This past month, the Lord spoke to me as we were nearing Mother’s Day. I had been watching, with a discerning eye, the attacks that the enemy had been waging against women and children, as well as the function and identity of men and women. The enemy’s tactic is to destroy the Kingdom partnership between men and women by bringing confusion to their functions. As I was praying about this, God spoke to me and said, “I am raising up matriarchs that will bring alignment to the Body of Christ in this hour.”
The Matriarch Mantle
Throughout history, the enemy has worked overtime to put women and mothers in a box. In cultures around the world, women have been oppressed, held back and hindered; it is still that way in some countries and cultures. Let me tell you why that is.
The tactic of the enemy is that if he can’t oppress and silence women, he will steal their identity and what makes them unique. Why does the enemy have such a vendetta against women? In Genesis 3:15, God says to the serpent who tricked Eve, “And I will put enmity (hostility and hatred) between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel” (emphasis added).
This is the first prophecy of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Through Mary’s obedience, Eve’s disobedience was undone, and the Savior came into the world. Jesus, the offspring of a woman, crushed the head of the serpent, destroying his kingdom forever and humiliating him.
Now there is a hatred that satan holds for womankind. He desires to silence and humiliate women, because he knows that there is a unique kind of surrender to God that women carry, which is capable of shifting nations.
Recently, I was reading about lions and the way the pride works. The male lions are the protectors of the pride, but the lionesses are the hunters. See, there is a maternal instinct that women have to hunt down every enemy that is coming against their family, household and calling. There is an aggressive spirit that rises up in a woman which says, “I am not letting go until I see the promise manifest!”
Women are, by definition, wombed men; they’re birthers. When you begin to see God raise up matriarchs, you will know that a new season is being birthed.
Birthing Through Prayer, Intercession, Fasting and Action
“Rise up, ye women that are at ease; hear My voice, ye careless daughters; give ear unto My speech… Until the Spirit be poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest.” (Isaiah 32:9, 15)
In this passage God, through the prophet Isaiah, is calling on a company of women who are asleep and complacent to rise up into their destinies and functions, because there is an assignment to bring forth something new. When women lose sight of their assignment, there is a sleep that falls upon them, allowing evil to flourish. You see, even though the Kingdom has been given to us, we have to birth that into manifestation through prayer, intercession, fasting and ACTION.
When God wants to usher in a new season He always raises up a matriarch mantle, because there’s a birthing that needs to take place.
Smith Wigglesworth accredited his entire ministry to his wife. In fact, she was the one who birthed the ministry, doing the majority of the preaching in the early years of their ministry. Smith Wigglesworth said, “All that I am today I owe, under God, to my precious wife.” (Photo of Smith Wigglesworth via Wikipedia)
A survey from a while back revealed that an average American congregation is around 61% female and 39% male. However, it was revealed that families are 90% more likely to go to church if the man of the household attends. If the men and women are not in alignment, we can lose our families. If we lose our families, what ensues is chaos, complacency, and misalignment.
“On that day Deborah and Barak son of Abinoam sang this song:
“‘When the princes in Israel take the lead,
When the people willingly offer themselves –
Praise the Lord!
“‘Hear this, you kings! Listen, you rulers!
I, even I, will sing to the Lord;
I will praise the Lord, the God of Israel, in song.
“‘When You, Lord, went out from Seir,
When You marched from the land of Edom,
The earth shook, the heavens poured,
The clouds poured down water.
The mountains quaked before the Lord,
The One of Sinai,
Before the Lord, the God of Israel.
“‘In the days of Shamgar son of Anath,
In the days of Jael, the highways were abandoned;
Travelers took to winding paths.
Villagers [in some translations, the warriors] in Israel would not fight;
They held back until I, Deborah, arose,
Until I arose, a mother in Israel.
God chose new leaders
When war came to the city gates,
But not a shield or spear was seen
Among forty thousand in Israel.
My heart is with Israel’s princes,
With the willing volunteers among the people.
Praise the Lord!'” (Judges 5:1-9 emphasis added)
The word “arose” in the Hebrew means to rise up against, to decree, to stand up, to stir up, to strengthen, to establish.
At a time when there was no fight left in the people, and the men had forsaken their positions, God raised up Deborah as a matriarch, and she influenced the men to take to their rightful positions. Matriarchs are raised up to bring alignment and to strengthen the partnership between men and women.
Birthing with Jesus
“The Lord gives the command [to take Canaan]; the women who proclaim the good news are a great host (army).” (Psalm 68:11)
Women are called to proclaim, to decree, and to set forth the will of the Lord as an army; as a great company; as birthers. They are called as matriarchs, put into position for such a time as this to birth a new move, to bring alignment and to make way for men to get into their positions, and to walk side by side in each function as matriarchs and patriarchs of the Kingdom of God.
There is an anti-woman, anti-Christ, anti-Kingdom spirit in this country, disguising itself as feminism, which says that we can give up our femininity and our masculinity for a falsehood, believing a lie. The enemy is attempting to pit men and women against one another and to blur the lines of gender, function and Kingdom appointment, because he knows that a house divided against itself cannot stand. Satan knows that if he can corrupt the assignment and identity of women, he can destroy the Kingdom mantle that births the new.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus travailed as He faced death. This is because He was birthing something new – a Kingdom family. All of His disciples fled, but the women (the birthers) stayed by His side. It was a woman who anointed the physical body of Jesus; it was women who stayed by Jesus’ side during the crucifixion; and women were the first to proclaim and declare His resurrection. They travailed by His side through each stage of His death, burial, and resurrection – through all the pain and turmoil, which is not by coincidence… it’s because they were birthing with Him! (Photo via Pxhere)
The bigger the promise, the more you’ve got to labor. The greater the revival, the heavier the travail.
God’s Matriarchs Throughout History: Aimee Semple McPherson
Aimee Semple McPherson was raised up into the matriarch mantle during a time when women weren’t accepted as preachers. She emerged during the Depression and birthed a church that had thousands upon thousands of members. She preached an average of 20 times a week.
Her parsonage had a balcony that overlooked a park, and thousands would gather there to hear her preach from her balcony. She was more influential than Hollywood and politicians of the day. She was an evangelistic preacher and an apostle, and in a dark time when people were losing everything, she built some of the most incredible architectural structures in California, and even became the first media evangelist over the airwaves.
She had a mantle that was bigger than just herself, or her personality. People would be healed in her meetings just by sitting in the auditorium under her ministry. To this day, she is still considered an icon; not just as a religious figure, but as a woman who changed culture. To this very day, we have the foursquare denomination, and thousands of churches now exist because of what she established apostolically as an inspirational leader of the highest order.
During a time when hope was lost, when there was no fight left – the time of the Great Depression – God raised her up as a matriarch to bring change and to usher in a new season, and her mantle is still continuing today.
Many women were raised up as matriarchs throughout history.
Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc was a mystic visionary who had visitations with angels at a young age. There was a well-known prophecy released in France during a time of turmoil and war by a prophetess named Marie Robine. This prophecy spoke of a young maiden from the marshes of Lorraine, who would be a deliverer that would restore France. This was Joan of Arc’s destiny, and she knew it. At seventeen years old, she led a small army to victory at the Siege of Orleans, followed by other supernaturally spectacular military successes. She would ride into battle with a banner of Christ, and is famous for these words: “I am not afraid. I was born to do this!”
The entire French army followed her into battle, knowing that she was ordained by God to lead them into victory. Because her influence was so great, she was conspired against and eventually sentenced to death as a heretic, dying at 19 years of age. Despite this, she would not retract any of her beliefs or visions, and as she was burned at the stake, she asked that a cross be lifted before her, that she might see it.
God is raising up women who will stand up for righteousness and justice, even as Joan of Arc did for her generation.
Maria Woodworth-Etter
Maria Woodworth-Etter was a powerful healing minister. Thousands upon thousands were healed under her ministry, and she was marked by a powerful conviction of the Holy Spirit which would affect those in her vicinity even miles away. She was known as a revivalist who could break towns open.
At the start of her ministry, she was hindered by her own insecurities and feelings of inadequacy, but soon gave in to the longing in her heart for souls and the strong call of God on her life. She faced much opposition in the time that she lived in, but many of those who came to harass her were those most likely to fall under the power of God. She was determined in prayer, and ministered with great authority and power.
God gave Maria a vision of a wide field of wheat. In the vision, as she began to preach, the grains began to fall like sheaves. Jesus told her that “just as the grain fell,” so the people would fall as she preached. She continued to minister until she preached at a meeting at a church in Western Ohio. As she preached, people began to fall into trances, which would become a manifestation that her ministry would be known for in the years to come. (Photo of Maria Woodworth-Etter via Wikipedia)
She could not answer all the invitations to minister, and she created a national stir with the spectacular demonstrations of power that followed her ministry. No one has done more to shed light on the role of women in ministry, and she greatly influenced many who followed after her: Kathryn Kuhlman, Aimee Semple McPherson, John G. Lake, Smith Wigglesworth, and many others.
“My dear sister in Christ, as you hear these words may the Spirit of God come upon you and make you willing to do the work the Lord has assigned to you. It is high time for women to let their lights shine; to bring out their talents that have been hidden away rusting, and use them for the glory of God, and do with their might what their hands find to do, trusting God for strength, who has said, ‘I will never leave you.’
“Let us not plead weakness; God will use the weak things of the world to confound the wise. We are sons and daughters of the Most High God. Should we not honor our high calling and do all we can to save those who sit in the valley and shadow of death? Did He not send Moses, Aaron – Miriam to be your leaders? Barak dared not meet the enemy unless Deborah led the van. The Lord raised up men, women, and children of His own choosing – Hannah, Hulda, Ana, Phoebe, Narcissus, Tryphena, Persis, Julia, the Marys and the sisters who co-labored with Paul. Is it less becoming for women to labor in Christ’s Kingdom and vineyard now than it was then?” – Maria Woodworth-Etter
Sister Elena
Sister Elena was a nun who was very passionate about the Holy Spirit. In her prayer times, she began longing to see a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit as on the day of Pentecost. She wrote letters to Pope Leo between 1895 to 1903, urging him to lead the Church back to the Upper Room. She desired that the Church would experience a perpetual “Pentecost.” The amazing thing is that the pope took it seriously, and they penned several letters back and forth before, at Elena’s encouragement, he invoked the hymn “Veni Creator Spiritus” (Come, Holy Spirit) on New Year’s Day, 1901. By singing this hymn, he was asking the Holy Spirit for a fresh outpouring on the Church.
It is no coincidence that at the very same time (January 1, 1901), in Topeka, Kansas, there was the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon a little group gathered at Charles Parham’s school, Bethel Bible School.
Agnes Osmond, a student at the school, received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues on New Year’s Day, after prayer and the laying on of hands. Her experience sparked the modern Pentecostal movement. Several other students also received the baptism of the Holy Spirit after Agnes; one of those students was William J Seymour, who went on to lead the Azusa Street revival five years later in 1906.
Because Sister Elena rose up as a matriarch and encouraged Pope Leo (the patriarch of the Church) to get into position, there was a ripple effect of revival around the world!
God has raised up matriarchs throughout history to birth new moves of God, to break bondages, and to release fresh hope to the Body of Christ. I’ve seen in the spirit that many women will be raised up in this season to step into this mantle! Are you one that God is calling?
Amy Shamp
Spirit Word Ministries International
Email: amy@spiritwordministries.org
Website: www.spiritwordministries.org
Jesse and Amy Shamp are a powerful evangelism team based in Columbia, Tennessee, and are the founders of Spirit Word Ministries International. Their mission is to edify and equip the Body of Christ for the work of the ministry. Signs, wonders, and miracles follow their ministry, and they often receive powerful prophetic dreams from God for the Church. They are committed to crusade evangelism and are passionate about bringing in a harvest in the nations.