Peggy Kroupa

The King is Coming: A Wedding and Coronation Story

 

The Lord has shown us that He loves celebrations and has even planned them for us to commemorate as well as act as dress rehearsals until the events are fulfilled.  He teaches His people about the Feasts of the Lord in Deuteronomy 16:1-15.  The first four were fulfilled with Jesus’ first coming, which are Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, and Pentecost.  The last three will be fulfilled at Jesus’ second coming. They are the Feast of Trumpets, Day of Atonement, and Feast of Tabernacles.

 

I was very blessed to have been coronated by Sisters of the Crown.  It was a joyous experience where I could not help but reflect upon the coronation of Jesus that will occur in heaven after Jesus has gathered His betrothed bride, His church, at the rapture on the Feast of Trumpets. We will celebrate the Bride of Christ marrying her bridegroom, Jesus, at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb followed by Jesus being crowned King of Kings and Lord of Lords.  The ancient and even some of the modern Jewish betrothal and wedding traditions show us the detailed plans the Lord has for His marriage.  

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Here are some of these. 

 

A Jewish man and his betrothed sign a ketubah, which states the bridal price and the rights and privileges of the bride.  As the Church, Jesus’ betrothed, we have the New Testament that is our ketubah that tells us our rights and privileges and bridal price.  (1 Peter 1:18-19, 1 Corinthians 6:20)

 

In Biblical times, the groom gave his betrothed gifts. It was often clothing and jewelry.  Today, it can be an engagement ring.  Jesus gives His betrothed gifts, too. They are the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

 

In former days after the betrothal, the Jewish man went back to his father’s house to build a room on to it or a separate house in preparation for his bride. Only the groom’s father would know when the groom could go back to get his bride because it is the father who must approve of the home.  The same is true of Jesus.  (John 14:1-3, Matthew 24:36). The bride had to be ready. The bridegroom could come anytime. (Mark 13:32)

 

The bridegroom brought along his friends and a special chair so that they could have the bride sit on it. Then they lifted her up and carried her to her new home to have a wedding and dwell with the bridegroom at his father’s house.  This sounds similar to what happens at the rapture. (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17)

 

As we experience the birth pangs preparing us for Christ’s return, may we think about being with our Lord and Savior forever and of the glorious festivities the Lord has in store for us to celebrate this.  Our redemption draws nigh.

He Restores My Soul

 

After I had inner healings from sessions and experienced freedom, I began to identify recurring negative feelings. I knew I needed deliverance so that I would seek God on my own. One time, I realized I would get very angry if I got a haircut that was not to my liking, and especially if it was shorter than I had wanted. On my own without any prayer partners, I asked the Lord to take me back to the source and origin of that anger. He reminded me of a time when I was in middle school. My hair had just grown out to a length where I could curl it into a page boy style.  My mother insisted that it was time for me to get a haircut. I knew at the time it was expected of me to submit to it, even though on the inside I was seething with anger and rebellion.  In that memory, the Lord gently spoke to me and asked me to forgive my mother. After I did that, I knew that I needed to ask the Lord for His forgiveness for allowing that rage, rebellion, and unforgiveness to rule my mind for so many years. Forgiveness is a huge part of being set free. From then on, a disappointing haircut was just that, and my attitude was that it was just hair and would grow back. I was free.

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I had been a competitive swimmer since I was six years old and was never afraid of the water. When I was older, I realized I had a fear of drowning. As an adult, I decided to take this to the Lord to find out about it. He took me to a memory when I was a young teen on a swim team. We had an end-of-summer party and were celebrating at a place that had a smaller pool than where we had competitions. One of the coaches had gotten a huge inner tube from an airplane that we were playing on in the pool. I fell off and struggled to surface because of the size of the inner tube compared to the pool and the number of legs that were in the way. I coughed and sputtered and had a hard time catching my breath when I did surface. This is where the enemy planted fear. I asked God to give me His truth. I sensed Him saying, "I will never leave you or forsake you." Immediately, I was set free from fear. I knew that if I ever had to face drowning, He would be there to take me to the surface or to heaven safely.

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I have found that there are times when I need a team to help me get freedom rather than seeking the Lord on my own. Part of a prophecy I received said that I had a wall around my heart. I prayed and sought the Lord, but could not hear about this. During a Soul Healing session, the Lord took me back to a memory when I had been teased as a fifth grader. I built the wall for self-protection. God wants us to depend upon Him for protection. I asked God to take down the wall. When He did, I felt too vulnerable. When I told Him I could not function like this, He told me to put on the full armor of God. It is so wonderful to experience His freedom and then His protection.

 

Listening prayer is not just for inner healing. We can ask God a question anytime about anything and receive His answer. I had heard that God confirms everything with two or even three witnesses. I knew of some examples in the Old Testament but could not think of any in the New Testament. Since I was starting to study Matthew, I asked the Lord to show me examples in this book if there were any. The first example encountered was when Jesus was eight days of age. God used Anna and Simeon at the temple to confirm that Jesus was the Messiah. At Jesus' baptism, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit confirmed that Jesus was God's Son.  On Sunday morning, after Jesus' crucifixion, three women witnessed the empty tomb, confirming Jesus' resurrection.

My Soul Healing Journey

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This month, I would like to explore how to recognize when we need soul healing. Soul healing is a ministry, but God is involved in healing our souls in many ways, not just as a ministry.

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One day, I was musing about the Word and thought that a good way to sum up the Bible is that it is a book about relationships. God wants us to understand how to relate to Him, how He relates to us, and to cultivate positive relationships with others. The Word is full of good and bad examples of these. When we experience difficult relationships, we can benefit from soul healing. "And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free." John 8:32 (KJV)

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Our Relationship to God. ​I got saved when I was 25 years old. There were many positives about the experience and my early walk, but one looming difficulty remained. I had not had a loving relationship with my father. He was neutral when my siblings and I allowed him to do what he wanted, or was angry when we interfered. I had a lot of emotionally based father wounds. For self-protection, I avoided him and authority figures in general. This perspective made it difficult for me to see God as loving, caring, and someone I could completely trust, submit to, and want to be with. Mother wounds could certainly affect one's relationship to God as well. Most of my examples are based on my personal experiences, as we want to maintain total confidentiality during any healing sessions we have with others. If someone gives public testimony, it becomes public knowledge, and we can then discuss it.

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We can become angry at God because we feel He has withheld something from us, caused something, failed to protect us, or done any number of other things that we might hold against Him. God wants to speak to us about these hurts and bring freedom and restoration. The first time God revealed one of His names to His people was to Moses, as recorded in this scripture: 

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Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, "The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in faithfulness and truth." Exodus 34:6 (TLB). It is so reassuring to know these are attributes of our loving Father who invites us to come boldly to His throne of grace.

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Relationships with Others. We can experience a deep hurt or recurring hurts from friends, co-workers, or even close relatives. Additionally, we can have stressful or contentious relationships and wonder why we struggle to get along with others. God can speak truth into these situations and bring healing, or at least show us how to be protected from them. The following scripture assures us of God's concern: " I will restore your health [physical, emotional, spiritual] and heal all your wounds [physical, emotional, spiritual],' declares the Lord." Jeremiah 30:17 (EHV-Emphasized)

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Recurring Negative Emotion. Lingering negative emotions can be so difficult to bear. These are a few examples: abandonment, regret, fear, loneliness, rejection, anxiety, extended grief, unworthiness, shame, condemnation, shyness, rage. The enemy plants a lie. God speaks truth to the lie and dispels it, setting us free. "So if the Son sets you free, you really will be free." John 8:36 (NIV)

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Questions. We can come to Abba Father and ask any question, even those hard "why" questions. He has such wisdom and love for us that He knows precisely what answer we need. The question can be related to emotional healing or not. I was widowed when my son was three. When he was seven, he went through a phase where, when I corrected him, he would not listen and got into a circular discussion that went nowhere. God promised to be a father to the fatherless, so I cried out to Him to give me a strategy. He did, and it worked every time. I corrected him with a Bible verse. It shut down every argument, and he took the correction.

 

Curses. Often, curses are negative words that are spoken over a person. Those lingering words can have a profoundly damaging influence. They need to be broken off, and then positive words spoken over the person to replace them. Curses can be generational. God's blessings extend to the thousandth generation, but curses can extend to the third and fourth generation. You can examine your family tree to identify any recurring negative patterns. Some of these are divorce, conceiving out of wedlock, cancer, genetic conditions, rebellion, anger/rage, addictions, etc. These need to be broken off as well.

I Shall Not Want

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As a new Christian, I struggled trusting and fully surrendering to God. My earthly father never demonstrated any of God’s loving, nurturing attributes. My earthly father provided for the physical needs of his family, but that was it. It was difficult not to project my father’s lack onto my heavenly Father. I can see in hindsight that my walk with the Lord has been to teach me to trust Him, to surrender to Him and to teach me to go to Him in prayer for every need. Here are a few of the disappointments with their instructive and redeeming outcomes.

 

At age two, my son was diagnosed with autism. At age seven, I enrolled him in a Christian school with no need for special education support. God miraculously transformed him.

 

As an infant, my son developed food allergies, especially milk. At four, he came to me and emphatically asked me to lay hands on him and to pray he could consume dairy products. After that prayer, he immediately went to the refrigerator to get yogurt. He declared he was healed and has been eating dairy ever since. Because of this experience, John prays with great faith that God will hear and answer his prayers whether it is for him or others.

 

When my son was three, my husband died. I can say with David, I have been young and now am old; Yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his descendants begging bread. Psalm 37:25

 

When John was seven, he was diagnosed with neurofibromatosis (NF), which is a genetic condition that can cause many different problems and is often progressive and can develop issues at any age. Some of these can be deafness, blindness, various cancers, tumors and nodules all over the body to name a few. He was given a baseline MRI which the doctor said indicated he had a small tumor in his motor ganglion in his brain. He said it was inoperable and had no treatment. He assured me that at some point it would grow and take his life. John would not live to see age 18. It was a devastating diagnosis. I remember praying, “But God, he is my son, my only ….” At that point I sheepishly realized that God could relate.  I fervently prayed for him until God answered and assured me that He would only let the disease go so far and that God would not allow it to disable John.  I was able to surrender this to God and believe for His provision. That was 40 years ago, and God has stayed true to his word. The next year when it was time for his checkup, I was referred to an NF clinic because the previous doctor had retired. I took his MRI films from the year before. These specialists reviewed them and assured me that the tumor was a misdiagnosis, and there was nothing life threatening.  If I had not prayed, heard God’s answer and surrendered it, I could have allowed this misdiagnosis to torment me for a year until I heard the truth.

 

Early in my pregnancy, I started declaring this verse for my baby: Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above(James 1:17a). When we found out our baby was a boy, my husband wanted him to have his first name. When I suggested John for his middle name, my husband agreed. John means God’s gracious gift.  We called him by his initials A.J. When he turned six, A.J. decided he did not like being called by his initials because it was not a real name. When I went through the list of his given names and their nicknames, he decided to be called John. Even going through these trials, John has been a good, perfect and gracious gift from God. My son chose to be called John, which is a constant reminder.