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Weariness
is an
enemy
to our
souls.
~
But
God
has
the
antidote!
~
Take
refuge
in the
Blood
of the
Lamb.
~
He
will
restore
your
weary
soul.
~
"Weary"
in the
Hebrew
literally
means
"to sever
oneself."
~
You
will
have to
take
refuge
in
His
Word,
and
let
God
speak
it to
you
as
rhema,
as
the
quickening
of God
to you
in that
moment -
'til
God's
glory
works
in
you
&
transforms
you!
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An apostle spoke this Word of the Lord to me on our way to the
airport, "Tell her, be not weary in well doing: for in due season you shall reap
if you faint not. Persevere; move forward in the knowledge of the Lord. Any time
He tells you to do something ~ that is a demand, an order ~ do it. That is a
counter-attack against weariness. Wait on the Lord and He will establish you, A
Great Love Ministries, and all that concerns you. Keep your heart pure and
encouraged."
Then he gave me Proverbs 4:23, "Keep thy heart with all diligence;
for out of it are the issues of life." When he gave me that prophetic word, I
wasn't really weary then. We know that prophecy confirms what God has
already spoken to an individual, and that prophecy releases ~ it will release
the things that God has already said ~ it will release you, and it will release
the people that need to be a part of that.
I have also known God to speak the most magnanimous, prophetic
words to people making them out to be a darling, when in fact they are a little
devil. They may be doing things that nobody knows about, and after this
tremendous prophecy comes, in a short time, what they are doing is exposed. God
released such a prophetic word in order to express to them, "This is the way I
see you ~ these are My plans and thoughts for you. This is what I want
for you, and from you, and this is what I expect." He gives them such an
uplifting prophecy to give them time to repent so that they will not have
to be exposed and have to bear the fruit of sin.
I have also seen prophecy given to prepare and strengthen you, for
God knows that down the road there is something that the enemy is going to put
in your path. He knows the beginning from the end. It is as a sign
pointing to that which is ahead so that you will be in the right position to
make the appropriate decisions. So God speaks prophecy as a sign to His people
as well to alert us, strengthen us, and prepare us for what is coming.
The word that the apostle gave to me concerning weariness was
preparing me. God does not want us caught off guard! He has given us the Holy
Ghost, and as we listen to Him much can be averted and overcome. My friends, I
began to study weariness. Have you ever been weary in well doing? Weary of
praying, of coming to church, weary of giving, and of being good, weary in
ministry and in practice? Know this: Weariness is an enemy to our souls ~ it is
a poison! The enemy wants us to succumb to weariness in order to cause us to
become incapacitated and unusable. Weariness is a subtle, yet very serious
device of the enemy.
Every one is tempted with weariness. Every one of us faces it! In
the Book of Daniel, describing the end times it speaks of the adversary
marshalling his demonic powers to wear down the saints. If we recognize and are
aware that this is a device of the enemy in this hour (as Paul cautions us not
to be ignorant of Satan's devices, but to have revelation, wisdom, and
knowledge) we will understand how to deal with those things so as not to be
hindered or overcome.
God has an antidote to weariness! So when the enemy comes and tries
to overcome us with weariness, God has not left us without an antidote that we
can counter-attack and defeat it.
We must be cognizant that we are spirit, soul and body. Weariness
attempts to gain a foothold through the soul-realm, (the mind and emotions) and
through the physical body. Soul and body are interrelated ~ that which affects
our soul is going to affect our bodies as well, and vice-versa.
We are all familiar with the weariness that arises from physical
fatigue, and can perhaps readily identify times when physical weariness affected
our souls. Last evening, as I was exhausted from travel, I began to wonder why I
was even in the ministry. This morning, refreshed, I began to thank God that I
was counted worthy to be in the ministry! The Lord quickened to me, "You are
spirit, soul and body. It is not enough to just build up your most holy faith
praying in the Holy Ghost, and reading the Word, you have to get physical rest
for that body!"
We may be less familiar with the insidious nature of weariness as
it relates to our soul-realm. The Bible has much to speak to us on this subject
of weariness. "Weary" in the Hebrew literally means "to sever oneself." The
enemy wants to orchestrate things in our lives to tempt us to ultimately become
severed from God, and open a door to weariness. Severing oneself from God
means we have stopped trusting in God. We are to have no other gods before Him,
and if we are not trusting in God, in what or in whom are we trusting and
elevating above God? This form of idolatry will lead to disappointment and loss.
In Genesis 27:46 Rebekah says to Isaac, "...I am weary of my life."
People get weary of the way their lives are going, weary of their jobs, their
marriages and the list goes on. What caused Rebekah to become weary? She
went on to say, "I am weary of my life because of the daughters of Heth. If
Jacob takes a wife of the daughters of Heth, such as these which are of the
daughters of the land, what good should my life do me?"
In the event that her son might marry one she disapproved of she
declares, "What good should my life do me?" She has subordinated her life
to the conditions existing in her son's life. Rebekah had wrapped up her
own sense of well-being in her son's well-being, putting trust for her life in
Jacob and not in God's will and plan. She also trusted more in her own ability
to orchestrate Jacob's well-being than God's. She herself had become
severed from God, not trusting first and foremost in Him.
She continues upon a course of manipulating the circumstances of
Jacob's life by taking things into her own hands that began with deceiving Isaac
in order to steal the blessing of the first born for Jacob to try to procure for
Jacob the future she desired for him. Jacob and his mother Rebekah ~ not the
devil ~ were responsible for him going into 20 years of bondage. They did that
through manipulation by trying to do what God wanted to do for him anyway and
had prophesied He would do in Jacob's life - but it was not God's time
yet, nor God's way.
As a result, Jacob had a hard life of 20 years of bondage and the
sad thing was that he had put himself there ~ not the devil. Many in the
Body of Christ are weary and in bondage, not because of the work of the devil ~
we can bind the devil but he won't go anywhere, nothing will change ~ because he
didn't put us there. The wonderful thing we can take heart in is found in
Genesis Chapter 32. When Jacob took one step to get out of bondage one billion
angels went to work to assist him out of bondage.
So if you've put yourself in bondage through weariness, and
subsequent decisions, if you will take one step towards God He will move or He
will send His angels, one billion angels if needs be to your assistance to get
you out of bondage and get you into the land of your inheritance. And you can
inherit and possess the perfect will of God!
How did this trouble begin? Rebekah became wearied because she was
worried about her son, Jacob, taking a wife from the daughters of Heth.
In that I perceived quickly that worry instead of trusting God about our
children, and to make decisions about their lives beyond what God would have us
to make for their lives (and these may be spiritual children as well) can make
us weary.
We are doing this to ourselves ~ it is not the devil! This
can be applied to other areas of our lives as well where we take on
responsibility that either is not ours, or we undertake in the wrong way.
When you get weary, you begin to fear and become alarmed. Alarm can
be God's alarm system warning you, but one can also become alarmed, "This isn't
going to work, why did I begin this," or, "They are not doing as they should do,
and the outcome is going to be bad." You become alarmed about your future,
"their" future, etc. and can miss hearing the answers and direction of God. Fear
is the opposite of faith, and God's wisdom is poured out to us and established
when we ask and doubt not, as James Chapter 1 so aptly outlines for us.
We must guard our souls. Weariness can overtake us through our soul
realm if we allow it. We can get wounded and carry a broken heart, or become
offended if we allow it. All strife, jealousy, insecurity, unforgiveness ~ all
of these flesh works that go on in the soul, in the mind and in the emotions
bring poison into ourselves and we weaken.
Part of guarding our souls requires that when things happen that
hurt or threaten us ~ we must be quick to avail ourselves of our Saviour ~ the
One Who heals the broken-hearted, sets the captive free, and makes us secure in
Him. We must seek God's help, and allow it to have full course, its "perfect
turn" before something adverse to God's abundant life flow for us has an
opportunity to become rooted in our soul-man, disrupting, delaying, or even
preventing the good God intends for us.
A very important area related to this is identified in Psalm 119:28
NIV, "My soul is weary with sorrow, strengthen me according to your Word, O
God." Sorrow wearies the soul! God did not create us to be sad, but to be
glad. We are not a sorrowful, mournful, grieving people, but a people full of
joy, gladness of heart, and peace of mind. When something brings sorrow into our
lives for a season, we do not sorrow as those that have no hope.
We must not allow grief to overtake our sorrow and become
inextricably entrenched throughout our entire being when something bad happens.
"Grief" in the Hebrew literally means "every evil work." This tells me
that if we allow grief to settle in, every evil work will ensue.
"Weary" also means "to loathe," "to have a disgust," and "to be
ashamed." It means "to feel displeasure." When we are weary we become
displeased. We become displeased in our lot in life, we crave change because we
are displeased with the way things are. How many have either themselves, or
their children, husbands, or wives, committed sin, and we have worried or
sorrowed over it, and felt responsible for it.
We cannot carry this responsibility - whether the devil is trying
to place a false sense of responsibility on us, or whether we bear a part or the
whole responsibility in contributing to whatever.
Take refuge in the Blood of the Lamb, let Him relieve you of that
burden, and cleanse and restore your soul! God will enable you to forget what is
behind and to press on in the Lord into the good future, the hope that He has in
store for you, and to believe this for others!
When I was burdened with a terrible sorrow, I had to fly out to
minister a few days hence. When you go to minister, the people don't need to
know of your troubles ~ they are bringing you in to hear God's solutions, His
answers. I looked like death warmed over the day I was to minister. I waited
upon the Lord as Isaiah 40:31 instructs us to do, and the next time I looked in
the mirror, the glory was upon me. I was transformed in His glory and was able
to go and fulfill His assignment for those people. I continued in that
season of time in particular in the Book of Psalms, soaking in the Word He
quickened to my soul and letting the glory work in me. If you are going to get
over sorrow, you will have to take refuge in His Word, and let God speak it to
you as rhema, as the quickening of God to you in that moment.
The opposite of sorrow is joy. I learned a valuable lesson many
years ago ministering in Sweden. When I would go, I would often be physically
tired and even weary in my soul from taking on other people's cares, and then I
would minister there from 8:30 - 12, and from 7 pm until whenever the service
ended for however many days were scheduled. Yet around their table between
meetings ~ we laughed constantly and good things about God went forth the whole
time. I never heard complaints about tiredness ~ but only laughter. I would come
home from Sweden even with all the intensity of ministering and yet was so
refreshed! I learned that joy is literally a key to our strength, body and soul.
God has exalted Jesus, His Name is above every name. We can use the
Name of Jesus to destroy the power of what we have named "weariness," for His
Name is greater! In Galatians 6:9 we see that where initially "weariness" is a
noun, a name that can present itself, yet it can become a verb if we don't get a
hold of it, meaning, we can allow it to become an action ~ acting forcibly upon
us. What begins in weariness through choices we make, and flesh becoming weary ~
can, if not dealt with, open a door to a demonic spirit to provoke weariness.
You cannot just use the Name of Jesus, however, to rebuke weariness, and then
continue what you are doing without repenting of that which has contributed to
the weariness to begin with. Repent means to change your mind, and to go in
another direction.
God is greater! God provides a way of escape. Weariness comes to
all of us at one time or another. We can learn to avert it before it takes a
hold of us, but if we do become weary and we don't know why or what to do, God
is faithful to bring revelation. As we recognize what is causing weariness and
are quick to apply the antidote of the Lord, we know God as Restorer of our
souls. Blessed be the Name of the Lord. We can confidently and thankfully say:
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pasture:
he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul:
he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil: for thou art with me;
thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies:
thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life:
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.
Psalm 23
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