The Fortress & the Firebrand: Prophetic Stories of God's Grace in the Fire with a Vision of Purpose and Hope

By Terry Hartikka

Do you want to reclaim your nation, your family, your church, and your life? Then this is what God is calling you to do! To help you understand that calling, author Terry Hartikka offers his life message from heaven to you.

The Fortress and the Firebrand presents Pastor Hartikka’s journey through an unusual number of difficulties that might cause people to question how a God of love could allow such things. It details how God often turned the pain of the past into power for the future. Pastor Hartikka is as a brand plucked out of the fire, and Jesus is his fortress. Through the many lessons he learned along the way—from extreme fatigue to being used to raise a man up from the dead—he provides an honest look at how God took an ordinary man with many faults and showed him His love and presence.

This inspirational personal narrative serves as a message of encouragement and preparation for our future as individuals and as a nation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Mar 8, 2023
• ISBN: 9781664291096

Terry Hartikka

Terry Hartikka has dedicated himself to embracing the pain that life brings and turning it into a positive eternal force, the result of a lifetime of difficult experiences. A husband and father, he has been a pastor for forty years, served in the military, worked in the mines, and served as a television broadcaster with his own business.

Book preview

Copyright © 2023 Terry Hartikka.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means,

graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or

by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the

author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the

author and the publisher make no explicit guarantees as to the

accuracy of the information contained in this book and in some cases,

names of people have been altered to protect their privacy.

WestBow Press

A Division of Thomas Nelson & Zondervan

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.westbowpress.com

844-714-3454

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or

links contained in this book may have changed since publication and

may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those

of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher,

and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are

models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Unless otherwise indicated, scripture quotations are taken from

the Holy Bible, King James Version. (Public Domain)

Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New

International Version®, NIV®.Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.™

Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

ISBN: 978-1-6642-9107-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6642-9108-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-6642-9109-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2023901765

WestBow Press rev. date: 03/02/2023

To our three girls, Lori, Lindsy, Stacy, and their families.

Special thanks to my wife, Lonie, for all her

patience and faith through it all.

CONTENTS

Introduction

1.     The Fortress Showed Up

2.     A Vision of the Fortress

3.     It’s about the Remedy, Not the Problem

4.     Why, God?

5.     Visions of the Lord in the Storm

6.     Living by Faith in the Fire

7.     Does the Rain Have a Father?

8.     Reduced to New Life

9.     The Liberty of a New Life—Who Do You Think You Are

10.   Liberty Establishes Identity

11.   God Is Big

12.   This Is What My Heart Sounds Like

13.   Great Is Thy Faithfulness

14.   Threats Introduced Me to Life

15.   God Will Take Care of You

16.   Plucked from the Fire

17.   Thirsty

18.   Disciplined by Joy

19.   Meeting God in the Dirt

20.   Buy Gold Tried in the Fire

21.   Destined for Glory

INTRODUCTION

Do you want to reclaim your nation, your family, your church, and your life? Then this is what God is calling you to do! I believe this book is my life message from heaven to you. It is why I have lived. It is why I have suffered and been called to persevere. I haven’t tried to put my best foot forward. It’s an honest look at God’s pathway. It is a life lived, with all its hardships, for you. Here is what God has shown me for you. I believe not knowing this is why so many so-called prophets have missed it.

Many storms have come over the years. The biggest ones are those I have been sent out into—sent to find peace in them, sent to find peace for men and nations. Struggle marks all of them. But to strain at the oars when in a boat in a storm, as the disciples did, is fruitless. John said, when they took Jesus into the boat, immediately, they got to where they were going.

It was in 2019 when I was sent out into this present storm. I lost my health, my ministry, and finally, my television broadcast business. What is this storm like? The other night, I awoke about 3:00 a.m. because I felt too exhausted to breathe. It felt relief to just pause for a bit, but I’ve learned to rest in this storm of disability. I can no longer go out to enjoy what I used to love to do for rest, solitude, and peace from chaotic business. Pastoring, managing four TV channels, a sports broadcast crew, and being an active family man were all out of the question. The only thing I could look forward to was leaning back in my recliner, turning on some peaceful worship music, and falling into the presence of God!

When my ability to function was cut back, I began to hear a whisper in my spirit, What you are going through is what this nation is about to go through. God uses people as His ambassadors and witnesses to tell the world what He is like.

I thought my ministry was fundamentally over. It was refreshing and a blessing to seek the Lord just for myself, my nurture, and my refining, as well as that of my family. I had learned years ago, when things in life get cut back, God is often allowing them for a positive reason. Lord, You let this happen. Show me what You want me to learn.

Something big was coming. It was a storm, and that storm would be followed by another, and they would keep growing in intensity. By the time COVID-19 hit, I knew God was about to take over.

The things I was learning when all the props I trusted in were knocked out were also the things the nation would need to know, if they had ears to hear. Like everyone else, I began hearing news that didn’t seem to add up. Every morning, I would research the source of what was going on. In the afternoon, I would seek the Lord. I didn’t have to fact-check in the afternoons! This has been my habit now for going on three years.

What I found out about living in the storm was built upon decades of learning this in my years as a pastor. A large part of the learning curve was making sense out of the hard times. In fact, I did 157 episodes of a podcast called Life Journeys about the life lessons I learned during challenging times. I found, if I looked past a heightened sense of justice and listened instead, I would find God and peace in the storm. That is just like the plan of Jesus when He sent the disciples out into the storm. He was teaching them to believe, no matter what. However, precisely what to believe and how to accomplish it is a large part of what people are missing today. Because of it, they struggle with their faith, feel they are unable or unworthy, and often either give up or compromise.

I want to slam the door closed on the deceptive tricks of the enemy of our souls that can shipwreck the faith of so many. I want to reveal how to navigate the darkness ahead and find peace while the storm still rages. In fact, there’s a way to embrace the storm so fully because of the joy, peace, and power given, that it doesn’t matter if the storm ceases or not! Really! One day, the Lord spoke to me, You can’t speak peace into the storm if there’s no peace in your heart to speak out of.

Life is a journey. It’s not all about the destinations we are hoping for. The final destination, heaven, is of utmost importance. The pathway we walk is really what God’s will is all about. It’s not the physical healing, the sudden sum of money that miraculously comes along, or the circumstance that just one day changes and you get a new job. Victory over poverty isn’t more money. Victory over sickness isn’t immediate healing. God is after the heart, and faith is about God getting us to be what He wants us to be instead of us getting Him to do what we want. Though many of us already know that’s true, the actual outworking of it is quite a bit more involved than nicely calculated phrases that cause a momentary sense of relief.

I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust (Psalm 91:2).

When threats press in hard and sleep is fleeting because of the sorrows and fears, I need a refuge. When thoughts about regrets, guilt, and fading memories come pouring in, my mind can all too easily lead me into an unhealthy place. That is when I need to find God as a fortress from the invasion of enemies—real and often irrational.

What’s going to happen to our job, income, home, children, peace, and liberty? Where will our health be five years from now? Why is there so much chaos that I can no longer listen to the reports or even talk about it? Why did my friend have to die? What’s my purpose? Why is there so much pain?

The fortress God supplies will be the key to surviving the days ahead. But how do people find it, and how can they know such a place will be given to them? That’s where the lesson of the firebrand comes in. God is the fortress, and we are the brands plucked from the fire.

And the LORD said unto Satan, The LORD rebuke thee, O Satan; even the LORD that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire? (Zechariah 3:2)

Am I worthy to find the fortress of God’s comfort, peace, and protection? How can I know for sure? The vessel plucked from the fire answers that question. When a person looks at the pluses and minuses of life and tries to judge his worthiness to be cared for in the storm, that’s when the battle is identified. God’s answer is the fire. It is the fiery trials we have had and the ones we are in that must be understood. Why has God allowed these hard things, and how can we embrace them to establish ourselves in the fortress of unlimited hope and help? That is the message of The Fortress and the Firebrand.

CHAPTER 1

The Fortress Showed Up

LORD, how are they increased that trouble me! Many are they that rise up against me.

—Psalm 3:1

I t’s over sixty years ago, but I can still see the weave in the couch my mother was sitting on. The sun was reflecting off the brass trim on the fireplace behind Dad. With a square-nosed butcher knife raised over my mother’s head, Dad was a picture of rage. I said to myself, I can’t believe this is happening! I would later conclude this is what family life must be like.

It would take time, but I would come to appreciate what years of stress can do to a man. Mom and Dad were living in a nightmare, and today, I greatly admire my parents who lived through it all. They never divorced or, to my knowledge, even talked about it. Dad made a commitment, lived through years of great uncertainty, and weathered the storm.

Dad took me fishing on the weekends. In the fall, he taught me to hunt. I loved to hunt, and I’d spend hours cleaning the guns in anticipation of the upcoming season. During one fall season, I was on my way to the basement to check out the gear. Mom and Dad had one of their shouting matches. I stopped on my way down the basement stairs and sat down. Dad was loading a shotgun and putting the barrel under his chin. He’ll never do it, I thought as I sat there frozen.

It was probably just my protective mechanism of denial. But I was right. He didn’t kill himself, and he didn’t stab my mother the week before.

Many scenes like this played out in my preteen life. They would become emotional explosions that shaped the way I looked at the world for a long time. How does one overcome emotional trauma? It caused me to look at everything through colored glasses. But I undertook the journey, and through it, I learned, grew, and overcame it. But this is about more than a challenging upbringing.

As I grew older, somehow, in my soul, I knew I needed a safe place from the pain of being me. Eventually, I found a sure place of healing that worked in every attack, every insecurity, and every failure. God would teach me the truth about being a brand plucked out of the fire. It would be a message of sovereign grace in a place of great resistance. But God was allowing that resistance for a reason.

There seems to have been resistance to my life before it began. One cold morning in November, my grandmother and my three-year-old dad boarded the Mauretania and fled Finland. The Russians threatened an invasion that would eventually capture their town. Coming from a foreign country, he would have to learn to defend himself. He would eventually teach me what he had learned. But one event sticks out that was far beyond his ability to defend.

When he told me of it many years later, I realized Dad had seen me before I was born! In her early thirties, Mom had a severe emotional breakdown. Back in those days, she was tied to the bed until the police arrived and took her to jail. From there, she spent years in a mental institution until one day the doctor called my father in. She is going to need brain surgery if you ever hope to see her again outside of this hospital. But there is a fifty-fifty chance that she won’t survive it. What do you want to do?

That night in the motel room down the street from St. Mary’s in Duluth, Dad faced a decision. That’s when the fortress showed up. Now my dad wasn’t a Christian. It had been only a few months after Mom became a born-again Christian that this all started. Dad blamed the church. He was so mad, he drove around the church, threatening to blow it up, and he could do it. He was the foreman on a demolition crew and had dynamite in the trunk. In fact, he used to fish with it! A quarter of a stick, we later called a Dupont Spinner, was all it took. So the night that God showed up, it was pure grace.

As my father fell into bed after the doctor’s news, he saw an open vision of a hillside full of sheep with Jesus standing in front of them. A cradle with a baby in it was in front of Him. Then Dad said it felt like someone pulled the covers back and got into the bed. He said it happened two nights in a row as he struggled with what to do.

Many years later, when I came home from college to visit, he told me of the vision and asked what I thought it meant. It was as clear as a bell! Dad, God was trying to tell you that your wife wasn’t going to die but that you were going to have a child, and, Dad, I’m here!

He never let on that he figured it out. Maybe he just wanted to know if it was true and that he wasn’t crazy.

It was decided that Mom would have the operation, and of course, she survived and was out on probation when I was conceived. When it seemed impossible, God showed up. Those two nights were my father’s fortress experience, whereby Jesus was beginning to be the author of his faith. But it would take a long time. Don’t forget that part. My dad’s journey took some very dark turns over the decades before he would ever give his life to Christ.

Mom was one of eleven children. It was said she was the sweetest of them all, but I never got to see it. Not long before her operation, her mother came to visit her. What she saw could’ve broken her heart, but this mother chose instead to break the darkness in that room. My mother was curled up in a fetal position on her bed. It was a sight I saw the day God used me to break my father’s darkness decades later. Then in this desperate place, my grandmother began to pray. When she walked out of the room, she told my dad, Your wife is going to be released before long!

My entire forty years of pastoral ministry have been marked by learning to make sense out of the hard times. There have been many fires of adversity, such as Mom being on probation from a mental hospital when I was born; a man dying and then being raised when I was preaching about healing; Dad seeing a vision of me before I was born when his wife had a fifty-fifty chance of surviving; bankruptcy; gangs trying to stop our crusade work in Russia; emergency room visits; car accidents; chronic disabling fatigue. Why, God? I need a fortress!

As I progressed on my life journey, I discovered it was the same pathway America is on now. Our potential future as individuals and as a nation will go through some deep valleys. If we’re going to survive and thrive, we’re going to need some healing. But that restoration is also going to require that we learn not to waste our trials.

I was born for such a time as this. As of this writing, our nation is being worn down. On that infamous day, January 6, 2021, while the images of the Capitol incursion in Washington DC played on the screen, God spoke to my heart. As is often the case, He just showed up, and by the time He was done, I was stunned. You’ve seen what men can do. Now get ready for what I’m going to do. I’m going to bring this nation to its knees.

He had never spoken to me quite like this. I was so shaken by His presence that I couldn’t speak for several hours. When I finally tried telling my wife, I barely choked the words out.

Looking back, God has brought me to my knees many times, and it has been painful. But I have learned not to waste my trials as He worked toward a positive end. The pathway of hard times I’ve been on has built a foundation of hope for what’s ahead, be it a personal valley or a national dilemma. As I look back, I see how all these things have come together for a specific divine purpose that will enable me to work with God in where He is going.

What has it meant for me to be brought to my knees? What did it mean, and how was I led to prepare for what’s ahead? Get ready, for there is an amazing outcome. But it’s going to take some significant preparation, and it has got to go beyond guesswork.

I would come to realize in my present battle with disabling chronic fatigue syndrome that all the challenges of my life have worked to establish a battle plan for this present day. Through every trial, God was building a foundation and blueprint to overcome. For some, it may be depression, old age, chronic sickness, financial stress, or abuse, but the process of restoration for a person or a nation is the same. People today are saying Jesus is the only answer for our nation. The process of learning and preparing in hard times is about discovering how to connect the dots between Jesus and the future of our personal lives and nation.

Most people today have a basic idea of what posttraumatic stress disorder means. Many would argue you really don’t know what it is until you’ve been there. It’s like saying, You don’t know what a tornado is until you’ve been in one.

Personally, I believe there are a lot of people who have PTSD who don’t realize it. Then there are a few who have posttraumatic growth or PTG. Yes, it’s a thing. This is where people have learned to embrace the pain of the past or present. They have then learned to become better people for it. It really is possible! But it takes an intentional effort and a fair amount of time.

German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche is noted for originating the statement, What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Left alone, this idea doesn’t work well.

What doesn’t kill you will often leave you bitter, broken, and afraid. However, the idea behind Nietzsche’s statement is, if a person will embrace the trial and learn to accept its reality, he can learn from it and grow.

Each chapter of my story is a look at the trials and the gold that would come out of the fire. It is not necessarily in chronological order. God has often taken me back to things in the past to reveal more of what the goals of heaven are. They are building blocks that take an honest look at