How much can a person learn, change and endure in one year? It’s amazing what we, as humans can endure. 2016 was a year of learning, transition, and stepping into the new. Little did we know how much we would have to learn and dig into, in order to live effectively and wisely with what had been brought our way. Learning to manage life in a whole new way is not an easy thing to do.

Have you ever made a decision and you started moving towards that and nothing happens the way you thought it would? That was 2016 for us. We felt like we heard God speak and were supposed to move in a certain direction. The typical response when one hears God, hopefully, is to move forward with what was spoken. We did, and it turned out to be completely different. Then the questions started and we began to doubt what we thought we heard. Did we actually hear God? Were we not obedient in doing what we thought we were supposed to do? Why isn’t anything happening?

As we have stepped into 2017, a brand new year that none of us have ever experienced, we have since seen what one of my pastors, Kris Vallotton declared recently:

“Sometimes you have to participate in what you think is the end so you can see it’s not the end”.

This was our experience. We saw what we thought we were supposed to do, but in the end of this process, when nothing actually happened the way we thought it was going to, it brought us back to an original vision that had somehow gotten lost with all the activity and change around us. We learned a lot, changed a lot, and we made many mistakes along the way. It actually wasn’t the end of it, but what it did was brought our perspective back into alignment with our heart and our feet back on course. God was there every step of the way.

The Senior Pastor where I attend church, Eric Johnson once put it this way:

“God is not interested in giving us just what we need, but He desires to give us beyond what we need and give us abundance”.

When we are longing for a breakthrough and it feels like everything is chaotic and falling apart around us, then that should tell us that we ARE breaking through. Breakthrough is not just a ‘bam’ and it’s done. It’s actually a continual pushing forward and digging deeper. I’m sure you’ve heard it said, ‘when you’re going through hell, don’t stop’. Contending for the breakthrough does not mean we just sit and wait for it to come to us. It also doesn’t mean that God is teasing us with breakthrough saying ‘how badly do you want this breakthrough’?

How a person contends will be different for each one of us, but the point is that you are continually moving towards it and through it. Contending can look like fasting and prayer, daily renewing your mind with the Word. It could also be setting something aside that might be keeping you from hearing or seeing the heart of God on your matter. Maybe it’s spending more time in His presence, perhaps it could even be speaking declarations everyday. It’s going to look different for all of us. The whole point is you are breaking through; breakthrough is moving through the unseen barrier of our paradigms and fears, which hold us captive to our current place in God. Breakthrough also requires us to sacrifice something or allow something to die that we are holding on to, in order to step into the opportunity God has for us to embrace the new.

Breaking through is not easy and it won’t be by your works, it will be because you have learned to trust in His faithfulness and with each foot forward laying down those things you don’t need. Every step you take will be another step closer to the new place He is leading us toward.

Sometimes we think breakthrough means reconfiguring our circumstances, but more accurately stated; our breaking through is so we can see Him face to face in the middle of our circumstances. Remember what He has spoken to each one of us through the promises or prophetic words that we’ve received so that our eyes remain fixed on Him. Our hearts will begin to expand and increase for a greater capacity to trust. In this place, He is able to express Himself in and through us according to the dream He has made us to be…all in the process of moving towards our breakthrough.

So I would encourage you to look at your breakthrough a little differently than you used to. Look at it as an opportunity to let the old die and the new to grow and expand in the Kingdom of God: transformation. It’s not just about getting breakthrough, it’s also about growing in Him, knowing Him and hearing His heartbeat. Those around you will be able to glean from your breakthrough and it will encourage them to contend for their own. He is longing to show each one of us His faithfulness again and again!

Breaking Through…

Veronica