Never Give Up!

​When You Reach the End, God Is Just Beginning...

As we approach Resurrection Sunday, are you going through a battle that is testing everything you believe? Then I want to let you know, when you think you’re ready to give up—God steps in. We can become battle weary, feel like our strength is failing, and be tempted to throw in the towel, but not God. He is the beginning and the end, Alpha and Omega, so He will never give up. When we come to an end, He’s just getting started. He is constantly, eternally, at work in us.
 
Can You Perceive Your New Beginning?
The challenge we often face is seeing His new beginning and flowing with it. Around this time last year, the Lord began to overflow me with inspiration. I had spent almost three months in South Texas recovering from a persistent bout with my inner ear. After much prayer and preparation, my husband and I felt it would be best for me to be at sea level in moderate weather for winter. He would commute back-and-forth as his schedule allowed. Things moved quickly and seamlessly with my temporary relocation. And throughout the process, though it challenged our minds, we both had a witness of the Spirit and a peace we couldn’t explain.
 
I didn’t realize it right away as words flowed from my heart onto paper, but I would afterwards. God was resetting my foundations. When we arrived the first week of January, I was tired—from battling illness; losing the ability to do things I had easily done in the past; and losing my ability to earn an income. I loved God but was affected by the prolonged physical, mental, and emotional suffering I had endured over the past four plus years. I felt like I was losing my purpose, my independence, and who I had always been. In short, I was coming to the end of myself. But God was just beginning. He was giving me a new start.
 
Are You Ready to Rise Up and Step Out?
By the first part of February, I was recouping well, and the Lord began stirring my heart. After having been in maintenance mode for so long, He reignited the pilot light of hope and purpose in me. I started seeking Him earnestly and rewriting my personal vision and mission. My spirit was on fire. I knew it was time to activate. It was time to rise out of my affliction and do what the Lord had been showing me to do. By mid-month, I wrote a faith declaration:

• I am walking in my healing.
• I am walking in restoration.
• I am bringing others with me…Amen!

 
That same day, I received and wrote my first blog in four months. The day after, the Lord prompted me to forgive those who had offended me. Then He started revealing practical things to reestablish my personal disciplines and my work for Him. The more I sought the Lord and did what He led me to do, the more He revealed.
 
What does God want you to activate in this season or situation? I encourage you to respond in faith and DO what He leads you to do. Follow Him without hesitation. You are at the dawn of a new day.
 
Exposing the Root of Your Struggle
About a week later, God went to the root and supernaturally confirmed the core issue. Through years of struggling and feeling like I was losing ground in every area of my life—I had lost my joy. While reading a devotion, I learned the Hebrew root word for “Gospel” is “basar,” which means cheerful or joyful.1 The author described it as “always new, always fresh,” filling the one who receives it with life. God quickened my spirit.
 
Then I remembered hearing a powerful message a week or so before about the Hebraic month of Adar (the Hebrew word for strength), which generally takes place mid-February through mid-March. The pastor called Adar “the month of joy,” because the joy of the Lord is our strength (Nehemiah 8:10).2 The Lord opened my eyes. I had been living without joy far too long. I felt a burden lift and a burst of creative energy. Before my quiet time was over, the Lord gave me the title of one of the books I would write.
 
Four days later, in the wee hours of the morning, He awakened me and started pouring into me. He spoke in my heart about past works I had done, as well as works I would write in the future, covering every detail. It was mind boggling. Divine inspiration kept flowing for the next six weeks, all the way up to and through Resurrection Sunday and the eight days of Passover. The final book concept and outline poured out of me in about an hour on Good Friday, which was also the first day of Passover.
 
For years and months prior to this, I hadn’t been able to look at my computer screen or phone for longer than five to ten minutes at a time. My eyes were overly sensitive to light, which caused a reaction in my ear. Now, moving carefully and deliberately, I was writing extensive notes in my journal and posting blogs on my web site. My heart was bursting with joy and thankfulness.
 
My friend, it is my prayer that if a core issue in your heart has kept you from receiving and activating God’s best, He would reveal it to you today. Be open as He leads you. Let go of the baggage of the past and step into the new.
 
God’s Timing Is Perfect
God’s timing amazes me. He culminated my three-month hiatus during the month of joy and strength with a wellspring of His presence, healing, deliverance, and revelation. He resurrected my hope and gave me a new beginning during the same period He delivered the Jewish people out of Egypt, and centuries later, when Jesus died and rose again. And now, I’m writing to you a year later, on the dawn of Good Friday and just before Passover…how wonderful and mighty He is! 
 
When the time came for me to leave my South Texas home, I was almost sad to go. But I left there much stronger. I also left with a renewed confidence in the Lord and the strength of His promises. You see, when God is doing a new thing, it’s not always easy to perceive it. But when He gives you an inner witness—like a stream bubbling to the surface in the wilderness—you can rest in Him, knowing you’re going in the right direction.
 
What battle are you in right now? I encourage you to never give up on the Lord. No matter what things look like, what you’ve been through, or how long you’ve been through it—He can lead you into a new beginning. Trust God right where you are. Ask Him to renew your strength, vision, or whatever is lacking. Nothing can replace the inestimable value of spending time with the Lord. It is from His presence that your healing, deliverance—and the direction you may desperately need—will flow. If you’re coming to an end, I encourage you to go to God. Resurrection Sunday is right around the corner. It’s time for a new beginning.
 
 
“Behold, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs forth; do you not perceive and know it and will you not give heed to it? I will even make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”
                                                                                                                     Isaiah 43:19 (AMP)

 
1 Cahn, Jonathan. The Book of Mysteries / Day 132, “The Bisorah.” Charisma Media/Charisma House Book Group, www.charismahouse.com. Copyright © 2016. All rights reserved.
2 Heidler, Robert. “Entering into JOY in the Month of Adar,” February 11, 2018, 9:30 a.m. Glory of Zion International. All rights reserved.

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© 2019 Paula R. Bryant • All rights reserved