8After four hundred years of prophetic silence, God sent John the Baptist to announce the coming of the Messiah, the baptism He would bring, and the in-breaking of the kingdom of God on earth. In response, people streamed to the Jordan River to hear John's words and be baptized by him in the Jewish ritual mikveh bath for cleansing from sin and defilement. John's calling was to prepare the people for the coming glory.

Our God is nothing if not consistent--the same yesterday, today and forever. As in the days leading to the return of Jesus, He therefore continues to send messengers in advance to announce coming moves of the Spirit in order to prepare His people to receive. Author R. Loren Sandford believes God is about to do something huge, wonderful, and even unprecedented in scope and impact, and he is urging Christians everywhere to prepare for it.

Beginning with the prophet Haggai and moving through the Bible, Loren lays a foundation for his belief that the time of the last great outpouring and the Lord's return is now.

He writes, "The church in our day has been ravaged and diminished in influence under pressure from the idolatrous culture that surrounds us and that, figuratively speaking, a remnant is even now returning from exile. It's time to rebuild on a biblical foundation and construct a temple adequate to contain the outpouring God is about to send."

Loren says we must reject our present culture, which is steeped in consumerism and a focus on self, and return to a culture of covenant. The former has weakened and destroyed us, while the latter will edify and strengthen us.

As John the Baptist came in the spirit and power of Elijah to prepare the way, prophetic voices are now rising to proclaim that the greatest outpouring of the Holy Spirit in history is coming. The great last days' move of God approaches and the call for preparation now is the same as John preached so long ago. Through reliable prophetic voices, God now cries for holiness and cleansing to uproot everything in ourselves and in our churches not solidly rooted in the nature of Jesus and the Father.