He’s Coming, Be Ready

Gwendolyn had once tapped into God’s spiritual realm of creativity and wonder, but she refused to bring her faith in line with it. She loved God but didn’t understand her destiny. She never considered the reality that God pours His blessings into us and we are obligated to present them back to Him, so that He can then fill us up with even more. It is a blessed cycle of giving that He has anointed for those who belong to His Kingdom. Our individual agendas are not part of this equation, because our plans are almost always about our individual needs or wants. We’re constantly thinking of the ‘ME’ and not the ‘WE’. The need to get her name out there and to obtain a huge venue for artistic expression was constantly on Gwendolyn’s mind. It’s almost all she ever thought about. After the friends and resources that she lost, and after her many attempts failed to make this dream a reality, she put her faith on hold and her relationship with God suffered. Her dreams shifted from beautiful visions to those of death and destruction. She didn’t question this much at first, but then her life took an unexpected turn and she could not have prepared for it. God has a plan for our talents, skills, and abilities. Whenever you and I begin to make moves in our lives without the knowledge of what God has planned for us, we are opening ourselves up to being tossed about. We can become carried away in ideas and agendas that are not grounded in God’s purpose. This causes us to regress rather than progress, and this isn’t what the Lord desires. Our Heavenly Father wants us to wake up and recognize that He is our Great Big Wonderful Heavenly Father, and the plans He has for us are exponentially higher and infinitely better than any plans we can make for ourselves. Yes, God gives us dreams and visions. He said in Acts 2:17(NKJV), “‘And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, that I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams.” We are living in the last days and He causes us to dream dreams and have visions. Many of them are fantastical, vibrant, and beautiful, but we must always remember that they are for His Plan and Purpose, and they must never be taken outside the context of His Will.

Often the times or seasons shift but we don’t shift with them. A new season could be upon us, but we are fixated on what happened in seasons long gone. We’re looking for a repeat when a repeat isn’t possible. We remember the seasons when life was so much more friendly towards us. It just seemed to open its doors of opportunities. The atmosphere felt ripe with fruitfulness, as if the next new blessing was literally within our grasp. We had a brand of hopefulness that was succulent with all the possibilities we wanted for ourselves. It was all so yummy, and it primed our taste buds with delight. It was so delightful that we keep trying to get back and reopen that same door, not recognizing that it is permanently closed. God blessed us tremendously, and He has been extremely patient with us. In past seasons, He allowed us to indulge ourselves. For most, it was an indulgence in things of the flesh, and not of the Spirit, but we didn’t see it for what it was. Gwendolyn is an incredibly creative person. She is a dreamer, but like many of us, she didn’t value the things of the Spirit as high as she should have; therefore, she didn’t prioritize them according to God’s standard. Because of this, she was stuck but didn’t realize it. She was trying to hold on to seasons of the past. As the systems of the world continue to break down and their corruption and wickedness is exposed, people will be forced to be less reliant on those systems. Therefore, they will be forced to be less reliant on the flesh and more reliant on the Spirit. If our faith isn’t where it needs to be, many will find the road ahead incredibly perilous. It will be fraught with challenges and obstacles of which most will lack the spiritual preparation and strength to handle.