Pioneers, I know you have been in a darkroom season...
It's a season where not only does the enemy rage hard at you, but it's also a season where it feels like the lights are out.
Heaven seems quiet. Dreams are less. And you have no idea where you are going.
It was like you were paving a new path, then someone turned the lights off.
Now, you can’t see, and you don’t have any insight into where you are going or what God is saying.
This can easily be diagnosed as a failure season, but isn’t a darkroom where photographs go to be developed?
What is this darkroom is not a dead end but the beginning of a new chapter. A revealing?
But regardless, the darkroom can often multiply the state of woundedness of the pioneer.
Pioneers, one of the most critical parts of this process is the healing from witchcraft attacks.
The last three years have been a tough road for those breaking new ground because it’s become even more unpopular.
The religious have slimed you nonstop for being a supposed rebel and heretic.
The Sauls have slimed you for not putting on their armor and wearing their slogan.
The apostolic moguls have kicked you out for now, bowing down to their elitist agenda.
The eunuchs who do nothing have dragged your name through the mud because your yes exposed their disobedience.
The Athaliahs have come after you because you are pure-hearted and without guile.
Jezebel has been after you because you can’t be bought and don’t dance with culture.
The secret saboteurs close to you have created campaigns to discredit you and shut doors.
And well, let’s say it: some family and friends think you have lost your marbles, so they have thrown daggers and doubts at you the whole time. But… you kept pioneering anyway, mighty warrior! Wow, what a feat!
But, let’s be honest, it does take its toll, and right now, you are feeling like a boxer the day after a big fight. You didn’t feel it months ago, but today you do, and the Lord is now DE-SLIMING you and healing your wounds.
He is pouring His oil and wine over you and restoring you to total health.
He is breaking soul ties and strongholds you didn’t even know you had and setting you completely free so you are UNLATCHED, UN-HINGED, and UNLEASHED for tomorrow's assignment.
Recently I had a dream the Lord said, “I have to go back to launch you forward.” And right now, many are feeling the sudden influx of triggers, and past pain and PTSD come up out of nowhere.
“Didn’t I deal with that?” Many are saying. But this is a deeper clean to create a greater capacity inside you for the days ahead. There have been some subtly sabotaging mindsets that have been clinging to you from those memories, and you won’t be able to move ahead while still thinking in that way effectively.
“But why am I being triggered the way I am? It feels like everything is erupting inside of me?”Yes, it’s all coming to the surface right now because God is not only healing you of your wounds but also recalibrating your emotions, and mind and retraining you in how you see and respond to things around you.
A battle season will teach you to react in a not spirit-led way.
You swing your sword at anything that comes near.
You rush to put out every fire you see.
You have been cursed and betrayed by so many people that you begin to see everyone as the enemy.
Your heart gets burnt so often that you hide it behind many layers of self-protection.
Essentially, you live in a constant state of fight or flight.
The fight-or-flight response refers to the physiological reaction that occurs in the presence of something mentally or physically terrifying.
You have lived in that place long enough, even for decades, and the Lord is healing you from the triggers of the past and the ways they cause you to react now.
It’s survival mode at its finest, and that MUST BREAK BEFORE YOU CROSS OVER!
Many pioneers have been at this threshold for too long.
It’s the place of tension between the new day and the night of the soul.
You have been stuck at 3 am feeling broken and battered and knowing morning is coming but inside of how to get there.
Many have been like Jacob wrestling the angel, and now daybreak has finally come.
But your hip is out.
You are walking with a limp, and while your name is changed and your new day before you, you need to heal before you can even make a step.
To end this word, I want to share an encounter with Jesus last week that I believe the Lord gave me for the pioneers.
I went into a vision of standing in a furnace with Jesus, but it wasn’t hot or scary. It felt like the safest place to be. Then I asked him why I was in there. He looked at me, smiled, and replied to my question, “You and many are in the refiner's fire because you have asked for more than most.”
“What have I asked for?” I asked, needing to know specifics.
“All of me and none of the world.”
Then I broke down. I could feel the fire hitting my heart and soul. I could feel it breaking down the trauma and weariness of being in the battle for so many years without seeing an end.
I could feel it tearing down constructs I had built in the wilderness of the last three years, where I believed it was on me.
I could feel the fire hitting the fear and anxiety that had started to build up, causing me to hold back instead of stepping into new frontiers.
I could feel the toll of the nomadic years beginning to kindle like a slow burn, but one I didn’t realise needed to go.
I could suddenly feel the blows I had taken from principalities but just ignored them.
I could feel the fire burning away of words - at first, and it was a few, then it streamed in like a dirty river of curses and judgements.
As this happened, I began to say, “My life has been a long battle, and I need rest!” then something happened I didn’t expect.
Then, very simply and smothered in so much freedom, He said to me,
“What makes you think this life is your own?”
Then he started to laugh again hysterically, and I came out of the encounter.
I feel I had this for many of us who are pioneering and have done so for some time. This is a message on the Lord's heart for us and showing us why we are in this process.
We are in the fire with Jesus.
The good kind.
The freeing kind.
The kind of fire where wounds are healed, hearts are reconnected, and the road gets cleared ahead while you linger there.
