Prophetic Word – It’s a Season, not a Lifetime

This prophetic word is titled  It’s a season, not a lifetime.  I felt inspired to write this after speaking with some individuals who are going through a difficult time.

As I was there talking to the people and discerning the spirits I was able to see two distinct groups, those who realized that they were going through a bad season and were hopefully that things would change and the other group were people who had just accepted this downturn in their life as a reality for their future.  Like they would never get out of this situation.

It caused me to think about a time in the past where things drastically changed for me and how I handled that season.

Who is this word for?  Those who feel they are in a pit, you may have just fallen into it or perhaps you’ve been there for years and you just don’t know how to get out of it.

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For me, while I was going through it, I knew it was a spiritual attack because I was doing everything that I was suppose to be doing as far as business was concerned, I was tithing, reading the word, praying, had a strong relationship with the Lord and still things began to go down like the titanic.

I remember the first full year when I was in this season that I was sitting with my accountant and heard him making deep heavy sighs, while shaking his head and plugging in the numbers and at the end he says to me “you know you’re below the poverty level, right?  You could be getting government assistance now if you wanted it”. I looked at him like he was out of his mind and said “No, things are going to change next month”.  You see, prior to this, I was very successful in my career and business.

He had the deepest look of concern on his face and I could tell he was in shock too because he’d been doing my taxes for years and had never seen me in this position before.  Do you know anyone below the poverty level with accountants?  LOL. That just goes to show you that things were very different from the previous years. He asked me if I had a plan to get out of this cycle.  I basically told him that God was my plan.  That’s when I usually get the look of “oh no, she went off the deep end”. He knew me before I was saved and always knew me as being a passionate, driven, career focused successful woman. So for me to be saved now, talk about the Lord and now he’s seeing that things have taken a bad turn, he’s worried that I turned into “one of those types of Christian”.  Delusional and in denial.

The truth is, I wasn’t worried about it.  By the way, there’s nothing wrong with taking government assistance if you are going through a season in your life and you need to do it.  However, for me, this would be a sign of me throwing in the towel and accepting that I am officially in the pit and decided to stay there.  That’s what it would mean for me.

I was wholly convinced that things would change the next month.  I was SURE it would change next month.  I just had to figure out how to slay this Goliath that was coming after me financially and I would be out of this boat.

Let’s just say my “things will change next month” went on for a little over THREE years!  Yeah.  During that time it felt like there was a hole in the bottom of my purse and everything was draining out of it.  Nothing worked during those years.  I didn’t have him as an accountant after that year.  Not because I was mad at him, but because who needs an accountant when you’re under the poverty level?!  LOL. Turbo Tax here I come!

I never once thought that was my final spot.  I knew that this was just a season, it’s not a lifetime.  The minute I figured out how to fight this type of warfare I would be free from this.

And, so eventually I did!  And, I got out of that season. You should’ve seen the accountant’s face when I started going back to him.  I made him a believer!!  That faith does work and that you can be UP, you can go down, but if you just stick with the Lord and do things His way, you can make a comeback BIGGER than what you had before!  Praise the Lord!  I’m still me, passionate, driven, GOD-focused successful Christian woman.  I am the same person, I’ve just directed my focus into the things of God and when you make a switch like that, you kinda wobble sometimes but as soon as you  get the hang of it, it works!

By the way, I am talking about finances here but you can take this for any pit you may have fallen into.

How did I get out of that season?  Treat that pit like it’s the Cave of Abdullam (1 Samuel 22 – 24)

Imagine being David, you were perfectly fine living your simple life and then God comes along and anoints you king and calls you into a new position.  You didn’t ask for this, you were chosen for it. You think that you are going up from here.  Well, let’s just say that you started to go up and then here comes this season when you are now on the run for your life, everything is being taken away, and you’re living in a CAVE.  A cave!  When you’re supposed to be the king?!  What gives?

Here’s what you do….

1. What did God say?

It’s great to get a prophetic word from someone else but when God tells you something directly, you know it has to happen.  If you got a prophetic word, you need to sit with the Lord and get 100% confirmation that the word is from Him and that it is for you.

Numbers 23:19

God is not human, that He should lie, not a human being, that He should change his mind. Does He speak and then not act? Does He promise and not fulfill?

I knew that I wasn’t going to be in that place forever because GOD SAID SO.  Period, the end.

Whatever pit you fell into now, what did God promise you?  If it hasn’t happened yet then obviously that is not your final place.  No, YOU ARE COMING OUT OF IT!!!

You never, ever lose faith in what the Lord told you.

When David was in the Cave of Abdullam, he never lost sight of the fact that he was anointed to be king.  Even though things were not going like he would’ve hoped he knew who he was and where he was going.

You have to stay focused on the vision.  If you don’t know where you are going, you will be lost!   Focus on the the vision.

What did God say?

2.  Consult God everyday along the way.

When you’re walking through these seasons it is critical that you are reading the word of God daily. You need direction when you don’t know which way to go.  The only thing you can trust, is the Word of God.  If you don’t have the prophetic gifting, you can’t hear God speak, you don’t have dreams or visions, your MAIN WAY for hearing God’s voice is by reading His word.  Read your bible.

When the Israelites were in the wilderness…

Exodus 13:21-22

²¹ The Lord went ahead of them. He guided them during the day with a pillar of cloud, and he provided light at night with a pillar of fire. This allowed them to travel by day or by night. ²² And the Lord did not remove the pillar of cloud or pillar of fire from its place in front of the people.

He never left you. If anyone did the leaving, it was you.

When you read the word and make it a habit, what will happen is God will start to highlight to you the things you need to do, or stop doing.  Through this, you’ll start to see the progress.

David had Ahimelech, the priest during this season when he was on the run and in hiding and after the priest was gone he consulted the ephod.  He was not trying to figure out how to get out of that spot on his own.  God was the One instructing him through the entire process. (1 Samuel 22:9-23, 1 Samuel 23:9-12).

There may come a point where there is no one else for you to ask for help so you need to learn how to inquire of the Lord for yourself.

***King Saul had a leviathan spirit attached to him.  What that means is that he not only wanted to kill David, he killed anyone that tried to help David get out from under him.  That is what a leviathan spirit does.  So that at one point David had no one else to consult so he had to go directly to God.  Now when the leviathan goes after your family – much like it killed Job’s children – and you understand that this is what it will do, you have to separate yourself from the people you love in order for them not to get hurt in the process. 1 Samuel 22:3-4***

This is a lonely road but this is not a forever place.  It’s a season.

3. You are being tested and trained.

You know, when I was a young Christian I used to believe that if I read the word and obeyed it, then none of the “bad stuff” would happen to me. This is a lie.

Everybody is going to get into the pit at some point.  I’m so sorry if you were never told this.  Suddenly, one day you fall into the pit and you start thinking “What’s wrong with me?”.  Nothing, nothing is wrong with you.  You are just at the point of your walk with Christ where now you are about to be tested and trained.

You are not a chef because you bought all the kitchen equipment and read the cookbooks from cover to cover.  No, you are a chef because you actually made the recipe successfully, it may take several tries to get it perfect.

You see you can read the cookbook but it is only when you actually go to make the recipe that you realize, oh no, I over mixed the flour in the batter and now the texture has changed.  Oh no, my oven is this wattage and so I should’ve turned it down by a certain degree to get this right, so now I have a burnt cake.  Oh oh, I guess you can’t switch the butter for margarine in this recipe because it doesn’t work.

Read the Bible all you want, but know this…that word has to get tested.  At some point God is going to call on you to make the recipe.

It would be like going to a marriage counselor who has never been married, they can tell it to you in theory, BUT they themself have never lived it so they will miss some of the nuances of what it is to be married.  Even if they quote a scripture, it still needs a proper application which will never happen if they’ve never been married.

It irks me when someone loses a loved one, especially a child, and then there’s that person that says “well, you know God has a reason for everything”.  Really?

But it’s the word of God?!  Sure.  But this is not the time or place for that scripture.  Your application of that word is wrong.  Try another one.

So then God has to pick you up and put you a pit so you can FEEL what it feels like to be that person.

You will never pray “my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory…” unless you have financial lack.  You will never pray “by His stripes, I am healed...” unless you need healing.  You will never pray “when I am weak, He is strong…” unless you are in a powerless position.  You never pray “no weapons that are formed against me shall prosper…” unless you are under a warfare attack.

You will never USE anything in the Bible until you go through it.

At some point GOD is going to put you in the position to see if you BELIEVE what you read in the words.  And to also PROVE to you that word of God is living and active and powerful and it actually works when applied correctly!!!  PRAISE THE LORD! You need to get trained and that word in you will get tested at some point in your life.

There are things within you, character traits that need to be developed, that will only happen when you are under pressure.  When things are not going well.

We may not like the pit, but we need it to be formed into the image of Christ.

4. Glean, glean and then glean some more.

Gleaning – extract (information) from various sources, collect gradually and bit by bit, gather (leftover grain or other produce) after a harvest.

The worse thing you can do when you are in these seasons is not to glean the lessons.  You are not in a pit for no reason.  And it is highly likely you are going to stay there for as long as it takes to glean the lessons you are supposed to learn in that place.   Joseph got out of prison when he was completely dead to himself.  He wasn’t concerned about being right or even defending himself, even though he did nothing wrong.  it took him awhile to get there but eventually he got it.

So what lesson have you gleaned while you’re in the pit?

By the way, if what you learnt sounds self centered, then you haven’t learnt anything.

This….I learnt never to trust a woman again.

vs

This….I’ve learnt how to truly forgive the people who hurt me.

Which one of these two statements sounds like someone read their bible and knows how to make the recipe?

How about this one…

I’ve learnt that you can’t trust just anyone one with your business dealings or they will throw you under the bus.

vs

I’ve learnt that I need to be completely honest in all my business dealings because your sin will find you out.

Spend some time reflecting on what you learnt in that place.  It is the perfect place for character development. Seeds grow in the dark, when they are covered up and buried and people just forgot about them.  Then they come bursting forth into a beautiful flower after they’ve gone through the process.

5. You learn not to Judge people so harshly

When David was in the cave it said that “men who were in trouble or in debt or who were just discontented” came to see him. I am convinced that you are a lot more graceful and kind to people when you’ve been through a similar situation.  When you meet people and you see them at their worst and you refuse to use that one season to judge them because you realize at one point that was you as well.

Remember when David, pretended he was insane to survive? (1 Samuel 21:10-15) Can you imagine if you knew nothing about him and saw him for the first time I that state?  What a mess!  Just imagine running into him while he’s living in the cave?  No running water!  Would you believe he could make it out of that?

Don’t use a season to judge someone.

Funny story, I remember one time I went to a party and there was this woman there that pointed to someone I know and said he looks very familiar to her.  She couldn’t get over the fact that she knew him so she skillfully snapped his photo and took it home to ask her family if they knew him.  They sure did! That was “Bugsy” who used to grab people’s gold chain and run so he could sell it to feed himself back in Jamaica.  He was purse and chain snatcher. He used to live down by the “stand pipe” in the ghetto where there was no running water so he would have to line up with his container to get water from a single standing pipe in the neighborhood to bathe.

Now he’s a registered nurse working for a large hospital and lives in a $700K house in the USA!!!  LOL. You betta put some respect on Bugsy’s name!  Don’t go judging him by his season on the streets!  He legally obtained his US citizenship, legally became a registered nurse, and legally bought his home.  Bugsy, doesn’t know that I know he is Bugsy, LOL.  That’s ok because he’s not Bugsy anymore, that season ENDED.

That was a season for him, it wasn’t a lifetime.

I know another person who owns a trucking company now that used to sleep in the cemetery on the graves at night for several months when he was a homeless teenager on the streets.  Now he has more homes than he knows what to do with!

Sometimes your season is a month, 3 months, 3 years.  Hey, sometimes it was your entire childhood!  That doesn’t mean you stay in that season forever.

What did God say?

6. Stop surrounding yourself with people who keep you in the pit.

Remember I told you that this post was inspired by people I met who were going through a difficult time?  Well, there were 3 homeless men and one had been on the streets for so long that you could tell he resigned himself to that being his life.  Then there was another young man, I believe mid twenties, who was on the streets because his father died and he couldn’t afford the rent anymore.  Well, the “veteran homeless man” was telling the younger guy that he would help him and teach him the ropes to live on the streets well.

I just thought in my mind,  dude you need to run from this guy!  You don’t want to hang out with a person that is going to encourage you to be a “successful homeless person”. No!  You need someone who is going to show you how to get out of this.  I believe the saying is, misery loves company.

You need to identify the people that have no intentions of getting out of the pit and try to avoid them.

Who you have around you during this season of life is important.  If you had any level of success prior to this moment, a lot of those people may abandon you.  You find out who your friends are during these times. Think about Job’s friends.

Then you have another group of people who constantly remind you of your past success.  You know the ones who go down memory lane with you “Remember when you used to be the President of …”  They lead you into your past, and they can never point you to your future. Those people.

They remind you of how good you used to be without telling you that you can actually get out of the place where you are now and be better.  They will lead you into a depressed state.  What is the point of reminiscing if you can’t get it back????  Unless you are using the past as a springboard to propel you into your future there is no point in being stuck in that loop in your mind.

Some people get stuck in the pit because they keep trying to get back the old thing, when the old thing isn’t coming back.  That is over.  All you can do now is move forward.

Job did not get back the same sheep and goat…or children for that matter.  No, he had to move forward with the new.  The new, is better, but you can never get the new if you are still holding on to the old.

You don’t even need to have the support physically present, it is the sermons you’re listening to, the blogs you choose to read, the podcasts you subscribe to, the YouTube videos you choose to watch, the church you attend.  You can surround yourself online with the people who motivate you to be better.

Check your circle of friends and ask yourself this question, is this person helping me out of this place or are they encouraging me to stay here??

Jonathan never said to David “remember when you were married to my sister? Remember when you slayed Goliath?  Remember when you use to live in the palace with my father?”  I mean, what would be the point of that???

This is what Jonathan said when his father was trying to kill David

1 Samuel 23:17-18a

¹⁷ “Don’t be afraid,” Jonathan reassured him. “My father will never find you! You are going to be the king of Israel, and I will be next to you, as my father, Saul, is well aware.” ¹⁸ So the two of them renewed their solemn pact before the Lord.

He reinforces and reminds him of where he is going when he’s at a low point in his life.  These are the people you need to have around you.  You don’t need the jealous people, or the envious people, or the ones who remind you of the bad things from your past or the ones who pull you into depression by reminding you how good you used to be…in the past.  No, you need the ones who help you focus on where you are going and they are willing to help you get there. By helping you financially, by praying for you, by encouraging you to be better, by reminding you of God’s promises.

7. The pit is the best place to strategize for your next move.

Most people miss this.  They believe they need to be out of that spot before they can actually make plans.  This is not true.  Plan your comeback from the pit!  You can start planning your business now.  It is while you are in this place that you begin to regroup, restrategize, learn from your past mistakes, gain new insight and resources you need to make your next move.  You have the internet, make your business plan, organize your budget,  get on Pinterest and make the boards with the things that you want in the future.  Plan to get out of the pit!  And keep the vision in front of your face.

Don’t waste pit, use it!  David launched many campaigns during this season of his life (1 Samuel 22-25).  He was not just sitting around and crying about his situation.  I am sure he had bad days, you can see that in the Psalms but it is clear through the Scriptures that he never stopped believing, seeking God, moving forward until the Lord brought him out. You can do the same.

8. Spiritual gifts will start to rise up in you.

When I was in this season of my life is when I started praying in tongues heavily.  I had spent a few years in this spot so I prayed every prayer that needed to be prayed in English. So what do you do when you don’t know what to pray?  You pray in tongues!

Little did I know the power of that, those demons don’t understand a word I was saying. Familiar spirits and monitoring spirits cannot monitor tongues so they were not able to stop anything.

Tongues brought wisdom and clarity like I had never known!  Strategies started coming to me!  I just knew things I had no way of knowing about how to fight and what to do to get out.  Tongues!  Because the enemy couldn’t hear the prayers I was praying, he couldn’t stop the manifestation of my blessings.

Every day I did it for at least 30 minutes to 1 hour.  And things began to move in a direction that I couldn’t do without speaking in tongues.

You can be saved and not speak in tongues, I did it for years. But I have to be honest and say that tongues took my spiritual growth to a whole other level.

The people who I had to disconnect from while I was going through this period of my life who later came back, knew that something was very different about me.  The only thing I was doing differently is praying in tongues.  I would say this was the game changer.

Then because I was alone I started having more encounters with the Lord.  He transitioned me into the supernatural at the end of this season.  I began getting caught up into the heavenlies everyday.

So guess what?  The pit did me good!  I grew spiritually while I was there and tapped into spiritual gifts I never had before while I was going through this.

The 4 administration of the Gift of Tongues

Praying in Tongues

 

9. An issue of the location

One of the main things I learnt through this is when you are not in the right location, you will have a problem.  Especially when you have a calling from God and the enemy is trying to stop you.

Listen!  I didn’t know how critical your location is until I went through this.  The Lord covered me for quite some time.  There was grace on the things that I was doing and it worked well.  But in the moment when the Lord wanted me to move from that location, the grace started to lift.  I had tarried there long enough. It was time to pull up the tent pegs and move!

What happened is things got progressively worse.  Until I moved and went into the location where I was supposed to be and then everything changed.

I didn’t realize that this is how your physical location can shut down your blessings and land you in a pit.

Now I make it a habit to ask the Lord, am I where I should be physically?  I need to know the answer to that.  You could tell me the biggest natural disaster is about to hit….guess what?  I’m not moving because I am where I am supposed to be at this very moment.  My life is blessed because I am where I am supposed to be.  Until that changes, I’m going to stay right where I am.

I loved the city where I was living before, loved the church I attended, loved my friends but I wasn’t supposed to be there.  It’s easy to leave a place you don’t love but what happens when you actually love it there?

So the Lord had to take His hand off me and allow the enemy to touch my life so that I could truly understand how horrible it is when God’s hand of protection is no longer on your life and when He starts drying up the brook and the ravens stop feeding you.  You start questioning everything.

Your physical location could be the reason why you’re in the pit.

God told Abraham, go to the land I will show you.

Did God tell Joseph exactly where that dream he had of being the leader would take place?  Perhaps he wouldn’t have any desire to move to Egypt. So he had to be sold to get there!!  Have you ever thought about that?

Sodom and Gomorrah ruined Lot’s life!

There’s no way the Israelites would be blessed in Egypt.  Egypt was for Joseph, not his brothers.  That means you can’t be watching another person to determine if that’s where you need to be.  Just because it worked for them doesn’t mean it’s going to work for you. What did God say?

Their journey through the wilderness was exactly that, a journey.  They were not to set up camp and stay there forever.  Same with you, stop making a home in the pit.  Time to get out.

If you sit in a location, in a church or under a ministry where you shouldn’t be that means you are missing out on valuable information and blessings that are only available to you in the place where you should be.  Stop wasting your time.  Find where God needs you to be and go there.

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I can distinctly remember when my season changed.  I could feel it in the spirit.  I remember I was coming back home from a road trip and I was in the car praising God and I suddenly knew that things had changed.  I was so overjoyed.  I was sure that I would go home and there would be a letter in the mail, well it wasn’t there.  I checked my emails, read everything.  It wasn’t there.  Went to my business post box, nothing was there.  Looked to see if I missed any calls or had voicemails I didn’t listen to, nothing was there.

I remember walking around the house all glittery like I just drank 12 cups of coffee because I was so SURE that something changed and I was looking to see where it was and what it was. It was like Christmas morning and I was getting ready to open a gift.  I was excited and it was the kind of excitement that I had not felt in 3 plus years. My SPIRIT knew that something had happened.

Well, nothing seemed to change…until about 3 months later.

Yes!  Your spirit man is going to know the change happened before you see it with your physical eyes.  You know in your knower that it is done!

You know what?  It changed the day when I felt it but that was in the realm of the spirit.  It hadn’t yet made it into this physical earth realm.  So my spirit man knew it but my natural eyes had yet to see the manifestation of it.

Believe me, if you can feel a thing in your spirit…it is done!  All you need to do is continue to stand in faith until you see it.  It is just a matter of time.

Remember in Daniel 10, when God sent an answer to Daniel’s prayers the answer never showed up for another 3 weeks.  But God had answered him the moment he prayed.  Daniel continued to pray and fast until the answer came.  He never gave up.  The Lord doesn’t want you to give up.

Do not lose hope.

Some of you are on the brink of breaking out of that season, but you need to remain in faith.  Do not doubt what the Lord has said.  As you continue to walk in faith, it will surely be seen with your natural eyes.  Some people have suddenly moments, like what happened for Joseph – pit to the palace overnight, but it didn’t happen like that for me.

My coming out was a gradual thing, I didn’t jump out of my cave and run around.  Nooooooo, it was like Puxsutawney Phil slowly crawling out of my cave to see if the “coast was clear”, is spring coming early or am I going to have to wait some more? Is the demon gone yet?  Or is this two steps forward and one step back like it has been for the past 3 years.  I moved out sloooooooowwwwwly.

via GIPHY

 

It wasn’t some big bang moment where my life changed overnight.  No, it was a slow movement out of the pit. I was afraid to even say that the season had ended because I wasn’t sure.  Sigh.  Have you been there?  But as I slowly exited the cave and looked around and God started to tell me to do things here and there and I realized the enemy was no longer coming to take it and that I didn’t have to battle anymore to keep it. That is when I realized it was over.  I started my gradual climb up. And then I kept going up and up and up and up and up…..

I look back at that period in time now and I say Thank the Lord!  Not for getting me out of it, that’s  good but the best part is what I learnt as a result of it.  Invaluable lessons that helped me to become who I am today.

My prayer for you is that if you’ve found yourself in a pit and you know that God has something better for you, 2024 will be the year when you made it out!!!  Praise the Lord!!

Declaration:  Holy God of Israel, lead me as You’ve let Your people out of Egypt.  I declare and decree that 2024 will be the year when I will step into the Sonshine and out of the darkness I have been in.  2024 will be my year of abundance, prosperity, lavish resources, open doors and promises fulfilled.  2024 will be the year when I draw closer to God.  2024 will be the year when I enter the right location and see God move to bring about changes in my life.  2024 will be the year when I remember the goodness of the Lord and I experience my own “from the pit to the palace” story, in Jesus name, Amen!

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Blessings