Wise Men from the East - by David Demian

Wise Men from the East - by David Demian

It was ten years ago that the Lord first started speaking to me about the role the Chinese in God’s end-time global purposes which are now beginning to unfold.

I was invited by Ernest Chan, a well-known American Chinese leader, to speak at a large conference he was hosting in Los Angeles in July 2001.  Many Chinese believers would be attending from all over the world. 

Since the conference was in the summer, I decided to drive down from Vancouver with my wife and 5 kids and make it a family vacation time by including some days in Disneyland.  We drove the first day without incident.  But suddenly, around midnight, there was complete chaos on the highway ahead of us – cars strewn about everywhere. Before I could react, something hit my front and rear right tires and the van started careening out of control, balancing precariously on the remaining two left tires.  I was sure we would flip over when suddenly we shifted to the right.  Then just as it seemed the van would fall over, something pulled us back to the left.  Left to right, left to right we kept wildly swinging back and forth until amazingly the van came to a complete stop.  I jumped out and to my shock found there were no tires at all on the right – they had been completely blown out.  In turns out, we had hit one of many huge concrete barricades that had accidentally spilled out of a large truck that had been transporting them down the darkened highway. 

People already stopped on the highway had witnessed the whole incident.  “It’s a miracle you are alive!” they exclaimed. “It was as if someone literally held your van upright and brought it to a stop.”  And we knew that’s exactly what had happened. The hand of the Lord had protected us. 

Now we were faced with the decision whether to continue or head back home.  Either way, we would be waiting for days until the parts for our van could arrive in the remote Oregon community near the accident site.  But when God intervened once again and provided flights for the whole family to get to LA for just a few hundred dollars, we felt it was a sign that we were to continue.

After we arrived at the conference, I was seeking the Lord about what to share in the meeting when He asked me an unexpected question.

“What hinders My kingdom from being established in the Middle East, David?”  I was so surprised by the question, I didn’t know what to answer.

“It’s the fear of persecution and the fear of death,” He continued.

Having lived in Egypt, a Moslem nation, I could understand this very well.

“But I have a prepared a people,” He explained, “a remnant of My body who have no fear of persecution or death. These are the Chinese people and they will have a very special role to play in seeing the end-time destiny of the Jews and the Arabs being released.”

I was stunned by this revelation.  My heart has always been for my people, the Arabs and then through my journey in Canada, God had also given me a heart for the Jewish people.  But I had never seen any connection between this and the Chinese. 

When I shared what the Lord had revealed to me in the meeting that night, the presence of the Lord came in an unusual way.  It was as if we were all captured in a divine moment of sovereign revelation from the Lord.  In fact, Ernest was so stirred that he immediately encouraged the people to sow into printing one million CDs of this message to be passed throughout the Chinese world. On the spot, all the money was raised.

But when we went to the professional company who was producing the CDs of the conference, the recording was completely blank!  All you could hear was my voice praying at the beginning, then silence throughout my message until I came to the closing prayer.  As soon as I said “Amen” the recording began again. 

We assumed it was an equipment malfunction, so my friend and pastor Gideon Chiu, who had been capturing the meeting on his camcorder, suggested we could take the audio from his tape.  But when we looked at the tape it was the exactly the same story:  just before I began my message, the tape went blank and the recording never resumed until just after I finished.

My first thought was that this was warfare from the enemy.  But then the Lord spoke to me clearly saying, “It is not the time for this message to go wider yet, David.”  So I left this conference knowing there was something profound the Lord was showing us about the destiny of the Chinese but I wasn’t sure what, where or when the next step would be.

A few months later, Ernest invited me to join him for some meetings he was having in Asia that November. I prayed and I felt the Lord said to go.  Before this though, I was scheduled to speak in an international conference in Israel.

But then September 11^th happened.  The airline schedules were in chaos and all the new airport security measures were causing huge delays.  It was not an easy time to be an Egyptian flying to Israel.  So I sought the Lord to know if I should cancel my attendance at the conference.  But He answered me saying that I must go because there was someone I was supposed to meet there.

At the conference, I had many meetings with many people but at no time did I get the clear sense “this is THE person” I was supposed to meet.   So I came home mystified.

A few days later, Ernest called saying he had received a message from a pastor in Taiwan who had just met me in Jerusalem and wanted me to speak in his church during the November trip. 

Suddenly I remembered this man – he was supposed to leave back home before I arrived but the post 9-11 airline problems had delayed his return by a couple of days so he “happened” to be there while I was speaking.  After my sharing he asked to meet with me, but because he didn’t speak English we had to communicate through a translator.  When he told me he was from Taiwan, I mentioned I would be traveling there in November and he had asked if I would speak at a leaders meeting at his church.  I didn’t think much of it – he seemed like a very nice man and I thought maybe he was the pastor of a small church who would like me to encourage his leadership team.

“David, do you know who this man is?” Ernest continued.  “Pastor Nathaniel Chow is the founder and apostolic overseer of a movement with more than 100 daughter churches worldwide.  If there is one leader who is respected and trusted in Taiwan and throughout Asia it is him.”  At that moment I realized the Lord was up to more than I could understand..

I will never forget this meeting in Taipei, which was a gathering of the movement’s leaders from all around the world.  As I began to share about the destiny of the Chinese, suddenly my translator (who I later found out was Tony Tseng, the president of Good TV, the only 7x24 Chinese Christian TV station in the world) started weeping to the point he could no longer continue. The rest of those present were also so overcome that they came out of their chairs weeping and travailing and lay across the altar and the platform calling out for the destiny of the Chinese.

As I watched this, the Lord spoke to me that the day would come when He would begin to gather the Chinese people to worship the Lord and seek His face waiting on Him for His steps to see the destiny of the Chinese fulfilled.  And this would benefit not only the Chinese, but God’s end-time purposes for the Middle East and for the body of Christ globally. 

I believe that we have now entered into this day when the destiny of the Chinese is coming into collision with the timings of God.   In 2009, the Lord opened the door for the first Chinese gathering in Vancouver during Rosh Hashanah. 1000 believers gathered to worship and wait on the Lord without man-made agenda or schedule, simply allowing the spirit of God to direct every session.  The Chinese are masters at planning and scheduling and the Lord honoured their obedience to lay these down by His manifested presence and by using this gathering as a seed to birth the first global gathering of the Chinese in Hong Kong in May 2010.  During the Homecoming Gathering the Lord focused on uniting the 5000 Chinese attending from Asia and around the world into one family- as a prophetic sign of what He is longing to do in the wider Chinese body.   This in turn led to the “Homecoming: One Heart” gathering in Hong Kong in June 2011 where the Chinese invited believers from across Asia  and the world to join with them to worship and wait on the Lord together during the Feast of Pentecost.  12,000 believers gathered from more than 30 nations.  At the end of the meetings, the Lord issued this challenge:  was there a remnant willing to stand on behalf of the wider body to prophetically declare, that there is One indivisible Body of Christ in the earth, united in absolute submission to One Head and King, the Lord Jesus Christ?  All those in attendance stood and covenanted themselves by faith, establishing a beachhead in the spirit realm for the sake of the body of Christ worldwide.

At this same gathering, a group of Chinese pastors from Vancouver shared how the Lord had begun to speak to them about another gathering in Vancouver in 2011. The Lord highlighted the date 11-11-11 and revealed to them that it is the fullness of the time of transition - the 11^th hour. 2012 will be the beginning of a new season of the establishment of God's divine government in the earth.  Everything that can be shaken will be shaken and it is time to awaken the Church.  The Lord said He wants to see a remnant from the Eastern and Western Church who are willing to come together to be prepared and receive revelation about what is to come.  And the Lord wants to shape this remnant corporately into trumpets through whom He can release a "cry at the midnight hour" to His faithful Bride that the time has come for the Bridegroom’s return.

As they began to share this revelation with leaders from many nations, there was an immediate witness of the Spirit. So with this confirmation, these Chinese leaders, joined by leaders from around the world, have issued a call for the 11-11 Gathering in Vancouver from November 9-12, 2011. 

2000 years ago, wise men from the East followed the signs pointing to the coming Messiah.  Could it be that once again, as part of their eternal destiny the Lord is raising up “wise men from the East” as forerunners to trumpet a call to the Church worldwide to recognize the signs of her soon-returning King?   

I believe in the global “chess board” of God’s end-time purposes, the Lord is now surprising His opponent by moving His “Chinese piece” into a strategic position, a spiritual “checkmate” that will assure His victory at the end of the game.  To the Chinese believers, the Spirit is calling you to rise up and embrace your destiny – you have been brought into the kingdom for such a time as this.  To the rest of the Asian brethren, the time has come for “wise men from the East” to walk in humility and brokenness together as one so that you might to fulfill your mandate to awaken the global body to the hour in which we are living. And to the non-Asians, if our spirits witness with God’s present purpose for the Eastern Church, we must join together with them as the Western Church, fighting for our brothers’ inheritance, knowing that it will bring pleasure to our Father and the fulfillment of His purposes for the Bride of Christ worldwide.