A WORD FOR THE PIONEERS: “AND SUDDENLY!”
I have a word of encouragement for the pioneers as we head into this weekend. All week, I haven’t been able to shake this word, and to be honest, it’s been these two words that have been irritating in a good way all week. Why?
The reason why we wrestle words of encouragement and hope is normally because of one of two things:
1 - We have been exposed to a lot of hope deferred. Not seeing the promise come to pass. Not seeing the thing that God’s saying.
2 - Or because we’re going through internal stretching and the word exposes our level of faith, our level of vision, and our level of agreement with the Lord. It also exposes where we’ve been in agreement with the enemy.
I believe this is one of those words. So if from the outset this word convicts you, and you feel that wrestle, ask the Lord why.
The two words I’ve been hearing all week are:
“AND SUDDENLY…”
Pioneers, I can’t even tell you how many times the Lord has told me to do something, and initially I don’t see any fruit. I don’t see God moving through it or breaking out through it. I don’t see anything spectacular, supernatural, or any divine importance or value.
Ninety-nine percent of the instructions and the leadings God has given us as a family in following and serving the Lord, haven’t come with rainbows and the glory shining down from heaven.
They’ve come in raw moments of just pure obedience and often where it doesn’t make sense, and people around us don’t understand while we’re making those decisions.
They’ve come from dreams where the Lord has repetitively told us to do something, to the point that we know we need to step out and do it no matter what the cost.
So let’s be real. A lot of the time when you follow the Lord and you do what He asks you to do, it can feel like the longest pregnancy in history to the point where the enemy tries to lie to you and tell you that you’re actually barren and that there’s no baby there or that it will never be birthed at all.
I know many pioneers have been in a healing and reviving season where it’s like God is rebuilding so many of you who have stepped out for Him yet you feel like it’s fallen to the ground. You feel like you’ve been left in a shipwreck and it doesn’t make any sense.
I know so many pioneers right now who are in a place where they’ve actually given up. A place where they have grown despondent, deeply discouraged, and soul-sick because the promises haven’t come to pass.
But it’s exactly in those seasons that God begins to break out and move. I’ve seen it time and time again in my life, where I’m at my wit’s end, in my own strength, my own ability, and the Lord begins to move suddenly WHEN ALL HOPE IS LOST.
Can I be honest? I have been through seasons where we are at rock bottom. Depleted in every area… AND SUDDENLY God moves. It doesn’t make sense.
It’s like Jacob at Penuel—at the place of breaking, where he wrestled with the promise and with the Angel of the Lord. Then suddenly, God moved in his life, and everything turned around. I do believe we’re in another one of those moments RIGHT NOW.
Hannah is about sing forth…
You are about to cry out aloud with the sound of joy as BIRTH COMES.
So many people are carrying small seeds, small beginnings and it looks like nothing is happening, that there’s nothing moving. The provision isn’t flooding and flowing. The open doors aren’t coming. None of it makes sense. “God, where is Your hand? Where is Your provision?” AND SUDDENLY...
So to the pioneers–
Don’t give up. Contend in this moment.
Let me share a dream with you, and why I believe the Lord has put this in my spirit to declare over you right now.
Last week I had a dream and in the dream, I’m pregnant but instead of joy, a sadness comes over me. I asked, “will this baby ever be birthed?”
Suddenly, the baby starts kicking. I get excited that the baby is about to be born. Then, the baby falls asleep. And again, this sadness comes over me.
Yet again, it feels like more delay after more delay and I say, “I guess I just have to wait until this baby is ready to be born.”
No sooner had I said those words, I looked down, and the baby is laying on my chest. No birth. No painful moment. It’s just there.
AND SUDDENLY, AND SUDDENLY, AND SUDDENLY!
I haven’t been able to shake this word! It feels active and alive!
I just keep hearing the Lord say over His pioneers: “this is an ‘and suddenly’ moment.”
This is where the word of the Lord in your own life is going to come up and fight against the hope deferred, the frustration, and the barrenness, and the lie of barrenness that’s been over you. God is breaking that, and He’s saying that this is an “and suddenly” moment.
And He led me to Isaiah 48:3:
“I foretold the former things long ago, my mouth announced them and I made them known; then suddenly I acted, and they came to pass.”
And that scripture parallels with Joshua 21:45, which says this: “There failed not ought of any good thing which the Lord had spoken unto the house of Israel; all came to pass.”
This is an ‘and suddenly’ moment but the question is, what are you going to partner with?
Are you going to partner with what you’re seeing around you? Are you going to partner with the discouragement? Are you going to partner with the things that haven’t happened, or are you going to partner with the word of the Lord?
The Lord is decreeing over you: “and suddenly, and the birth shall come swiftly, and the birth shall come swiftly, and you will give birth.”
You will not be barren any longer. In fact, I break the barrenness off you. I break the demonic assignment of barrenness that’s been against your womb, against your destiny, against your kids, against your finances, against every area of your life.
The Lord says, “Pioneers, I did not call you to lead you on a wild goose chase. I did not call you to make you discouraged and to make you lose hope and trust in Me. The enemy has tried to discourage you on this journey, but this is an “and suddenly” moment.”
Habakukk 2:3 says:
“For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and will not delay.”
I think the challenge right now is not letting what we see shift our faith and have us partner with unbelief. Choose to partner with FAITH again and watch God do what has for stalled.
So let me prophesy this into you– “and suddenly'“ is coming, in Jesus name!