Blessed Transgressions

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Strength or Breakthrough: Which One Should You Pray For?

Christian Lifestyle· Overcoming Difficulty

Strength or Breakthrough: Which One Should You Pray ForOne of the unpleasant experiences of my life was when I had an emergency C-section for my second child.

That was rough!

I was just coming out of a season where I knew and saw God intervene on behalf of others and even myself! I knew God heard and answered prayer! So when I found myself in painful recovery after the emergency C-section, I prayed.

And prayed. And prayed. And eventually started crying. Because God was not answering me!

I was asking for healing and deliverance and relief.

And nothing.

I was still in unbelievable pain and couldn’t move.

Now if any of you are familiar with pregnancy, you will know that there is a constant need to “attend to yourself” for those first six weeks after delivery. And then there is a newborn baby to nurse, bathe, change, burp, put to sleep, and play with.

But there I was stuck on my bed. Yes! It was that bad! Like, we had a bathroom in our bedroom and I couldn’t get up to go use it!

So I prayed, but the deliverance I sought was not forthcoming.

I guess I should have discerned that God wanted me to pray for strength to make it through, and not immediate release! Of course, my knee jerk reaction had been to ask God to instantly get me out of it.

Is it easy to ask for strength?

When I found myself in another long-term difficult situation a while later, I finally started asking God for strength.

But a new warfare arose in my mind and spirit. I was so used to things not working out that I struggled to grab hold of a breakthrough. I mean, what if it was God’s will for me to stay in that condition?

Maybe the opposition and blockages I seemed to be perpetually facing were actually from God and not the Devil!?

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Being confident about what you pray for

Let’s recall what Scripture says in Romans 8:26-27:

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

It takes the Holy Spirit for you and I to know God’s will for us. And it takes the Holy Spirit to pray!

So we must be cultivating and nurturing a relationship with the Holy Spirit.

That’s the surest way to position ourselves to know what God wants, and to lean on His leading in prayer. The Holy Spirit is the One who will let you know if you should be saddling up with some strength, or if you’re to expect a breakthrough.

We must also have one other very important key in place, which is openness to whatever God’s will is! Our victory can’t be all about relief. We must be open to the lessons God’s trying to teach us as well.

Your Challenge

Next time you go through something hard, start praying for strength and to see what God is trying to teach you. The Christian journey is more about how we handle what comes our way than the destination ahead.

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Blessed are those whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered.

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