Ignite Your Faith: The Call to be a Torchbearer for God

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Sept. 29, 2025 - Sharing a word God gave me today, calling His sons and daughters to shine brightly for him in the darkness.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 00 (00:11):
Hello, hello.
Welcome to the Dona WatsonShow.
I'm your host, Dona Watson.
Hello, everybody.
This is going to be a littlebit different word for you today
from what I normally bring.
I'm out here on my front porch.
We're just going to have afamily chat.

(00:32):
And I wanted to come, I've beenquiet for the last few weeks
because I've been in prayer.
I've been in meditation as towhere the Lord is taking us as
his church and as a nation.
And we've had some prettymomentous things that have

(00:52):
happened here the last fewweeks, not the least of which
was Charlie Kirk's murder.
And I've been in, like I said,I've been praying for direction
because I felt there was ashift.
I felt that the Lord had adifferent direction for us to

(01:13):
go.
And I don't talk about thisvery much, but when I was in
fourth grade, the Lord gave me avision.
I was home sick.
My dad and my sister had goneto Wednesday night church, and

(01:33):
my mom stayed home with me.
And the Lord called me toprayer, which was a little
unusual, but I felt his calleven as a young nine-year-old.
And I knelt down by my bed topray.
And as I was praying, the Lordgave me a vision, and I won't
share all of it with you, justthe part that pertains to what I

(01:56):
want to tell you today, becausethe Lord brought it back to me
today and directed me that it'stime to share this part.
Because this part of thevision, I'm 62 years old, and
God has never revealed the fullmeaning of this part of the

(02:17):
vision until today.
And it directly correlates towhat I want to share with you.
I was reading in my one-yearBible devotional this morning,
and part of the scripture theLord highlighted for me today

(02:38):
was out of Isaiah chapter 60,verse 1 through 3.
And I've read these verses somany times, but they came alive
in a different way today.
Let me read them for you.
It says, "Arise, shine, foryour light has come, and the
glory of the Lord shines overyou.
For look, darkness will coverthe earth, and total darkness

(03:00):
the peoples.
But the Lord will shine overyou, nations will come to your
light, and kings to your shiningbrightness." I want to stop for
just a moment and pray overthis word and pray over you.
Dear Lord, we come before younow in praise and thanksgiving
for your graciousness to us andfor your love for us.

(03:23):
And I ask, Lord, that you wouldprepare the hearts, Lord, to
hear what you have to say.
And I ask right now that yourwarriors would block anything
that would come from the enemy,from anyone listening to me now
or in the replay, that theenemy's designs would be blocked

(03:48):
from this word going forth.
I pray that you would openpeople's hearts to hear what you
have for them to hear today.
In your precious name, Jesus.
I cover this in the blood ofJesus right now, in the name of
Jesus.
Amen.
Okay, so the Spirit highlightedthis verse today.

(04:11):
And just to show you how Godworks.
When I sat down to record thisvideo, my neighbor's dogs
started barking.
And I prayed and I prayed theblood of Jesus, and I said, When
it's time for me to record thisvideo, these dogs will be quiet
in Jesus' name.
And when I pushed play, thedogs quit barking.

(04:32):
Praise the name of the Lord.
So, Isaiah 60, verse 1 through3.
The Spirit highlighted thisverse for me today.
And as it did, it reminded meof the vision that I had in
fourth grade.
And the part that I will sharewith you is that there was this

(04:56):
beautiful shining city, like theNew Jerusalem, and I saw it
descending from heaven, comingdown to earth.
And at that time, mynine-year-old mind interpreted
that as the New Jerusalem comingto earth.
But today, God said, "There isanother meaning to this vision

(05:20):
that I gave you." And I believethat this reflects what we are
going through as his churchright now in our present day in
the year 2025.
The scripture says, "For look,darkness will cover the earth
and total darkness the peoples,but the Lord will shine over

(05:44):
you." In this day, spiritualdarkness has definitely covered
so many people.
But God has brought radiantlight and joy to his children,
especially the last couple ofweeks.
If you've been watching like Ihave, you've seen the fires of

(06:07):
revival start to sweep acrossthe United States of America,
and the world, for that matterof fact.
I believe that this is a periodof time when God is separating
the light from the darkness.
And in my vision, this shiningcity came down to the earth, and

(06:33):
there were people inside thecity going about their business
with joy and with purpose,living God-given lives according
to what God had planned forthem.
But there were also peopleoutside of the city.
Everything outside of the citywas dark, dark as night.

(06:57):
Stumbling with no purpose, justwalking, stumbling, doing

(07:21):
nothing.
And they were sad andmiserable, and their clothes
were in rags, in tatters.
And in my vision, some of thepeople came out of the darkness
through the gates of the city.
The gates of the city wereguarded by God's angels.

(07:43):
They had these magnificentspears, they were huge angels.
And when some people came infrom the darkness as they passed
through those city gates, theywere transformed.
Still makes me want to cry.
To see the joy on their facesas they came out of hopeless

(08:10):
darkness into the gloriouslight, and they became citizens
of heaven.
And just as much joy as thatbrings, it breaks my heart that
there were others who camethrough those city gates and

(08:34):
they were not transformed.
Their clothes didn't change.
Their skin was gray.
It was like a black pebble on awhite beach.
They didn't change.

(08:55):
And they didn't have new life,they didn't have joy.
And the angels immediatelyescorted those people back out
of the city forcibly.
Grabbed them by the arms andtook them back out and put them
back in the darkness.
And that's because these peoplerefused to abandon their rags.

(09:20):
They refused to take on theways of God and to live
according to the ways of God.
And this is the part of thevision that I never completely
understood until now.
What the Lord was telling metoday is that this part of that

(09:41):
vision was something yet to comeand is a reflection of where we
are as the church today.
That this is not necessarilythe physical New Jerusalem, but
this is our spiritual, spiritualworld right now.

(10:02):
In my vision, we were notmaking forays into the darkness
either.
We were living in the light.
Almost like an angel.

(10:31):
But the hearts of some of thoseoutside of the city, those in
the darkness, couldn't help butnotice the light and be curious.
They were looking for a betterlife, and they came through the
gates of the city out ofcuriosity.
Meanwhile, the others were solost in their darkness that they

(10:54):
ignored the light.
They had no desire to change.
And that felt really importantto me.
As the Lord said, "Lives willnot be changed because of human

(11:14):
effort." There's nothing that Ican do that is going to change
somebody's life.
It's the Holy Spirit thatchanges hearts.
Right now I'm talking to theremnant, I'm talking to God's
children.
Those who have already decidedto follow Christ.
You see, I see that my job, ourjob, is to live fully in the

(11:40):
light, to walk in God's ways,and to go where he directs us to
do, to do the jobs that we'vebeen given.
And we are safe.
His warriors are there,guarding his people day and
night, looking after us.
God is keeping us safe as we'regoing about his business.

(12:01):
So I was just reading myone-year Bible, and I felt
nudged to circle back and sitwith this scripture.
And this is the word that Godgave me when I did.
And then I continued myreading, and I picked up where
we left off yesterday atPhilippians 1.27, and I went,

(12:24):
wow, this directly correlates towhat we just read.
Philippians 1.27 says, "Justone thing: As citizens of
heaven, live your life worthy ofthe gospel of Christ." And this
is just continuing the themethat God had me on this morning.
And I felt like I have to sharethis today.

(12:48):
It has to be out today, Monday,September 29th, 2025.
We need to live well ascitizens of the shining city of
heaven, as God's sons anddaughters.
And throughout Philippians,Paul continues to teach us how

(13:14):
to live as God's sons anddaughters.
Starting in verse five, he sayswe need to adopt the same
attitude as the one that JesusChrist had.
He was all God, but he emptiedhimself.
And he humbled himself bybecoming obedient, even to the

(13:38):
point of death.
I challenge all of God's sonsand daughters to be willing to
come to the point where we emptyourselves even to the point of
death.
Because death has no sting forus.

(13:59):
It just means we get to go bewith Christ.
Paul goes on to say inPhilippians 2.12 that we need to
work out our own salvation withfear and trembling.
I challenge you also to not bejudgmental of your brothers and

(14:20):
sisters.
That's the Holy Spirit's work.
Let God tell them what theyneed to do.
It's not up to us to decidewho's a Christian and who's not.
I know that's a hard word.
And we need to be careful whowe follow.
I'm not saying that.
The Spirit bears witness, youknow, when someone connects with

(14:49):
you as a son or daughter ofGod.
But we need to take care andnot be judgmental.
We are not the judge.
God Almighty is the judge.
Our job is to love.
All lives are precious.
It doesn't matter who they areor where they come from.

(15:11):
We are to love them.
Verses 14 through 17 says, "Doeverything without grumbling and
arguing, so that you may beblameless and pure, children of
God who are faultless in acrooked and perverted
generation, among whom you shinelike stars in the world by

(15:36):
holding firm to the word oflife." This shining continues to
be presented to me again andagain.
When we live according to God'sways, we are to have compassion

(15:57):
and we are to value life.
We see that reflected in Psalm72: 12 to 14.
God said that he would put asense of justice in the heart of
righteous kings.
That he would show them hisways of justice, and that's to

(16:17):
rescue the poor, the afflicted,and helpless, to save the poor
from oppression and violence.
Those are God's ways.
And then my devotions endedwith this really sobering
instruction from Proverbs that Ihad never remembered reading

(16:38):
before.
I've read the Bible my entirelife.
And this just jumped off thepages at me today.

Proverbs 24 (16:45):
11 to 12.
It says, "Rescue those beingtaken off to death, and save
those stumbling towardslaughter.
If you say, 'But we didn't knowabout this,' won't he who
weighs hearts consider it?
Won't he who protects your lifeknow?

(17:08):
Won't he repay a personaccording to his work?" Wow,
guys, everyone that's walkingaround in the dark outside the
shining walls that guardheaven's citizens, they're

(17:30):
stumbling around in the dark.
And that's the way it was in myvision.
Those in the dark werestumbling around, they had no
clear sense of purpose, unlikethe shining citizens of heaven,
who each had a job and a purposeand were going about their
business.
Last Friday I wrote down ascripture that I thought I would

(17:54):
share with you today.
Little did I know that Godwanted to expand that scripture
with everything that I'vealready said.
But God.
God has used this period oftime that we are in and the

(18:17):
tragedy of Charlie Kirk's murderto awaken so many of his
sleeping children and to bringso many out of darkness.
And Paul penned theseinstructions to the Ephesians
that are so critical for us toremember today.
Ephesians 5, starting in verse8, reads, "For you were once

(18:44):
darkness, but now you are lightin the Lord.
Live as children of light, forthe fruit of the light consists
of all goodness, righteousness,and truth, testing what is
pleasing to the Lord.
Don't participate in thefruitless works of darkness, but

(19:04):
instead expose them, for it isshameful even to mention what is
done by them in secret.
Everything exposed by the lightis made visible, for what makes
everything visible is light.

Therefore it is said (19:18):
Get up, sleeper, and rise up from the
dead, and Christ will shine onyou." Now that we're awake, it's
critical to not be lulled backto sleep by the distractions of
the enemy.
That's what he wants to do.

(19:38):
Expect that to come.
If you've recently had a heartchange, expect some pushback
from the enemy.
He's gonna want you to go backto sleep.
He's gonna want you to go backto the ways of Babylon.
The comfort, the hedonism.
Don't let your new holy fire inyour heart die.

(20:02):
Fan it into flame, like Paultold Timothy.
Be a fire brand, be a torchbearer.
God is calling us to beministers of his holy fire and
to let our lives shine with hisglory.

(20:28):
If you're listening to thistoday, you've gotten this far,
and you have no idea what I'mtalking about, or maybe you do,
maybe you've walked away fromGod, maybe your heart's been

(20:50):
cold, and God's tugging on yourheart.
You feel something inside yourchest, inside your mind, saying,
you know, this resonates withme.
Um, there's gotta be more.
I encourage you.

(21:10):
That's the Holy Spirit.
That's the Holy Spirit pullingyou to give your heart to him.
And if that's you, I challengeyou to pray, to invite the Lord
into your heart, to ask him, toshow you how to follow his ways

(21:37):
so that you can be one of hiscitizens.
The Bible says that if youconfess with your heart that he
is Lord, that Jesus Christ isLord, and that he will save you,
you will be saved.
That's all, guys.
That's all it is.
You gotta decide to follow God.

(21:57):
Listen to his spirit, listen tothat tugging, that tugging that
you feel right now.
If you ignore it, it will goaway.
But if you listen to it, it cancontinue.
That's the Lord guiding us andshowing us how to step forward
and walk in his ways.

(22:18):
And this is the first step tocome to him.
And if you prayed today andyou've invited the Lord into
your heart, find a goodBible-believing church that can
support you.
That's all I have for youtoday, guys.

(22:41):
I pray that this message goesdeep and that you take it to
heart.
Fan into flame the Holy Spiritfire.
Jesus is King.
This has been the Dona WatsonShow.
For more information on mybooks and other projects, visit

(23:02):
my website at Dona Watson.com ormy substack at substack.Dona
Watson.com.
God bless you.