(Gen 12:1-3 KJV) Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show thee: {2} And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: {3} And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.

God told Abraham,

1. I will make of thee a great nation (fulfilled in Isaac and Jacob)

2. and I will bless thee

3. and make thy name great

4. and thou shalt be a blessing

(Gen 26:4-5 KJV) And I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy seed all these countries; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; {5} Because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.

Winter says God made what seemed to be unconditional promises, but then goes on to say that God's words were like a two-pronged fork. The first prong, "I will bless you," found fulfillment in Abraham's relationship with God. The other prong, Winter writes, is that

"Abraham is commanded to 'be a blessing . . . (to) all the peoples of the earth.'"(3).

This two-pronged covenant is supposedly mentioned three times towards Abraham (Gen. 12:1-3, 18:18; 22:18), once each toward Isaac Gen. 26:4-5) and Jacob (Gen. 28:14-15).

Here are Winter's Scripture references:

Genesis 12 "1 Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee: 2 And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: 3 And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed."

Genesis 18 "18 Seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him?"

Genesis 22 "18 And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice."

Genesis 26 "4 And I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy seed all these countries; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; 5 Because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws."

Genesis 28 "14 And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. 15 And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of."

Notice: nowhere in any of these did God COMMAND Abraham to "be a blessing." God only said he WOULD BE a blessing; the PROMISE also pointed to the seed of Abraham, meaning Christ. The promise of Abraham AND HIS SEED - Christ - being a blessing to the nations could not be fulfilled until Christ came in the flesh. Only He could bring fulness to God's words. After Christ's finished work, the Holy Spirit could then be sent to indwell all who believed. In His power, the gospel would be taken to the world. Israel could not have done this in the Old Testament.

Having changed the meaning of God's words to Abraham, Winter then uses this change to say that this established the "'mission-covenant,' the 'Secret Mission'."(4) Sounding much like Alan Vincent, Winter writes that this "Secret Mission" is the plan which the Bible unfolds and seeks to bring to fulfillment, and that there didn't have to be a waiting period of 2,000 years. Again like Vincent, he says "it is restated and renewed again and again and thus reappears throughout Scripture (Ex. 19:4-6; PS. 67; Isa. 49:6; Acts 3:25; 13:47. and Gal. 3:8)" (all parentheses in the original).

The idea behind all of this is this: without the spiritual awakening of what Winter calls the first prong, the second prong is impossible to bring about. Winter is saying this in regards to a world evangelization effort, that without a major spiritual awakening designed to push back the evil kingdom there could be no such effort. But, consider the same thing regarding the Toronto Blessing: there would be no opportunity to TAKE the Abrahamic Blessing, now called the Toronto Blessing, to the nations and every person on earth without a major spiritual awakening of this type as well. One is a word preached, the other is an experience. There is a large difference between these strategies and the true Great Commission. One leads to dominion through men's efforts, while the biblical Great Commission will lead to Jesus' return - at which time He will slay the adversary with the breath of His mouth, judge the nations, and bring about the complete fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant. But Winter wrote,

"Furthermore, it is apparent that the command to love God is inherent and implicit in the phrase 'I will bless you.' The flavor of command in all this is even clearer in Genesis 12:2 in the phrase 'So . . . be a blessing,' where the Hebrew verb and the English margin reveal an imperative verb. This covenant is not just a one-way promise to which a given people can hold God accountable! It is an awesome mandate from God to man as well as a gentle, loving summons to us to fellowship with our God and Creator."(5)

Here again Winter defines the Abrahamic Covenant as A MANDATE rather than a promise to be ultimately fulfilled by God Himself when He sent Christ into the world. Winter cites a few words out of Genesis 12:2 - "So . . . be a blessing" - which is much different than what it really says:

"(Gen 12:2 KJV) And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and THOU SHALT BE A BLESSING."

By changing what was the original unconditional covenant, Winter can now say,

"The Covenant is not optional in either its upward or outward elements."(6)

What Winter means is that God has promised to bless us (upward), but after blessing us, COMMANDS us to take this blessing to the nations and extend His rule to the ends of the earth so ALL men can know and love Him (outward). The implication is that, if the mandate is not obeyed, the promise won't be fulfilled.

At this stage in Part Two of his series, Winter has redefined the Abrahamic Covenant and placed a call to the Church to go forth with the Great Commission to extend the rule of God. But don't miss seeing the door to the Toronto Blessing that he opened by this redefinition: a "New" Beginning with a "new" Abraham, a "new" Sarah, a "new" corporate child (Isaac), and a "new" Israel based on a "new" Abrahamic Covenent.

I want to end this section by showing that Winter's 1986 redefinition set the stage for teachers like Vincent to later preach the "redefined" Abrahamic Covenant and the current global manifestations of Toronto. In him the two come together. It's plain that Winter's series basically said Israel failed to obey the mandate to take the blessing to the nations. In a later article entitled "The Work of the Savior," Winter builds on the idea that Abraham and Israel failed, and extends the failure to the early Church. Here he explains why they failed:

"If Jesus had explained or tried to explain to these self-concerned disciples just what the full meaning of the Abrahamic Covenant was, it would have been as if He had taken a tennis racket, run into an accident ward of a hospital where all the patients were bundled up in splints and in traction and doped out with anesthetics, and shouted, "Tennis anyone?" The disciples could not have responded had they wanted to. Thus He did not in that passage review the Great Commission.

"When we speak of the Savior and His Work, we need to ask not only, 'What did He do?' and 'Why did He come?' but, 'Why did He come when He came?' We must try to see who He was and what He did in the light of God's timing in history.

"When the Christ appeared, it had been 2,000 years since the call of Abraham and God's crystal clear enunciation of His concern to be a blessing to Abraham, to Abraham's children by faith, and, through them, to be a blessing to all the other peoples of the earth. . .

"When Jesus appeared, what time was it? How was the nation of Israel doing with its Commission to be a blessing to all the peoples of the earth? Had it been hiding its light in the ground? Had it revolted, not just against Rome but against the Land Owner who finally sent His Son to check up on things? . . .

"In our inerrant Bible we must admit that the real meaning of Christ's call does not show up in the bulk of the text.

"God clearly and distinctly commanded the Chosen People to reach out with blessing to all the peoples of the earth. (It does not help that our modern translations for the most part translate the Hebrew imperative in Genesis 12:12 - 'be a blessing' or 'you must be a blessing'). Despite this mandate, repeated very clearly five times in Genesis, we find that the bulk of the text of the Old and New Testaments does not portray an obedient people reaching out with blessing to others"(7; parentheses in original).

Winter says that because Israel and the early Church failed to take the blessing to the nations, God had to keep repeating Himself until someone finally obeyed. Who finally did obey? The modern Church and its world evangelization effort. But included in this must be Toronto as the sending out place of the "Toronto Blessing." If what I believe we are seeing is correct, people are being herded into planted churches throguh world evangelization, most often to be filled with the "Toronto Blessing."

How often today do we hear the phrase, "It is time!" What it is time for appears to be a season of New Beginnings when God will finally get the modern Church to take the Abrahamic Blessing to the nations. Supposedly God has said "It is time," through Alan Vincent and the late John Wimber. These New Beginnings center around the Church dosed with the flavor of a "New" Israel, the Great Commission, the "redefined" Abrahamic Covenant and the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles.

Here is another example, from Master Potter ministries, of Latter Rain teaching blended with the redefined Abrahamic Covenant. This 1994 prophecy speaks of a worldwide revival of dry bones, starting with the Church. The prophecy is based on Ezekiel 37 (which speaks to Israel, not the Church) and Acts 2 (which doesn't refer to dry bones):

"The dry bones of the Church will be revived, as described in Ezekiel 37 and Acts 2, to advance the Kingdom of God so we can go out and restore the bones in the graveyards of the world."(8)

Out of beliefs such as these spring evermore "new" revelations which bring us another message, another spirit and another Jesus - "another" Abrahamic Covenant through a "new" Israel" - such as in this final prophecy, this time from the End-Time Handmaidens:

"Sarah is a type of the Church. The Church is 'withered,' and its womb is dried up in many places, but God is sending a revival of joy to awaken and renew the Church so that she can bring forth the 'man-child' of joy, even the army of overcomers who will go forth in the likeness and image of the Lord in these last days."(9)

We have looked at the words of the alchemist/mystic Jane Lead, the "new" Israel that came out of the prophetic revelations of John Wimber and others, and now the redefining of the Abrahamic Covenant that was an open door for the Toronto Blessing to replace the true Abrahamic Blessing in Christ. There does have to come a preaching of the gospel to the whole world, but this "revival" is not it and I don't believe this world evangelization effort is it either.

I want to now continue this series with a look at Israel and the Church in scripture as I understand them to relate to the culmination of God's plan.

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(1) Ralph D. Winter, Mission Frontiers, "The Work Of The Savior," February 1987, p. 11.
(2) Ibid.
(3) Ralph D. Winter, Mission Frontiers Magazine, "THE 'SECRET' MISSION: A Theology Of Redemption," March 1986, pages 10-11.
(4) Ibid.
(5) Ibid.
(6) Ibid.
(7) Winter, The Work Of The Savior.
(8) Master Potter, Prophetic Insights For The '90's: Quarterly Perspectives from Jill Austin, "The Great Intruder" Passion & Fire Conferences, Summer '94.
(9) Discernment newsletter, Jewel van der Merwe, LATTER RAIN and The Rise of Joel's Army, p. 5 citing End-Time Handmaidens, Angel Letter #2, September/October 1994.