundreds of IHOP “Prayer Furnace” locations across the USA, including networking with mission groups like YWAM and various prayer organizations across the globe.

Another NAR affiliate, HAPN (Heartland Apostolic Prayer Network), led by John Benefiel (who pioneered the bizarre divorcing Baal ceremonies across America), is also lending support to David’s Tent DC. Jon and Jolene Hamill have make the weird claim that:

Dr. John Benefiel led a nationwide initiative to divorce Baal and renew covenant with Jesus Christ.

This initiative primarily culminated July 4, 2011 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. We divorced Baal and presented the Lord with a Declaration of Covenant. Exactly fifty days later, an earthquake shook metro DC and cracked the Washington Monument.[6] [bold added]

Hamill’s have also made the strange statement that:

The Ellipse is an oval, egg-shaped park, called the President’s Park, directly in back of the White House South Lawn.  We believe that new life is in the egg as we build an oval altar of worship to Jesus by the Oval Office![7][bold added]

Even more exotic, the Hamill’s wrote concerning a vision, that babies were shooting out of the ground to signify the beginning of the Third Great Awakening!

The land trembled. Then a geyser broke forth. The ground began to split apart from this well of awakening in Lowville all the way down to the Washington Monument in Washington DC. Wherever the ground broke forth, babies shot out of the ground and into the sky! They were caught by angels.

I knew God was conveying a promise of His coming move–a Third Great Awakening. [8] [bold added]

Hamill’s use the typical military language of the prayer warfare dominionists when they write:

Warriors! Time to Surround the Tent!
To counter their vulnerabilities, Solomon had the wisdom to surround this tent of intimacy with 60 valiant warriors. That’s where you and I come in. Much like these men of valor, you are being invited to literally surround David’s Tent in prayer![9] [bold added]

The Hamills continue by quoting the Song of Solomon 3:6-7: “Who is this coming up from the wilderness, like columns of smoke?… Behold it is the  traveling couch (throne) of Solomon; sixty mighty men around it of the mighty men of Israel…” They then explain their extrabiblical “Bridal Canopy, Governmental Throne” idea:

This picture from the Song of Songs portrays the romantic journey of the Bridegroom and his bride. They are moving together from the wilderness to the Promised Land…. That’s where we are today, even with David’s Tent…. Unending praise that builds a throne for our Savior night and day, propelling us out of the wilderness!

But note that in Solomon’s procession, this traveling “bridal canopy” was also the Throne of governmental authority for all Israel! That alone made them a huge target.[10] [bold added]

Allegorical or Literal Governmental Throne? 

Today, “apostle” Mike Bickle has borrowed from the Latter Rain in expanding its teaching of the Tabernacle of David heresy. He has made it the centerpiece of his ministry at IHOP, jazzing it up with allegorical and symbolic Bridal Mysticicm.  Indeed, Bickle is not the first to allegorize “The Song of Solomon.” To allegorize, one must decide that certain historical texts of the bible are a mystical code and stand for things in the present. Bickle has, by allegory, created a whole Bridal Paradigm of erotic intimacy with Jesus. This is a topic in itself.

These IHOP versions of Tabernacle of David are being replicated around the country especially among young people. IHOP and YWAM (Youth with a Mission) and many other NAR affiliated personnel will thus become the manpower source of the David’s Tent DC endeavor.

But remember —  Bickle’s Bridal Intimacy teaching is made to serve the underlying end time militant dominion goal that goes ultimately back to the 1950s and the Latter Rain. Notice the canopy is just window dressing added to the endtime conquest of the nations found in dominion teaching. All of this is just fancy new wallpaper covering essential Latter Rain Dominion/Kingdom Now teaching. The primary expression of current Latter Rain Domionism is the NAR with all its subsidiaries organized and configured by C. Peter Wagner.

“It is dominion that we are after.”

Don’t be fooled by the mystical and allegorical spiritual terminology. The New Apostolic Reformation,
with its many created affiliated sub-organizations and multitude of
like-minded allies, is a movement that has entered the American
political scene and whose stated purpose is dominion. George Grant once stated the goal of dominion starkly:

Christians
have an obligation, a mandate, a commission, a holy responsibility to
reclaim the land for Jesus Christ-to have dominion in the civil
structures, just as in every other aspect of life and godliness.

But
it is dominion that we are after. Not just a voice. It is dominion we
are after. Not just influence. It is dominion we are after. Not just
equal time. It is dominion we are after. World conquest. That’s what
Christ has commissioned us to accomplish. We must win the world with the
power of the Gospel. And we must never settle for anything less.

If
Jesus Christ is indeed Lord, as the Bible says, and if our commission
is to bring the land into subjection to His Lordship, as the Bible says,
then all our activities, all our witnessing, all our preaching, all our
craftsmanship, all our stewardship, and all our political action will
aim at nothing short of that sacred purpose.

Thus,
Christian politics has as its primary intent the conquest of the land –
of men, families, institutions, bureaucracies, courts, and governments
for the Kingdom of Christ. It is to reinstitute the authority of God’s
Word as supreme over all judgments, over all legislation, over all
declarations, constitutions, and confederations. True Christian
political action seeks to rein the passions of men and curb the pattern
of digression under God’s rule.

Fortunately,
because of the theocratic orientation of our founding fathers, our
nation has virtually all the apparatus extant to implement such a
reclamation. Unfortunately, the enemies of the Gospel have hand-in-hand
eroded the strength of those godly foundations.[11]

The fact that the NAR is now planning to camp out on the Ellipse in Washington, D.C. is cause for concern.

What is the Tabernacle of David heresy?

http://www.deceptioninthechurch.com/orrel11.html

THE RESTORATION OF DAVIDIC WARFARE/WORSHIP
By Orrel Steinkamp, The Plumbline, Volume 7, No. 4, September/October 2002

Endnotes:
1. Email from John & Jolene Hamill, HAPN (Heartland Apostolic Prayer Network), “8-8-12 DAVID’S TENT DC PRAYER BEGINS!”
2. Email from John & Jolene Hamill, HAPN (Heartland Apostolic Prayer Network), 8-16-12, “PROTECT AND DEFEND! PRAYER FOR DAVID’S TENT!”
3. Thomas Kenny, “David’s Tent D.C. Launches September 25 on The White House Ellipse:
Historic 40 Days of 24-7 Worship Will Happen Continuously Through Election Day,” http://www.christiannewswire.com/news/2553120468.html. The article stated that “DAVID’S TENT DC can be found on the web at www.davidstentdc.org.”
4. Ibid. 
5. Jon & Jolene Hamill, “ANNOUNCING DAVID’S TENT DC: SEPTEMBER 25-NOVEMBER 6
Jul 25,”  http://www.usrpn.org/articles/single/announcing_davids_tent_dc_september_25_november_6 
6. HAPN, 8-8-12, Ibid.
7. Kenny, Ibid.
8. HAPN, 8-8-12, Ibid.
9. HAPN, 8-16-12, Ibid.
10. Ibid.
11.  George Grant, The Changing of the Guard (Dominion Press 1987), “Reclaiming the Land,” pp. 50-51, http://www.garynorth.com/freebooks/docs/pdf/the_changing_of_the_guard.pdf 

A special thank you to Susan J. Conway and Sarah H. Leslie for their assistance with this article project.