Some threshold traps are unavoidable. Life is full of situations where we find ourselves in the position of having to choose between the lesser of two evils. Sometimes, without warning, we may find ourselves asked to participate in a threshold covenant and there’s no way out—or perhaps there is a way, but it involves dishonour to another person.
Dishonour on a threshold invites retaliation, so it’s advisable to avoid it.
On arrival in New Zealand at Auckland International Airport, it’s impossible to avoid the tomokanga, the carved Māori gateway symbolising a spiritual portal from darkness to light. The passage under the arch is the only way in for travellers from overseas. How do you avoid accepting the covenant with the land implied by your movement through the passage? Or perhaps, you’re travelling along a road in Japan and suddenly find yourself whizzing under torii gates? Again, your acceptance with covenant is implied by nothing other than the fact you travelled that road.
Back in biblical times, it was understood that all you had to do to raise a threshold covenant was to pass over the cornerstone in the doorway of someone’s house. Simple as that. If you wanted to refuse covenant, you’d kick the cornerstone instead. That understanding of an ordinary everyday action constituting covenant is still found in many cultures.
Visit a temple with a tour group and simply by stepping through the entrance you may well have agreed to a covenant. Or participate in a ceremony invoking a blessing by the spirits of the land and, again, you may have covenanted. Many people think that they’re joining a social club when they are invited to become a Freemason and never realise that they are partaking in a threshold covenant ritual.
So what do you do when, against your will, you suddenly realise you’re in a situation where you’ve been involved in a threshold covenant?
First, don’t create a situation of dishonour. That just plays into the claws of threshold spirits like Leviathan. Second, dissociate yourself—quietly but verbally.
Say something along these lines:
‘I am a covenant child of Yahweh and I am covered by His armour, overshadowed by the prayer shawl of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and protected by the power of His saving blood. I mean no dishonour by entering this place. I am here simply to honour the person who invited me. Any action of mine, done in ignorance of the customs of this place, that might be construed as raising a covenant with the spirits in residence here, is absolutely and for all time null and void. If any spirit wishes to contend the legality of this statement, then that spirit should take up the matter directly with Jesus of Nazareth, my covenant defender. I ask for His kiss to armour me as I enter and I say to any enemy of my Lord in this place, “The Lord rebuke you!”’
This is Grace Drops and I’m Anne Hamilton. May Jesus, the Chief Cornerstone, be your covenant defender.
Thank you to Lorna Skinner of www.riversofmusic.co.uk for the background music.
Covenant is at the heart of the Christian faith. It’s necessary to understand it in order to understand what can go wrong with it and how covenant violation affects our ability to come into our life’s calling. The most recent book in the Strategies for the Threshold Series is Dealing with Azazel: Spirit of Rejection.