AJI Mission and Vision

AJI Mission and Vision

February 2010

Who We Are

Artists’ Junction International is a network of artists, leaders, and organizations that are like-minded in their dedication to restoring artists and the arts in the Kingdom of God.

Our Mission

Our mission (assignment) is to restore artists to the fullness of life and artistic expression in the Kingdom of God. Our heart is to encourage, equip, and empower artists around the world to worship and serve Him through the arts with all that He has purposely placed in them individually and collectively.

Our Vision: “Restoration through Relationship”

Artists to Artists: Intentional connections for encouragement, validation, and the sharpening our skills and gifts.

Artists to God’s Kingdom: Through pursuit of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and developing a Kingdom perspective that flows from Israel and a lifestyle based on the complete Scriptures (Old and New Testaments united as one full revelation of God and His Kingdom).

Artists to the World: Encouraging artists to engage with people through the arts in their communities, nations and also internationally for the purpose of being God’s light in the world and witnesses of Jesus the Anointed One (Yeshua the Messiah)

Our Perspective on The Kingdom of God

The Kingdom of God is: The eternal government, rule, supreme administration and universal dominion of God over all of His creation in heaven, the earth, and all the universes. Of God’s Kingdom there is no beginning and there is no end. It always has been, is, and always will be.

1 Chronicles 29:11-12

“Yours, O Lord, is the strength and the power and the glory, and the authority and the honor: for everything in heaven and on earth is yours; yours is the kingdom, O Lord, and you are lifted up as head over all. Wealth and honor come from you, and you are ruler over all, and in your hand is power and strength; it is in your power to make great, and to give strength to all.”

On earth, God’s right of dominion and ownership is firmly established through His creative act in shaping from nothing all that is seen. He did so as the God-head that we call The Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit). Mankind was created in God’s image as His children– His royal family on earth - and was given positional authority to act, care for, and reign in prosperity on His behalf over all things on earth. Mankind’s charge was to keep all things on earth in perfect alignment with God’s Kingdom of Light and Life and to exercise such authority according to God’s daily revealed will. In an act of disobedience (in kingdom terms treason), mankind broke the Father/child relationship with God and was stripped of the position and ability to reign as God had intended. God’s great enemy, the fallen angel Lucifer, had successfully deceived mankind, acquired access to earth, and began to release his Kingdom of Darkness and Death into the world.

Though the earth remains under God’s sovereignty, this “foreign and enemy power” has invaded in effort to control and destroy it. Lucifer’s intention was, and remains, to forever separate both mankind and earth from the realm of God’s Kingdom. At mankind’s giving in to deception, God immediately initiated a plan to restore his lost children to relationship with Him and to a position of authority on earth. He created a nation through which to work His plan and keep as a constant testimony to all the earth of His continuing care for, involvement in, and faithfulness to all He had created. God established a people through whom the Son – who was with Him at the creation of earth - would enter the fallen world to redeem and restore mankind, and eventually all of the earth, to the fullness of God’s Kingdom. That nation was born through Abraham and Sarah, eventually known as the Hebrew people (Jews) and the nation of Israel.

It is through Israel that Jesus (Yeshua) came (as a Jew) as the Messiah, the Anointed One. His choice to lay down His own life as the perfect and final sacrifice for all of mankind’s failures and shortcomings (sins) makes it possible for all of mankind, Jewish and Gentile, to be reconciled as children with God and regain rightful position in God’s Kingdom to once again to exercise God’s authority on earth. Those within the Hebrew tribes fulfill the destiny for which Israel was created by individually acknowledging Yeshua as the Messiah, and applying His sacrifice of atonement and the power of His resurrection to their lives. Those from outside the Hebrew tribes (Gentiles), through doing the same, are adopted as sons and daughters into God’s royal family. They are “grafted in” and made a part of Israel; God’s chosen people, a nation unto Himself, a royal family and a royal priesthood. This choice, for both Jew and Gentile, is called “salvation” or “being born again”. The individual is moved from living in Lucifer’s Kingdom of Darkness and Death and in to God’s Kingdom of Light and Life. For mankind on earth, Yeshua is the only path back to God and re-entry into His Kingdom. Once restored to God’s Kingdom, there is no longer a difference between Jew and Gentile…all are known only as sons and daughters of God.

According to Scripture, Yeshua will one day again return Israel, to Jerusalem, and will complete a physical restoration and establishment of God’s Kingdom on earth. Lucifer’s attempts to control and destroy earth through his Kingdom of Darkness will be firmly defeated and rendered powerless on earth. Both Jews and Gentiles who have accepted Him as Messiah and have entered in to His provision of salvation will be considered to be His people, citizens of His Kingdom, the people of His Holy Nation Israel. These will reign with King Yeshua over this present earth for 1000 years. A new and glorious Jerusalem will be His capitol city. After these 1000 years, Lucifer will be allowed to try again to overtake earth and dethrone the King. Those of God’s Kingdom will once again be tested – both in their personal relationships with Him and their loyal commitment to His supremacy. Through the prophecies of Scripture we know that Lucifer will not succeed. He and those who choose to follow him will be destroyed forever. A new heaven and new earth will be created, the present also being completely destroyed. God’s Kingdom will then continue on throughout eternity. Those who pass this test will go deeper in to that eternity with Him.

The Kingdom of God is an eternal kingdom not presently seen on earth by the physical eye. It is a very real, very powerful, spiritual kingdom (as is the Kingdom of Darkness). God’s Kingdom is characterized by righteousness, justice, peace, wholeness (prosperity), and joy. Its citizens, in both the seen and unseen realms, walk in loving relationship with King Yeshua, for whom they live to honor and obey. Their lives are characterized by love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, kindness, and self-control.

It is vital to those who belong to God’s Kingdom to realize that those around them who by choice, or who have not yet met with the salvation opportunity, are currently living in the Kingdom of Darkness. Though they physically live on the earth which is still God’s by sovereign right, they spiritually dwell outside the rule of His Kingdom. Though intended for a greater destiny, they are being held captive by Lucifer’s deceptions and strongholds. They are seen by us as ”kidnapped royalty” in need of revelation and deliverance. It is the role of the sons and daughters of God, the citizens of His Kingdom, to bring all life on earth back into compliance with the ways of God’s Kingdom - “on earth as it is in heaven”. It is the commandment of our King, Yeshua the Messiah, to bring hope, faith, love, forgiveness, healing, and His path to deliverance and restoration to all who surround us. It is to be our joy to welcome “kidnapped royalty” back in to the family and help them discover the wonders and blessings of abundant life in the Kingdom of God!