A woman in the crowd had suffered twelve years with constant bleeding. She had suffered a great deal from many doctors and over the years she had spent everything she had to pay them, but she had gotten no better. In fact, she had gotten worse. She had heard about Jesus, so she came up behind him through the crowd and touched his robe. For she thought to herself, “If I can just touch his robe, I will be healed.” Immediately the bleeding stopped, and she could feel in her body that she had been healed of her terrible condition. Mark 5:25-20 NLT
Can you imagine hemorrhaging continuously for 12 years? Medical science had no answer, and the money to pay for expensive medication had run dry. She was suffering both physically and emotionally. Everything she had tried in her own efforts had failed and she was no better, but worse.
Have you ever tried everything you could do naturally and even spiritually, yet still hadn’t received your breakthrough? You are still sick? Still childless? Still sitting in a financial mess? You sit back and think, “What am I doing wrong?” I am a logical person and think that when I do “this” plus “this” it should equal “that”, right? But what do you do when “this” plus “this” doesn’t equal “that”?
The woman was sick for twelve years! She had spent all that she had, so not only was she sick, but she was broke. Have you ever had an attack that came upon everything in your life? An attack that not only steals your joy, but your peace too? It steals your financial stability, your family relationships, your identity, your marriage, your job, and possibly your relationship with God? Have you ever been in that kind of fight?
How do you tell yourself while in the middle of your fight that there is still hope things could change? How do you tell yourself that it’s not always going to be like this and today might be the day it will all change even when everything around you is telling you screaming at you otherwise? How do you continue when it just seems to be getting worse and God’s silence is to the point of crushing you? How do you continue when you come to the end of your rope, and like this woman, you just feel “spent”? Well, I am this woman…And I am “spent”…
A Journal entry from not long ago…
I can’t do this anymore. I have tried everything from IVF, Metformin, taking numerous vitamins, exercising seven days a week, reducing my carb intake, charting, timing, ovulation prediction kits, and using a $200 fertility monitor. I have done everything the doctors have told me to do (including Dr. Google) and nothing has worked. So, I have switched to doing everything I know to do spiritually. I have been praying, fasting, declaring, not speaking negative, expecting with hope, praying harder, and fasting some more, but I still haven’t received what you have promised me. I know all the verses and I have spoken them in faith, yet nothing has happened. Am I missing something? I have been obedient to your word and if you told me that I needed to stand on my head for five minutes every hour for the next 365 days I would do it. In fact, I would do it with my head buried in the ground. And do I need to mention that I am worse physically and emotionally today than when I started this journey? But You already know. The truth is, I am spent. And I quit. But I don’t quit hoping and believing in You and Your promises; I quit striving and I quit fighting this battle. I.am.exhausted.
It wasn’t long after writing the words “I quit fighting this battle,” God spoke to my heart and He said, “Good. Now will you let me do the fighting? Much of the breakthrough you are waiting for hasn’t come yet because you have too much faith in your ability rather than My ability.” Ouch! I realized in that moment that there are things only God can do, and every time I fight it, He has to stop fighting it. Every time I put my hands on my situation, every time I try to fix it, He has to take His hands off of it. It is not until I am completely done in my own striving, and in my own efforts (whether doing things in the natural or spiritual) that I can give it over fully to Him, so that in return, He can make something beautiful out of it.
I have realized two things. First, that there are certain doors man cannot open and only God can. Second, if I am not careful, the breakthrough I am trying to manufacture, in the time frame I am wanting it to happen, will leave me more of a mess physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
The women with the issue of blood came to the end of herself and realized the only way her situation could turn around was through Jesus. She had turned away from herself and her own efforts by allowing God to be her deliverer.
On that day in my journal entry, God was asking to be my deliverer. He wanted to fight for me. He wanted me to just stop and rest. He wanted me quiet; and He wanted me still. Does this mean I will stop praying? Stop seeking? Stop knocking? No. This means I will no longer be doing it in my strength, but in His strength and His power.
When we stop all of the frantic activity to try to fix our situations and rest, God is then able to come in and save us.
Exodus 14:14 says,“The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still.” As people, when God does not do what He needs to do in the time frame that we need Him to do it, we tell ourselves we are going to help Him. Our flesh screams, “Do something!” But God is saying, “Be still! Allow me to do the fighting!” Today, I am at rest in quietness and trust. Today, I wait for God, my deliverer, as He fights for me.
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