Let Patience Have Its Perfect Work!

James 1:2-8

Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 5 If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. 6 But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. 7 That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. 8 Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do.

In the past few months since I finished college, the Lord has placed me on an extremely interesting journey. This has not been a time that many people experience when they are fresh out of college. I haven't had the luxury to relax, kick back, get an amazing job, and life with experiencing the fruit of what I have worked so hard for over the past four years, and in many cases my life. This season has been a season full of trials, challenges, pressure, and experiences to build faith in me. Honestly, I have hated this experience, from my employment, to my personal life. There were times that I wondered if I would ever accomplish all that I believed for years the Lord place in my heart. I have gone through times of sadness, and even battles with the spirit of depression. My place caught on fire, I felt as if I had holes in my pockets, feelings of being lonely, frustration concerning my job, and I just recently totaled my car, these are just some things that I have experienced in the past 3 months. All the time wondering, what was happening to me and in my life. I also wondered if I was experiencing a repercussion of something I did. All through the midst of this season I have felt the Lord closer to me than ever. I mean really, you know how the Bibles says, Enoch walked with God, there have been times where I have felt like the creator was my roommate, no lie. He has spoken to me concerning his plans on the earth, ignited a greater burden and passion for ministry with in me, given me more understanding of how to minister, taken me into a deeper place as it relates to prayer, increased my anointing, filled me with an amazing measure of faith and joy, and brought me closer to Himself. Through all my terrible experiences around me, the Lord has truly comforted me and birthed in me the type of faith that was delivered to the saints in the early church that we read about in Acts. 

However, the question is posed of why. Why am I a going through all this? One day I was on the phone with my mother, franticly asking her to explain to me what was happening and she responded "life." Her statement to me caused me to reconsider how I was handling this season. A minister that has been dear to my family, Brenda Tatum, preached a message years ago about "Growing" through the process. That message has stuck with me and it helped me to shape a different perspective concerning my personal situation. Last week, when my car hydroplaned off the turnpike, was probably the icing on the cake for me. With all the situations that rose up from that accident, the Holy Spirit kept whispering in my ear a portion of the James 1 passage, "The testing of your faith produces patience. Let patience have its perfect work."  I mean all week long, He kept whispering this verse to me. To answer the question of why all the crazy experiences have been happening to me is found right here in this passage. These experiences have been sent by God to allow my faith to be strong producing and strengthening my patience in God and his seasons, allowing patience to bring forth the fullness of what God sent the trial to produce. My trials have been divinely assigned to me to crush me bringing out more of God and His anointing. Please hear me, I am not in any way trying to pump myself up, but I am just sharing with you that the intense hell I have encountered in the past few months have increased my faith so that I walk more in God's glory to conquer hell. The more the devil has attacked me, the more God has demonstrated His supernatural power in me. It seems a little strange but it is true. God used hell to push my spirit higher to experience heaven. An experience of pressure brings out what God has put deep within. My decision has been to let patience have its perfect work. 

 James wrote this chapter with a very interesting approach on suffering. The funny point of the text is that he says to consider it a joy when we are going through trials. The irony of this is because joy is associated with good experiences. How can we have joy when we are in bad times? The way we do this is but trusting in the Lord and His faithfulness over our life. A few notes back, the Lord had me to write about the revelation of praying the Word of God. The Bible tells us in Isaiah that the Lord’s word shall not return to him void, but it accomplishes what He sent it to do. His word over our lives cannot return to him without it being accomplished. So we when we go through trials, we have an outlet to rejoice because the trail is the very proof that the word over your life is coming to pass. All the trial is doing is positioning you for the manifestation of God’s word. Then it says that going through trails brings about a testing of our faith and that brings about perseverance. Life is not easy, and accomplishing the will of God is even harder (because you have to fight hell to do it). God uses the trail to build faith and that brings about the ability to stand. Standing in the midst of storms is a decision. We decide to stand, same as we made a decision to be saved. When you make up your mind to “grow through” it must be a finished decision, you mustn’t doubt. Doubting is grounds to not experience the fullness of the word of God manifesting in your life. If we say we are believers in Christ that is it! Through the storm, believe that God has a word over you and rejoice because the word is coming to past. Falling out of faith, limits the word from coming forth. The Bible says, if we doubt when we request of God that we are double minded and that makes us unstable in every aspect of our lives. Believe God or don’t believe, it is impossible to go back and forth. Be filled with faith through the process.

This note is a little different for me because my notes are normally written concerning various revelations the Lord has deposited in my spirit, but this note is to encourage. My desire is to encourage you to stand in the midst of your adversity. The enemy would love to confuse you to think that God is mad at you, or you are off in some way or another, but hear me, God has positioned you in this season to bring more of himself out of you. As you read this note, the word of the Lord to you is to stand and let it have its perfect work in you. I am reminded of how it is when we take medication. Sometimes the doctor informs us to rest and let the medication do what it needs to do. Or when we are put under an anesthetic for medicinal purposes, the person that administers the drug always says, "Just relax." As I write this note I feel the anointing for a person provided an anesthetic with a message from God saying, "Just Relax" and let the will of God for your life do what it needs to do in your life. Grow through this process and let the Glory of the Lord be revealed.

Prayer Assignments

Apart of our personal prayer life, the Lord does give us different assignments concerning prayer needs on the earth. A prayer assignment is whenever you have a strong desire to pray for a particular place, need, person, or situation. Sometimes people have prayer assignments for a short season, a day, a few years or even a lifetime. In any case, God gives us prayer assignments because we have the anointing and faith to get the job done in prayer. Prayer assignments are all through out scripture, from Elijah, Nehemiah, Ezra, Daniel, Anna, Paul and Silas to the saints that prayed for Peter out of prison, all these examples had a particular burden through prayer and the Lord gave them the influence to meet the need either spiritually or physically. Many times God will place a burden on our heart for a situation and it is our responsibility to pray what God reveals to us concerning that unction. The Holy Spirit is the only one who gives prayer assignments and our responsibility is to stay yielded to receive from the Lord what we are to pray.

In the previous module we discussed praying the will of God and waiting to receive what the Lord wants us to pray. Whenever you pray, inquire of the Lord what he wants you to pray and the pray accordingly. Many times the Holy Spirit has already placed our prayer assignment in our heart. That thing that bothers you about your nation, job, friend, church, community, or family member is probably the thing that the Lord has placed upon you as a prayer assignment. Many times, we express our heart in the wrong ways and we end up hurting and hindering that which we are called to pray for. There are so many Christians that see issues in the church and instead of praying for it they began to gossip and talk about what they see and cause more of a problem. Imagine, if every believer would start talking less and praying more how our world would be. When inquiring of the Lord what to pray, the best thing to do is to pray what’s on your heart. If you stay true to your heart, you will never go off. Many times what is on your heart is your prayer assignment. In prayer we are able to affect change in places that we may never have a chance to physically visit or see naturally. Your prayer assignment may be some far off country and you may never have the opportunity to go and work in missions to help but you can go there in the Spirit. There is no distance in prayer.

                  Sometimes your prayer assignment would cause you to physically make a difference. We see this with Nehemiah chapters 1 and 2. Nehemiah was so distraught to hear that the walls of his city were tore down that he prayed to God and the king granted him favor allowing him to go to his nation and start an initiative to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. The burden that he had for his country led him to be the revolutionist that launched a movement in Jerusalem. Your prayer assignment can sometimes be associated with your life purpose. The main things is to stay true to where God has called you. Again, if you follow your heart, you will never be off. Follow what the Lord has already place inside of you and your prayer life will full of victorious stories of God’s miracles power.