When I first became a Christian I thought men of God spoke the true words of God. As I read the Bible at home and listened to my pastor on Sundays and Wednesdays, I began to see a huge chasm between what I was reading and what he was saying. (I attended a Church of God attached to the Anderson, IN organization).
It was approximately a decade later that I learned why there was such a difference between what my pastor was preaching and what I was reading in the Bible. It happened one night at a prayer meeting. I stood up to say something while we were all in prayer, but was stopped from uttering a word. As soon as I stood, I collapsed on the floor, and my spirit was caught up to a place where I stood with Jesus, Peter, James, and John. Paul walked across in front of us as Jesus was speaking to me. Among other things, Jesus told me I had been born before my time, and that I must wait until God had completed a work in His people, at which time the knowledge I had received would be usable.
The knowledge I had been receiving since my spiritual birth was meant for a later time, and I, myself, was being set apart for that later time. That’s why it was different from what was being preached then. Forty years later in August 2017 the Lord spoke and said, “It is time.”
Many of the falsities I have heard through the years appear to have been accepted by upwards of millions of people. Most of the people who have been caught up in the teachings of false prophets hold to them because they tickle their ears. It is not for their sake that I write this letter; it is for the sake of the wheat that is growing among them. And not only the wheat ensnared by the false prophets, but also the wheat whose legitimate pastors, as well as fellow laymen, have unwittingly picked up some of these false doctrines.
My prayer is for all who belong to Jesus to understand that the awakening is upon us; it is time to awaken from sleep and return to the Shepherd and Guardian of our souls. It is time to stop following this man and that man, and hanging on to their every word. It is time to follow Jesus; it is time to reaffirm that we are nothing and submit ourselves completely to our beloved Savior. To do this, we must be willing to allow the Holy Spirit to show us where we’ve been wrong in the past. We must to begin TODAY.
For over fifty years the only book I have read is the Holy Bible. It is the only book I will read for the rest of my life (the Lord told me to stop reading books, and to only read the Bible in the 1970’s). I am a follower of Jesus, and I follow no one but Him. I have been appointed as His ambassador by the laying on of His hands. I desire only the truths of God and His perfect will. If you cannot accept me, please, at least, consider my words.
In His holy name,
Jon David Banks, God’s most unworthy servant
P.S. Please weigh everything I say on the scales of the Word of God.
jondavidbanks.com 