Seasons of Life - God Wants Your Attention!

 

God Wants Your Attention!

But by means of their suffering, he rescues those who suffer. For he gets their attention through adversity -Job 36:15

I'm sure you've heard some say 2014 is your year of jubilee, miracles or even double blessings! I too feel that 2014 is a special year. One of the things I've learned in my walk with Christ is, if you are a Christian with a call on your life, your breakthrough or next level appointing will come with a price. Many people entered 2014 receiving breakthroughs and blessings upon blessings. Many entered into a wilderness season scratching their heads like, "God what are you doing"? Some people as I write are entering a dry season or a season of spiritual warfare. You might even be experiencing all three. 

 

• Wilderness season is when you feel alone, lost and confused about what's going on in your life and you can't seem to move forward. 


• Dry season is when there seems to be no open doors, no breakthroughs, your prayers seem to bounce off the walls and everything is dried up. 


• Spiritual warfare is when the enemy attacks God's children or tries to take something away that was promised or spoken to you by God. It's a supernatural battle that takes place between God and principalities and spiritual wickedness in high places. Your role is to put on the Armor of God and stand firm until victory is won. 

I will be writing a series of posts sharing my personal experiences entering 2014 and what The Lord revealed to me. One evening (while in the middle of my season) during my time of prayer and reading the bible, I asked the Lord, "Why do I feel so alone"? As I continued reading - this passage of scripture lifted off of the pages for me to see:

I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, It remains alone. But its death will produce many new kernels - a plentiful harvest of new lives. 

-John 12:24

God explained to me exactly what was taking place in my life through this scripture. Every believer with a call on their life will enter a wilderness season, dry season and a time of spiritual warfare. It's a process you have to go through in order for your life to be powerful, fruitful and effective not just for yourself but for OTHERS. Your calling or purpose in life will benefit from this spiritual death. When all is said and done you will have developed humility, great character and unbelievable faith in God which will sustain you in whatever the Lord has called you to do. 

 

God got my attention: 

One morning in December 2013, I awoke with numbness in my left arm and tingling in my feet. I experienced this a couple of years prior and I knew what to do - so I thought. I inhaled a couple of Aleve pills and went on my merry way. After a couple of days, it didn't get any better. I gobbled a few more pills and decided to relax by getting a five-minute massage from the massage chair in my home. The balls in the chair were extremely hard and raced up and down my back kneading me in certain areas. It hurt like crazy but I didn't think anything of it because I've sat in that chair many times before.

A week later I still had numbness and tingling on my left side but now it was starting to affect my right side. From top to bottom, my back was starting to hurt. I whipped out a book I had purchased several years ago but never read called "The Makers Diet." I read the book from cover to cover in about a week. I really don't know why I pulled that book out but it blessed me tremendously. The author who is a Christian shared how he spent thousands of dollars searching for a cure for his chronic Krohns disease in addition to all kinds of infirmity in his body. He was sent home to die but his faith in God and the changing of his diet (God's diet) healed him completely. I was very inspired by his story and decided to change my eating habits and follow the plans in his book. There was a healing prayer that you would say in the morning and in the evening as you followed the plan. This led to me spending time with God in prayer. Prayer means everything to me but I had slacked in this area for a while.

Things were not getting better and I refused to go to the hospital. I was going to trust God to heal me through prayer. Hands and oil were slapped on me by my husband, children, parents, brother and sister n law, I even stood in the prayer line at church! There was no healing and no relief. My whole entire body was inflicted with pain and nerve issues. The pain was so excruciating I ended up in the emergency room. The doctors said it was a pulled muscle and sent me home to inhale all kinds of drugs. After that, I was in and out of the hospital. I researched my symptoms for my lower back pain and realized I was suffering from Sciatica. I visited a spine clinic for my upper back and neck because it was affecting the nerves in my arms, face and head. I was diagnosed with cervical sprain. All of this from a stinking massage chair that I've sat in several times? This was not normal. I began to wonder if something spiritual was going on here. The pain was so great that it literally drove me to my knees.

 

I began to cry out to God for healing. I began to spend quality time in God's word again. I was in God's face day and night praying. My kids were like, "Mommy are you going to pray again?" Yup! After a while, I realized I was right where the Father wanted me to be. God wanted my attention. As I cried out to God I asked, "What am I doing wrong? What do I need to change?" Immediately the Holy Spirit told me to give up a particular thing that I enjoyed. That same night, the thing I was told to give up was confirmed in a dream. Without hesitation, I gave it up. The bible says, "I have the right to do anything but not everything is beneficial" (Corinthians 6:12). God definitely wanted a sacrifice from me and wanted to know if I'd obey his command. Had I not been obedient to what God asked of me, it could have negatively affected what I was going to experience in the coming months. All I knew was God wanted my time and attention and He got it. I was so desperate for relief I told God whatever he wanted me to do, I'll do - thus the journey began.

Are you in a wilderness season or a dry season? Are you battling spiritual warfare? Have you tried everything you know to do and nothing seems to work? Give God your undivided attention! Seek his face and cry out to him. Ask him what is going on and if there is something he wants to speak to you about. Ask him if there is something he wants you to change. God will speak to you in that still small voice, through the bible and in many other unique ways. You just need to pay attention and listen. Once you know what God wants from you, act on it immediately. Delay is disobedience. The quicker you obey God's commands the quicker you will move through the season you're in.

 

The next post will be on Obedience.

Blessings,

Tytenisha